774 replies to this topic

[shadowhawk]

Link: If the DNA code is intelligent why do we see both humans and other animals that are born with horrible birth deformities (often these are so severe that a child is stillborn or dies shortly after birth), or genetic illnesses such as muscular dystrophy and hemophilia.

Human beings are intelligent and yet none of them are perfect or make perfect things. Therefore even nature does not rule out Intelligent Design. We have an example of it in our very selves. There are all kinds of evil but this does not disprove God. Christianity explains evil in its own way but that is not the issue here.

Link: Surely an intelligent system would recognise these as damaging genes and repair them or replace them with functioning ones, but it does not.

You assume you know the mind of an Intelligent Being and can judge it. That would make you greater than.... God can act by even letting evil happen if it meets His purpose in Christianity. It is called the permissive will of God.. I have seen good come even from sickness. Would you deny this? You are making all kinds of theological and philosophical statements with no scientific basis. Christianity has its own theological reasons, with the, "fall," Etc, but that is beyond the topic,

Link: Of course genetic inheritance is explained and studied very well and we know that genes traits are assigned randomly from both parents and we are often able to predict the probability of a child being born with a particular illness, depending on whether one or both parents is a carrier or sufferer and whether a particular trait is dominant or recessive. All because we know that genes are assigned randomly.

True assigned randomness is not predictable nor random. Prove it is random. This issue we have delt with before.

Edited by shadowhawk, 27 January 2012 - 01:58 AM.

[shadowhawk]

Great Stanford lecture, Scientific evidence for Existence of God..

http://www.youtube.c...d&v=FetjUAvXFk8

Edited by shadowhawk, 27 January 2012 - 02:28 AM.

[churchill]

@shadowhawk.
Not sure if you have covered this one already but what is your view on why the human body seems to have been designed poorly in some respects. Two examples come to mind.
1) The appendix which seems to be redundant but can cause a fatality in human.
2) Birth which is a very strenous procedure and use to cause many female fatalities until the advent of modern medicine.

Great question. It is a broader issue then bad design in nature. This is just a subdivision of the larger Problem of Evil Why do things not work? What is physical evil such as the example you brought up and spiritual evil.

Atheists complain about "bad" designs in biology and everything else. It has to be God’s fault. God is even responsible for the great evil atheists have done in history. http://www.hawaii.ed...kills/NOTE1.HTM
http://www.str.org/s...Article&id=5527 You ought to see how they blame theists for their own evil

The implication in biology is that a divine designer could not do such a poor job. Let's look at some famous examples of "bad design" and see what the latest published literature says about that design. I am going to give you a source to avoid writing a book.
http://www.godandsci...igngonebad.html
This is about the larger Problem of Evil.
http://www.barnesand...nXBFa30M-_-10:1

http://www.barnesand...n=9780743296229

http://www.arn.org/

Thanks for the info.

Do you believe that god is perfect, and does not make mistakes then?

Do you believe in heaven and hell?

Do you believe that all you need to do is accept Jesus and you get to heaven?

What specific Bible version do you follow?

What happens to an aborted fetus, does it go to heaven or hell?

Do you believe in magical dragons?

(This question presumes that you believe the earth is very young, not sure if this is your belief or not).
What is your answer as to why carbon dating gives such a long life span for the earth?
Does it not trouble you that many of the things that were previously ascribed to god or gods has turned out to have nothing to do with gods, e.g. weather, crops failing war etc.
Why are you so sure that your god is the one true god and not Zeus?

If there is a heaven and hell then do you think it is fair that there will be some people who never come into contact with Christianity and thus are doomed to go to hell?

[platypus]

It's obvious that the mammal body is designed by a blind watchmaker, i.e. evolution. Even a dumb conscious designer could easily improve the design.

[platypus]

Great Stanford lecture, Scientific evidence for Existence of God..

http://www.youtube.c...d&v=FetjUAvXFk8

Peer-reviewed references please. Science trumps propaganda!

[Link]

Link: If the DNA code is intelligent why do we see both humans and other animals that are born with horrible birth deformities (often these are so severe that a child is stillborn or dies shortly after birth), or genetic illnesses such as muscular dystrophy and hemophilia.

Human beings are intelligent and yet none of them are perfect or make perfect things. Therefore even nature does not rule out Intelligent Design. We have an example of it in our very selves. There are all kinds of evil but this does not disprove God. Christianity explains evil in its own way but that is not the issue here.

This is not an issue of evil.

If it was an issue of evil i would be asking "Why would a benevolent God allow this to happen". This is an issue about design, and critical flaws in a design that would be obvious to an intelligent designer. The question is more like "Why would a seemingly intelligent designer put such terrible flaws in a design"

There is a huge difference between designing something that is less than perfect, and designing something that is a complete failure. For example:

Cystic fibrosis is the most common, fatal genetic disease, affecting about 30,000 people in the United States, according to the National Human Genome Research Institute. Cystic fibrosis causes the body to produce thick, sticky mucus that clogs the lungs, leads to infection and affects the pancreas. Breathing is difficult, and digestive enzymes are blocked, which inhibit the absorption of food nutrients.

Any "intelligence" whatever it may be that is smart enough to design the insanely complex system of life on Earth from it's own mind is surely capable of fixing one gene in an organism that is going to kill it slowly and painfully.

Link: Surely an intelligent system would recognise these as damaging genes and repair them or replace them with functioning ones, but it does not.

You assume you know the mind of an Intelligent Being and can judge it. That would make you greater than.... God can act by even letting evil happen if it meets His purpose in Christianity. It is called the permissive will of God.. I have seen good come even from sickness. Would you deny this? You are making all kinds of theological and philosophical statements with no scientific basis. Christianity has its own theological reasons, with the, "fall," Etc, but that is beyond the topic,

So your argument is that no-one can know the mind of God and that God has his own reasons for doing the things he does.

And then you say that i am "making all kinds of theological and philosophical statements with no scientific basis."

Seriously do you not see the blatant hypocrisy of that statement?

Link: Of course genetic inheritance is explained and studied very well and we know that genes traits are assigned randomly from both parents and we are often able to predict the probability of a child being born with a particular illness, depending on whether one or both parents is a carrier or sufferer and whether a particular trait is dominant or recessive. All because we know that genes are assigned randomly.

True assigned randomness is not predictable nor random. Prove it is random. This issue we have delt with before.

The work was first started by Gregor Mendel and is called Mendelian Inheritance. I'd be very surprised if you haven't heard of it (I'm pretty sure i learned about it in eighth or ninth grade).

This is a Wikipedia article that summarises it:

http://en.wikipedia....ian_inheritance

These are the important parts.

Law of Segregation (The "First Law")

The Law of Segregation states that every individual possesses a pair of alleles (assuming diploidy) for any particular trait and that each parent passes a randomly selected copy (allele) of only one of these to its offspring. The offspring then receives its own pair of alleles for that trait. Whichever of the two alleles in the offspring is dominant determines how the offspring expresses that trait (e.g. the color of a plant, the color of an animal's fur, the color of a person's eyes).

Law of Independent Assortment (The "Second Law")

The Law of Independent Assortment, also known as "Inheritance Law" states that separate genes for separate traits are passed independently of one another from parents to offspring.


I will provide you with an example.


Say two parents are carriers of the gene for huntington's disease. Both parents have a pair of alleles represented as Hh. H represents the dominant "normal" gene and h represents the recessive defective huntingtons disease gene.

They each pass on a single allele to their child which will the form their child's pair. The alleles are assigned at random (we know this from the original experiments performed by Mendel and numerous experiments and laboratory observations that back it up).

Because the alleles are assigned at random we cannot accurately predict the outcome of the childs genetic pair but because we know the limited number of possibilities we can predict the PROBABILITY of each genetic pair occuring. There are only four possible gene combinations the child could inherit.

H from his father and H from his mother = Completely normal

H from his father and h from his mother = Carrier of huntigtons gene but unaffected as has the dominant normal gene

h from his father and H from his mother = Same as above

h from his father and h from his mother = Sufferer of huntigtons disease


So therefore we know that there is a 25% chance the child will be normal. A 50% chance the child will be a carrier, and a 25% chance the child will be a sufferer of huntingtons disease.


That is how you predict the probability of a random event, by knowing all the possible outcomes. Grade school shit.

[shadowhawk]

Don't have enough time to deal with your Massive right now. Here is an excellent video on topic.

[shadowhawk]

Great Stanford lecture, Scientific evidence for Existence of God..

http://www.youtube.c...d&v=FetjUAvXFk8

Peer-reviewed references please. Science trumps propaganda!

To ask for peer review of this video at Stanford University is nonsense. You are a one trick moneky who produces no peer reviews of your own. Here is a peer reviewed of a similar topic.

http://intelligentde...T14_26_19-08_00

Again, Here is Dr Michael Strauss followed by a summary of the video and information on Who Dr Strauss is.



Summary of video:

What does science tell us about God?
- the discoveries of Copernicus made humans less significant in the universe
- the discoveries of Darwin should that humans are an accident
- but this all pre-modern science
- what do the latest findings of science say about God?

Evidence #1: the origin of the universe
- the steady state model supports atheism, but was disproved by the latest discoveries
- the oscillating model supports atheism, but was disproved by the latest discoveries
- the big bang model supports theism, and it is supported by multiple recent discoveries
- the quantum gravity model supports atheism, but it pure theory and has never been tested or confirmed by experiment and observation

Evidence #2: the fine-tuning of physical constants for life
- there are over 100 examples of constants that must be selected within a narrow range in order for the universe to support the minimal requirements for life
- example: mass density
- example: strong nuclear force (what he studies)
- example: carbon formation

Evidence #3: the fine-tuning of our planet for habitability
- the type of galaxy and our location in it
- our solar system and our star
- our planet
- our moon

About Dr. Michael Strauss :

“I had an interest in science and theology, so in 1977 I chose to go to Biola University where I could study both subjects in detail. I thoroughly enjoyed college and participated in intramural sports, was elected to student government, served as a resident assistant, competed in forensics, and studied a lot. As I neared college graduation my dual interest continued so I applied to seminary and to graduate school. After graduating summa cum laude from Biola, I decided to pursue a graduate degree in physics at UCLA.

During my first few years of graduate school, I developed an increased interest in quantum mechanics and subatomic physics and decided to do research in a field that dealt with these subjects. I joined a High Energy Physics experimental group doing research at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and moved to the San Francisco Bay Area to actively participate in research at SLAC. I graduated in 1988 with my Ph.D in High Energy Physics (a.k.a. Elementary Particle Physics). If you would like to know more about High Energy Physics, the Particle Data Group at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory has a very nice interactive adventure that teaches you all about the subject. My research advisor was professor Charles Buchanan and my disertation was titled “A Study of Lambda Polarization and Phi Spin Alignment in Electron-Positron Annihilation at 29 GeV as a Probe of Color Field Behavior.”

After graduation, I accepted a post-doctoral research position with the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. I continued to do research at SLAC where I joined the SLD experiment. My research interests centered on the SLD silicon pixel vertex detector. I wrote most of the offline software for this device, and did physics analysis which used the vertex detector, including tagging b quark events for flavor specific QCD (Quantum Chromodynamics) analysis. In the seven years I was employed by UMASS, I only spent 3 days on the Amherst campus. The rest of the time was spent in California.

[...]In August 1995, I accepted a job as an Assistant Professor of Physics at the University of Oklahoma (OU) in Norman, Oklahoma. The University of Oklahoma has a vibrant high energy physics research group involved in experiments at the Fermi National Accelerator Center (Fermilab), and CERN. I joined the DØ experiment at Fermilab where I continue to do research in elementary particle physics. As a member of the DØ collaboration I have made contributions to the testing of silicon sensors for the upgraded vertex detector, to the track finding algorithms, to a measurement of the photon production cross section which probes the gluon content of protons, and to other QCD measurements. I am currently studying properties of B mesons that contain a b-quark, the production cross section of jets coming from quarks and gluons, and other QCD analyses. At CERN, I am a collaborator on the ATLAS detector.

I received tenure in 2001 and was promoted to the rank of Professor in the summer of 2010. Most of the time at OU I have taught introductory physics classes to physics majors, engineers, and life science majors. In these classes I have used a number of interactive techniques to facilitate student participation and learning. I have been privileged to win a few awards for my teaching. In 1999, the Associated Students selected me as the Outstanding Professor in the College of Arts and Science, and in 2000 I was awarded the BP AMOCO Foundation Good Teaching Award. In 2002, I was given the Regents Award for Superior Teaching. I received the Carlisle Mabrey and Lurine Mabrey Presidential Professorship in 2006 which is given to “faculty members who excel in all their professional activities and who relate those activities to the students they teach and mentor.”“

[churchill]

The expression is a one trick pony, not a one trick monkey. Monkeys are more adept than ponies and thus they would have more tricks up there sleeve, if you are going to insult someone at least get your terminology right:)

[platypus]

Shadowhawk is a quack peddling pseudoscience.

[hooter]

The fine-tuning of constants of any kind is an absolutely ludicrous argument. There are infinitely many universes, billions of galaxies, billions of stars and an innumerable amount of celestial bodies. Just because the one we happen to be on happens to function proves nothing except that we exist. This is all completely tautological. If they weren't fine tuned, we wouldn't be here to complain about it. Earth would be an empty planet like mars or venus.

Please don't try and claim god as science, that's abysmally infantile. Now that I see you've been insulting people the entire thread, let me clarify this to you. You don't seem interested in evidence just convincing other people of this rubbish. I suggest you listen to to the bible:

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

-Matthew 6:6

Edited by hooter, 31 January 2012 - 05:02 PM.

[shadowhawk]

These questions are off topic. Next time ask me my personel views somewhere else. Thanks

Churchill, Do you believe that god is perfect, and does not make mistakes then?

Yes

Churchill , Do you believe in heaven and hell?

yes

Churchill , Do you believe that all you need to do is accept Jesus and you get to heaven?

Depends. More complicated than a yes or no.

Churchill ,What specific Bible version do you follow?

Specific, Hebrew, Greek, Old and New Testaments . I like most of the translations.

Churchill What happens to an aborted fetus, does it go to heaven or hell?

I believe they go to heaven.

Churchill Do you believe in magical dragons?

You mean like the Purple Spaghetti Monster? No.

Churchill (This question presumes that you believe the earth is very young, not sure if this is your belief or not).

Wrong presumption. Does gravity slow down time?

Churchill What is your answer as to why carbon dating gives such a long life span for the earth?

Wrong method to be used to figure out the age of the earth. It wouldn’t give a long life span.

Churchill Does it not trouble you that many of the things that were previously ascribed to god or gods has turned out to have nothing to do with gods, e.g. weather, crops failing war etc.

How do you know these things have nothing to do with God? Answer, I am not bothered, why should I be? You must know something I don’t.

Churchill Why are you so sure that your god is the one true god and not Zeus?

Why do you feel your view is right? In the end Faith, just like you.

Churchill If there is a heaven and hell then do you think it is fair that there will be some people who never come into contact with Christianity and thus are doomed to go to hell?

How do you know who goes to heaven or hell? How ever it is done, it will be fair. Are you the one who decides what is fair? I will take my chances with God.

[shadowhawk]

The expression is a one trick pony, not a one trick monkey. Monkeys are more adept than ponies and thus they would have more tricks up there sleeve, if you are going to insult someone at least get your terminology right:)

Hmmm Thanks for the biology lesson. What would a one trick monkey be like I was thinking of a monkey, not a pony. Are you sure there isn't a one trick monkey? I guess I should have known that!

[shadowhawk]

I have read these posts carefully and it strikes me you do not understand intelligent design. You seem to be arguing from the position that those who hold to intelligent design do not agree with evolution and in fact many do. You do not need to repeat elementary evolution theory as though this is all that is at issue. Not all ID theorists are theists and there are many views of where intelligence comes from. You are repeating basic evolutionist views which most ID theorists would not care about. I don’t either.

http://dennisdjones....ry-explained-2/

Definition of Intelligent Design

What is intelligent design?
“Intelligent design refers to a scientific research program as well as a community of scientists, philosophers and other scholars who seek evidence of design in nature. The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection. Through the study and analysis of a system's components, a design theorist is able to determine whether various natural structures are the product of chance, natural law, intelligent design, or some combination thereof. Such research is conducted by observing the types of information produced when intelligent agents act. Scientists then seek to find objects which have those same types of informational properties which we commonly know come from intelligence. Intelligent design has applied these scientific methods to detect design in irreducibly complex biological structures, the complex and specified information content in DNA, the life-sustaining physical architecture of the universe, and the geologically rapid origin of biological diversity in the fossil record during the Cambrian explosion approximately 530 million years ago.

See New World Encyclopedia entry on intelligent design

In a broader sense, Intelligent Design is simply the science of design detection D— how to recognize patterns arranged by an intelligent cause for a purpose. Design detection is used in a number of scientific fields, including anthropology, forensic sciences that seek to explain the cause of events such as a death or fire, cryptanalysis and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). An inference that certain biological information may be the product of an intelligent cause can be tested or evaluated in the same manner as scientists daily test for design in other sciences.

ID is controversial because of the implications of its evidence, rather than the significant weight of its evidence. ID proponents believe science should be conducted objectively, without regard to the implications of its findings. This is particularly necessary in origins science because of its historical (and thus very subjective) nature, and because it is a science that unavoidably impacts religion and Atheism..

Positive evidence of design in living systems consists of the semantic, meaningful or functional nature of biological information, the lack of any known law that can explain the sequence of symbols that carry the “messages,” and statistical and experimental evidence that tends to rule out chance as a plausible explanation. Other evidence challenges the adequacy of natural or material causes to explain both the origin and diversity of life.”

DEFINITION OF ID ON THE NET.

http://www.intellige...rg/whatisid.php
http://www.uncommond...com/id-defined/
http://www.evolution...s_de036251.html
http://www.discovery.org/v/1971
http://www.evolution...tion028051.html
http://dennisdjones....ry-explained-2/
http://conservapedia...elligent_design
http://biologos.org/blog/defining-id

http://www.discovery.org/a/4299
http://www.caseyluskin.com/id.htm
http://www.intellige...ID religion.htm

[hooter]

What you wrote and what you quoted is directly contradictory and giving me a migraine. Natural selection isn't a good explanation, but you agree with evolution? What? I'm getting an aneurysm here, someone blindfold me I can't compute this wh wwh ffrfrr *smoke rises from head*

[hooter]

If god = perfect and incapable of mistakes, explain the following:

My response is that when Creationists talk about God creating every individual species as a separate act, they always instance hummingbirds, or orchids, sunflowers and beautiful things. But I tend to think instead of a parasitic worm that is boring through the eye of a boy sitting on the bank of a river in West Africa, [a worm] that's going to make him blind. And [I ask them], 'Are you telling me that the God you believe in, who you also say is an all-merciful God, who cares for each one of us individually, are you saying that God created this worm that can live in no other way than in an innocent child's eyeball? Because that doesn't seem to me to coincide with a God who's full of mercy'

-Sir David Frederick Attenborough

Edited by hooter, 31 January 2012 - 11:43 PM.

[churchill]

Thanks for the responses.
Can you give a more indepth response into the criteria for getting into heaven then if it is more than just accepting jesus.
---
Quote

Churchill What happens to an aborted fetus, does it go to heaven or hell?
I believe they go to heaven.
---
Do you also believe that abortion should be illegal?

[Link]

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1328050149' post='498808']
I have read these posts carefully and it strikes me you do not understand intelligent design. You seem to be arguing from the position that those who hold to intelligent design do not agree with evolution and in fact many do. You do not need to repeat elementary evolution theory as though this is all that is at issue. Not all ID theorists are theists and there are many views of where intelligence comes from. You are repeating basic evolutionist views which most ID theorists would not care about. I don’t either.[/quote]

Right... and that's why when people try to address weaknesses in intelligent design with logic, you use defenses like:

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1328050149' post='498808']
You assume you know the mind of an Intelligent Being and can judge it. That would make you greater than.... God can act by even letting evil happen if it meets His purpose in Christianity. It is called the permissive will of God.. I have seen good come even from sickness. Would you deny this? You are making all kinds of theological and philosophical statements with no scientific basis. Christianity has its own theological reasons, with the, "fall," Etc, but that is beyond the topic,[/quote]

And then go on to say:

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1328050149' post='498808']
Through the study and analysis of a system's components, a design theorist is able to determine whether various natural structures are the product of chance, natural law, intelligent design, or some combination thereof. Such research is conducted by observing the types of information produced when intelligent agents act. Scientists then seek to find objects which have those same types of informational properties which we commonly know come from intelligence....

In a broader sense, Intelligent Design is simply the science of design detection D— how to recognize patterns arranged by an intelligent cause for a purpose.[/quote]

You are the king of contradiction.


So, if you are happy to stick with your latest definition of intelligent design then my last post (which you have conveniently elected to ignore) is entirely relevant.

[quote name='Link' timestamp='1327663172' post='498105']

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327628472' post='498042']
[quote] Link: If the DNA code is intelligent why do we see both humans and other animals that are born with horrible birth deformities (often these are so severe that a child is stillborn or dies shortly after birth), or genetic illnesses such as muscular dystrophy and hemophilia. [/quote]

Human beings are intelligent and yet none of them are perfect or make perfect things. Therefore even nature does not rule out Intelligent Design. We have an example of it in our very selves. There are all kinds of evil but this does not disprove God. Christianity explains evil in its own way but that is not the issue here.[/quote]

This is not an issue of evil.

If it was an issue of evil i would be asking "Why would a benevolent God allow this to happen". This is an issue about design, and critical flaws in a design that would be obvious to an intelligent designer. The question is more like "Why would a seemingly intelligent designer put such terrible flaws in a design"

There is a huge difference between designing something that is less than perfect, and designing something that is a complete failure. For example:

Cystic fibrosis is the most common, fatal genetic disease, affecting about 30,000 people in the United States, according to the National Human Genome Research Institute. Cystic fibrosis causes the body to produce thick, sticky mucus that clogs the lungs, leads to infection and affects the pancreas. Breathing is difficult, and digestive enzymes are blocked, which inhibit the absorption of food nutrients.

Any "intelligence" whatever it may be that is smart enough to design the insanely complex system of life on Earth from it's own mind is surely capable of fixing one gene in an organism that is going to kill it slowly and painfully.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327628472' post='498042']
[quote] Link: Surely an intelligent system would recognise these as damaging genes and repair them or replace them with functioning ones, but it does not.[/quote]

You assume you know the mind of an Intelligent Being and can judge it. That would make you greater than.... God can act by even letting evil happen if it meets His purpose in Christianity. It is called the permissive will of God.. I have seen good come even from sickness. Would you deny this? You are making all kinds of theological and philosophical statements with no scientific basis. Christianity has its own theological reasons, with the, "fall," Etc, but that is beyond the topic,[/quote]

So your argument is that no-one can know the mind of God and that God has his own reasons for doing the things he does.

And then you say that i am "making all kinds of theological and philosophical statements with no scientific basis."

Seriously do you not see the blatant hypocrisy of that statement?

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327628472' post='498042']
[quote] Link: Of course genetic inheritance is explained and studied very well and we know that genes traits are assigned randomly from both parents and we are often able to predict the probability of a child being born with a particular illness, depending on whether one or both parents is a carrier or sufferer and whether a particular trait is dominant or recessive. All because we know that genes are assigned randomly.[/quote]

True assigned randomness is not predictable nor random. Prove it is random. This issue we have delt with before.
[/quote]

The work was first started by Gregor Mendel and is called Mendelian Inheritance. I'd be very surprised if you haven't heard of it (I'm pretty sure i learned about it in eighth or ninth grade).

This is a Wikipedia article that summarises it:

http://en.wikipedia....ian_inheritance

These are the important parts.

Law of Segregation (The "First Law")

The Law of Segregation states that every individual possesses a pair of alleles (assuming diploidy) for any particular trait and that each parent passes a randomly selected copy (allele) of only one of these to its offspring. The offspring then receives its own pair of alleles for that trait. Whichever of the two alleles in the offspring is dominant determines how the offspring expresses that trait (e.g. the color of a plant, the color of an animal's fur, the color of a person's eyes).

Law of Independent Assortment (The "Second Law")

The Law of Independent Assortment, also known as "Inheritance Law" states that separate genes for separate traits are passed independently of one another from parents to offspring.


I will provide you with an example.


Say two parents are carriers of the gene for huntington's disease. Both parents have a pair of alleles represented as Hh. H represents the dominant "normal" gene and h represents the recessive defective huntingtons disease gene.

They each pass on a single allele to their child which will the form their child's pair. The alleles are assigned at random (we know this from the original experiments performed by Mendel and numerous experiments and laboratory observations that back it up).

Because the alleles are assigned at random we cannot accurately predict the outcome of the childs genetic pair but because we know the limited number of possibilities we can predict the PROBABILITY of each genetic pair occuring. There are only four possible gene combinations the child could inherit.

H from his father and H from his mother = Completely normal

H from his father and h from his mother = Carrier of huntigtons gene but unaffected as has the dominant normal gene

h from his father and H from his mother = Same as above

h from his father and h from his mother = Sufferer of huntigtons disease


So therefore we know that there is a 25% chance the child will be normal. A 50% chance the child will be a carrier, and a 25% chance the child will be a sufferer of huntingtons disease.


That is how you predict the probability of a random event, by knowing all the possible outcomes. Grade school shit.
[/quote]



Before i finish i'd like to address some points made in your earlier post and reiterate some points made by hooter.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327630734' post='498044']
Evidence #1: the origin of the universe
- the steady state model supports atheism, but was disproved by the latest discoveries
- the oscillating model supports atheism, but was disproved by the latest discoveries
- the big bang model supports theism, and it is supported by multiple recent discoveries
- the quantum gravity model supports atheism, but it pure theory and has never been tested or confirmed by experiment and observation[/quote]

None of these models either support or weigh against the existence of a God.

Perhaps if you believe that they do, then you should elaborate on how you believe they do, or are you merely repeating it because you heard a scientist say something that you agree with, without giving it any independent thought?

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327630734' post='498044']
Evidence #2: the fine-tuning of physical constants for life
- there are over 100 examples of constants that must be selected within a narrow range in order for the universe to support the minimal requirements for life
- example: mass density
- example: strong nuclear force (what he studies)
- example: carbon formation[/quote]

The fact that life in this universe requires the physical constants of this universe to survive points neither toward the existence of a God nor an intelligent designer, it's just common sense. Of course life is going to exist within the physical boundaries of the universe in which it exists, and if there were a universe in which life could not exist then there would be no one there to observe it. So the argument is moot.

No one really knows how many universes there are, perhaps we never will, perhaps there are an infinite number, perhaps this is the only one.

But is it not possible that there are different universes with different physical laws which forbid life as we know it, but allow life to exist in other forms which could not exist in our universe?

Or perhaps we are simply the lucky universe which worked and there are billions before us which have failed. The bottom line is, you don't know how rare or unlikely universes like ours are so you cannot assume it is the hand of the divine.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327630734' post='498044']
Evidence #3: the fine-tuning of our planet for habitability
- the type of galaxy and our location in it
- our solar system and our star
- our planet
- our moon[/quote]

Our planet is one of hundreds of billions in this galaxy. There are billions of galaxies in this universe. So is it not logical that if a planet like ours can exist then given the sheer number of stars and planets in the universe that one like it will?

Besides, the planet is not "fine tuned for habitability" it just is what it is. The reason that the life on our planet is so well adapted to live on it is because those individual organisms best suited to exist in their environments are the ones that survive and go on to reproduce. Natural selection produces organisms finely tuned to their environment, without the need for environments to be finely tuned by an intelligent designer.

[shadowhawk]

hooter
What you wrote and what you quoted is directly contradictory and giving me a migraine. Natural selection isn't a good explanation, but you agree with evolution? What? I'm getting an aneurysm here, someone blindfold me I can't compute this wh wwh ffrfrr *smoke rises from head*

What is contradictory? I have already answered these issues below. Following Number 5 is a series of posts regarding evidence of random mutations. This is where the design issue is. I won’t repeat myself here.

THE ARGUMENTS I PRESENTED FOR INTELLIGENT DESIGN
1. http://www.longecity...post__p__491476
2. http://www.longecity...post__p__491932
3. http://www.longecity...post__p__492066
4. http://www.longecity...post__p__492250
5. http://www.longecity...post__p__492433
6. http://www.longecity...post__p__496211

DEFINITION OF INTELLIGENT DESIGN
http://www.longecity...post__p__498808

Maybe you need to see a doctor for your many ills?

hooter:
If god = perfect and incapable of mistakes, explain the following:

Quote
My response is that when Creationists talk about God creating every individual species as a separate act, they always instance hummingbirds, or orchids, sunflowers and beautiful things. But I tend to think instead of a parasitic worm that is boring through the eye of a boy sitting on the bank of a river in West Africa, [a worm] that's going to make him blind. And [I ask them], 'Are you telling me that the God you believe in, who you also say is an all-merciful God, who cares for each one of us individually, are you saying that God created this worm that can live in no other way than in an innocent child's eyeball? Because that doesn't seem to me to coincide with a God who's full of mercy'
-Sir David Frederick Attenborough

This is the problem of natural Evil. Intelligent Design does not say what the source of ID is. See the definition of ID above. Both the parasite and boy could be designed in ID. This is not an argument against ID.

Science will not solve this problem either. It is a theological and Philosophical issue as is the statement you presented by Attenborough above. Do you think this invalidates ID and the possibility of God? If not this is off topic. Try, “What is God Like.”

Christians attribute this form of evil to the fall. I have posted on this subject several times in this topic.

[shadowhawk]

Again and again, Link does not understand ID which has been my repeated complaint. He has spent much time creating another massive straw man posts which misrepresent both ID and my take on it. That is the reason I finally had to define ID and source it. He now argues I changed the definition of ID when it contridicts his strawman. Nonsense..

In the modal I presented, ID was evidenced by a self correcting code in the DNA. We argued the issue of how codes are created and why intelligence is required to create codes. My real, detailed arguments for ID are found in previous posts

Here again is my argument for ID.

THE ARGUMENTS I PRESENTED FOR INTELLIGENT DESIGN

1. http://www.longecity...post__p__491476
2. http://www.longecity...post__p__491932
3. http://www.longecity...post__p__492066
4. http://www.longecity...post__p__492250
5. http://www.longecity...post__p__492433
6. http://www.longecity...post__p__496211

DEFINITION OF INTELLIGENT DESIGN
http://www.longecity...post__p__498808

[shadowhawk]

Thanks for the responses.
Can you give a more indepth response into the criteria for getting into heaven then if it is more than just accepting jesus.
---
Quote

Churchill What happens to an aborted fetus, does it go to heaven or hell?
I believe they go to heaven.
---
Do you also believe that abortion should be illegal?

Again, this is off topic. Without resorting to faith, religion or philosophy, when does a human become human? Lets define what is human life. There must be an abortion topic to cary on a discussion like this. As for Jesus, I will answer you in the "What Is God Like" topic..

You also have a number of questions in post #182 you have not answered. It goes two ways you know?

Edited by shadowhawk, 02 February 2012 - 12:06 AM.

[Link]

This is my impersonation of a shadowhawk rebuttal.

Rarrrgh! Straw MAN! LOGical Fallacies Rarrgh! Wiliiam Lane Craig Video! AD HOMINEM ATTACKS!!!!!! YOu don't understand ID!!!! BOLD TEXT!!!!!!


I already addressed your five posts summarising your argument for ID in an earlier post. Here is a quick overview of your replies to that post.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
Nothing here that I have argued. Where? You love to set up the straw man fallacy don’t you. It neither proves or disproves ID. Lots of debate going on and many views beside ID. ID has different views as well. Are you ignorant of this? http://www.discovery.org/[/quote]

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
I didn’t say mutations are always harmful. They usually are. Show me the science backing this up. We have already had a long discussion on the topic in this thread. Perhaps you should read it. Again, another straw man. Must feel good![/quote]

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
So do you think this disproves Intelligent Design? How? I was pointing to Intelligent Design, not God. Possibly God?[/quote]

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
Not at all. You just have misunderstood ID[/quote]

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
Since the very beginnings of history Jews and later Christians have had various views of Genesis. For example the word ‘Yom” is Hebrew for both day and age. There are many places in the Bible where it is used for a period of time. The first days in Genesis one, came before there even was a sun, so we are not talking about 24 hours. Then there is the issue of point of view and such issues as relativity. How does this affect time? Again I have posted on this earlier. I think you have shot yourself in the foot with ignorance. You treat these issues like a Sunday School child.[/quote]

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
What baloney! The problem you have is your ignorant view of Theism. I suggest you get more exposure to what faith is all about. Being a Christian does not mean we have to believe your ignorant, dumb view of our faith.
[/quote]


Here was my response post, to which you then chose not to respond.

[quote name='Link' timestamp='1327549106' post='497876']
[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
Nothing here that I have argued. Where? You love to set up the straw man fallacy don’t you. It neither proves or disproves ID. Lots of debate going on and many views beside ID. ID has different views as well. Are you ignorant of this? http://www.discovery.org/[/quote]

That is what was in the video that you posted.

This is what i was talking about. If you are going to be so lazy as to simply post videos of other people talking then i assume that those are your own opinions as well. If you don't agree with what is in the videos you are posting don't post them.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
I didn’t say mutations are always harmful. They usually are. Show me the science backing this up. We have already had a long discussion on the topic in this thread. Perhaps you should read it. Again, another straw man. Must feel good![/quote]

Whatever. Here are your own words from that post:

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
What is meant by "random variation"?

Thousands of biology books say it's accidental copying errors in DNA. Cause ‘random variation.”
They say, essentially, that it's corrupted data that occasionally turns out to be beneficial instead of harmful.

Nowhere is corrupted data helpful instead of harmful." It's ALWAYS harmful. Always. Copying errors and data transmission errors never help the signal. They only hurt it.

....

Technically, this is because random mutation is noise and noise *always* destroys a signal. Claude Shannon called it information entropy. Entropy is not reversible. Noise never improves a signal. It only mucks it up.[/quote]


[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
So do you think this disproves Intelligent Design? How? I was pointing to Intelligent Design, not God. Possibly God?[/quote]

Again, i don't have to disprove intelligent design, that is your burden, to prove it. I was simply showing that what you stated is not proof of intelligent design, even the guy you were quoting doesn't think it is.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
Not at all. You just have misunderstood ID[/quote]

Ok.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
Since the very beginnings of history Jews and later Christians have had various views of Genesis. For example the word ‘Yom” is Hebrew for both day and age. There are many places in the Bible where it is used for a period of time. The first days in Genesis one, came before there even was a sun, so we are not talking about 24 hours. Then there is the issue of point of view and such issues as relativity. How does this affect time? Again I have posted on this earlier. I think you have shot yourself in the foot with ignorance. You treat these issues like a Sunday School child.[/quote]

Perhaps Yahweh in his great wisdom could have maybe clarified this then so there was no confusion.

[quote name='shadowhawk' timestamp='1327545236' post='497868']
What baloney! The problem you have is your ignorant view of Theism. I suggest you get more exposure to what faith is all about. Being a Christian does not mean we have to believe your ignorant, dumb view of our faith.
[/quote]

You can "believe" whatever the hell you want. I honestly couldn't care less.
[/quote]


Anytime anyone presents a logical challenge to an argument you have presented you dissolve in to a babble of nonsensical dribble. Some of your responses don't even use coherent sentences, let alone an intelligent argument.

Your strategy seems to be that since you can't actually articulate a response to someones post (or find a youtube video or cut and paste something from another website to do it for you) then you can simply accuse the person of not understanding the issue and sit back and feel smug. This is why i have to keep re-posting what i have said.

How can you accuse me of building a straw man argument when i am simply directly quoting what you have said, and then responding to it logically? i haven't tried to twist your words or misquote you i have simply presented an argument which you have done everything you can to avoid dealing with directly. You are, as you would say "a one trick monkey".

Edited by Link, 02 February 2012 - 12:34 AM.

[shadowhawk]

http://www.longecity...post__p__492252

"And it's also not because the "random mutation" model works. It actually doesn't. I challenge anyone to show me a link, book or source which says, "Here is the actual experiment that proves random mutations drive evolution." So much for science.

The random mutation theory, sadly, is an urban legend. "

Give me scientific proof sources. You might want to read the debates earlier before you enter the discussion. Don't repeat. Don't give me a bunch of grade school crap as though you have proved something against Intelligent Design. This is the heart of the issue..

Remember that Theism is comfortable with a number of positions including evolution as I have posted earlier.

[shadowhawk]

Huge massive posts which are not on target and are not worth writing a book over. No one is interested in a pissing contest. Not me. Lets focus on the real issue of Intelligent Design or random mutations as the source of DNA code. That has always been the heart of it for me as far as biology and ID is concerned. I do not think the issue is settled yet. It is not decisive against Theism one way or the other..

Edited by shadowhawk, 02 February 2012 - 01:24 AM.

[hooter]

Truly half of your posts don't even make lexical sense, I feel like I am reading a lorem ipsum generator. Anyhow, thank you shadowhawk for supplying the world with further public evidence that religion is a mental disorder and makes people aggressive and resort to personal attacks.

Edited by hooter, 02 February 2012 - 11:59 AM.

[churchill]

@shadowhawk
What is your goal in this thread? If it is to become more enlightened you are failing, if it is to convince others of the validity of your own opinions then you are failing. So what is your goal?

[hooter]

@shadowhawk
What is your goal in this thread? If it is to become more enlightened you are failing, if it is to convince others of the validity of your own opinions then you are failing. So what is your goal?

It's neurological. You can hook someones head up to a magnetic field generator and they'll be preaching about the beauty of god without regard for evidence. I don't think getting into a discussion or argument has any sense. It's like talking to a schizophrenic, they progressively degrade into more irrational language patterns and hostility the more you push them. The point of the debate is not to convince you of the existence of god, but rather to solidify his own belief because his conscious mind has problems reconciling it with evidence. The more they can argue, the more their faith grows. It's a common way in which the brain tries to preserve cognitive dissonance. This is why people with claims of divine knowledge have such a strong drive to 'preach'.

I've never seen a truly religious person convinced by any form of evidence whatsoever. They would rather assume Jesus rode around on a dinosaur than face the facts. I think it is an escapist displacement mechanism into a fantasy reality where things are subjectively more pleasant and agree with one's personal opinion. A mystical father always protecting and watching, taking care of you. It gives people a sense of stability at the cost of sacrificing sanity and reason. I've never understood it personally, true belief might be some structural abnormality like low serotonin receptor density. There's some studies to suggest that, but I think the actual processes are much more complex.

Edited by hooter, 02 February 2012 - 04:05 PM.

[platypus]

This is why nobody should "debate" science with cretinists or other deranged quacks. Let idiots keep their idiotic beliefs.

[shadowhawk]

@shadowhawk
What is your goal in this thread? If it is to become more enlightened you are failing, if it is to convince others of the validity of your own opinions then you are failing. So what is your goal?

Same as yours. I enjoy the stimulation and learning things. What is your goal?

[shadowhawk]

Truly half of your posts don't even make lexical sense, I feel like I am reading a lorem ipsum generator. Anyhow, thank you shadowhawk for supplying the world with further public evidence that religion is a mental disorder and makes people aggressive and resort to personal attacks.

Not all subjects are for everyone. I noticed you haven't said anything very substantual. Its ok, do your best. Did I call you a name? Where? Have I made you aggressive and prone to personal attacks on religous people? Isn't this an overeaction? Sorry, this is not my intention.