Sigh....
The reference to asexual reproduction demonstrated your omission of that fact in your comments. It’s consensus science which is relevant to your comment which failed to recognize it.
What the hell? Asexual reproduction and sexual reproduction are two different things, and I never said anything about asexual reproduction, and you bringing it up doesn't in any way undermine my point. And you still haven't shown how it does. All you're doing is the usual tail spinning and baseless accusation. I didn't "omit" it anymore than I omitted facts about the galaxy. The existence of moons in no way undermines the point I made, and neither does asexual reproduction. All you're doing here is showing you're inability to comprehend, but what else is new.
The flaw in the statement is accusation …are no longer “doing science.” It’s a false statement that science terminates research with “it just does.” That’s the statement. To suggest that scientists are stopped in their continued research and resort to “it just does” is false.
Then prove it. Provide the scientific procedure used to determine humans have always procreated based on a desire to pass on genes. Provide the scientific procedure used to determine the selfhiness of genes.
You see, you can't. All you can do is blow smoke. You know as well as I do that you cannot show how any of this is science or else you would have done so by now. All you know how to do is attack religion, and you can't even do that well because yo make it perfectly clear you don't know what you're talking about and that damages the credibility of your position.
Second, the reference to the “selfish gene” is a reference for laymen designed to convey the self-protective nature of preservation propensity of genes. Compelling and overwhelming evidence exists that genes are self-protective.
So you're equating human consciousness with the gene activity. Good one! Genes protect themselves, therefore we must be having sex because our genes manipulate us so they can continue to exist! Huh? Genes now have consciousnesses and they huddle together to construct manipulating plans? Where and how the hell was that determined in a lab? This is mere speculation and interpretation of the data. I'll show in a second how that data can be interpreted differently by other scientists.
Their evolution (change) is a result of countervailing forces upon them as well as changes within them. Adaptation of species is well established. That involves a multiplicity of genes and genetic change in organisms with many genes.
You're rambling now. Nobody is questioning adaptation. The issue is whether or not humans procreate due to an innate desire to pass on genes. This is Dawkins' philosophical conclusion based on scientific data, but the same data can be interpreted entirely differently.
Take for example the celebrated Oxford physiologist and systems biologist Denis Noble, who said:
"Genes are trapped in huge colonies, locked inside highly
intelligent beings, moulded by the outside world, communicating with it by complex processes, through which, blindly,
as if by magic, function emerges. They are in you and me; we are the system that allows their code to be read; and their preservation is totally dependent on the joy that we experience in reproducing ourselves.
We are the ultimate rationale for their existence."
Now take Dawkins' version of the above:
"Genes swarm in huge colonies, safe inside gigantic
lumbering robots, sealed off from the outside world, communicating with it by tortorous indirect routes,
manipulating it by remote control. They are in you and me; they created us, body and mind; and their preservation is the ultimate
rationale for our existence."
Dawkins and Noble interpret the scientific data differently. Both can't be right.
So whose version is "real science"?
They are providing philosophy in their conclusions, while the science is simply found in the raw data. This proves the point I was making in my first post.
The attempt to defend religion is demonstrated in this statement:
First you say I was making religious claims, and now you backpeddle to say I was merely defending religion. This is why talking to you is pointless. All I did was point out the rationale behind the New Atheists like Dawkins. They are trying very hard to make science render religion obsolete and they do so by coming up with all sorts of illicit philosophical conclusions while masquerading them as science.
You've done nothing to show otherwise.
dart introduces religion and “God” as explanation in the above paragraph quoted. “…because God commands it…” is a religious assertion unsupported by any evidence for the claim “God” and is a religious assertion that “God” is like humans.
Sigh... I simply said atheists recognize the biblical claim and the understanding most religious people have from it, and they feel the need to disprove it using both science and even non-science. This isn't, by any stretch of the imagination, a demonstration that I "introduced God as an explanation." I said it is how most religious people understand it, and people like Dawkins know this. So they want to disprove it because reducing the number of religious people is the core of their agenda. This is what they want to do, even if it means going beyond the boundaries of science.
Humans give “commands.” Earthworms do not in the contextual reference to biblical claims. Attacking scientists for researching superior explanations is demagoguery. It’s also a feeble attempt to defend ancient, superstitious, religious posture as if it were superior to genuine science today.
You're so blinded with anti-religious hatred that you couldn't accept basic points where this piece of myth was actually correct, in light of modern science. For example, for centuries scientists supposed the universe always existed, simply because it flew in the face of Genesis, and yet here we are and modern science pretty much declares, along with Genesis, that the universe has a beginning. How did these ancient myth-making idiots know something that scientists just recently figured out? This discovery was so powerful that even Stephen Hawking said it is enough to make theism a reasonable position to take. Is Hawking stupid now? Accordng to Hawking, if the universe has a beginning, theism is a reasonable position to take.
Now is Genesis science? Of course not. Only a tiny minority of eligious idiots would say otherwise. It is a religious text telling an ancient story in metaphor and allegory. It is no more a scientifc guide than it is an psychological one. But it did happen to express a correct scientific worldview thousands of years before modern science discovered it.
No evidence has been established for religious claims implied or stated in the above quoted paragraph. It is religious agendas which are “anti” science. Such agendas attempt to stifle scientific research (and have done so historically). What groups want to prevent science from being taught in public schools? The answer is religious groups. Worse, many want to suspend education (science) in favor of religious dogma. To a significant degree, religion has had success in that in some parts of the world.
When all else fails, go off on a typical anti-religion rant. You've been refuted on several of these points in the past, but I guess you're not much for learning. Few scientists really think science and religion are at odds, and roughly half of them are in fact religious. You've been bamboozled by the Dawkins parade.
I'm a theist but I'm not religious. Science would be nowhere today without religion, and I can acknowledge that without "attacking science." Hell if it weren't for the Catholic Church, there'd be no universities. You're in Blind-Faith-Dawkins mode again, just reiterrating his stupid talking points from his book, when we both know you're in no position to make an intellectual argument for any of them. Dawkins is a moron when it comes to virtually everything outside of genetics. His has proved he doesn't know anything about psychology, sociology of religion or the history of religion.
For you to say "science" always Trump's social science is dowright absurd. Aside from the obvious fact that all of these are sciences, social science and psychology are sciences geared to analyze and determine scientifc truths about human behavior. So when Dawkins proposes to explain human behavior while ignoring established scientific facts in these other sciences, he is no longer acting as a scientist because he is essentially spitting in the face of established sciences. Biology isn't the only science and far from the only one that matters.
“agenda” of science and scientists is to make discovery which can be supported by evidence, transparent and open for all to see.
Stop equating Dawkins with science. As I tell Mormons about Joseph Smith, "He is just a man subject to his own personal agendas and biases." But he is worshipped by people like you in the same way Joseph Smith and Jesus are adored. At least Gould has the integrity to make qualification when he refers to Dawkins and his ilk as "fundamentalists." But according to JAK, Dawkins and "Science" are synonyms.
It is dart who used the term “God” twice in the above paragraph.
Of course I did. One can hardly talk about atheistic agendas without mentioning th word God. But this is a truly enlightening moment regarding your method of comprehension. I mentioned the word twice! Context means squat. I mentoned the WORD, so that is all the proof you need huh? Hell I mentioned atheism too. Does that mean I was defending that too?
And the term is used as an opposition to science.
No it isn't. It is used to show religious positions to which the agenda driven atheists wish to refute. It is no secret what Dawkins' agenda is here. Saying it is scientific fact is ludicrous. I have already shown above that an equally qualified biologist interprets the data differently, essentially proving the concluson is ultimately philosophical.
Attacks on “atheists,” also named in the above paragraph, is hollow and without substance.
Of course it was substance. I proved a direct link to Dawkins' argument and what it seeks to kill on the religious side of the fence. Only an idiot would say there is no connection here, especially in light of Dawkins' admitted "full frontal attack on religion." He makes no secret about his agenda, so why pretend there isn't one?
Cures and treatments for diseases and the very computers on which we communicate here are products of science, not religion./quote]
And explanations with meaning are generally produced by religious teachings, not scientists in lab coats. Don't take my word for it. Accoring to Stephen Jay Gould, Religon is unlike science only because it deals with "questions of ultimate meaning" and not concerning itself with the "empirical realm." I think that is a fair assessment.
Science only tells us what's going on in the world, but to add meaning to the facts requires philosophy or religion. There are plenty of scientists out there who accept this axiom, and have no problems accepting the limits of science.
Absent any compelling, transparent consensus for god claims, such claims should be disregarded.
Uh huh, and the consensus should have been accepted during Copernicus? You know nothing about the history of science and how paradigms have changed. You also don't understand that the argument from teleology was considered the scientific standard in the days of Aristotle.
Incidentally, the scientifc evidences for a superior intelligence, from a cosmological/teleological standpoint, are overwhelming and growing at a staggering pace. But you wouldn't know anything about that, unless you can google something up really quickly.
dart, real science does not concern itself with religious claims absent compelling, transparent evidence for all to see.
You don't know what science is, let alone "real" science, and no one ever suggested it should be concerned with religious claims. You're still a walking straw man machine, like always.
There is no “anti-religious agenda” as you imagine.
Oh really? Then why are Darwinists like Michael Ruse, saying they are embarrassed to be an atheist because of Dawkins's bigotted campaign against relgion? Just my imagination huh? Nice try, but you're simply not up to date on relevant facts.
There is a pro-information, pro-evidence search (research) for fact(s). Science (contrary to your apparent view) relies on that information and evidence to reach reliable conclusions.
Science itself is interested in the material world, whereas religion is interested in everything science can't answer. Science makes no religious claims, and religion very infrequently and only indirectly, makes claims that can be called scientific. If proved wrong, religious orgnaizations generally accept the science and if need be, modify religious teaching accordingly. For example, you don't see the Catholic Church fighting against Evoluton theory. Instead they embrace it. And it pisses Dawkins off.
However, certain scientists like Dawkins often do make their own religious claims. The claim that evolution disproves God, that the universe might have been designed by aliens, that life began on earth by natural unguided processes, that multiverses exist, that we procreate because our genes are selfish, etc, are all faith based claims with a dash of scientific speculation. They are taken on faith just as religious theists take on faith their own particular religious claims.
Science clearly does not rely on “blind faith” either in individuals or conclusions absent compelling evidence.
"Science" no, but many people like you do. You take on faith what Dawkins says. I mean it isn't like you've gone through the rigorous education process of evolutionary biology. You're just one of many religion hating atheists who adopt his pop atheism books as your personal Bible. Equating yourself with "science" is pretty damn funny.
You never were a serious poster JAK. Do us all a favor and step aside so beastie can answer my questions. My time is limited.
“All knowledge of reality starts from experience and ends in it...Propositions arrived at by purely logical means are completely empty as regards reality." - Albert Einstein
