Buffalo wrote: Prediction ≠ direction. I hope this helps.
Heh. No need to condescend as you don't know what you are talking about in this case. Biological evolution is just physical chemistry behaving in what ultimately are predictable, if massively complex, ways. (Even with quantum indeterminacy, at the macro-scale chemistry is predictable.) This of course doesn't mean there was some preordained, as in consciously decided, direction of the events. But it also doesn't preclude it either. Evolution is only undirected in the sense of not requiring a director just like the diffusion of salt in a solution at a given point in time does not require a director. It's only random in a particular kind of context - and that context is not incompatible with the existence of a God directing it. Random environmental conditions doesn't mean unknowable to any possible entity. It means unpredictable to us.
Think about it this way. If I draw a card at random out of a deck, the card was "random" because from the perspective of the draw, our state of knowledge left us with an equiprobable chance that any card might have been drawn. There was a chance that some card other than the one I picked might have been picked. But the reality is if you knew enough about the motion of atoms underlying that entire event, you would've known what card I was going to pick in advance. Why? Because it wasn't random in that sense. It was in the inevitable consequence of chemical events leading to chemical events according to a predictable set of rules. My "random" draw could've been set in motion by some great manipulator of the universe eons ago. So it is with evolution. This, of course, is highly superfluous in of itself, but that doesn't make it incompatible.
Franktalk wrote:Does this mean that a system of parts like a human has no free will?
I'm a compatibilist, so no, I don't think that. Or, rather, I think it is still meaningful to talk about people's voluntary choices and assign moral responsibility in a determinist world. And, as a matter of fact, I think acausal will is incoherent or just random to the extent that it is.
So nobody ever has invented a thing they were just puppets of the initial conditions of the universe?
I think you went to deterministic land and drank the koolaid.
I'm a determinist, but the sort of indeterminacy that that actually has respect doesn't really change much about prior chemical states determining future chemical states at the scale of biological evolution. Buffalo was trying to make hay of the fact that evolutionary theory involves things like random mutations and undirected processes to say it is incompatible with a god directing it. But that misunderstands the context in which those terms are used. Undirected natural processes can theoretically be directed by some ghost in the machine. They just don't have to be. Randomness in mutations doesn't preclude someone setting up the "random" events from happening that way.
LDS scriptures are compatible with the known age of the earth. It is not compatible with the blasphemy of evolution.
THERE NEVER WAS A BEGINNING
Every world begins and ends of course. But a beginning to life and the seeds of life, no. Big Bang be damned. It was just God mining the universe for more material to expand his creations. Unleashing material from where it is kept in storage as it were.
D&C 29: 33 33 Speaking unto you that you may naturally understand; but unto myself my works have no end, neither beginning; but it is given unto you that ye may understand, because ye have asked it of me and are agreed.
Moses 1:29-38 29 And he beheld many lands {WORLDS}; and EACH land was called earth {SEPARATE WORLDS} , and there were inhabitants on the face thereof. {ON THE FACE OF WORLDS WITHOUT NUMBER} 30 And it came to pass that Moses called upon God, saying: Tell me, I pray thee, why these things are so, and by what thou madest them? 31 And behold, the glory of the Lord was upon Moses, so that Moses stood in the presence of God, and talked with him face to face. And the Lord God said unto Moses: For mine own purpose have I made these things. Here is wisdom and it remaineth in me. 32 And by the word of my power, have I created them, which is mine Only Begotten Son, who is full of grace and truth. 33 And worlds without number have I created; and I also created them for mine own purpose; and by the Son I created them, which is mine Only Begotten. 34 And the first man of all men have I called Adam, which is many. 35 But only an account of this earth, {NOT AN ACCOUNT OF ALL THE OTHER EARTHS AND ALL THE OTHER INHABITANTS THEREOF} and the inhabitants thereof, give I unto you. For behold, there are many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man; but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them. 36 And it came to pass that Moses spake unto the Lord, saying: Be merciful unto thy servant, O God, and tell me concerning this earth, and the inhabitants thereof, and also the heavens, and then thy servant will be content. 37 And the Lord God spake unto Moses, saying: The heavens, they are many, and they cannot be numbered unto man; but they are numbered unto me, for they are mine. 38 And as one earth shall pass away, and the heavens thereof even so shall another come; and there is no end to my works, neither to my words.
THIS EARTH IS JUST ANOTHER EARTH THAT WILL COME AND GO FROM ALL THE BILLIONS OF EARTHS THAT HAVE COME AND GONE AND MORE THAT WILL COME AND GO.
According to LDS scripture chronology Adam was given this world with his wife and commanded to multiply and replenish it and finished all the hosts thereof BEFORE he was placed into the Garden of Eden. If we figure over 20 billion inhabitants will abide here it is most reasonable that the finishing of all the hosts thereof in multiplying and replenishing the heavens for all things were created first in heaven before they were naturally upon the earth, that great work of providing spirit bodies from seed conceptions took billions and billions of what we call years.
During all that time the physical world did exist as Christ said that he would take of these materials and make an earth, which happened to be multidimensional as it had a heaven dimension and a physical dimension. The observed fossil record shows that life and death occurred for million and millions of years which prepared the resources that are abundantly utilized today. Science admits an extinction event. End of story. The second phase of this earth being occupied by living beings began in the Garden of Eden. We do not know how long Adam and Eve were there before they fell. It well could have been the entire period of the day the Lord rested. A very long time if we again realize that all the hosts of animals, plants and humans were made in heaven before they were place upon the earth beginning in the Garden of Eden go all the way back to day three. (no way a thousand of our years for each day)
Then later all the animals placed into the Garden could well have been partaking of the forbidden fruit and gone out of the Garden to fill the lone and dreary world long before Adam came out. Was the heaven of the whales and fishes dimensionally within the bounds of the physical seas and oceans of the earth? Probably so.
In the first chapter of Genesis all the animals were commanded to multiply as well as the man and woman. And everyone was eating grass and fruits. In heaven. Before they were naturally upon the earth. A dimensional heaven of unimaginable abundance.
Why do LDS think that it was only them in the pre-existence. Strange. Am I the only man to have reconciled the first and second chapters of Genesis and the Book of Moses? Lots more to it and ignoring it will not unfold anything about it.
Who would not want a break from over 20 billion children?
The exalted bodies of Adam and Eve were considered spirits [Intelligence is eternal and exists upon a self-existent principle. It is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it. TPJS page 354 ] and God mingled those spirits with the clay or natural elements of this earth to tether them here lest they leave. And it made them forget. A vacation then, as it were, to forget all the bother they had just gone through and for so long a time.
What I have said is scripture. No LDS believer can possible argue against it. They can open their minds and see it for themselves. Or ignore it as they are most want to do and would rather come of perpetually stupid in all things of God.
Lots more to the story but I shant trouble you presently.
EAllusion wrote:I'm a determinist, but the sort of indeterminacy that that actually has respect doesn't really change much about prior chemical states determining future chemical states at the scale of biological evolution. Buffalo was trying to make hay of the fact that evolutionary theory involves things like random mutations and undirected processes to say it is incompatible with a god directing it. But that misunderstands the context in which those terms are used. Undirected natural processes can theoretically be directed by some ghost in the machine. They just don't have to be. Randomness in mutations doesn't preclude someone setting up the "random" events from happening that way.
I feel a bit odd adding a reply to a post with which I agree with all of its specifics. Subsequent to the specific contents of the post my thoughts and EAllusions thoughts diverge I believe.
I do not image God having need to superintend all the cause effect transactions. As Sethbag noted that is a bizarrly cumbersome picture. I would like to present an analogy to picture an alternative hypothetical operation. If we consider throwing a pair of dice it is normal to consider which number comes up as random. It is true that a series of specific forces,motion of the hand, trajectory,distance,surface etc determine the outcome. It is theoretically knowable even if people do not normally have the detailed observations necessary to know the outcome beforehand. There is a different view point which may be considered. A pair of dice will come up a number greater than one and less than thirteen every time. This fact is entirely knowable and is not random.
My analogy is that I picture God setting up the stucture of creation, its atomic structures in a way in which organic being are within the range of results. It is a five or six and not twenty considering the dice analogy.
With in that context where the nature of creation is naturally tending towards life, God could make relatively few surgical adjustments not an absurd tangle of adjustments.
It is obvious that the world contains creatures and those creatures are complex. So a determinist must believe that matter can self organize into complex systems. This is a classic understanding of evolution. With the wave of the arms and saying millions and millions complex systems pop into existence. And people of science say they don't use faith for their beliefs.
At the base of this complex generating system is the accident. In the case of evolution it is the accidental combination of molecules that led to the first replicator. This of course requires no leap of faith what so ever. Then using nothing but a series of happy accidents sight and hearing, touch and transport systems came along. Again this requires no faith what so ever. I have always wondered why it is that people who believe in evolution refuse to admit it is a belief?
I see no reason why people of science do not build altars to the accident. After all they view the accident as their creator. Without the accident they feel they would not be here. How odd that these people have no respect for the very thing that made them? Or is there something else going on? If the people of science have given power to something that can't have power then just where do they think is the power? Is the power in the thing that has gathered to itself a complex state? Is the top dog on the evolutionary chain a gathering of the power and therefore deserves our respect? Should man be worshiped? Or in this case should each man worship himself?
Franktalk wrote:I see no reason why people of science do not build altars to the accident.
Perhaps because (whatever scientists may do when they are not at work) very few professional scientists would think that building altars was any part of their role as scientists.
Franktalk wrote: Should man be worshiped? Or in this case should each man worship himself?
I think it is pretty safe to say that science makes no claim to be able to answer such questions.
You could be an excellent particle physicist or marine ecologist or whatever, while still bowing down in adoration once a week to hamsters or empty packets of potato chips. Your qualifications in your day job would simply do nothing directly to help you make a worship choice, if you feel you need one.
Zadok: I did not have a faith crisis. I discovered that the Church was having a truth crisis. Maksutov: That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
I am constantly being told that there is a logic to science and a logic to the belief in evolution. There is a process that leads to conclusions. If that is true then where does that logic go and what conclusions should be reached as a result of accepting evolution as fact. If indeed one feels it is fact then where does that conclusion lead? I think it is the measure of a weak argument to stop at some arbitrary place and say it means nothing more. We have many theories that project all kinds of things. Why is it that science avoids this one? Why not just come out and say that science has proven the Bible to be false? Why not say there is no God? Why act like a weak willed punk kid?
I am constantly being told that there is a logic to science and a logic to the belief in evolution. There is a process that leads to conclusions. If that is true then where does that logic go and what conclusions should be reached as a result of accepting evolution as fact. If indeed one feels it is fact then where does that conclusion lead? I think it is the measure of a weak argument to stop at some arbitrary place and say it means nothing more. We have many theories that project all kinds of things. Why is it that science avoids this one? Why not just come out and say that science has proven the Bible to be false? Why not say there is no God? Why act like a weak willed punk kid?
Science has proven all gods worshiped by humans so far to be false. That doesn't mean there is no god, just that none of the ones humans have come up with are real.
Parley P. Pratt wrote:We must lie to support brother Joseph, it is our duty to do so.
Franktalk, the theory of evolution attempts to explain the diversity of species that exists on Earth. That's it. It's not about the "meaning of life", or who or what we should worship, or in what positions and with whom we are allowed to have sex, or whatever other questions you "accuse" it of not addressing.
It more than adequately addresses the question of the diversity of species. Why do you insist it answer to more?
Your thinking about this stuff is muddled. Time and time again you have demonstrated in this thread that you just don't get what evolutionary theory is about, what science is about, etc. You keep conflating these things with your religious worldview, and then finding it comes up short. Well yeah, any science that isn't already built in to your religious worldview is going to come up short if measured against the yardstick of your faith in God, the Bible, etc.
Evolution has nothing to do with God. And to me, that's part of the whole point. By demonstrating that things have clicked into place apparently without the need for any God, it infers to me that either there isn't a God, or if there is, she/he/it is a lot different than all the self-appointed prophets here on Earth say she/he/it is.
Mormonism ceased being a compelling topic for me when I finally came to terms with its transformation from a personality cult into a combination of a real estate company, a SuperPac, and Westboro Baptist Church. - Kishkumen
Tarski wrote: Indeed, a naïve and purely combinatorical probability calculation would lead one to say that Bernard convection cells are virtually impossible. Yet they form spontaneously quite often in an ordinary pan of cooking oil.