SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

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Everybody Wang Chung
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SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by Everybody Wang Chung »

The proprietor just dropped another steaming pile of Discovery Institute today.

In the proprietor's recycled article, he relies on two authors, Jay Richards and Guillermo Gonzalez. As predictable as the sunrise, they both are associated with the Discovery Institute.

Jay Richards is a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute.
https://www.discovery.org/p/richards/

Guillermo Gonzalez is a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.
https://www.discovery.org/p/gonzalez/

Jay Richards, Guillermo Ganzalez and the Discovery Institute are considered fringe and pseudoscience by mainstream science. Just what we've come to expect from the proprietor of SeN.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by drumdude »

Still waiting on his argument against Douglas Adams’ sentient puddle.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by Physics Guy »

There's a big range of degrees of fine tuning. To evolve creatures exactly like us probably does take exactly our kind of conditions, which probably haven't been replicated exactly anywhere else in the universe (pace Star Trek), and in that sense are incredibly rare. Nobody should be caring about that question, though. The puddle is a perfect rebuttal to arguments for design based on how much fine tuning it would take to duplicate humans. If its hollow in the ground had been different, it would have fit a different puddle just as perfectly. If there were never any humans like us, there could have been intelligent blob-creatures, or something, and they would have been just as confident that the universe was made to make them.

The puddle is less devastating to arguments based on the amount of fine tuning needed to get the universe to last more than a few nanoseconds, or to have any stars in it, or to have any planets. Any low spot in the ground would have fit some kind of puddle, but it's really not clear that any random set of natural constants would have produced anything even remotely comparable to us.

It's also not clear that it wouldn't have. Perhaps there are uncountably infinitely many different ways of achieving intelligent life. Or perhaps there are even infinitely many alternatives that could not reasonably be counted as intelligence, or even as life, but that really would be just as cool, in some different way that we can't imagine. So the puddle argument may still be worth something as a parry, even for arguments about natural constants needing to be fine tuned to make any universe remotely similar to ours.

Speculating about something unimaginable like that doesn't make a strong point, though, especially against fine tuning arguments that are at least concrete and evidence-based, even if I don't find them convincing. If somebody is telling you that without design the universe wouldn't have lasted ten nanoseconds, it's not so good a response to say, "Hey, a lot of intelligent life could have been packed into ten nanoseconds, and those fast-living intelligent creatures would have been just as convinced that their brief universe had been tailored for them, like the puddle!" Sure, maybe, but if that's your best shot, you don't have a strong case. Ten nanoseconds isn't much time. I still don't buy the fine tuning argument for design, but I don't think the puddle has much to say about it at this level.

The latest fine tunings that Peterson mentions are bizarre, though. If you pick a random planet then, sure, it might have to be lucky for it to be in a good part of a galaxy, and for its sun to be on a galactic orbit that stays good, during a nice era of the galaxy's existence. Galaxies are big, however, and they last a long time. A galaxy doesn't have to be lucky at all to have an awful lot of planets in it that satisfy all those conditions. So these three new local conditions aren't even fine tunings. Peterson doesn't seem to get the logic of fine tuning arguments even for what they are worth.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by Alphus and Omegus »

Ultimately, all fine tuning arguments are instances of the argument from ignorance, which is a basic logical fallacy.

In addition to the flaws you mentioned, PG, it's irrational to suppose that physical constants could be catastrophically different unless you can prove that they are not inherently the values that we can observe. It's unknowable whether gravity or other forces could operate at different fundamental rates, etc. It may be impossible for the constants to have other values.

It's also fallacious to suppose that things we consider to be physical constants could not be different in other parts of the universe about which we know little or nothing.

In other words, the constants could be immutable in all possible universes or they could be mutable in this one. Both of these possibilities must be disproven in order for fine-tuning arguments to be valid.

And then of course, proving that there might be creators does absolutely nothing to validate the easily debunked theological claims of Mormonism. Getting past deism is insurmountable for all religious attempts to prove themselves in my view. Human religion also must prove that there are not multiple creators as well, which is also impossible.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by drumdude »

Steven Hawking described the creation of the universe as analogous to digging a hole. At the same time the hole is dug, a mound of dirt is formed next to it. They are opposites and at the end of the day sum to zero.

The Universe has exactly the same number positive and negative in the ledger. It sums to zero. So the universe can be created from nothing, as the universe can be thought of as an expression of nothing similar to -10 + 10 = 0.

I don’t think Daniel has even reached that part of physics in his high school review. He would do well to read some non-theist standard physics books instead of the Christian apologetics trash.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by Alphus and Omegus »

My guess is that he would claim to agree with that idea but use it as a "proof" that the "one eternal round" doctrine is true.

ETA: And also the all matter is spirit idea as well.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by drumdude »

Physics Guy wrote:
Thu Mar 02, 2023 3:09 pm
There's a big range of degrees of fine tuning. To evolve creatures exactly like us probably does take exactly our kind of conditions, which probably haven't been replicated exactly anywhere else in the universe (pace Star Trek), and in that sense are incredibly rare. Nobody should be caring about that question, though. The puddle is a perfect rebuttal to arguments for design based on how much fine tuning it would take to duplicate humans. If its hollow in the ground had been different, it would have fit a different puddle just as perfectly. If there were never any humans like us, there could have been intelligent blob-creatures, or something, and they would have been just as confident that the universe was made to make them.

The puddle is less devastating to arguments based on the amount of fine tuning needed to get the universe to last more than a few nanoseconds, or to have any stars in it, or to have any planets. Any low spot in the ground would have fit some kind of puddle, but it's really not clear that any random set of natural constants would have produced anything even remotely comparable to us.

It's also not clear that it wouldn't have. Perhaps there are uncountably infinitely many different ways of achieving intelligent life. Or perhaps there are even infinitely many alternatives that could not reasonably be counted as intelligence, or even as life, but that really would be just as cool, in some different way that we can't imagine. So the puddle argument may still be worth something as a parry, even for arguments about natural constants needing to be fine tuned to make any universe remotely similar to ours.

Speculating about something unimaginable like that doesn't make a strong point, though, especially against fine tuning arguments that are at least concrete and evidence-based, even if I don't find them convincing. If somebody is telling you that without design the universe wouldn't have lasted ten nanoseconds, it's not so good a response to say, "Hey, a lot of intelligent life could have been packed into ten nanoseconds, and those fast-living intelligent creatures would have been just as convinced that their brief universe had been tailored for them, like the puddle!" Sure, maybe, but if that's your best shot, you don't have a strong case. Ten nanoseconds isn't much time. I still don't buy the fine tuning argument for design, but I don't think the puddle has much to say about it at this level.

The latest fine tunings that Peterson mentions are bizarre, though. If you pick a random planet then, sure, it might have to be lucky for it to be in a good part of a galaxy, and for its sun to be on a galactic orbit that stays good, during a nice era of the galaxy's existence. Galaxies are big, however, and they last a long time. A galaxy doesn't have to be lucky at all to have an awful lot of planets in it that satisfy all those conditions. So these three new local conditions aren't even fine tunings. Peterson doesn't seem to get the logic of fine tuning arguments even for what they are worth.

How about the airliner fall argument?
DCP wrote:Another way of trying to escape the “Strong Anthropic Principle,” the idea that the universe seems in some sense to have been designed to be friendly to life and even to intelligent life, is to posit the existence of an essentially infinite number of number of universes. On this notion, the fact that we just happen to live in a universe in which we can live (note the tautology) is pretty much sheer dumb luck, and not even especially interesting. (See the link to my Deseret News article above.) If I fall thirty-five thousand feet from an airplane and somehow survive unhurt, well, I just happen to live in a universe in which that happened. Move along! There’s nothing to see here!
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/danpeters ... uning.html

Vesna Vulović (Serbian Cyrillic: Весна Вуловић, pronounced [ʋêsna ʋûːloʋitɕ]; 3 January 1950 – 23 December 2016) was a Serbian flight attendant who holds the Guinness world record for surviving the highest fall without a parachute: 10,160 m (33,330 ft; 6.31 mi). She was the sole survivor after an explosion tore through the baggage compartment of JAT Flight 367 on 26 January 1972, causing it to crash near Srbská Kamenice, Czechoslovakia. Air safety investigators attributed the explosion to a briefcase bomb.

Following the bombing, Vulović spent days in a coma and was hospitalised for several months. She suffered a fractured skull, three broken vertebrae, broken legs, broken ribs, and a fractured pelvis. These injuries resulted in her being temporarily paralyzed from the waist down. Vulović made an almost complete recovery but continued to walk with a limp. She had no memory of the incident and had no qualms about flying in the aftermath of the crash. Despite her willingness to resume work as a flight attendant, Jat Airways (JAT) gave her a desk job negotiating freight contracts, feeling her presence on flights would attract too much publicity. Vulović became a celebrity in Yugoslavia and was deemed a national hero.

Vulović was fired from JAT in the early 1990s after taking part in anti-government protests during the breakup of Yugoslavia, but avoided arrest as the government was concerned about the negative publicity that her imprisonment would bring. She continued her work as a pro-democracy activist until the Socialist Party of Serbia was ousted from power during the Bulldozer Revolution of October 2000. Vulović later campaigned on behalf of the Democratic Party, advocating for Serbia's entry into the European Union. Her final years were spent in seclusion, and she struggled with survivor guilt. Having divorced, Vulović lived alone in her Belgrade apartment on a small pension until her death in 2016.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87

Daniel inadvertently proves the point against him. Every time he wanders away from the safety of copying and pasting others' ideas, he gets it wrong.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by malkie »

drumdude wrote:
Tue Mar 07, 2023 9:06 pm
...

How about the airliner fall argument?
DCP wrote:Another way of trying to escape the “Strong Anthropic Principle,” the idea that the universe seems in some sense to have been designed to be friendly to life and even to intelligent life, is to posit the existence of an essentially infinite number of number of universes. On this notion, the fact that we just happen to live in a universe in which we can live (note the tautology) is pretty much sheer dumb luck, and not even especially interesting. (See the link to my Deseret News article above.) If I fall thirty-five thousand feet from an airplane and somehow survive unhurt, well, I just happen to live in a universe in which that happened. Move along! There’s nothing to see here!
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/danpeters ... uning.html

Vesna Vulović (Serbian Cyrillic: Весна Вуловић, pronounced [ʋêsna ʋûːloʋitɕ]; 3 January 1950 – 23 December 2016) was a Serbian flight attendant who holds the Guinness world record for surviving the highest fall without a parachute: 10,160 m (33,330 ft; 6.31 mi). She was the sole survivor after an explosion tore through the baggage compartment of JAT Flight 367 on 26 January 1972, causing it to crash near Srbská Kamenice, Czechoslovakia. Air safety investigators attributed the explosion to a briefcase bomb.

Following the bombing, Vulović spent days in a coma and was hospitalised for several months. She suffered a fractured skull, three broken vertebrae, broken legs, broken ribs, and a fractured pelvis. These injuries resulted in her being temporarily paralyzed from the waist down. Vulović made an almost complete recovery but continued to walk with a limp. She had no memory of the incident and had no qualms about flying in the aftermath of the crash. Despite her willingness to resume work as a flight attendant, Jat Airways (JAT) gave her a desk job negotiating freight contracts, feeling her presence on flights would attract too much publicity. Vulović became a celebrity in Yugoslavia and was deemed a national hero.

Vulović was fired from JAT in the early 1990s after taking part in anti-government protests during the breakup of Yugoslavia, but avoided arrest as the government was concerned about the negative publicity that her imprisonment would bring. She continued her work as a pro-democracy activist until the Socialist Party of Serbia was ousted from power during the Bulldozer Revolution of October 2000. Vulović later campaigned on behalf of the Democratic Party, advocating for Serbia's entry into the European Union. Her final years were spent in seclusion, and she struggled with survivor guilt. Having divorced, Vulović lived alone in her Belgrade apartment on a small pension until her death in 2016.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesna_Vulovi%C4%87

Daniel inadvertently proves the point against him. Every time he wanders away from the safety of copying and pasting others' ideas, he gets it wrong.
[apologist Hat = "on"]
If only she had fallen a further 1670 feet you might have a point.
[apologist Hat = "off"]
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by Res Ipsa »

Sad when a guy doesn't know what a tautology is.
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Re: SeN Continues Its Love Affair With The Discovery Institute

Post by Tom »

The proprietor seems to have updated part of his post. The relevant part currently reads:
If I fall fifty-five thousand feet from a high-altitude airplane without a parachute and somehow land on my feet, completely unhurt, with my unspilled cup of Coke Zero with ice still in my hand, well, I just happen to live in a universe in which that happened. No questions needed. No mystery. Move along! There’s nothing to see here!
It previously read:
If I fall thirty-five thousand feet from an airplane and somehow survive unhurt, well, I just happen to live in a universe in which that happened. Move along! There’s nothing to see here!
Well now.
Last edited by Tom on Wed Mar 08, 2023 12:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
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