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Inference is no guarantee of correctness outside of a purely deductive mathematical proof.

What is the probability of you with your experience and genome existing? Yet you exist.

ruveyn

Last edited by ruveyn on 29 Nov 2010, 5:12 am, edited 1 time in total.

Don't you know though? Any instance of things that we don't understand how they work, like vestigial organs and "Junk DNA", automatically disprove any and all instances of fine tuning and the possibility of design even though later on functions are found and aren't given as much fanfare in the sensational journal headlines.

As the old shopworn joke goes: what Intelligent Designer would lay a waste disposal pipe through a recreational area? The lumbar region of the human spine and the existence of the appendix are strong arguments against Intelligent Design. If God designed us, He is at best a C- student of Design.

ruveyn

Perhaps not a guarantee, however inference lends credence towards one conclusion or another.

If you were to go pester some employees of Wal-mart, for instance, asking them what they think of working at Wal-Mart it would be my bet that the Sales Associates, Cashiers, and other people who actually work would be noticeably more ready to complain than Associate Managers, Asset Protection members, the General Manager, or any of the busybodies at Home Office. Going out and collecting comments, I believe, would lend credence to my perspective. However, it would not guarantee that all workers at Wal-Mart hate their job, as some might be dumb enough to love it there for the first day.

Well lets separate this out for a second. The reason I mentioned evolution wasn't because I believe that human life has been fine tuned at the level of DNA. It was because creationists, who I disagree with, set the standard of evidence too high on the points that they are discussing. I believe that ruveyn was doing the same and I gave my reason fro this above.

Now as to the point that can be made that 'Junk DNA' means that we can rule out fine-tuning for life at the universe level seems to be a bit of a stretch. This is due to the fact that the DNA, gravity and entropy are separate subjects. If you wish to disprove fine tuning, then you would have to argue that the fine tuning that does indeed exist, within the factors I listed can be accounted for in another way. You cannot disprove the contention with a logical fallacy that says that since DNA is not fine tuned therefor we can conclude that the universe is not fine tuned.

Last edited by 91 on 29 Nov 2010, 5:30 am, edited 1 time in total.

In the case of our universe, we essentially seem to have repeatedly won the physics lotto. If $100,000 appeared on my door every day would it not be reasonable to conclude that this is due to something other than luck.

Last edited by 91 on 29 Nov 2010, 5:27 am, edited 1 time in total.

A C- student of design that can navigate through all fields of engineering. Where would you place the waste disposal pipe? On your foot so you spread crap around everywhere you go, literally? Where would you place the recreational area, your hand so that shaking hands is serious business? Perhaps for males there ought to be a separate tube for urine to go through, rather than have it clean out the tube through which semen is expelled? The curvature of the spine is so horrible, yes, because everyone knows how strong a straightedge is for anything other than compression force. Our spines ought to be completely straight so as to make them easier to break.

"We have exhibited our understandings. I do not expect anything I say will have the slightest effect on you or your world outlook. You have not presented anything I can take seriously. "

Well - in which once again we see that in at least some respects you resemble my brother. Which I realize can be of but little interest or relevance to you, especially since I am not providing documentation; but please bear with me, it is relevant to my drive to taxonomize, I can read you better if I can bring in comparative data from him.

In our fairly long attempt to communicate, it was eventually made clear:

I had no possible interest in changing him or his world outlook, beyond convincing him that I was not in fact a blind fool, but rather someone he might find interesting to know and a source of interesting discussions.

My goal was to know who he is [he is enough younger I did not get a real chance to knosw him before leaving home]. and to exchange views. On the principle of the proverbial "he who has never left home believes his mother is a good cook", I find cross-fertilization - exposure to other data and other logics - sets the best fruit in the scientific endeavor.

In the end, on the other hand, he stated explicitly that if neither of us could persuade the other, he saw no possible point to discussion.

Which, it would seem, taking you at your word, is where you stand.

Fine. I shall no longer waste your time by asking you to make your meaning clear.

For the record, I do not see it as possible or needful to change your mind on anything. I would have enjoyed some serious discussion, but I respect your wish to be the One True Opinion.

I may from time to time point to a place where your logic has gone off the rails or where your view from the Top brings out a bit more bile [I think not vitriol] than usual.

Tot ziens.

Master Pedant

[It is strictly speaking irrelevant, but I confess that while Philologos is as appropiate a monicker as I could devise and I would not change it, I am occasionally irrationally irked by your appropriation of "Master Pedant", which I instinctively apply to meself.]

I thank you for your neatly bulleted list. It is helpful. I am unlikely to issue position papers without proper perusal and preparation, but it is nice to know it is there. I see others have found it useful as well.

Since you can produce such a list in such a form, it is likely you will have enough Doubting Thomas in your makeup to be aware that in many cases [and I mean in the scientific endeavors of the academic mainstream] one man's conclusive evidence is another's irrelevant and baseless assertion, one man's due process is another's kangaroo court. There is not - even in the confines of one field operating in the same arena, even with competent and honest scholars, true consensus on what are interesting data and what are appropriate types of analysis.

There are, I maintain, good reasons why there cannot be - and I think good reasons there should not be. After all, one finger cannot kill a louse. But it is possible and desirable - and sometimes even in the heart of wildest academia happens - to state without smears of fecal matter what and why one's conclusion.

For that step, my graces.

I'd pretty much go to Isaac Asimov's whole "relativity of wrong" thesis for this:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWvVGbTPNaM[/youtube]

While there's debate and contention around various details, the chance that the paradigm will shift back to a watchmaker God seems very, very, very, very, very, very small.

The chance of the paradigm shifting [specify your field] is always vanishingly small. One fingertip after another and the honeypot is emptied. Occasionally toppling points come and the kaleidoscope finds a new pattern. It takes a lot of faith to trust the paradigms are a spiral, not a circle.

Hey, don't worry. That's what government schools are for: instilling faith in doctorate holders who can know and understand infinitely more than the ignorant masses.

Lo, lo looo. We will have to get Sand's help. As a second generation academic, it has always mystified me that students, the further they get into the system, do not increasingly distrust the pronouncements of the Doctors [in case anyone is worried, I strongly urge that you closely scrutinize my pronouncements]. And yet, even when they have seen how people GET those degrees, and how things get into refereed journals, and why Rublev is the Grand Old Man of Mixology, a large proportion actually seem to put faith in process and people.

But no doubt it is because I am lacking in perception and unaware.

But don't you know that once you've completed years of busywork and have provided hundreds of thousands of dollars to an academic facility via grants, scholarships, and loans, that afterward you automatically are omniscient (at least within the field of expertise which you paid for a major in).

The reverse snobbery here is amazing. My only wish is that out of some strange tragedy of fortune you get the chance to attend a doctoral program, go through the rounds, and end up with an appreciation for the work a doctoral degree requires.

I hope it would be in Aeronautical Engineering, but not in Minnesota since the U of MN seems to be the government version of Rash Mustard College.