Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

Response to Comments: The Problem With Miracles

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Imagine if a police detective was told his theory had to be strictly natural. The evidence at the crime scene was obvious, but the boss wants no criminals indicted. The cause of the crime must be limited to the wind, rain, earthquakes, polar shifts, whatever. Absurd you say? Welcome to evolution.  Read more

Comments
F/N: remember too, dear onlookers, the reason for my choice of making the primary case in what is in effect a draft course reader. We are dealing with a complex system of thought, one built up and institutionalised over generations, and which purports to be the definitive account of origins and reality. It has to be addressed at least as a reasonable survey across its width and roots. For instance, after some preliminaries on the roots of key idea alternatives, that is why I begin with the stellar and cosmological issues [origins science done right], and it is why I expose the C19 rationalist myths about the imagined dark age just before the alleged dawn of the "rebirth." Educated people in our civilisation since about 300 BC have known that the earth is round [Ari noted on the shadow the earth casts on the moon in a lunar eclipse: what solid ALWAYS casts a round shadow?], and that it has a size of about 50 times the distance from Alexandria to Syene. Indeed that was one of the objections to Columbus: his number was wrong. But he did have some evidence of something out there, not least near enough that bodies in boats could wash up in Ireland, IIRC.kairosfocus
July 12, 2011
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Dr REC: At this point, you have your answer, step by step [including for several onward rhetorical tacks], both from the undersigned and from several others, but refuse to acknowledge it. I will give just one clip from my overnight response, which should be understood in context:
absent positive evidence that warrants a “demonic” explanation [in context, of a hypothetical murder and framing of the actually innocent, and onward context, Sagan's terms of a "demon-haunted world" as discussed by Lewontin] as a live option, it is not a reasonable consideration at the table of comparative difficulties across factual adequacy, coherence and explanatory power.
The onward context takes up the wider issue, on artificially constructed delusional world scenarios, and where the relevant positive evidence lies. Greenleaf as quoted from the three pages you have refused to take two or three minutes to read, highlights the limitations and practical basis for adequately establishing empirical facts as the cornerstone of a credible view of the world and of events in it. Good day GEM of TKIkairosfocus
July 12, 2011
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So that is a no on a direct answer? More quotes and more chapters of your online courses? Absurd.DrREC
July 11, 2011
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PS: To top off, we can observe that to reach his level in whatever discipline he is in Dr REC has had to do many courses, so he is very familiar with the amount of reading that a typical course requires; typically 300 or so pp [about 200 -300,000 words]. For just one instance, can someone above point out where any objector has addressed the little challenge on the HR diagram and its connexions, or on the implication of the C13 medieval cartoon of men walking around a round earth to the antipodes? What does this tell us about the C19 rationalist myths on the so called dark ages?kairosfocus
July 11, 2011
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Dr REC: I am sorry to have to be direct, but you are now being outright disrespectful. You have had your answer, several times, from several people, including myself, but want to go on making objections that in the end if accepted and taken to logical conclusions, would reduce our empirical knowledge base to irretrievable delusions. In short, your undetectable demonic defense -- with all due apologies to Descartes -- is little more than the brain in the vat absurdity; compounded by sheer chronological snobbery by a live donkey kicking the bones of a dead lion, here a key founder of the modern theory of evidence. Do you really want to imply that we should take the experienced world as deceptively delusional, in absence of specific evidence, even as Plato in his Parable of the Cave, made sure that he had his former captive SEE the cheat, before being led up out of the cave to the outer, non-manipulated world. As for Greenleaf whose work you wish to deride, you would do well to consider his strictures on the sort of selective hyperskepticism tactics you are playing at, from the first three pages of vol I of The Treatise on Evidence you have refused to read, on how:
None but mathematical truth is susceptible of that high degree of evidence, called demonstration, which excludes all possibility of error, and which, therefore, may reasonably be required in support of every mathematical deduction. Matters of fact are proved by moral evidence alone ; by | which is meant, not only that kind of evidence which is employed on subjects connected with moral conduct, but all the evidence which is not obtained either from intuition, or from demonstration. In the ordinary affairs of life, we do not require demonstrative evidence, because it is not con- sistent with the nature of the subject, and to insist upon it would be unreasonable and absurd. The most that can be affirmed of such things, is, that there is no reasonable doubt concerning them.^ The true question, therefore, in trials of fact, is not whether it is possible that the testimony may be false, but, whether there is sufficient probability of [--> i.e. epistemic warrant for] its truth; that is, whether the facts are shown by competent and sat- isfactory evidence. Things established by competent and satisfactory evidence are said to be proved. § 2. By competent evidence, is meant that which the very- nature of the thing to be proved requires, as the fit and appropriate proof in the particular case, such as the produc- tion of a writing, where its contents are the subject of inquiry. By satisfactory evidence, which is sometimes called sufficient evidence, is intended that amount of proof, which ordinarily satisfies an unprejudiced mind, beyond reason- able doubt. The circumstances which will amount to this degree of proof can never be previously defined; the only legal test of which they are susceptible, is their sufficiency to satisfy the mind and conscience of a common man ; and so to convince him, that he would venture to act upon that conviction, in matters of the highest concern and importance to his own interest.^
If this is not directly relevant and if it is not a satisfactory answer to a fair minded and serious inquirer, then nothing is. I find it an eloquent summary of the challenge of adequate warrant, by one who has pondered long and well. In such a light, absent positive evidence that warrants a "demonic" explanation as a live option, it is not a reasonable consideration at the table of comparative difficulties across factual adequacy, coherence and explanatory power. And if you now wish to try to project Lewontin and Sagan's blunder about the alleged irrational demon haunted world, the problem you have is that in design thought we operate at two levels and are inferring on tested and known reliable SIGNS to a known, observed causal process that is a best explanation, design. And, in the case already pointed out, cosmological evidence of design of a fine tuned cosmos suited to C chemistry cell based life, points to a necessary being, with intelligence knowledge and power to create a cosmos. In that context, origin of life based on complex functionally specific information systems, and of body plans based on great elaboration of same, puts design by one and the same power right on the centre of the table as the candidate to beat, absent the sort of a priori materialist censorship Lewontin et al indulged. Going further, you will see that Greenleaf highlights that in the courtroom setting -- as a paradigm of factually anchored warrant -- the issue is to establish on preponderance of evidence or to reasonable warrant on competent and satisfactory evidence that a certain conclusion is the best. Not the one that is and must be so beyond all possible doubt, but beyond reasonable doubt. In any number of serious affairs, that is how you operate and that is how sane people operate. To see a Lewontin and ilk suddenly pretend and insist on a novel and extreme standard because you do not like where the evidence on the balance of the merits points across alternatives, and then beg worldview level questions, once exposed, is its own rebuke. GEM of TKIkairosfocus
July 11, 2011
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If you and I were detectives, investigating the same murders, whether or not I start with the demon as my number one suspect on every list, or the demon is the last suspect on my every list, (and you with no demon on any list), all things being equal between our skills as detectives and the evidence that we acquire, we will come to the same conclusion, by using argument to best explanation, in every instance. Except one. The event that the demon is actually responsible for the murder. In this event, I will be open to investigation, but you will double back. Moreover, nothing would stop me from doubling back as well, but you are hindered from moving foreword.junkdnaforlife
July 11, 2011
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"I think that is the point I attempted to make in four words, and Kairosfocus illustrated in great detail in 3,000,000." Goldilocks? Hehe. Is there a middle ground here. In your defense, you make as coherent a point in 4 words as Kairosfocus does in "3,000,000" as you say. Nevertheless, neither of you answer the question. "Best explanation" is a weak post-hoc attempt to bolster the answer you've chosen with philosophy. Again, maybe in 50-100 words, tell me how you dispose of the demon defense, if not with defaulting to methodological naturalism.DrREC
July 11, 2011
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DrREC: Does Pat Robertson’s theory that God caused hurricane Katrina win because I can’t test it? How do you know you can't test it? Do try not to beg the question.Mung
July 10, 2011
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DrREC:
I would never defend evolution by telling someone to do their homework and read the entire scientific literature.
I haven't seen you defend evolution at all. Why is that? Perhaps what you meant to say was: "I would never defend evolution."Mung
July 10, 2011
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DrRec: "Did you presume methodological naturalism?" There is no need to presume any methodological naturalist first premise, or any premise whatsoever to arrive at the argument to best explanation. I think that is the point I attempted to make in four words, and Kairosfocus illustrated in great detail in 3,000,000.junkdnaforlife
July 10, 2011
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"No. As far as I know the argument to best explanation was the low pressure areas over the ocean." By what criteria? Did you presume methodological naturalism? "The argument to best explanation" seems an oddly subjective dodge.DrREC
July 10, 2011
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"Does Pat Robertson’s theory that God caused hurricane Katrina win." No. As far as I know the argument to best explanation was the low pressure areas over the ocean.junkdnaforlife
July 10, 2011
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junkdnaforlife "Argument to best explanation." This brackets the polar oposite to kairosfocus's problem. Instead of 1000's of words, I have four. I know what they mean, but an argument they do not make. Best in what sense? If I ask what "stands up best to tests," and one hypothesis is untestable, then what? Does Pat Robertson's theory that God caused hurricane Katrina win because I can't test it?DrREC
July 10, 2011
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DrRec: "In science, years of work are condensed in a one paragraph abstract." For the record, I gave my answer in a single sentence at 39, and 47, along with a fragment appearing at 42: Argument to best explanation. If the Demon ends up the best explanation, so be it.junkdnaforlife
July 10, 2011
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Oh dear. I've been out of town for the weekend, and I'd expected a response by now. What is the answer to the demon defense? How do we dispose of it except by accepting methodological naturalism? And why is it we like our forensic scientists, or NTSB or FDA or NHSTA engineers or meteorologists or seismologists or judges and jurys to adhere to methodologically naturalistic explanations? I don't see an answer to this. Why are we biologists in the hot seat? kairosfocus wants me to go read some links. I have. There is no direct answer therein. Further, persons who wish to engage in intelligent conversation have the ability to synthesize relevant information in providing a coherent argument. In science, years of work are condensed in a one paragraph abstract. What amazing response lies in 800 pages of a 1800's text, and " at 100+ pp equivalent" of links to kf's webpages that cannot be condensed into a response here? The term for this is literature bluff. I would never defend evolution by telling someone to do their homework and read the entire scientific literature. I do not treat people on this website as children or errand boys to send scurrying off to read hundred year old texts, or "100+ pp equivalent" pages of web posts before engaging them in conversation. KF routinely post 1000's of words here, so why can't he give me a few sentences in answer. I feel I'm being over polite. It isn't that I haven't, or won't read from your links-I just think they are a bluffing diversion that you think will dispose of me. Again, shame me and prove me wrong. Quote here the text that answers the demon defense.DrREC
July 10, 2011
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NormO: I have laid out the full argument at 101 college level with substantiating details and references as Dr Rec asks for by way of dismissing "personal web sites." Once you go to that level, you are looking at 100+ pp equivalent. (Remember, this includes stuff like, what is the H-R diagram, how does stellar evolution fit into it, what is the observational evidence therefor; how does this relate to the big bang cosmological model, how does this onward fit into the issue of fine tuning of the cosmos. BTW, unsurprisingly given that most people know very little about astrophysics and cosmology and how such fit into origins science, this is a particularly popular page with viewers of the IOSE. Tell me what you think of the significance of figs G.3 a and b, relative to common views of the thinking about the world in the Middle Ages.) That is, you are looking at a short course reader; as should be familiar. And, I am fairly sure that a course reader of 100+ or so pp is not a bad argument because it takes up that length. And, my point was that it is better to write out the 100+ or so pp once and link it in sections than to write or clip and quote at length the substance thereof over and over again. In short, your argument is a clever but misleading dismissive quip. Please do not try that stunt again. Above, you see a summary focused on certain key issues relevant to this thread. Additional materials focus on abductive reasoning, and on issues of evidence, warrant and provisionality of human knowledge and decision on courses of action. (This last is the 3 pp intro from Greenleaf on evidence, and also the summary of 12 principles leading on to a discussion of building a worldview from first principles of right reason and first self evident truths like "error exists.") Why don't you respond to the above in light of the context of substantiating details from here on and the other linked resources, instead of making clever dismissive quips. Good evening, GEM of TKIkairosfocus
July 8, 2011
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Dr at 36
Similarly silly is ’caused by an agent” or “artificial” where the tools of New Caledonian crows, squirrel nests and slug slime trails (I kid you not, see your comrade Upright BiPed’s comment at 22 above) are not natural. Then nothing is. Tell a scientist studying slug slime trails or microbial biofilms they are not adhering to methodological naturalism, and prepare to hear the laugh of a lifetime.
Tell a scientist that the slime trails appeared on their own, and be prepared to hear an equally robust laugh. Yet ask a materialist to demonstrate the rise of conscious experience from a computational network...and you'll hear crickets.Upright BiPed
July 8, 2011
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Pardon, but you know full well that if I were to lay out the argument in details here, which I do not have the time to do just now, ... And yet you do have time to write a 1,000 + word essay in response? Why not just lay out the argument and be done with it? If it takes more than 1,000 words, it's probably a poor one.NormO
July 8, 2011
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Dr Rec: Pardon, but you know full well that if I were to lay out the argument in details here, which I do not have the time to do just now, you and others would revert to the complaint against length. This is heads we win, tails you lose. Sorry, a case is laid out in summary, and serious sources are given on the merits, with reference resources to back it up. If you then refuse to address the matter on its merits but complain against those showing the outline and giving where details are to be found, then that says to me you are only trying to find objections and distractions. In which case, the already provided is more than enough to show to the onlookers what is going on in-thread, and to show to those who need it, where they can follow up in responsible details. Fundamentally, it is clear that a loaded switcheroo has been done, to substitute for the eminently empirically study-able issue of inference to credible cause on empirical signs across the generic patterns, chance and/or necessity and/or art, to go to a loaded language prejudicial censoring straight jacket, natural vs supernatural. So, to correct this rhetorical side track, we need to restore the central issue of inference to cause on empirically tested, reliable signs. There indisputably are highly reliable and generally recognised and used signs of design and/or of necessity and/or of chance, and science itself is demonstrably based on the logic of abduction, as is courtroom inquiry and as is historical inquiry, and as is arguably a good slice of worldviews analysis. So, we can reasonably approach the that tweredun case using recognised methods of inquiry. At least, so long as we do not beg worldview level questions at the outset, whether overtly as Lewontin did, or covertly by imposing a nice sounding criterion that smuggles in a priori materialism as a censoring control by the back door. As you can easily see, I documented that this is just what is being done, done by even top level science and science education institutions. If science is to preserve its integrity and credibility, such ideological censorship must be removed forthwith, maybe fifthwith. In terms of the question of science detecting he supernatural, I have pointed to the cosmological evidence and what it implies on logic: a necessary being at the root of our cosmos. I am not going to reproduce already written out fairly lengthy materials here, and I am not going to write the equivalent of textbook chapters, you have more than enough to see this already. It also turns out that the observed cosmos is credibly fine-tuned for C-chemistry cell based life in many ways, ranging from the chemical abundance of H, He, O, C, N etc onwards, to the requisites of getting to a cosmos such as we observe. With only slight shifts away from present values, the cosmos would be radically different and uninhabitable, i.e. it has the characteristics of a functionally specific complex, operating point set entity with organisation of finely balanced interacting parts towards a goal. If you doubt me -- and your repeated snide references to "personal sites" amount to that [in the teeth of the fact that these pages are about evidence, serious citations of relevant authorities and inferences on evidence . . . i.e. it is in the end more reasonable to lay out the case once then point to it than to fill blog threads with hundreds of pages of detailed discussion over and over again], have an argument with Sir Fred Hoyle and many others. So, an inference to design as best explanation for the cosmos is reasonable and should be openly on the table, whether or not you are inclined to accept it. Just, do not play games and censor it. On reasoning in ways materially similar to how we do so in courtrooms to decide major and weighty matters with serious consequences, we can strongly argue that the link of a necessary being as causal root of our cosmos with a credibly designed cosmos, points to that necessary being being a cosmic architect. [And Greenleaf elegantly anticipated the sorts of issues we run into in reasoning on empirical evidence and in light of our fallibility, which is why I pointed you to him. If we are to be consistent in reasoning, courtroom praxis and the underlying principles set a benchmark for evaluating serious evidence in a tested context where serious matters are at stake.) Multiplying by the generally acknowledged fact that we have rights and the implication of the principle that my right implies your duty of respect for it, then we find ourselves under the moral government of ought. So, for those who take oughtness seriously, the only credible worldviews are going to be those that have in them a foundational is that can ground ought. Cutting to the chase scene, those views are views resting on a good Creator serving as cosmic architect. That is, a generic, ethical theism. Beyond this, many will go on to accept some one or other of the various ethical theistic traditions. That is of little concern here. What is, is that we have now moved from that tweredun, to whodunit, with a prime suspect now out to the jury with what looks like an open and shut case. And no surprises likely to toss the verdict overboard, as there is no serious question that the key SCIENTIFIC evidence pointing to design as a SCIENTIFIC inference on empirically reliable signs would be very hard indeed to account for on chance or accident. FYI, highly contingent outcomes are only credibly accounted for on chance or choice. Aned, FYI, if you now wish to inject a new standard of warrant for this case, proof beyond all dispute per deduciton form premises acceptable to all, this is selective hyperskepticism rooted in question begging. For the issue in all empirical investigations will be that there is always a way to construct some outlandish alternative that would sweep away all possibilities of reasoned scientific or forensic investigations. Like, we are all brains in vats dreaming that we share a common world, etc. The best reply to such is that hey would reduce our reasoning to utter delusion, and so we should not resort to such absent positive direct proof. Which of course proposers of such outlandish scenarios can never deliver. Notice, even in Plato's cave, somebody was freed and saw the apparatus of confinement and deception, then was led out to the real world. Science is not about investigating the supernatural, but it is about investigating cause effect pattens on empirically reliable signs. Which may in certain cases, point beyond a world of cause and effect driven by chance circumstances, noise interference, and mechanical necessity. GEM of TKIkairosfocus
July 8, 2011
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DrRec you wrote: I would explore some options- 1) He was arraying the knives to make a antenna, and fell backwards on them. 2) He was not actually alone. 3) He was killed by another human prior to leaving earth. the knives are clearly jabbed in, as my a murderer, all investigation has turned up no sign of another person, we had been in contact with him while on Mars, was not dead before leavinges58
July 8, 2011
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When you can't be bothered to read explanatory material when directed to it, you don't really want an explanation.Meleagar
July 8, 2011
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Posit a miracle as an alternate hypothesis, by all means.
How would that make your position any less irrational?Mung
July 8, 2011
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It's back to this null hypothesis thing. Posit a miracle as an alternate hypothesis, by all means.Elizabeth Liddle
July 8, 2011
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But oddly, I often find its proponents railing against methodological naturalism, in effect saying that we should include miracles as counter-hypotheses.
Still waiting for a coherent definition of methodological naturalism... Is it ok for us to rail against the irrational?Mung
July 8, 2011
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"We send a single astronaut to Mars,and lose contact, years later a team arrives and finds he’s been dead for years, with 500 knives in his back. There’s no evidence anyone else was ever present except the knives. Would you conclude that was a suicide?" What would you conclude, and why would you abandon methodological naturalism at the onset? I would explore some options- 1) He was arraying the knives to make a antenna, and fell backwards on them. 2) He was not actually alone. 3) He was killed by another human prior to leaving earth. But once you conclude the findings were due to a supernatural, unexplorable event, it limits further investigation. And how would the team proceed in this event. Would they radio back NASA, and say something supernatural occurred, or look for clues, collect data, and test methodologically natural hypotheses?DrREC
July 8, 2011
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Chris Doyle- I was concerned with methodological naturalism, not ID per se. There probably are ways ID could adhere to methodological naturalism. And ID does claims to be a science, unless I'm mistaken. But oddly, I often find its proponents railing against methodological naturalism, in effect saying that we should include miracles as counter-hypotheses. Seems odd.DrREC
July 8, 2011
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DrRec: We send a single astronaut to Mars,and lose contact, years later a team arrives and finds he's been dead for years, with 500 knives in his back. There's no evidence anyone else was ever present except the knives. Would you conclude that was a suicide?es58
July 8, 2011
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kairosfocus and others appealing to Greenleaf, personal websites, abductive reasoning, and argument to best explanation- Citing a concept, or sending me off to a reference doesn't make the argument. How does abductive reasoning solve the demon defense? How does Greenleaf address it? Why do you presume methodological naturalism sometimes, when it conveniences you?DrREC
July 8, 2011
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"Neil and DrREC, “Artificial” fits in perfectly well with what Intelligent Design claims." Then why protest so loudly about methodological naturalism?DrREC
July 8, 2011
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p.s. You don't get to define natural by appealing to what is natural. That's a logical fallacy. It means you're being irrational.Mung
July 8, 2011
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