Re: Dawkins for president

Sorry for the delayed response. I was busy with a sudden slew of
exams.

nando_ronteltap@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
Ari Allyn-Feuer wrote:

The TOE, for what I hope to be the last time, has no conflict with
probabilistic calculations of probabilistic events. Who has told you
otherwise?

You forget they generally deny the point of decision. And besides, when
you get a course on statistics you will likely be informed that
statistics measures a lack of information about causes, it does not
measure uncertainty. So when you see probability talk within science,
this is usually interpreted as cause and effect, not chance and
decision. What am I saying there isn't really any decision recognized
within science at all, except for creationism. Chances are simply left
hanging in the air in science, without some conceptual tool such as
decision to relate them to an actual result.

So you're saying that you object to the idea that "random" events are
indeed random, and instead believe they are the products of
intelligences orchestrating them for a conscious purpose? It seems
like this is what you are leading towards, but correct me if I'm wrong.

If this is indeed what you're driving at (confirmation would be nice)
then we've made some major headway. Let's take some classes of events
currently believed to be random, and see why you believe they must be
acts of intelligence. I'll start by talking about the resolution of
quantum superposition of electron spins.

Electron spin can take only two observed values, denoted +/- 1/2. When
the spin of a superposed electron is measured, all observations
indicate that as nearly to half as possible of the electrons so tested
resolve into each spin value.

By itself, this indicates nothing. Precisely half of all turns at
roadway intersections go left and half right, but we don't think
they're random, because we have observed patterns in how they travel,
patterns which give rise to consistencies which allow us to predict the
actions of individual decisions. For example, when I leave the school
in the afternoons, I consistently turn left, even though my turns as a
whole are evenly split. The patterns in these turns and their relation
to the circumstances of their occurence lead us to infer that they are
not random but have a causative mechanism. Other evidence leads us to
believe that these decisions are the result of intelligence.

The key difference between this example, where your inference is valid,
and that of electron spins, is very simple: electron spins have no
observed pattern. None at all. The resolutions of those
superpositions bear no relationships to circumstances that we have been
able to discern, and we have no ability to predict the actions of
individual electrons coming out of superposition. There is certain
"linked particle work" where two particles are known to have opposite
spin, and one will resolve to the opposite state from the other, but we
have no way to predict which will go which way. The losses of
superposition in the two particles take place simultaneously,
regardless the distance between the two particles (einstein took
particular exception to this, but the evidence overruled him in the
eyes of most contemporaneous and modern physicists.)

If you could point out a pattern, any at all, which allowed you to
predict the actions of electron spins, it would be among the greatest
achievements in physics, ever. Your demonstration of this technique
would bring adolation, and your theories about conscious decision of
random probabilities would recieve serious consideration.

In the light of this incredible impetus for you to enumerate this
algorithm, and your failure even to discuss doing so, one can perhaps
be forgiven for uncharitably assuming that you have no such method.
Until you do, there's nothing to indicate that your "theory" is
anything but religion.



You still have not answered the question. You say answers exist which
are supported by your theory, but you do not sally them forth. Do you
expect to extort me into believing your religion under the guise of
science on the promise that if I join you'll tell me what it is? No
thanks. Try some answers.

It is bizarre that you call simple basic knowledge about decisions
which you use in your everyday life, a religion. Again, tracing back
the way things turned out to the decisions that made them turn out that
way, regardles if these decisions fall in people's brains, or in the
weather. This is what creationism is about, but then we do it with big
things like human beings in general.

You have no examples of "decisions" except those arising on the quantum
scale, so "common knowledge" and the basic assumptions about philosophy
which let us get by day by day are as useless as is the intuitive
ballistics knowledge of a baseball pitcher to the calculation of
trajectories for space probes. You still need evidence.

These are not philosophical questions, Nando. I'm not talking about
quantum "ownership" or "decision points," but rather about the need for
scientific explanations of real world events. How does your creation
theory explain the present forms and diversity of life on earth?

To trace the organisms back to the decisions at which they were
determined to be. To trace back the probability of the appearance of
the organisms to the decisions which realized or negated the
probability. For instance you can find creationist science about the
way the constants of the universe are, from whatever else they could
have been, in relation to the probability of mankind appearing.

So what is this science? You say it exists, but what exactly is it?
Why are humans here, what made them appear, and why do they have less
hair then other apes? The questions are still unanswered, and you
can't have a theory with no explanatory power. Your antics are
starting to become reminiscent of the Monty Python Schtick of the radio
guest revealing a groundbreaking theory on brontosaurus:

PRESENTER;I have with me tonight Anne Elk. Mrs. Anne Elk.

MISS ELK;Miss

PRESENTER;You have a new theory about the Brontosaurus.

MISS ELK;Can I say here Chris for one moment that I have a new
theory
about the Brontosaurus.

PRESENTER;Exactly. What is it?

MISS ELK;Where?

PRESENTER;No, no your new theory.

MISS ELK;Oh, what is my new theory?

PRESENTER;Yes.

MISS ELK;Oh what is my theory that it is. Well Chris you may ask
me
what is my theory.

PRESENTER;I >am< asking

MISS ELK;Good for you. My word yes. Well Chris, what it is that
it
is-this theory of mine. Well this is what it is-my theory that I
have, that is to say, which is mine, is mine.

PRESENTER;Yes, I know it's yours, what is it?

MISS ELK;Where? Oh, my theory? This is it. (clears throat at
great
length) This is how it goes. The next thing I'm going to say is
my
theory. Ready?

PRESENTER;Yes.

MISS ELK;My Theory, by A. Elk. brackets Miss, brackets. This
theory
goes as follows and begins now. All brontosauruses are thin at
one
end, much much thicker in the middle and then thin again at the
far
end. That is my theory, it is mine, and belongs to me and I own
it,
and what it is too.

PRESENTER;That's >it<, is it?

MISS ELK;Spot on, Chris.

PRESENTER;Well, er this theory of yours appears to have hit the
nail
on the head.

MISS ELK;And it's mine.


What
evidence do you have for it? These questions cannot be brushed aside;
they are of the utmost importance.

Already addressed numerous times. You are stuck in your own
philosphical beliefs about decisions, which are entirely unevidenced of
course, and not very likely logically coherent. Do you think that your
beliefs about creation in terms of decisions are better then those of
creation scientists?

Then tell me exactly what parts of what I've said are "philosphical
beliefs." I've used the best available science to make my points. You
want to say this is part of SCIENCE, and can be evidenced, but when I
try to ask you what your theory is, you cite philosophical differences
and philosophical precommitments. You can't have it both ways. What
is philosophical about what I've said, and what is your theory? These
simple questions have to be answered, or you're going to get nowhere.

Talking about an infinity of universes, and cats both alive and dead is
going beyond reasonable limits. It is curious that you allow these most
bizarre superstitions, yet you protest the basicly common and
straightforward creationist alternative notions as unscientific.

How do you misunderstand? Let me count the ways:

You assume that science must be bound by "reasonable limits." This is
absurd. What is, is. Nothing changes that, not even folklore.

Whatever, reasonable judgement is how actual science is done.
Reasonable judgement means a great many things. Reasonability is all in
favor of creationism.

I stand by what I said. Observations trump everything, without
exception. Observational error can be part of a theory and can serve
to smooth over rough spots in a tapestry of evidence which supports the
theory, but the observations are the ultimate standard by which you
judge theories. If by "reasonable limits" you mean a mass of
well-supported prior theories, cite them. If not, explain why you
think rules of thumb trump observed reality.

I'll assume the last sentence is a joke, because I don't want to think
the things about you that its seriousness would imply. If reason is
with creation, tell me what the theory is.

You assume that Schrodinger's cat is a macro-scale superposition rather
than an explanatory analogy.

You assume that the TOE has something to do with quantum theory, indeed
that it presupposes the many-universes model of quantum randomness.

I already told you how Darwinism denies decisions. First they deny it
by denying creation, then they deny it by putting up natural selection
as a false concept of choice. False meaning, there isn't neccessarily a
possiblity that the alternative may become realized in natural
selection.

There's no "darwinism." There are no "darwinists." There's only the
theory of evolution, biology, and biologists.

You're saying that natural selection is deterministic, but you've
provided no evidence that the TOE is inconsistent with quantum
randomness. Your "decision theory" does not exist until you've
enumerated it, so you can't use it. Why do you think the TOE implies
determinism?

Then Darwinists proceed to worsten things no end by
conjuring up a totally unevidenced will to reproduce, making it
impossible to talk about actual will in relation to organisms. etc.
etc.

Now you're just off base. Will to reproduce is evidenced everywhere,
in every animal species. Check out your local nightclubs.

You assume that I protest against your creation theory. What you've
seen is me asking to see it! Once you do, THEN I'll start protesting.

regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

Ari Allyn-Feuer

.

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