Re: Science = 100% falsifiability? Really?



Seanpit wrote:
On Dec 17, 2:13 pm, Rupert Morrish <rup...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Yes, it does. That's why they're called tool marks, and not "random
scratchings that give us no clues".
Nature can make non-random markings as well. You have to have at
least some idea as to the limits of what nature can do before you'd
have any idea that the markings you think to be "tool marks" could not
be closely mimiced by some non-deliberate force of nature.
No. We don't put limits on what nature can do. We say that such marks
have not been observed to occur naturally.

And what the heck does that mean if that says nothing about what you
think nature is likely to be able to do? If this information says
nothing at all to you about what all of nature is likely to be able to
do and not do, then how can you make a conclusion that your tool marks
are most likely artifactual? You'd really have no idea given your
argument as stated.

Correct. Our only point of disagreement is that you want to fill this gap in our knowledge with Martian Masons.


I am not surprised that a
mind capable of accepting creationism, which explicitly places limits on
what God can do, has difficulty with this distinction.

You mean like limiting God to a point where he couldn't use an
evolutionary mechanism to create life? Is that the kind of
'limitation' you are talking about?

Yes.

If so, this is a common but inane
position. If an intelligent designer didn't use limitations of some
kind, even if self-imposed, there would be no way for us to understand
anything given the minds that we have.

You mean given the minds we were given, surely? God could have created the universe entirely differently, but if he wanted us to understand the universe he would have given us minds that were capable of understanding it.

My explanation is that our brains are a product of our environment. Discerning cause and effect is advantageous (eating red berries => death), so we evolved brains that look for causes.

We understand the universe
because it is logical to us - because it functions within the language
of mathematics.

As you should know, there's nothing magical about the mathematics we use. There are many other sets of self-consistent axioms that we could have chosen instead. The fact that we chose the one that made sense of our universe tells you more about us than it does about the universe.


As Einstein put it, what is most amazing about the universe is that it
actually make sense to us. It doesn't have to you know.

Evolution makes sense to me, and almost everyone who actually studies living organisms.


Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com

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