Re: How Our Brains Ignore Unpleasant Facts was: Re: The Reasonable

Ernest Major wrote:
In message <47827d7a$0$26566$882e0bbb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Garamond Lethe <cartographical@xxxxxxxxx> writes
On Mon, 07 Jan 2008 10:49:32 -0800, Evopeach wrote:

On Jan 7, 11:27 am, Grandbank <zetetic...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jan 7, 9:03 am, Evopeach <keaton1...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:





> On Jan 6, 11:33 pm, Mark VandeWettering <wetter...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> > On 2008-01-07, Evopeach <keaton1...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> > > On Jan 6, 8:59 pm, Grandbank <zetetic...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > >> On Jan 6, 4:43 pm, Evopeach <keaton1...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> > >> > It seems perfectly rational to assume that the universe and
> > >> > everything in it was created with Apparent age.

> > >> Well of course! And everyone knows that it happened last
> > >> Thursday!

> > >> So how's your sophomore year going so far? Puked on a chick
> > >> while you were making out yet?

> > > Nonsensical but I susupect you have great experience in
> > > puking......your AA buddy probably get a little worn with it.

> > > The reason you react so irrationally is that you realize that the
> > > apparent age argument cannot be disproved.

> > Of course it can't be disproved. That's why it's ludicrous to
> > consider it.

> > > Of course if say 10,000
> > > years ago such was the case in order to get the universe to
> > > operate properly it might well be reasonable to embue it with
> > > characteristics and properties typical of great age.

> > Why not last Thursday? Or why not consider that we are brains in
> > vats?

> > Mark- Hide quoted text -

> > - Show quoted text -

> Because there are recent historical documents, memory of varifiable
> events, and because we have a reliable record of God's acts and a
> demonstrated example of His character which is consistent with truth
> and not trickery.

But it was you who just claimed that things could be created with the
trickery of' "apparent" age.



> Why would anyone resort to irrational imaginary explanations when the
> written evidence is readily available for how all has began and
> unfolded.

But it was you who just claimed that things could be created with the
trickery of' "apparent" age.

> Unless you're an EVO and imagination is your stock in trade.

But it was you who just claimed that things could be created with the
trickery of' "apparent" age.

KP- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Creation of a man instead of a baby or a functioning sun instead of a
gas cloud is not trickery................turn on your brain button and
then come back.

That didn't make any sense at all. Care to try again?

I think that this time his comment makes sense (of a sort). It appears that he's offering Gosse's argument - that cyclical processes in a creation inherently must be created at some point in the cycle. The problem is that while this justifies the creation of adult hippopotami with teeth displaying the wear patterns of adult hippopotami teeth, it doesn't apply universally to all the evidence. While there is a justification for the wear patterns of hippopotami teeth - a hippopotamus with unworn teeth might be in trouble - it doesn't apply to the distribution (or even existence) of radioactive isotopes in rocks, or faunal succession in the fossil record.

It does apply to some things. But it doesn't even apply to wear patterns in teeth. There's no need to create a detailed wear pattern with noticeable scratches, just a tooth with the proper amount of enamel, cement, and dentine in the proper shape. Similarly, created trees would have no need for rings. Appearence of age only makes sense when the the appearance has a specific function. Hippopotami won't work without teeth of the proper shape. But that shape doesn't have to arise through the simulation of wear.

At this point an omphalist will probably go into a rap about god moving in mysterious ways, we mere humans can't know the functions of apparently useless characteristics, who are you to question god, etc.

Or he could try a silly answer. It's been said that we don't have new stars appearing constantly in the night sky (as the light of their creation reaches us) because that would be too weird and would frighten us, or that it would make creation too obvious and destroy the need for faith, or that they were all needed right away "for signs and seasons", so god created light in flight. No comment is usually necessary after this sort of argument.

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