Quote: Original post by HodgmanI don't want to disrespect your beliefs, but for what it's worth: you can "not believe in evolution" just as much as you can "not believe in gravity".

Whether you believe or not, gravity will pull you down and nature will evolve.

I'd like to see you perform a scientific experiment to test evolution. They are not in the same league at all. Approaching evolution from a scientific basis is much more akin to cosmology, and inherently less certainty can be given to interpretation of data... scientists can measure gravity to one part in a million, but they only agree on the age of the universe to the nearest few billion years.

Or, climate change. The news and politicians have started saying anyone who doesn't agree is in the same boat as Young Earthers, but there are loads of smart people who don't buy Al Gore's version.

This doesn't mean I'm saying evolution is bunk. But saying it's as well understood and scientifically solid as gravity is.

Quote: Original post by Hodgman

Quote: Original post by d000hg
but you can't prove how it happened because science doesn't pretend to cover miracles [wink]

Yep, whenever you ask "I wonder if a magic man did it?" you're choosing to leave science/reality behind ;)

If you make a full recovery from a condition doctors and scientists tell you is incurable, what's the scientific way to present this? What exactly would have to happen before you'd question the possibility of outside intervention?

Quote: Original post by d000hg

Quote: Original post by Hodgman

Quote: Original post by d000hg
but you can't prove how it happened because science doesn't pretend to cover miracles [wink]

Yep, whenever you ask "I wonder if a magic man did it?" you're choosing to leave science/reality behind ;)

If you make a full recovery from a condition doctors and scientists tell you is incurable, what's the scientific way to present this?

"For reasons unknown." That's what I'd say, anyway.

Quote: Original post by d000hg
What exactly would have to happen before you'd question the possibility of outside intervention?

I can't speak for anybody else, but unless the Hand of God literally parted the heavens, touched the patient and he got out of bed cured, then I don't think anything would convice me, personally.

I do believe it is possible for the human mind to overcome many illnesses in ways that we do not currently understand, however I don't believe there is any "external" entity acting on these people's behalf.

Quote: Original post by Yodaman Jer

Quote: I may have misunderstood you, but it seems like you are saying that the only explanation as to why some plants have positive effects on the human body when ingested, while others have no effect, and others have negative effects, is that the positive effect ones (which humans have labelled as medical ingredients) have been put there specifically by God so that we may learn how to use them for our benefit?

Do you really believe that? And can you really not think of other explanation?

Essentially what I meant is that it seems very likely that God put them there for our benefit, then granted us the ability to learn and to discover. And yes, I really believe that.

I think the value of this observation as a proof of the existence of God is beside the point. Discussion of whether or not God exists is even borderline off-topic. Given the topic of this thread, it's fair to argue from the assumption that God does exist (if I understand WillC, he missed this point). The argument that's relevant to this thread is that God has provide so many medically useful plants that it is unlikely he didn't intend for us to use them. It's not an argument about the existence of God, but about the nature of God given that He does exist.

Quote: Original post by Hodgman
Yep, whenever you ask "I wonder if a magic man did it?" you're choosing to leave science/reality behind

It's not so much that as that the scientific method only treats repeatable events while miracles are, by most definitions, not repeatable or even one-off events, so he's right in saying that science doesn't even pretend to cover miracles. Or, to put it another way, any test of the Christian God would have to account for both selection bias and it being an open trial (and I'm sure a social scientist could point out more issues).

Quote:
A belief that makes sense might be "while gravity exists, I don't believe it is the force that created the Earth" or, "while evolution exists, I don't believe that humans evolved from lower life forms".

Would you say that, "Humans did evolve from lower life forms," or, "Humans did not evolve from lower life forms," is a belief that makes sense? Just curious if you allow stronger statements than your examples.

I think part of the problem with the evolution discussion is that, as far as I understand it, the term is used to refer to evolution proper, the idea that species change over time, and a particular mechanism for evolution, random mutation with natural selection. The way I'd word my particular doubt about evolution is that I'm not sure whether the driving force for random mutation/natural selection is strong enough to account for the variety that's observed over time. What I'd like to see is something like the Drake equation, but for evolution by random mutation/natural selection. Anybody know of anything?

"Imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in, fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for."

-Douglas Adams

So what exactly is the definition of a "lower life form?" Anything that isn't human?

Quote: Original post by Oberon_Command
So what exactly is the definition of a "lower life form?" Anything that isn't human?

If it's part of the myth that made evolution initially palatable, where evolution is tied to ideas of technological progress and moral superiority, then "not human" is pretty much what it means. However, this goes by what humans value (e.g. intelligence), not what evolution "values" (me or my descendants continuing to be alive).

More scientifically, you could be referring to species that just happened to come earlier or had traits that necessarily come earlier (the human eye is the current step in some chain of transformations).

Combining the two, you could say that the Earth hasn't changed that much since life has appeared, so there may be a limiting set of species that will form at some point in the future that are better than all previous species. "Lower" species are further from this limiting set than "higher" species. "Better" according to evolution, but if we're an indication of where evolution is headed, then it may by coincidence (or not, insofar as we've evolved to like ourselves) also be better by our own judgment.

Quote: Original post by Yodaman Jer
Essentially what I meant is that it seems very likely that God put them there for our benefit, then granted us the ability to learn and to discover. And yes, I really believe that.

I’m not sure I follow how you come to the conclusion that it’s ‘very likely’ that God put them there for our benefit? If we’re assuming God exists and we’re assuming that he created the life we see around us, then we have to be talking about a really evil nasty piece of work. One that has created a massive amount of suffering on a daily basis for the vast majority of life on earth which is struggling to just to survive. Surely it's just as likely that he put the poisonous plants on earth so he could watch our ancestors suffer as they tried to work out, by a process of trial and error, which plants are food and which ones killed them?

It seems equally plausible to me that he’s actually pretty pissed off that we’ve got so smart, ‘cus we’re ruining his fun game of watching animals on earth suffer in the struggle for survival.

Quote: Original post by WillC

Quote: Original post by Yodaman Jer
Essentially what I meant is that it seems very likely that God put them there for our benefit, then granted us the ability to learn and to discover. And yes, I really believe that.

I’m not sure I follow how you come to the conclusion that it’s ‘very likely’ that God put them there for our benefit? If we’re assuming God exists and we’re assuming that he created the life we see around us, then we have to be talking about a really evil nasty piece of work. One that has created a massive amount of suffering on a daily basis for the vast majority of life on earth which is struggling to just to survive. Surely it's just as likely that he put the poisonous plants on earth so he could watch our ancestors suffer as they tried to work out, by a process of trial and error, which plants are food and which ones killed them?

It seems equally plausible to me that he’s actually pretty pissed off that we’ve got so smart, ‘cus we’re ruining his fun game of watching animals on earth suffer in the struggle for survival.

Yep. I think this quote from Sir David Attenborough sums it up nicely.

Quote:
My response is that when Creationists talk about God creating every individual species as a separate act, they always instance hummingbirds, or orchids, sunflowers and beautiful things. But I tend to think instead of a parasitic worm that is boring through the eye of a boy sitting on the bank of a river in West Africa, [a worm] that's going to make him blind. And , 'Are you telling me that the God you believe in, who you also say is an all-merciful God, who cares for each &#111;ne of us individually, are you saying that God created this worm that can live in no other way than in an innocent child's eyeball? Because that doesn't seem to me to coincide with a God who's full of mercy'.<!–QUOTE–></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE><!–/QUOTE–><!–ENDQUOTE–><br>

Quote: Original post by d000hg
I'd like to see you perform a scientific experiment to test evolution. They are not in the same league at all.

Ok -- here's one. Get 2 adults, get them to have a child. Compare the parents DNA to the childs DNA.
Does the child have DNA from both parents (and perhaps a few random mutations too)? If so, evolution just occurred.

Here's another one: put 50 species of insects in a toxic environment. Wait 3 months to see which species survived the hostile environment. Did some species survive while others didnt? If so, natural selection just occurred. Are the new generations of these insects more resilient to this environment than the original specimens? If so, generational evolution just occurred.

Or here's one you can do at home: model a genetic system in your computer. Add an arbitrary fitness function. Kill off any specimens that fail the fitness test. Does the average fitness of the population increase over the generations? If so, they've evolved.

All of these experiments have been done, and the results have lined up with the theory.

Quote: Approaching evolution from a scientific basis is much more akin to cosmology, and inherently less certainty can be given to interpretation of data...

How else do you approach evolution except from a scientific basis?
To quote wikipedia:
Any physical theory is always provisional, in the sense that it is only a hypothesis; you can never prove it. No matter how many times the results of experiments agree with some theory, you can never be sure that the next time the result will not contradict the theory. On the other hand, you can disprove a theory by finding even a single observation that disagrees with the predictions of the theory.

Quote: This doesn't mean I'm saying evolution is bunk. But saying it's as well understood and scientifically solid as gravity is.

I compared it to gravity in the sense that they are both solid accepted scientific theories.
The models of reality presented by both theories offer complete sets of non-contradictory rules that can be used to make real-world predictions, which can then be experimentally verified/falsified.
If you use the rules presented in the theory to make a prediction, and then show via experiment that the prediction is false then the theory is instantly bunk.
What is wrong with this comparison?

Quote: Original post by d000hg
If you make a full recovery from a condition doctors and scientists tell you is incurable, what's the scientific way to present this?

The doctors and scientists were wrong. Science isn't necessarily true you know, it's just a non-contradictory model.

Quote: What exactly would have to happen before you'd question the possibility of outside intervention?

Outside intervention, fine.
But, outside intervention by magic?? Isn't it fairly obvious that as soon as you start considering "magic" as an answer to anything that you've chosen to stop looking for a real answer?

I mean, really... If you're investigating the cause of a fire, and the fire-chief says to stop work because he's concluded that a unicorn started the fire (without any evidence), could you really take him seriously and accept his explanation as being based in reality? Or would you continue sifting through the available data hunting for a real cause?