Intelligent Design vs. Casino Universe

@FBM,

I can't agree--you're sinking to Herald's level when he raves about the big bang. When you address "scientific denialism," that is relevant. When you address faith healing, you address something which you have no reason to assume that Herald supports or believes in. Basically, it's a cheap shot.

1 Reply

@Herald,

http://www.livescience.com/33646-universe-edge.html

Quote:

Does the Universe Have an Edge?
Robert Roy Britt | November 10, 2012 10:02am ET

No. That's the simple answer. And I recommend you stop there and be satisfied, because as soon as you dig deeper, you'll be as confused as the average cosmologist.

One wild cosmological idea imagines the universe as a soccer ball with segments and seams. Think of each segment as a magical sheet of paper. If you traveled to any side, you'd reappear where you started. Toss in a little pixie dust and a few elves, and this one starts to make sense!

You're still reading. Okay, here goes: Imagine ants crawling on a balloon. They can crawl forever and never reach an edge; at best, they might return to where they started.

Of course now you're thinking, "Hey, if I'm inside the balloon and I head outward, I will hit it and that'll sure seem like an edge." Thing is, the balloon is expanding so rapidly that you'll never get there. And even if you did, those same wacky cosmologists that dreamed up the ants-on-a-balloon explanation say they have no clue whether there is more of our universe (or more universes) beyond the limits of the observable one.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

I can't agree--you're sinking to Herald's level when he raves about the big bang. When you address "scientific denialism," that is relevant. When you address faith healing, you address something which you have no reason to assume that Herald supports or believes in. Basically, it's a cheap shot.

I stated openly that I was not accusing him of being one of those who practice faith healing. Only that the culture of self denialism that he so frantically supports also supports faith healing and for that reason should be resisted. I think I used the metaphor of "fertilizer."

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@FBM,

Quote:

I stated openly that I was not accusing him of being one of those who practice faith healing. Only that the culture of self denialism that he so frantically supports also supports faith healing and for that reason should be resisted. I think I used the metaphor of "fertilizer."

How about vaccinations thne? extremely dangerous to once health!

And remember this, repeating non-sense doesn't make it true of course!

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@FBM,

     I doubt that you understand more than 10% of the videos you are using as reference.
     In the one about the form of the Universe in particular are presented all possible hypotheses and in order to prove that some hypothesis is the real case you will have to verify them with all the available knowledge for the Universe - when s.th. is the real case almost everything should perfectly match (except for the fake knowledge, which if we exclude the Big Bang 'theory' is hardly too much).
     Suppose the Universe is a hypotorus and you let a marked up laser beam to go though it - will the beam travel in a circle and is that circle so huge that you will not be able to detect the curvature? What will happen with the beam when it reaches the inner surface of the hypotorus? No matter what might be out there, on the 'other side' - the beam should be reflected - where do you observe anything of the kind in the Universe? ... and where have you received a 'circulating' beam after a round ... and how will the Big Bang have equal red shift in all directions if it is operating within a hypotorus?
     Besides that there is no way to place the telescope 'into the center' of the torus, for you don't have any access to that hyperspace out there ... not to mention that the probability for the telescope to be into the center of the Universe (no matter the form of the Universe) is 10^-84, which is virtually impossible and is far beyond any acceptable physical margin of feasible probability.

1 Reply

@Herald,

First of all the theory of the Big Bang predicted CMB which was proven to be true when it was discovered.
Theories should make predictions. The Big Bang Theory does.
Secondly, CMB doesn't show there is no light reflected from the edge of the universe. If anything CMB would show you don't have evidence of whether light reflects from the edge of the universe.

1 Reply

@parados,

parados wrote:

First of all the theory of the Big Bang predicted CMB

     How? Where is the prediction (math formula, formal model or whatever). When the CMB was discovered it simply has been sewn to 'provide more evidences' for the Big Bang and to consolidate the positions of the Big Bang in terms of the static model of the Universe. CMB may simply be reflected and diffused light from the outer surface of the Universe. Just don't start claiming now that the Universe has no outer surface. Even if it doesn't have any 'material membrane' in any case there is some boundary between two media - the 3D space (of the Universe) and the 11D space (of the Hyperspace), which in any case should be able to reflect the light just because they are different media. Besides, if not reflected the light will pass freely into the Hyperspace that will prove that the visible Universe & the Invisible part & the Hyperspace (eventually) are one and the same media (to the light) - hence they are either subsets of each other or are comprising one and the same type of space.
     If the light is getting out of the Universe (as your favorite theory claims) it will be irretrievably lost into the Hyperspace, and the energy that the beam is carrying will be gone forever to us, from where follows that the Universe is continuously losing energy that on its side is shaking seriously the law for conservation of energy of the classical physics.
     All these theories that the Big Bang is above the laws of physics, above the math logic, and as it goes also above the laws of the solid geometry & the Euclidean space, are very suspiciously invalid and unjustified, and hence absolutely inconsistent.

parados wrote:

Secondly, CMB doesn't show there is no light reflected from the edge of the universe.

Exactly - the possible reflection of the light from the outer surface of the Universe is eventually an alternative explanation of the CMB. I don't have sufficient knowledge on the theme, but I am almost sure that a lot of other hypothesis of explaining the CBM may be found as well.

parados wrote:

Theories should make predictions. The Big Bang Theory does.

     Would you name some of them ... and explain how exactly they have been made as predictions by the Big Bang.
     The evidence shows that the Big Bang is simply a huge Black Hole into the center of the Cosmology that is sucking in all the discoveries made by physics, astrophysics, etc., by claiming that it is the origin of the Universe. What are the predictions (& the explanations) of the Big Bang 'theory' in terms of the Black Holes, for example ... or perhaps in terms of the Dark Matter?
     If the mess in Cosmology becomes greater and greater with every fundamental discovery related to it, this is a sure sign that there must be something totally confused.

1 Reply

@Herald,

Herald wrote:

I doubt that you understand more than 10% of the videos you are using as reference.

You'll never know, will you? Now if only you had such a healthy sense of skepticism about truly outlandish claims, such as for a "personal 45% god-of-the-gaps" and other such magical thoughts that truly have no evidential support.

Quote:

In the one about the form of the Universe in particular are presented all possible hypotheses and in order to prove that some hypothesis is the real case you will have to verify them with all the available knowledge for the Universe...

It's so easy to make outrageous demands for all knowledge of all aspects of the universe, innit? Because such is impossible, you will always have a hypothetical gap to fallaciously wedge your favorite feel-good god into. But how do you respond to a similar challenge to present equivalent evidence for your "personal 45% god-of-the-gaps"? Evasion, obfusction, red herrings, strawmen, ie, all sorts of intellectual dishonesty. You know what you're pushing is bullshit, and that you're a con artist. Let's see an example of your con work:

What do you actually know about your god? Where does its power come from? What's it made of? How old is it? Does it have a gender? Is it eternal or was it also created? What evidence do you have that such a being actually exists outside your imagination?

Your con artist response (obfuscation, red herring, strawmen, evasion, goal post shifting, etc) goes here:

1 Reply

@FBM,

FBM wrote:

You'll never know

O.K., how do you explain a Universe without 'outer' surface ... and since when you are studying non-Euclidean solid geometry, let alone using it casually as 'evidence'?

FBM wrote:

if only you had such a healthy sense of skepticism about truly outlandish claims, such as for a "personal 45% god-of-the-gaps" and other such magical thoughts that truly have no evidential support.

First 'god-of-the-gaps' is your personal design & produced on this thread by you top-design straw-man, and in the capacity of being so attached casually (as usual) to something said in completely different context, and second it is 'non-evidential' only to those who are sliding down the aqua rollba of their own double-blinded studies, based exclusively on personal illusions & cross-cultural misunderstanding of the things and also view for free misuse with any scientific & non-scientific knowledge, all of which accepted without any critical justification & presented to the population as axiomatic truth of the last resort, and third what will you say about the big-bang-of-the-gaps concept - everything that can't be explained by math logic, Euclidean geometry, physics, astrophysics and astrobiology is sewn automatically as patch on the 'theory' of the Big Bang ... which in its own is the greatest patch on all indicators & for any age.
O.K., what are your pieces of indisputable evidence & evidential support about the abilities & the capacity of the Big Bang 'theory' to create all the chemical elements out of Higg's bosons ... & Singularity on grill, and to organize, to manage and maintain in operation the Evolution of the Stars ... and in the end as a crown of the achievements to guess to make, to design from ground zero, and to implement and set in operation the Biosphere & Life on Earth?

1 Reply

@FBM,

It's still not relevant, and it's still a cheap shot. It has nothing to do with the topic and nothing to do with your interlocutor. It's an emotive appeal against a stand your interlocutor has not taken.

EDIT: That's also an accusation of guilt by association

1 Reply

@Herald,

That's funny. You accuse me of coming up with the 'god-of-the-gaps' as a strawman, then immediately launch back into the god-of-the-gaps fallacy yet again. To wit:

Quote:

O.K., how do you explain a Universe without 'outer' surface

It doesn't matter how I explain it; I don't. I'm not a professional in that field. What matters is that you're trying to find a gap in scientific knowledge where you can wedge your god into. God of the gaps fallacy.

Quote:

First 'god-of-the-gaps' is your personal design & produced on this thread by you top-design straw-man

The god-of-the-gaps fallacy predates my awareness of it, therefore it is not of my personal design. You have openly acknowledged that you are promoting the supernatural diety hypothesis, but instead of showing positive evidence for the existence of such a diety, you're spending all your time pointing to gaps in scientific knowledge. A blind man can put two and two together. If you want to avoid the god of the gaps fallacy, start spending your time promoting positive evidence for the existence of your diety, instead.

"double-blind" You keep using this word. I don't think this word means what you think it means. We are not talking about medical studies here.

Quote:

O.K., what are your pieces of indisputable evidence & evidential support about the abilities & the capacity of the Big Bang 'theory' to create all the chemical elements out of Higg's bosons ... & Singularity on grill,

The presumption being that if I can't personally, as an amateur, explain every detail of every aspect of every hypothesis or theory in cosmological science, then there's room for your god hypothesis. God of the gaps fallacy in exquisite relief.

Thing is, we could link you to tons more scientific work than we already have, but you're so deep into your denialism that it wouldn't make any difference. We have shown you to be fundamentally ignorant of the predominant scientific concepts over and over and over again, yet you still continue to pursue your god of the gaps fallacy, no matter how thoroughly you've been exposed.

On the internet, we're floating on an ocean of information. You can find the answers to your questions if you really want. But you don't really want to know or learn. You're only interested in constructing rhetorical, hypothetical gaps that you can squeeze in the slight possibilility of your supernatural explanation into. In short, you're still just screaming, "God of the gaps! God of the gaps! God of the gaps! God of the gaps! God of the gaps! God of the gaps! God of the gaps!"

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

It's still not relevant, and it's still a cheap shot. It has nothing to do with the topic and nothing to do with your interlocutor. It's an emotive appeal against a stand your interlocutor has not taken.

EDIT: That's also an accusation of guilt by association

I do understand your objections, and you may turn out to be right. I'm only explaining my current understanding of my motivations for engaging in the debate. I'm open to the possibility that I might later reflect on my involvement and find fault in it. I've done it before. I would point out a couple of things, though.

First, I clearly stated that I am not accusing Herald himself of being guilty of faith healing, only science denialism. To that extent, I'm still convinced that my assessment is accurate. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Second, the broader mindset of science denialism has a variety of manifestations, such as anti-vaxers, climate change denialism, faith healing, witchcraft, crystal healing, homeopathy, etc etc. As far as I can tell, none of these people take up science denialism as their ultimate cause. They only engage in science denialism in order to further their particular version of woo. Conversely, if one takes up the broader cause of defending the scientific approach, one might find oneself at different times opposing anti-vaxers, climate change deniers, faith healers, witches, crystal healers, homeopaths, etc etc, any of whom I'm just as willing to engage.

In this particular exchange, I'm engaging a g0d-of-the-gaps theist who is using science denialism to promote faith in a diety that he himself has professed only a 45% confidence in. This 45% is less than the probability of the results of a coin toss, yet he demands that it has more explanatory power than all of the accumulated scientific knowledge to date. I feel no remorse in ridiculing such a ridiculous claim, approach or mindset. It's no different from when I give a student a failing mark on an exam if s/he expresses a conclusion that contradicts prevailing research on a particular topic.

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@FBM,

FBM wrote:

It doesn't matter how I explain it; I don't.

This is obvious, and the next question is: 'If you don't have the vaguest interpretation of the form of the Universe, how did you come to know that the 'theory' of the Big Bang is absolutely valid? How do you assign the truth values to undefined formal math model ... and how do you validate undefined variables ... when you don't even know how many of them actually might be?

FBM wrote:

I'm not a professional in that field.

If you are not a professional in the field, how do you assess which text is science-like, which is pseudo-scientific and which is actually saying something, justified by verifiable evidence?

FBM wrote:

What matters is that you're trying to find a gap in scientific knowledge where you can wedge your god into. God of the gaps fallacy.

No, I am verifying the claims one by one, and I am not looking to put any God/ID anywhere. If this is the plausible and feasible hypothesis - so let it be so, but I am not looking especially for anything of the kind. This is your roughest error - you a priori & axiomatically accept that there has been any Big Bang ever happening (& creating whatever there might be), and after that you start attaching various patches to your 'theory' in order to reinforce it and to prevent the it from collapsing.
BTW you cannot interpret how I am thinking with your way of reasoning & your understanding of the world ... and attitude to the things. This is called cross cultural misunderstanding ... in any interpretation of the world.

FBM wrote:

The god-of-the-gaps fallacy predates my awareness of it, therefore it is not of my personal design.

     Can't you really see your personal logical fallacies, like for example:
     ●ad hominems - you attack the person and give qualifications to the person instead of discussing and providing any justification on the argument;
     ●appeal to ignorance - so and so nobody can present any evidence that the Big Bang cannot exist, therefore the Big Bang must have happened;
      ●argument from omniscience - I always know what (and how) you are thinking and in the capacity of being omniscient I can always comment casually any of your claims;
     ●appeal to tradition - just because some 'scientists' feel comfortable with the Big Bang 'theory' it must be true (no matter whether I understand anything of what it is claiming or not);
      ●argument ad ignorantiam - if you don't start believing in the Big Bang you are 'obviously' illiterate and ignorant;
     ●bandwagon fallacy - there are so many people having earned so much money ... and power around the Big Bang 'theory' that there is no way for the idea not to have some merits - so many people are believing in it and/or use it as a springboard for their scientific careerism;
     ●begging the question - (to assuming the answer) We must encourage our youth to believe in the Big Bang 'theory' in order to lay down the scientific foundations of the society. But does the Big Bang (and the design of the mythology around it) actually produce any scientific foundations?;
     ●confirmation bias - refers to selective thinking that focuses on evidence that supports what the followers of the Big Bang 'theory' already believe, while ignoring evidence that refutes the fake claims;
     ●confusion of correlation & causation - the Big Bang 'theory' has more Nobel prices than any religious order, therefore the Big Bang should be a better theory than any explanation of the world by the Church;
     ●excluded middle - it is either the Big Bang 'theory' or God and there is no other ILFs in-between ... that is a priori and axiomatically (without any serious justification) excluded;
     ●misunderstanding of statistics - whenever one has any stochastics it is not obligatory to have probabilistic function of distribution, for stochastics can exist without any function of probabilistic distribution;
     ●misrepresentation - we don't know what the assumptions of the Big Bang actually are ... or could be, but this does not deprive us from the opportunity to present the gap of our knowledge as an advantage of the scientific method;
     ●observational selection & delegation of blame - pointing out favorable circumstances while ignoring the unfavorable - if the Universe cannot explain whether it has surface membrane or not - so much worse to the astrophysics ... for with the Big Bang everything is hunky dori;
     ●proving non-existence - so and so, we the fans of the Big Bang 'theory' hereby, would never be able to prove that God does not exist (having in mind that we are even unable to verify the assumptions of our own top-design 'theory'), why don't we challenge the opponents to prove that God exists ... thus for them will be much worse as well.

1 Reply

@Herald,

Well, argumentum ad ignorantiam is your special fallacy, not mine. All I'm asking is that you provide some positive support for your god hypothesis rather than continue to appeal to the negative god-of-the-gaps fallacy. Show us some positive evidence for your god. Otherwise, you got nothing.

1 Reply

@FBM,

FBM wrote:

Well, argumentum ad ignorantiam is your special fallacy, not mine.

You haven't answer the question: 'If you don't have the vaguest interpretation of the form of the Universe, how did you come to know that the 'theory' of the Big Bang is absolutely valid?

1 Reply

@Herald,

Herald wrote:

FBM wrote:
Well, argumentum ad ignorantiam is your special fallacy, not mine.
You haven't answer the question: 'If you don't have the vaguest interpretation of the form of the Universe, how did you come to know that the 'theory' of the Big Bang is absolutely valid?

I have a pretty good understanding of the form of the universe because I rely on empirical evidence and necessary inference, rather than wishful thinking for such things as immortality.

What empirical evidence do you have for your god-of-the-gaps? How did you come to know that the 'theory' of the God of the Gaps is absolutely valid?

The evidence for the scientific explanation is on full display for everyone to examine. Where is your evidence for your 45% god hypothesis? Why do you insist on hiding it from us?

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@Herald,

For those that are too stupid to do their own research...

http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/bb_tests_cmb.html

Quote:

The existence of the CMB radiation was first predicted by Ralph Alpherin 1948 in connection with his research on Big Bang Nucleosynthesis undertaken together with Robert Herman and George Gamow.

If light is reflecting it would be seen as light in the same wavelength. If light was reflecting why would it result in a constant low level microwave radiation? Your hypothesis fails just based on the principles of how reflected light acts.

Quote:

Would you name some of them ... and explain how exactly they have been made as predictions by the Big Bang.

I already did. Rather than accepting facts, you seem to want argue your fantasies.

1 Reply

Does this sound familiar? It's Herod and all the trivial crap questions about nth-dimensional hyperspace, valid assumptions for blah blah, etc etc. In other words, just another amateurish and intellectually dishonest rhetorical approach: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Gish_Gallop

Quote:

Gish Gallop

The Gish Gallop is the debating technique of drowning the opponent in such a torrent of small arguments that their opponent cannot possibly answer or address each one in real time. More often than not, these myriad arguments are full of half-truths, lies, and straw-man arguments — the only condition is that there be many of them, not that they be particularly compelling on their own. They may be escape hatches or "gotcha" arguments that are specifically designed to be brief, but take a long time to unravel. Thus, galloping is frequently used in timed debates (especially by creationists) to overwhelm one's opponent.

Examples are commonly found in "list" articles that may claim to show "100 reasons for" something, or "50 reasons against" something. At this sort of level, with dozens upon dozens of minor arguments, each individual point on the list may only be a single sentence or two, and many may be a repeat or vague re-wording of a previous one. This is the intention: although it is trivial amount of effort on the part of the galloper to make a point, particularly if they just need to re-iterate an existing one a different way, a refutation may take much longer and someone addressing will be unable to refute all points in a similarly short order. If even one argument in a Gish Gallop is left standing at the end, or addressed insufficiently, the galloper will attempt to claim victory.

The term was coined by Eugenie Scott of the National Center for Science Education, named after creationist Duane Gish.[1] Creationists are fond of it; see "101 evidences for a young age of the Earth and the universe" for example, which is perhaps the most stunning case. Sam Harris describes the technique as "starting 10 fires in 10 minutes."
...

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@FBM,

I was in a presentation by Duane Gish at a "Creation in His Name" lecture. I and two of my students came in and sat down.
During the Q and A I asked him how Creation "Science" explains biogeography, specifically island , cavern, and topographic speciation where these local cave species and island species were entirely different from their parent species and how those differentiated species only occur in those very localized environments.

We were asked to leave the "fest".

It was open to all who were true believers in Creation "Science"

I was actually afraid for my students who came along . But they thought it was great fun.

The NCSE has taken on so many different fights these days that I dropped my membership, where Id been active since 1988 (about a year after the Edwards v Aguillard USCS case)

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@farmerman,

lol

Quote:

"two of my students"???????????????

Whoaaa!!! poor kids! And you still, even now haven't adressed any issue!
You keep in the black/white creation/evolution mode.
BOTH ideologies btw!

1 Reply

Intelligent Design vs. Casino Universe

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