Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

Your knowledge of Dawkins readily available work is obviously encyclopedic.

spendi, You are attacking the messenger and not the message. duh!

It's a ridiculous contention that all the pain and suffering in the world is caused by religion as if there are no other explanations.

Is the thinking process a creation of modern man or is modern man a creation of the thinking process?

But the thinking process pats itself on the back and thinks of itself as a superior part of life and thus blinded it cannot survey the world without prejudice.It takes it for granted,as professors tend to do, that thought,cold abstract thought, is the only way to approach "last things" or,if you like "irreducible complexity".Thought ends up imagining a satisfying picture which blots out the unknowable mysteries.Life is about more than thinking.Because we think doesn't mean we consist of thinking.

It's a circularity really and a very useful one.

Are not given animal urges the cause of all the pain and suffering."They are on our land and they are screwing our women" is one way of saying it.Your football is about territory and impressing women isn't it?So is ours.

Is Dawkins going to call for a suppression of animal urges?Gee-that's Religion's task and so far it has only mitigated them slightly and imperfectly.
Of course one might do it using chemicals or surgery even which is all Science can offer.

One oughtn't to continually confuse the imperfections with the aim.

spendi, You always talk in circles; very few people reading your posts understand what you're trying to say.

You wrote: Is Dawkins going to call for a suppression of animal urges?

Plain idiocy.

What you think is "plain idiocy" c.i. is not scientific evidence that it is.I'll admit to over-simplifying but I feel it is necessary to keep posts brief.

Here's more about that programme:

Root of all Evil, The - Documentary & Factual

Professor Richard Dawkins, the world-renowned evolutionary biologist, whose atheism has earned him the nickname of 'Darwin's Rottweiler', takes a personal journey through the world's three great monotheistic religions: Christianity, Judaism and Islam.

Dawkins thinks it is time for science to stop sitting on the fence. In the light of overwhelming scientific evidence that, he believes, shows a supreme being cannot exist, and in a world in which religious conflict and bigotry are increasingly centre stage, Dawkins argues that for the good of humanity, religion needs to be challenged and disproved. Never one to shy away from a debate, Dawkins meets leaders from the Christian, Jewish and Muslim religions to find out how their beliefs fit with modern science's extraordinary knowledge of our world and the wider universe.

In The Root of All Evil Dawkins accuses the religious establishment of preying on people's desire to believe in a greater being; abusing reason and humanity in the process. Ultimately he asks how they can defend what religion has done, and is doing to us?

Dawkins is overextending the reach of science with that. Supernatural concepts can not be proven/disproven by science. They don't relate.

However, his point about challenging the rational validity of supernatural beings who interact with and alter the natural world, is basically valid.

While it is possible that there is a teacup orbiting pluto, it is not reasonable for anyone to claim that such a thing exists, just because it hasn't been disproven.



Those are tough questions for religions to answer. Obviously, good and bad consequences can result from almost any human behavior, but in the overall scheme of things, religion might have a difficult time coming out on the positive side of the balance.

For the thinking man solutions to problems are either right or wrong.The causality side.

For the man of action,engaged with life,solutions are either valuable or otherwise.The Destiny side.

The thinking man believes that he is significant and should run things but in fact he is riding along on the coat tails of life.Dawkins will be unknown in 200 years.Mr Putin,Mr Bush and Mr Blair's actions will be read about and discussed by the thinking men of that time and other men of action will be changing the course of Destiny.

I too gotta disagree with Dawkins' assertion "God Cannot Exist" - all that science can say in that regard is that to within a statistically very significant degree of probability, the existance of such a critter is unlikely.

Logic, on the other hand, can make a valid claim for the non-existance of such a critter as the God of the Abrahamic Mythopaeia, as expressed within and defined by that mythopaeia:

The mythopaeia declares its godhead to be "All Perfect"

"Perfect" means without fault, flaw, want, need, or other defect. Adding "All" to the attribute of "Perfect" is nought but a redundancy, though it does rather disambiguate the concept; perfection is an absolute, subject to no qualifier - a thing, state, or condition of being either is perfect or it is not - period.

An All Perfect Entity logically would have neither need nor want to form or create anything. Therefore, to assert that an All Perfect Entity created the universe entails a logical contradiction. Now, whether or not there is or even might be an All Perfect Entity, an All Perfect Entity logically could have had no role in the creation of the universe.

timber has a 'perfect' point; Why would perfection create an imperfection? A contradiction in terms.

Agreed. Likewise it is illogical to assume that an omniscient/omnipotent being would think or act in any way which we might recognize.

Thinking and acting are things which occur over time, and time is just a dimensional effect of spacetime.

Supernatural Omniscient and Omnipotent beings existing outside of time and "before" (if there could be such a concept) creation, simply don't make sense. The concept seems oxymoronic.

I prefer science that is "value-free". I admire science for its objectivity. Scientists who use science to promote any dogma (religious or political) undermine their own credibility. Using science to promote atheism detracts from the contributions Dawkins has made to our understanding of natural science.

That's not exactly the point, c.i. - the point is that an "All Perfect" entity would have neither need nor want to create anything, perfect, imperfect, or otherwise; "perfection", particularly unambiguously as would be entailed by "All Perfect", entails a completeness, leaving nothing to be wanted, needed, or created.

Now that doesn't mean there is not or may not be an all-perfect entity - it just renders creation a concept incompatible with any such entity.

No-the key to timber's fanciful post is this-



and acted upon in terms of value also defined within that system whatever it is.It's when it comes into contact with other mythopaeias with other perfect Gods that it's value is measured.

Logic is for dilettantes compared to action.Two opposing logics had Mr Bush's ear in c.i.'s quote from the stem cell piece.He had to act.They walked away and posed for the cameras.He stays where Mr Truman's buck still is.

Sorry-I'm a bit behind.I was referring to 359 on the last page.

This is a rum logic indeed.

Thinking we can second guess a perfect being.With beer slops down our shirt fronts.Gee whiz.

wand, I must agree with you; there's a world of difference between science and religion, and although Hawkins is a brilliant scientist, even I believe he stepped over the line.

well, Im not one of Sir Richards biggest fans. He has, as this bit of "Trailer" indicates often been caught doing exactly as wand has cautioned science against, the imposition of valyues on the work.
Dawkins has often been called a big loudmouthfor using his position of authority(as a philosopher of science ) to try to convince people of the validity of these beliefs using a bogus scientific approach.
Hes just like the late Jay Gould who, never running from a strict Darwinian argument had never failed to put in some cheap shots for his and Eldreges pet theory. (Even Eldredge has never gone out of his way to proselytize as much as Gould).
Gould and Dawkins had lost lots of respect in the scientific community when their egos got bigger than their science.

It struck me in the pub,from where I have just recently made a somewhat circuitous egress,that logically,if one could second guess the Perfect Being one would have gone a fair old way to proving that one is a perfect being oneself despite a rather a large amount of forensic evidence to the contrary.

spendi wrote:
It struck me in the pub,from where I have just recently made a somewhat circuitous egress,that logically,if one could second guess the Perfect Being one would have gone a fair old way to proving that one is a perfect being oneself despite a rather a large amount of forensic evidence to the contrary.

Will somebody please translate this into English, please?