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Post by christopher on Aug 17, 2008 15:35:30 GMT -8
;D ;D ;D LOL, This is just getting silly. Who said I was "offended" or playing the "victim"? All I’ve said is that I won’t waste my time rebutting ridicule (which really doesn’t have a point to refute) or giving an argument from ignorance (answering the endless unanswerable “why” questions). How convenient for you to take it there Mo. Talk about totally missing the point.  Hear me again say, as I’ve said elsewhere, if someone refutes a point you make by pointing out it’s logical fallacy, that doesn’t somehow put them under obligation to then present a positive case for the idea you are trying to refute. They've already rebutted you in the negative. They may present the positive if they wish to add to the strength of their rebuttal, but the burden of proof is still on you to make a valid point or show where the fallacy that was pointed out is not valid. There is no shift in burden of proof if you make a false assertion. One thing I’ve noticed in your approach is that you are regularly soliciting arguments from ignorance with all your “why did God…” questions. This is a classic atheist smoke screen and very common in debating atheists as if a failure to answer those questions of mystery proves God doesn’t exist. Then when you turn it around and ask similar first cause questions like “where did the big bang matter come from?” they will typically say it’s irrelevant and it doesn’t have to be an uncaused cause. So if an atheist gets to define the terms of the debate, they win huh? I don’t debate like that, and I'm not in it to win. I will (and have) freely admit if I don’t know something. But it does not follow therefore that something is false. You wrote: Please show me where I’ve said “please don’t ridicule me” so I can retract that statement. That’s not my style at all. I don’t care if you ridicule me or not, I’m just not going to get sucked into the trap of defending my views against such non-arguments. I haven’t changed my paradigm at all. Why don’t you read some of the exchanges Josh and I have had. They often get feisty and vigorous but we usually don’t resort to arguments so vacuous as ridicule. I’ll leave that to the judgment of the “objective readers”. I’ve never claimed to be a perfect debater. I’m not aware of places I’ve done it, but If I commit these fallacies, or mis-classify your point with one of them, then please point that out to me. I’ll thank you for it and adjust my argument accordingly (in fact I think I’ve even done that in one thread….Road to Healing?). That’s the fun of it. Iron sharpens iron. I’m constantly refining my debating style as well as my views. I’m good with that. No hard feelings? To be honest, I would much rather use the limited time I have getting back to discussing theology with other Christians. However, I don’t think it will be as easy as that because I know you are working on some responses to me that will likely tempt me to reply in return. But perhaps we can phase it out eventually and we can just agree to disagree agreeably and go our separate threads. I wish you well freund.  |
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Post by christopher on Aug 18, 2008 7:58:00 GMT -8
Josh wrote: I won't go to the mat over this particular issue. But I would say that intelligent Christians (oxymoron in the eyes of some  ) disagree on this issue. I will also say that you need to do something with the verse I quoted about Eve's new found "pain" in childbirth, and the serpent going on his belly (I'm not sure how credible this is, but I seem to recall hearing about fossils being found of serpent-like creatures with a leg or two...that could've been made up so I'm not going to use it as an argument, only a suggestion for further exploration). |
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Post by Josh on Aug 18, 2008 13:24:42 GMT -8
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Post by Josh on Aug 21, 2008 20:46:46 GMT -8
I have a direct question: What strength, in your opinion, do wisdom teeth enable? The cost-benefit analysis seems to indicate that they cost more than they benefit and hence have to be removed in the majority of the cases. The reason we have wisdom teeth is that before the dental medicine emerged, many people lost teeth in their teenage years. Wisdom teeth were an insurance policy, filling in gaps lost during those reckless years, when in pre-medical societies teeth are most likely to be lost. Also, it is highly debated whether even in our day wisdom teeth should be routinely taken out as a preventative measure. |
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Post by moritz on Aug 22, 2008 11:10:07 GMT -8
The reason we have wisdom teeth is that before the dental medicine emerged, many people lost teeth in their teenage years. Wisdom teeth were an insurance policy, filling in gaps lost during those reckless years, when in pre-medical societies teeth are most likely to be lost. So far so good. Now, wouldn't you agree that it's pretty strange God gave us just ONE pair of wisdomteeth on each side? What kind of insurance policy is that? Wouldn't it have made much more sense to have a "tooth-growing-system" like a shark, that simply grows a new tooth everytime it loses one? |
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Post by Josh on Aug 22, 2008 11:25:41 GMT -8
This is where the cost-benefit analysis comes into play, for those who know enough about this stuff to analyze it.
We can't just think of the benefit of "shark-like reproducing teeth" without thinking how such a system would "cost us". In layman's terms, what other features would we have to give up to have a fully optimized dental situation? I'd venture to say a lot. And since pound for pound (or tooth by tooth) teeth are not as essential to us as they are to sharks, it's not nearly as important to optimize the dental system when there are other features to focus space and energy on in humans.
Spatial and energy limitations, which is one way to define "creatureliness" in the first place, mean that everything can't be fully optimized in creatures. Some things are, many things aren't.
It would be the same when designing a robot or a machine.
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Post by moritz on Aug 22, 2008 11:34:01 GMT -8
This is where the cost-benefit analysis comes into play, for those who know enough about this stuff to analyze it. We can't just think of the benefit of "shark like reproducing teeth" without thinking how such a system would "cost us". In super layman's terms, what other features would we have to give up to have a fully optimized dental situation? I'd venture to say a lot. And since pound for pound (or tooth by tooth) teeth are not as essential to us as they are to sharks, it's not nearly as important to optimize the dental system when there are other features to focus space and energy on in humans. Does that mean God wouldn't have been able to optimize our dentition without loss? |
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Post by Josh on Aug 22, 2008 12:21:12 GMT -8
Yes, given the parameters He chose to set in the universe (physical laws).
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Post by moritz on Aug 25, 2008 1:57:23 GMT -8
Yes, given the parameters He chose to set in the universe (physical laws). But he himself, according to the Bible, chose to break those physical laws whenever he felt like it (walking on the water, multiplying bread, resurrection etc. etc.). Don't tell me he couldn't have optimized our dentition. You said God is omnipotent. PS: I'm still expecting your promised reply on previous points in this thread (at the beginning). |
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Post by Josh on Aug 25, 2008 5:55:57 GMT -8
Miracles like walking on the water are considered especially miraculous because they are temporary suspensions of what we think is normal, natural phenomenon.
God doesn't desire that we always walk on water (probably for the same reasons I mentioned above), just that it happened uniquely once (or a very few times) for specific reasons. The same goes for similar miracles.
From another angle: Miracles like walking on the water, feeding the 5,000, have nothing to do with "optimization" anyway, or with how God wants the human experience to be like in general.
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Post by moritz on Aug 26, 2008 2:24:47 GMT -8
Miracles like walking on the water are considered especially miraculous because they are temporary suspensions of what we think is normal, natural phenomenon. God doesn't desire that we always walk on water (probably for the same reasons I mentioned above), just that it happened uniquely once (or a very few times) for specific reasons. The same goes for similar miracles. From another angle: Miracles like walking on the water, feeding the 5,000, have nothing to do with "optimization" anyway, or with how God wants the human experience to be like in general. *sigh* you are consistently avoiding my points. You're saying God couldn't have done it another way. Yet you say he is omnipotent. You are contradicting yourself. Miracles, no matter with what intention or purpose show that he could have it another way if he desired. The fact that he gave us just one pair of wisdom teeth as a backup is totally random. They sit in a part of our jaw where they haven't got enough space. They used to have enough space when our jaws were still more apelike. But as evolution continued, our jaws became too small. This didn't hinder our reproduction and so it persists until this present day. That's the most logical explanation. If God was the designer, he obviously did a bad job there. |
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Post by sonlyte on Aug 30, 2008 20:46:00 GMT -8
Interesting discussion...  Sorry to eavesdrop, but I tend to be rather fascinated by most forms of science, and the wonder of the universe past and present.  "Sure, this will require a definition of perfection. I’ll provide one: Perfection is, broadly, a state of completeness and flawlessness. (Wikipedia)." Moritz (Yeah I don't spend enough time on here to learn how to pull a quote from earlier in the thread.) Moritz, I am wondering, would you maintain that if God was truly the designer of the universe, all created things would be perfect according to this definition of perfection? (I am aware that your first usage of the term was in response to Chris' statment.) And to anyone who knows the authoritative position of intelligent design (if there is one): Is the idea of intelligent design anti-evolutionary in every way? (It appears so from the video earlier on in this thread) |
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Post by moritz on Aug 31, 2008 5:43:29 GMT -8
Interesting discussion... Sorry to eavesdrop, but I tend to be rather fascinated by most forms of science, and the wonder of the universe past and present. Moritz, I am wondering, would you maintain that if God was truly the designer of the universe, all created things would be perfect according to this definition of perfection? (I am aware that your first usage of the term was in response to Chris' statment.) I'm not sure if I understood the question. I think it is self evident that we are neither complete nor flawless. Hence it seems safe to say that we aren't perfectly designed. IF God exists, one could argue that we are designed exactly like God wanted us to be. Perfect imperfection in other words. IF God was the creator and that was a fact I couldn't get around, I would still stand here and ask myself what the Lord might have thought when he designed wisdom teeth. It doesn't make much sense. If he wanted to give us an "insurance policy" like Josh suggested, one would expect him to give us an entire set of extra teeth, just like he gave us already two complete sets. The wisdom teeth measure doesn't seem to make much sense. IF God exists, I think the existence of wisdom teeth points at the conclusion that there doesn't have to be a divine purpose behind everything and that we aren't perfectly designed. Given the fact that we don't know whether God exists and what he might be like, I think the existence of wisdom teeth points at the non existence of a designer. If I missed the point, please rearrange the question. |
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Post by sonlyte on Aug 31, 2008 7:59:23 GMT -8
It seems from your response that you understood the question. I don't know why some of the characteristics of the human body could be better than they are. It is possible that the conditions that exist currently are in some way different than those that existed before. (I don't know how long before) I can see how evolution could agree with that, because if it exists now, it likely had a purpose in an earlier stage of development; life doesn't tend to waste energy with evolving traits that don't matter. However my wife is currently taking classes for nursing, and she has been explaining many of the systems and precariously balanced bio-chemical structures, and despite relatively small shortcomings, the human body is truly amazing.  I guess my personal belief in God doesn't require everything to be perfect, and my question was just trying to understand your perspective that way. The idea the God had the power to make it better, but didn't is at the heart of many people's confusion about his character. The problem of pain and suffering tends to have the same root. I have had to deal with God's character with respect to evolution more recently. From what I can tell, the story of life from the beginning seems to be entirely about overcoming great odds, usually at great cost of pain. I have watched the planet earth series that was made by BBC and when I finished it through the tenth time, I noticed that almost every animal and ecosystem that was filmed had one thing in common - suffering.  The animals are always struggling and fighting to survive. I don't think that God really intended to make everything so perfect that it was like a moving painting. A different idea seems to line up better with reality: that God has placed us in a world that needs work to make it right; almost like he left the last few chapters for us to write. Biblically speaking, given that these observations of nature and life are true, then God's view of complete could mean that he was done with his part and ready to hand it off to us. |
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Post by moritz on Sept 2, 2008 1:46:23 GMT -8
However my wife is currently taking classes for nursing, and she has been explaining many of the systems and precariously balanced bio-chemical structures, and despite relatively small shortcomings, the human body is truly amazing. No doubt about it. I guess my personal belief in God doesn't require everything to be perfect Fair enough. and my question was just trying to understand your perspective that way. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask. |
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) disagree on this issue. I will also say that you need to do something with the verse I quoted about Eve's new found "pain" in childbirth, and the serpent going on his belly (I'm not sure how credible this is, but I seem to recall hearing about fossils being found of serpent-like creatures with a leg or two...that could've been made up so I'm not going to use it as an argument, only a suggestion for further exploration).
