If you agree, why continue to attempt to assign the attribute of purpose to the universe throughout the rest of the response?



Up until the point where you write something other than 'I agree', you actually maintain the agreement, but as soon as you delve into the purpose of assigning a purpose to the universe you no longer agree.



That is what fallacy is all about. Equivocation.

Just because both P and Q share some things(1 and 2), does not mean that if P also has 3,4, and 5, then it is reasonable to say that Q also has those things.

That is exactly what you are doing here, and I will show you how.



All known designs = P

The universe = Q

P has 1(intent), 2(purpose), 3(order), 4(designer)

Q seems to have 3

How does the rest follow?

Both apple pie and coffee have sugar. Is an apple pie a drink because of that and that alone? Is coffee a dessert because of that and that alone?

The universe cannot be logically said to be a design simply because it seems to share the attribute of order.

There is your answer JB.

Everything changes. There is nothing that doesn't change, that is a fact of life. Why do things change? Because of motion, everything is in motion. Why do we have motion? Because there is energy.

It always comes back to energy. Something that everything has in common.

My brain is foggy today so I hope that makes sense.

The last quote here - from you - is a presupposition.



Sure they did. They presuppose - because every example of bones equals animal. They find bones and know - because there exists no evidence to the contrary - that the bones belong to an animal.

That is how we grow in knowledge.



Similar in what way?



The above answers your question at the beginning of this post.

If you looked at the evidence and the logical conclusions of science in a similar way you could not make the presupposition of assigning the idea that the universe has a purpose and reason, or that it was designed for one.

Don't kid yourself. You have no real answers to my questions.

And that one, makes no sense at all.

That one descibes the fundamental error in your thinking behind the questions you have asked here.

Across the board.

I like making myself laugh. It is good for the soul!

When I posted the following, there were several defensive responses to it...



My stating the above does not mean that I was talking about anyone specifically. It is simply an irrefutable statement in the sense that the amount of emotional investment necessarily corrolates to the amount of slavery existing in the mind. Acting upon emotion and emotion alone would equate our actions to unconscious re-actions. We would be no different than an animal without the ability to reason.

Emotion therefore is not a good foundation for a belief system.

Should such a belief system have at it's roots certain hinge propositions upon which all else is measured, it can be a dangerous thing. The amount of danger equates to the amount of fallacious reasoning required to maintain it. If one must support the foundation with inherently fallacious reasoning because of the fact that sound reasoning refutes it, there is a problem. It is even larger a problem if the reasoning must make the person feel good. I would hope that that need not be explained.

When there is evidence given in support of a claim, and that has been later demonstrated in such a way that denies the adequacy of the evidence by showing the invalid measures used when entertaining it, and yet the claimant does not accept the validity of that because their self-worth or emotional content cannot handle the idea, there is not much more to be done.

Thus one of the problems inherent in equating one's own value to a belief system, especially one without a reasonable foundation.

Some of the responses throughout this thread invoke the meaning of life and all that it entails. I hold that that meaning is had on an individual basis according to what one has been exposed to and accepts as true. For that aspect, I have a little philosophical humor for you'ins!








A seeker has heard that the wisest guru in all of India lives atop India's highest mountain. So the seeker treks over hill and Delhi until he reaches the fabled mountain. It's incredibly steep, and more than once he slips and falls. By the time he reaches the top, he is covered with cuts and bruises, but there is the guru sitting cross-legged in front of his cave.

"O, wise guru," says the seeker, "I have come to you to ask what the secret of life is."

"Ah, yes, the secret of life." the guru answers. "The secret of life is a teacup!"

"A teacup?" the seeker yells, "I came all the way up here to find the meaning of life is a teacup!!!"

The guru shrugs. "So maybe it isn't a teacup."

Towards the idea presented here in this thread, I have another joke to offer.



I love philosophy!

Abe: I got a riddle for you, Sol. What's green, hangs on a wall, and whistles?

Sol: I give up!

Abe: A herring.

Sol: But a herring isn't green!

Abe: You can paint it green.

Sol: But a herring doesn't hang on a wall!

Abe: Put a nail through it, it hangs on the wall.

Sol: But a herring doesn't whistle!

Abe: So? It doesn't whistle.

Creative saidThis is not the logic I am using.

So you either didn’t understand, or this was a strawman.

Designs do not have purpose or intent (any more than a bridge or a chair has purpose or intent). Only designers can have purpose and intent.

So the correct logic is much simpler: In all cases where the source of order is known, it is the direct result of purposeful intent by a designer. Therefore any order may reasonably be assumed to have been the direct result of intention and purpose by a designer.

The very nature of inductive logic means that it cannot result in proof. It is only an assumption based on similarities.

And the difference Sky?

Do you know the source of the universe? Your argument rests upon that, according to what you just wrote.



The universe is not one of those cases.




Order equates to a designer in either.

That alone is fallacious.

I can drop 5 pennies enough times that they - in at least one of those times - would accidentally land in a geometric design. If I were to conclude that that design had a designer, I would do so without sufficient reason.

A valid argument can be given without proven true premises.

An Irishman walks into a bar in Dublin and orders three pints of Guinness, and drinks them by taking a sip from, then the next, till their gone. He then orders three more. The bartender says, "You know they'd be less likely to go flat if you bought them one at a time."

The man says, "Yeah, I know, but I have two brothers, one in the states and one in Australia. When we all went our separate ways, we promised each other that we would drink this way in memory of the days when we drank together. Each of these is for one of my brothers and the third is for me."

The bartender is touched, and says, "What a great custom."

The Irishman becomes a regular in the bar and always orders the drinks in the same way.

One day he only orders two pints. The other regulars notice this, and a silence falls over the bar. When the Irishman comes back to the bar to order his second round, the bartender says, "Please, accept my condolences, pal."

The Irishman says, "Oh no, everything is fine. I just joined th Mormon Church, and I had to quit drinking!"

Ah, so my eliminating one unnecessary step makes it not the logic you were using?

Designs have purpose, reason, order, and intent because they do not exist on their own. They necessitate a designer.

I understood just fine.

Bare-bones...

All design is orderly and has a designer with intent, purpose, and reason. The universe is orderly. Therefore the universe is a design.

It does not work Sky.

All design is orderly and has a designer with intent, purpose, and reason. The universe is orderly.

That is all you can say. To attribute the rest of the elements which constitute a design, you must presuppose the intent,purpose, and reason because nothing identifies the designer.

The designer is presupposed simply because of the fact that order seems to exist. Order does not equate to design.

So what Creative.

Believe whatever you want.

Whatever makes you happy.

This is as a pure as sound reasoning gets. It's precisely valid reasoning.

Moreover, this argument doesn't even need to be made. It's automatic.

The only alternative to "design" is "happenstance" (or randomness).

So the only real question under consideration is whether or not this universe is happenstance. And science has shown us quite clearly that it's not happenstance.

In fact, we don't even need to observed anything as highly ordered as life evolving on planets. That's not even required to clearly see that this universe is not happenstance.

And if it's not happenstance, then it must be designed. Because that's the only alternative.

Here's the scientific proof:

This universe has been "created" (quite literally "created", if we are to accept the scientific hypothesis of Inflation Theory).

And of course that is science not religion!

In fact, let me quote Shoku at this time to emphasize this point:



And where does he get his information on this? He certainly can't speak for me. I can assure you of that much. I am coming from a very scientific and pragmatic point of view. No religion required.

Now let me also quote CreativeSoul to emphasize the same point:



So what? Unless you are actually accusing someone of this, then it's not even on topic. It's just a totally irrelevant idea that may or may not be true in any particular situation depending on precisely what context it's referring to. In the meantime, it has absolutely nothing to do with this topic unless you are confessing your own emotional investments in your belief systems concerning this topic. Otherwise it has nothing to do with the topic at hand.

~~~

Now getting back to the scientifically observed facts concerning the nature of this universe we can ask if the universe is happenstance. Well, all we need to do is look at the very foundational structure of this universe to see that it's clearly not happenstance.

From observation we have seen that this universe is made up of at least 70 sextillion stars. That 70 thousand billion billion billion stars. That's a lot of matter from a human perspective. Moreover if we think of those stars in terms of their constituent building blocks we can ask how many atoms are contained within each star. Well stars vary in size by quite a bit so that would be a hard quantity to put an actual number on, but from the perspective of the human mind we may as well say that there are "countless" atoms in each star. Far greater numbers of atoms than the human mind can even comprehend. In fact, we can't even comprehend the meaning of 70 sextillion stars to begin with.

Well, now we can ask how many different kinds of atoms are there in this universe?

The answer appears to be "about 100". This is a number that most humans can count up to in less than a minute. In fact if you've every rolled pennies you've even held a hundred objects in your hand. You can actually get a "feel" for the concept of "One Hundred Objects". It's well within our cerebral reach.

Well that's approximately the total number of different kinds of atoms in this observable universe. From a scientific point of view we can be sure of this because, no matter what stars or galaxies we look at, we see the spectral lines of only these few elements.

So, are the elements of the universe "happenstance". No. Clearly not! They are extremely limited and not at all what would be expected from a totally happenstance event. If atoms were happenstance we'd expect to find all manner of atoms in a universe this large. Some compatible, some not.

As it turns out, every atom in this universe can form bonds with every other atom in this universe. They are extremity compatible. Would we expect this to be the case from pure happenstance? No, of course not.

So even before we move on to talking about things as sophisticated as DNA and evolution we're already a point where it's clear that the universe is not happenstance.

Now, we can go in two different directions from here:

We can go down into the quantum world of what actually give rise to atoms and see structure there also. Not only do these atoms exist with prefect, precise, and very limited form, but we also see at the quantum level, that if we 'smash' these atoms they reassemble themselves in precisely the configurations that they had before they were smashed. This is called "quantum reconstitution" and it is indeed quite miraculous. Nothing happenstance about it at all. It's clearly a very well-structured behavior.

And like Sky suggest, it has a purpose. What is the purpose? Clearly the purpose is to be sure that only these allotted few (very specially designed atoms) can exist in this universe. No "happenstance" permitted! Happenstance has clearly been designed OUT!

Now, if we go the other way, and start allowing these atoms to come together via their natural forces what do we see? We see the formation of very long-lived stars that operate as very stable energy sources.

And what do these stars do? They created the more complex atoms from the primal atoms of hydrogen and helium.

Then what do they do with those newly formed atoms? Do they just swallow them and burn out? No. They explode in extremely powerful ways to spew these newly formed, more complex atoms, back out into the universe so that they can recondense into solar systems with planets.

Just think about that for a moment. Without these two vital steps. 1.) Creating the heavier elements, and 2.) Spewing them back out into the universe. Life would not be possible.

Happenstance again?

And what do the elements that they spew out do? Well, they combine in ways to form a very special molecule that we call DNA. And DNA has the ability to become a digital program that begins to build biological 'robots' that can seek food, devour other molecules, and disassemble them for energy, and reconstruct them to build a useful body for the 'robot'.

These little biological 'robots' of DNA can also reproduce themselves, and even construct sensors, manipulator arms and fingers, and even brains that allow them to see what all the other atoms in the universe are doing.

This was happenstance?

Where's the evidence for happenstance? There is none. All the evidence points to design from the word BANG (like in Big Bang). There is no evidence for happenstance anywhere in this universe. It's all clearly been designed from before the Big Bang.

And now allow me to address yet another comment that has been made by Shoku:



This sentiment expressed by Shoku above is a very popular misunderstanding of what "Intelligent Design" even means. What Shoku has described is a baby-sitter not a designer.

The kind of "designer" that Shoku speaks of here would be an intervening Godhead that reaches into the universe to prop things up because they hadn't been "properly designed" in the first place.

Whoever designed this universe designed it to be self-running. Think of it more like a pair of dice. The designer designs the dice, but does not design every roll of the dice.

The designer of this universe designed the atoms and the possibilities. But not the ROLL! At least not the precise outcome of any given roll.

However, the designer of the universe does know what numbers can come up and what number can't come up. Just like the designer of a pair of dice knows what numbers can and can't come up on the dice. If you pick up a pair of dice the designer can tell you precisely what you will roll!

You will role a 2, or a 12, or any whole number in between. But you'll never roll a 1, or 13, or 3.75. The designer knows what the possibilities are. The designer designed what's possible and what isn't. But the designer did not dictate precisely what number would come up given a particular roll.

That is how this universe is designed.

There is no question that this is how the universe is designed. And there's no question that it is indeed a 'design' because it couldn't be this way by "happenstance" (by the very definition of what we mean by happenstance)

So if we ask if this universe is happenstance, we have no choice but to say, "No, it's not". Therefore there is nothing left but to recognize that it must necessarily be by design.

Notice that there was no appeal to religion in this post, nor was there any need for any emotional investment. It's all based on pure science and pure logic and reason. We have no choice but to conclude that this universe cannot be happenstance.

So that's where I'm. And I've arrived here from purely scientific knowledge, logic, reason, and even mathematics. The universe is not happenstance. Period. That's a given. No religious beliefs required.

So now the question gets interesting. If the universe has a designer, then who is that designer?

Well, some very logical things come to mind:

If you were going to bother to design a universe, who would you design it for? Probably for your own personal entertainment, right? Unless you wanted to give it to someone you know as a gift. However, it's highly unlikely that you would bother designing it just so it could run it's course whilst you go off to do something else.

More than likely, if you designed a universe you'd probably want to participate in it. So you'd figure out a way to interface your conscious awareness into the universe. You would become the little biological 'robot' beings that you designed DNA to evolve into. And you would experience the whole gambit of what those little robot bodies could do and experience.

Well, that's the pantheistic view.

Sure, now we're getting into spiritual philosophy you might say. But keep in mind that we got here from our previous scientific conclusions, not the other way around.

Now we can see that we most likely are the consciousness that created this universe, and now we are enjoying our creation.

Moreover, since we now recognize that we are the conscious being(s) that created this universe, we might begin to realize that we probably did program things into this universe that will allow us to interact and 'intervene' with its unfolding as we evolve into higher and higher levels of conscious awareness.

Eventually someday we will evolve to the full and complete awareness that we are indeed the ones who created this whole illusion.

That's the pantheistic view. And I'm not trying to 'sell' this philosophy to anyone. All I'm saying is that this is the philosophy that makes the most sense with what we already know about the world via our scientific knowledge. Pantheism and science are 100% compatible. They support each other in every detail.

One view, science, was arrived at by meticulous observations of the physical universe. The other view, pantheism, is a philosophy that was arrived at by pure consciousness and introspection. They both arrive at the same conclusions. We are this universe. In fact, DNA and evolution prove beyond any shadow of a doubt that we are indeed this universe. We are star stuff, we are the quantum field, we are this universe.

What else could we be?

And this universe is clearly not happenstance. It only makes sense that we are the designers of this universe enjoying the design that we've created.

To enjoy it even better, listen to people like Jeanniebean and she'll tell you how you can become the intervening 'god' in your own life! First thing you need is some common sense, then maybe a deck of Tarot Cards.

Or you can wallow in the mentality of being a victim of the aftermath of meaningless happenstance explosion.

The choice is yours.

Truly. Who cares?

I've never seen anyone so passtionate about demanding that we're nothing more than a happenstance accident.

But if that makes someone happy, more power to them.

He should take his ministry and build a church and call it, "The New Faith Church of Happenstance"

He could probably even get money from atheist organizations that would support his cause.

I resemble this and I disagree with the idea that there is a designer or creator or whatever.

Abra wrote:
So the only real question under consideration is whether or not this universe is happenstance. And science has shown us quite clearly that it's not happenstance.

This is not a true statement because when you go searching for patterns, organization, similarities, order, etc... as scientist do, you will surely find it.

Even in the most random pattern or words or letters or numbers, patterns can be found. If you believe that means the patterns are intentionally there then you will see the intention without knowing who made the patterns, or having to fill in that blank with your imagination.

I was just thinking how I suspect that this universe is an "illusion."

To experience this, try going without sleep for a few weeks or even not getting the required amount of sleep.

Have you ever 'seen' things that are not really there? Have you ever been awake ...and still dreaming?

It is amazing how our minds can project objects and people that look real... and yet are not even there. These are what people call "hallucinations."

This reality COULD BE AN HALLUCINATION.

I suspect that it is.

No so at all.

The example I gave clearly defies happenstance. No need to even 'search' for a pattern.

The observation is blatant. The universe is filled with "countess infinities of atoms", yet there are only about 100 different kinds.

That flies in the face of anything that could even remotely be called "happenstance".

No need to search for any "patterns" at all.