Bad Evolutionary Arguments Refuted 1

(What is BEAR?)
I've been mulling over this topic for a few weeks now, so I'll go ahead and get started on what will be a series of posts. Note the nearly infinitely-clever acronym title and writhe in your pathetic not-cleverness.

Anyway, today's bad evolutionary argument to refute goes something like:
"If you have something to offer that has predictive and informative value, then produce it."

This statement was directed at Intelligent Design. I'm a creationist, which is a position that has certain overlap with ID, but is typically more specific than ID and certainly not identical to it, sharing only a few characteristics such as the position that an intelligent and powerful agent is responsible for life.
The point of the question is that science can make predictions of future events and future behavior based on observation of what has gone before, and the questioner does not believe that ID can. I am not sure I agree with that, but defending ID doesn't put meat on the table for me and I haven't thought a great deal about that since I'm not an expert on the run-of-the-mill ID arguments.

However, if Christian creationism is true, we'd expect to see all sorts of things:
-The universe would carry an appearance of design (since it was in fact designed).
-Rival worldviews would be irrational.
-The God-man would resurrect from the dead in a unique fashion, when He said He would.
-God would change lives like He said He would.
-Formerly twisted and immoral people (like myself) would end up living sanctified lives.
-Most people would not have saving faith in God.
-Quite a few even would mock God.
-People would have innate ideas of right/wrong and fair play.
-Evidence would be a good way to discover truth.
-The world would operate virtually all the time according to regular laws.
-Yet occasionally God would perform a miracle, for a specific purpose or set of purposes.

...just to name a few.

Let me call attention to the last 2. Skeptics tend to misunderstand Christianity and claim that we think that everything is God's hand working all the time. To some extent that's true, but that does not make God the direct cause of everything. Virtually all events in the world take place according to the natural processes that God has already put in place.

Ephesians 1:11 - In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will...

God has ordained everything that comes to pass. He has defined that these natural processes will pertain on the Earth and in the universe until the Eschaton, at which point we won't need to worry about it anymore anyway. On naturalism or some similar worldview, one can only study data going back some decades to know whether the processes in place today are similar or identical to those in place a short time ago (an infinitesimally short time on the view of current conceptions of naturalism). So one uses inductive reasoning to say that such processes have generally been the case before so they will overwhelmingly probably be the case one second from now, one minute from now, one year from now. Problem with induction is that it just takes one example to knock down from a good inference from what has always been to what is in doubt.
There is no security in these processes on naturalism, neither in the unobservable past nor in the future, whether immediate or long-term.

Further, on Christianity there is plenty of reason to think that a person's cognitive faculties are reliably aimed at producing true beliefs. On naturalism or some similar worldview, nothing popped into everything, and was organised by no one so that some impersonal "process" is responsible for there being order instead of total chaos in the universe. Atoms coalesced into molecules, into larger clumps of matter. Rocks became amino acids became proteins became unicellular organisms became bananas, platypuses, humans. Bananas don't think. Neither do cans of Dr Pepper. Why assume that another lump of matter (arbitrarily and customarily called a "brain") can "think"? A can of Dr Pepper, when shaken, produces fizz. The liver secretes bile when called upon to do so. The brain secretes brain fizz when called upon to do so. And the brain is somehow special?
Also see Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.
The point is that, on naturalism, there are no predictions to be made at all, no matter how you want to dress it up with a pretty label like "science".

What is BEAR?

I am beginning a series called Bad Evolutionary Arguments Refuted. The acronym BEAR is sufficiently awesome that it requires no further fanfare.

This is the explanation post for the series. Every post will examine a different bad evolutionary argument, mostly from the standpoint of naturalism. That is, I will grant most of the time the presupposition of naturalism, thereby granting huge swaths of rhetorical ground that I don't in reality grant at all and thereby tying both hands and one foot behind my back to see how the evolutionary position fares when everything is going its way. The BEAR series is a mostly an internal critique of naturalism.

All BEAR posts will be under the label BEAR, and all of them can be organised into an exclusive view here.

I of course welcome all interaction, but evolutionists - you do yourself few favors trying to defend these bad arguments. I recommend you come up with better ones.

freelunch is an emptyheaded troll

freelunch said:

There are no laws of logic.

Needless to say, I won't be wasting my time talking to freelunch anymore.

Bahnsen on the skeptic's worldview

I'd like to excerpt here from a book I recently read. Let "unbeliever" here mean "vaguely naturalistic skeptic".

---
But standing on the unbeliever's worldview quickly demonstrates internal problems. B/c of his opposition to the absolute God of Scripture, he must account for reality in some other way than by a personal, rational, sovereign Creator. In discounting an absolute mind creating and controlling the universe, in the final analysis he is committed to chance. In his view of origins, the material universe sprang into being from nothing and under not rational oversight. The rational, then, is built upon the irrational.

This view of origins produces insurmountable rational problems, for such a chance-based worldview can have no laws, no necessity, no logical principles, but only randomness. According to cosmic evolutionary theory all is ultimately subject to random change and is in a constant state of flux. But our very rationality requires laws so that things may be distinguished, classified, organized, and explained. Rational comprehension and explanation demand principles of order and unity in order to relate truths and events to one another. Consequently, on the basis of the non-believer's worldview rationality itself has no foundation.

The unblvr may attempt to acct for rationality by asserting that man's mind imposes order so that rationality results. If he does so, then his view of reality becomes subjective rather than objective (Rhology comments: like here). But even this attempt is impossible, for how can the mind impose order on a chaotic universe?

And what if your friend denounces your Christian worldview for its being governed by "faith" as over against "reason"? What if he argues that you are naïve in not employing his scientific method?

Point out to him the futility in his argument. The scientific method proceeds on the basis of observation thru the senses. As the Humanist Manifesto III (1993) expressed it: "Knowledge of the world is derived by observation, experimentation, and rational analysis. Humanists find that science is the best method for determining this knowledge as well as for solving problems and developing beneficial technologies."

This method holds, then, that knowledge must be limited to observation and sense perception. Once your unblving friend has committed to this procedure, demonstrate his epistemological self-contradiction: If all knowledge is governed by observation, then how did he come to know that? That is, how did he come to know that "all knowledge is governed by observation"? Did he observe that in the lab? Did he measure, weigh, or count it? Did he detect that conceptual limitation by exploring nature? And furthermore, does he observe that this principle is a universal limitation on knowledge in all places and at all times so that he can confidently trust it?

If he attempts to use the laws of logic in reasoning with you, ask him where in nature he has seen the laws of logic? Show him that you can't use the sci method to prove the laws of logic, for you can't observe, taste, or feel them since they are not material entities extended in space. How then can he justify logic? Or the sci method of empiricism?

But with the blvr's worldview, a personal, absolute Creator God accts for the rational, coherent, law-ordered reality that you and the unblvr both experience and depend upon. In God's sovereign revelation to man (Scripture) we learn that He spoke , "And it was so" (Gen 1:7, 9; Ps 33:6; 2 Cor 4:6; Heb 11:3). Not only do we discover order and harmony throughout the narrative of creation (days 1 thru 6 following logically one after the other), but the very idea of God's speaking reality into existence itself requires rationality. The universe is ultimately rational because the rational, law-ordaining God of Scr created it thus. Man is a rational being b/c he is created in the image of God, who is the standard of rationality. In Eden, God commands him thru verbal communication (Gen 2:16-17); Adam authoritatively speaks (2:19-20); God reasons with him (3:1-19).

...

Empirical (observational, sense-based) scientific investigation is also called for in the Christian worldview b/c God created an objective, material universe, governs it by predictable laws (Gen 1:14-19, 8:22; Job 38:31-33; Ps 8:6, 115:16). Furthermore, God created man as a sensate, physical being, for "the hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord has made both of them" (Prov 20:12)...

The unblvr's problem only gets worse when he demands that we provide proof for the existence of God...Ask your friend: "Why do you require that I give you a reason proving God's existence? After all, on your view there is no reason for reason itself." (p. 152-155).


When modern man commits exclusively to the sci method, then he has committed to empiricism. Empiricism is the view that all human knowledge ultimately derives thru the senses and thru experience. We discover laws of physics, for instance, by observing, measuring, counting, and analysing the behavior of things around us.

The unblving empiricist cannot acct for the laws of logic which regulate human reasoning. The laws of logic are not physical objects existing a a part of the sense world. They are not the result of observable behavior of material objects or physical actions. Do the laws of logic exist in the natural world so that they can be empirically examined? If we are materialists, then only that which is objective in the realm of sense experience is real. What sense do the laws of logic make for unblvrs? What are the laws of logic? If they are just the firing of nerve endings in the neural synapses, then logic differs from person to person and therefore its laws are not laws at all. The inherent materialism in the modern world cannot acct for laws of logic.

Furthermore, since the laws of logic are universals, invariant, abstract, eternal truths, how do they continually apply inn our changing world of experience? How do we get those laws from "above" down into the historical process?

...When unblvlrs talk of concepts, they need a worldview to make them meaningful. (p. 204-205)

Source: Pushing the Antithesis: The Apologetic Methodology of Greg L. Bahnsen, Gary DeMar, editor. 2007, American Vision, Inc.

The "no presuppositions" fantasy

Paul C said:

I'm not operating out of any "worldview" because the concept as used by presuppositionalists is meaningless. I don't have any "presuppositions" because the concept as used by presuppositionalists is meaningless. Neither of these points are relevant to this discussion - they are merely diversionary tactics used by presuppositionalists to divert attention from the failure of their arguments.

No presuppositions, eh? None? No fundamental axiom? This is simply ridiculous.
How do you prove that evidence is evidential?
That you are not a brain in a vat?
That evidence is a good way to discover truth?
How do you know that you know anything?
That your cognitive faculties are properly aimed at forming true beliefs?
How do you prove that the laws of logic are useful?

Anwer any of these without appealing to a fundamental axiomatic statement, and you will be begging the question. Such as:
"I know that evidence is a good way to discover truth because I use it every day to live my life."
You're begging the question - I simply ask how you know:
1) that you use it every day
2) that you are living your life
3) that it's good rather than bad for that purpose
4) that you actually arrived at truth.

And on and on.

How warm a welcome would Paul give to a statement like "God just is. That's it"? He'd call it circular. Indeed, and the same goes for his statements. The difference is that appealing to "God just is" is not viciously circular because the God of the Bible is self-justifying; He is where the buck stops. On Paul C's worldview (which he claims he doesn't have), the buck never stops, and that's a problem.

Here is a related post, and my long interaction with the Jolly Nihilist is instructive too. At any rate, Paul talks big and is obviously a sharp fellow, but sometimes he says amazingly poorly-thought-out things.

Got my own thread

At ERV. \/\/007.

As I said there, however, it's kind of low of her to claim to my face on Friday that her blog isn't moderated and then to restrict me to one thread just 4 days later, but then again her hypocrisy isn't exactly a secret.

ID and magic

I've been enjoying my time over at ERV recently. Here is the long thread in which I've been first involved.
One interesting question was raised by the eminent commenter Albatrossity, who 17 months ago revealed to me his actual identity, biology prof at a major state university in the Midwest. I would ordinarily think that he has given over responsibility for posting his comments to some student of his, or even that he's just lying about his identity, given:
1) the general tenor, mood, and abusive nature of this commenter's posts,
2) the poor reasoning exhibited, and
3) the fact that he comments a lot at a blog such as ERV, which is not what you would call a hang-out for refined intelligentsia as no doubt a major univ biology professor must be.

However, I'd hate to charge the man with dishonesty or inflation of his credentials, especially given that his histrionics pale in comparison to those of one Professor Emeritus Vic Hutchinson (edited out my misspelling) of OU and one PZ Myers of the Univ of Minnesota. So, sadly, it is at least very possible that this man represents some of the best and brightest of American universities.

Given the fairly broad nature of my initial comments, one might expect the good Professor to respond to some of them, but such has not been the case. Indeed, he exhibits a pattern of leaving scads of questions hanging, which is disappointing. And he wasn't the first to raise the question, but it has become his mantra.
So, first off, "minimalist" said:

(Rhology said) "It's completely valid to say that if science can't explain something, then therefore MAGIC!"

I responded:

So, to you, any non-naturalist force in action is "magic"? There's no other name for it?
If so, how precisely does this argue for naturalism? Just calling the other side names doesn't mean your side is correct, as I'm sure you realise in your calmer, more sober times of reflection.

Albatrossity eventually jumped in:

Rho, can you tell us a single objective parameter that distinguishes ID from magic? Quoting your magic book doesn't count. What I want to know is how would an objective person be able to tell if something happened via ID or via magic?

My reply:

Sure. Magic is an incantation calling on the power of some mystical, barely-defined cosmic principle or power, performed out of an irrational worldview by a non-omnipotent agent, also frequently accomplishing said incantation pretty quickly. Intelligent Design is, at its base, the understanding that the characteristics of life in nature show evidence of design by an intelligent and otherwise unidentified agent, probably over the course of many hundreds of millions of years, though not necessarily. It's only in the strawman of ID that you find the major parallels to ID. A major college prof like you should know better than that. Why not just deal with ID as it is? It cracks me up to see well-established minds like you burn strawmen all over the place. Makes me think you don't have a leg to stand on and some part of you knows it.

His reply:

I think you missed the point. I didn't ask for definitions of magic and ID, I asked for objective distinctions between that two that would enable an objective observer to distinguish between them as causes of any event.

Me:

Well, let's see. I would probably look at whether said occurrence were the result of an incantation calling on the power of some mystical, barely-defined cosmic principle or power, performed out of an irrational worldview by a non-omnipotent agent, also frequently accomplishing said incantation pretty quickly.
But of course, this doesn't matter. If the evidence is that it was NOT due to an unguided process working on random mutations, then the answer lies in somewhere other than Darwinian mechanisms. If you don't like the answer or where the evidence leads, that's no one's problem but yours.

Him (#60, I'm tired of linking):

Tell me HOW you would "look at whether said occurrence were the result of an incantation calling on the power of some mystical, barely-defined cosmic principle or power, performed out of an irrational worldview by a non-omnipotent agent, also frequently accomplishing said incantation pretty quickly." That's quite a mouthful of stuff, but nothing in there tells me HOW you would show me any difference between that sort of cause, and the think-poof causality that underlies ID. How, exactly, do the results of incantations look any different from the invisible hands that ID requires? Causes leave fingerprints; different causes should leave different fingerprints.

Me:

nothing in there tells me HOW you would show me any difference

Take Scenario X on a case-by-case basis and apply those criteria. Not that hard, though it might require a bit of logical and philosophical rigor, which I've not come to expect from most Darwinians, especially not most in academia, whose writings are often rife with unaccounted-for and unjustified assumptions.

why did you argue with commenters above when someone suggested that ID = magic?

B/c "magic" carries quite a pejorative connotation. I dispute that connotation.
And again, the bare assumption of naturalism (especially ontological, and yes, I know the difference) is not convincing, if it's unargued-for. Argue for it. Start by answering my above questions (and you'll reveal it's a faith-based position or an infinite regress, the former of which is the same thing you accuse the hated creationists of, the latter of which is clearly irrational). If "magic" is the way things are, where the evidence leads, what merit is there in clinging to Darwinian-style naturalistic processes as the way things are? That's the stuff of cults.

Him:

the appearance of drug resistance in Plasmodium falciparum was due to magic. You claim that the same phenomenon was due to an intelligent designer.

Me:

But this is not a good experiment, as it is a false dilemma for my position; I don't contend that the evolution of drug resistance is an example of ID "at work", but rather natural, microevolutionary forces. Who's denying that? I'm more interested in your evidence for, say, unicellular organisms developing into giraffes, etc. Things that are under dispute. I don't see why engaging the topics actually under dispute is too much to ask.
Further, please explain how naturalistic mechanisms to which you'd appeal to explain this change in the organism is distinguishable from, say, karma. Thanks.

Him:

More amusingly, you ask how this naturalistic explanation for malarial drug resistance is different from karma. That's pretty easy. It is explainable by purely natural mechanisms (changes in bases in DNA resulting in changes enzyme structure resulting in changes in enzyme function resulting in changes in drug metabolism), which can replicated in other organisms by other scientists. That's the definition of objective, in case you didn't understand that word either. Let me know when you figure out a way that ID think-poofing can be replicated or explained by natural mechanisms.

Me:

OK, and how does magic operate, exactly? Give me some info about it.
Out of what worldview are you operating? What are your presuppositions? On what power does this magic draw?
...I'll explain my 'karmic' worldview if you explain your magic one.

Him, throwing in the towel:

(Albatrossity asked) Why would it be impossible for magic to leave "evidence of design"?
(Rhology answered) It wouldn't be impossible.
makes my point for me, thanks. Magic cannot be distinguished from ID.

Him, later:

The onus is on YOU, not me, to show that magic can be distinguished, as a cause, from ID. You have evaded that responsibility from the beginning. I have repeatedly asked for evidence of design that could be distinguished from evidence of magic.

Me:

We've been over this. Feel free to address what I've already said, particularly on the question of karma and on the worldview underpinnings of "magic".

Him:

you have yet to give me even ONE criteria by which an objective observer could distinguish magic from ID.

Me:

And you haven't answered my setup questions that would show that you even have any idea what groundwork is necessary before answering such a question. Get on it.
You also haven't responded to my request that you show the ways in which your precious Darwinian processes are distinguishable from karma. It's all out there.

That's pretty much where it ended. Let the reader judge who left the questions out on the table.
The point is that Albatrossity is fixated on his buzzwords and Darwinian talking points, much like the former Pres of CFI in my previous post, namely: "Peer-reviewed journal!!!!!!! AAAHHHHH!!!" For Albatrossity, he has his talking point, maybe from PZ Myers or someone like that, and it's never occurred to think it through. It's kind of sad, but it helps one understand how grown-ups can desire and act to squelch dissent in universities with respect to these questions. Take Albatrossity, PZ Myers, and Hutchinson (edited out my misspelling) as your models and you'll find it's quite believable. It is apparently too much to ask that they back up their arguments.
"Magic" isn't just an amorphous mass that one can pluck out the air and then apply, in a serious debate. You have to define your terms and show me precisely what you mean. Absent that, it's a double-edged sword, as my karma example shows. I can just apply something that sounds pejorative to ANYTHING, refuse to define it, and I'll have just as much justification as he does. So I did, with my karma example. Maybe we'll actually get a response, but I doubt it, as he's had lots of chances.

My first encounter with ERV, or lemmmMMMEEEE talk, lulz!

This past Friday night, the evil young-earth creationist society-in-disguise, the IDEA club at the University of Oklahoma, opponent of all things scholarly and scientific, invited two lecturers who are, as I understand it (being no great expert in things satanic, least of all in Discovery Institute treachery) affiliated with the Discovery Inst, a leading Intelligent Design thinktank. One John West was called to speak on "7 myths of Darwinian evolution" or something similar, and Casey Luskin to speak on Academic Freedom and the Kitzmiller vs Dover trial.

Before I begin my synopsis of the night's events, the blogger known as ERV apparently believes that my church is a cult. I stand firmly opposed to such an appellation. Just because we believe that my pastor is the 2nd coming of Jesus Christ, just because we are flogged in the baptistry for questioning him, just because we believe that everyone except for members in good standing (and who give at least 23.4% of their annual income to the church) are on their way to Hell, just because leaving the church whether for conscience' sake or because one's job was transferred out of town (or because one's parents were transferred out of town) means a death sentence to be carried out as soon as possible in the dead of night with a solid silver crucifix, just because most of our church's budget is spent towards stockpiling assault weapons and most of our Sunday School curriculum deals with proper utilisation of high explosives, just because we believe that Charles Darwin was THE Antichrist, in the flesh, and that Richard Dawkins is the Beast, doesn't mean we're a cult. So, I'm only too happy to sort that all out.

Anyway, I'd estimate the audience at around 120, probably a bare majority of whom were sympathetic to ID. After John West's opening lecture, which I found to be pretty good, actually, if a tad repetitive, ERV approached the mic to ask a few questions. She engaged in a several minute long debate with West about some alleged misrepresentation, and I, to be honest, lost track of the topic, partly b/c I was myself waiting in line to ask a question and was fairly nervous (as I usually get before asking questions in front of an audience). I don't think anyone begrudged her the lengthy amount of time she took to interact with West, though I do think most were disappointed that the organisers only thought they could allow time for 4 questions. I didn't get to ask mine but instead ceded my place in line for last question to someone who would challenge West, since I was going to ask a sympathetic question. It turned out that questioner had failed to understand what I thought was a fairly elementary point from West but stubbornly would not let it go that perhaps HE was the one who was confused, not West.

I talked briefly to Ms. Smith in person during the intermission. She was cordial enough and we agreed that non-moderated blogs are more fun and valuable. Like so many bloggers (not excluding myself), her online persona is quite a bit more strident than her real-life character, and like so many (excluding myself), the former is more profane than the latter.

Luskin stirred the pot when he was speaking on academic freedom. His session was also quite interesting and valuable, I thought. Then near the end he brought up, almost as an aside, ERV's blog as an example of the kind of "welcome" that ID receives in the scholarly/academic arena. He pointed out the treatment of a commenter on ERV's blog who apparently was treated with sexual discrimination (see here ERV's admission thereof as well as numerous commenters expressing their salacious approval) (sexual discrimination b/c, as my best friend the BlackBlogger pointed out, neither she nor her commenters posted a request for above-the-waist nudity to any male commenter) after what I guess was a substantial period of time spent commenting at ERV's blog and annoying her and her commenters. I thought Luskin's presentation was strong in most of its parts except this part. This part was unnecessary and weak for a few reasons, including the following:
1) I don't have a beef with ERV moderating her comments, actually, and no one should. If someone wants to cut off someone they consider a troll, it's their blog. Maybe said commenter should get their own blog (and in this case, I believe the commenter does). Shoot, I myself was notified of my being banned from an atheist blog just a few weeks ago. You don't see me crying about it, do you? Stuff happens.
2) ERV is not exactly a scholarly arena, so I didn't really see the relevance. ERV's reasoning is very often sloppy, she makes clumsy unsupported assertions when the whim strikes, and she links to irrelevant essays in answer to challenges, and she often stretches the limits of what can fairly be described as literacy in the English language, among other things (such as flipping Casey Luskin off when they dare ask her to step down off the mic - see further down). Further, I was recently told that some of her commenters are "practicing scientists", and at least one (Albatrossity) is a biology professor at a major state university in the Midwest, yet they can barely be troubled to engage elementary questions such as these or to answer other challenges closer to their fields of study/research with much more than invective and argumenta ad incredulum. Point is, Luskin could have easily found evidence of this kind of suppression over at Pharyngula or something else, plus (though it may seem difficult at first) even more outlandish and boorish behavior.
3) He seemed to be trying to throw a bone to OU students and/or take a swipe at a local Darwinian interest. I guess I can understand that, but as the extracurricular discussions afterwards showed, it's not like their side is all that skilled in arguing for their side anyway, which is not to say they're not good at childish insults.

Anyway, when Luskin's talk was complete, ERV got up first to take the first question. I wished I had jumped up there more quickly, but I was a little hesitant because I was obviously a sympathetic questioner rather than an opponent. The problem was that when ERV got up, she decided to make the entire question period about her and defending her actions on her blog. I wonder why bother, though? Was she unwilling to let her actions stand on their own? Was she desirous of taking up the entire time so that no more nefarious and evil ID information could be distributed to the hapless cultists of Trinity Baptist or the unwashed hoi polloi of the unconvinced that were there? Only God and ERV know. Once it became obvious that she wanted to dominate the entire Q&A session, of which time was obviously limited b/c the moderator had made it clear, the eminent BlackBlogger, who was standing directly behind ERV in line for the mic, decided to speak up. He asked, in order to be heard throughout the auditorium "Could we please let someone else ask a question?" The moderator also tried to intervene but was far too gentle, actually, to dissuade her, and she argued continually for around 90 more seconds, so that the talking ranged between Luskin's wanting to answer her challenge, ERV's insistence on more time to herself on the mic, the BlackBlogger's (and to a lesser extent, my) requests for her to step down, and the moderator becoming more and more stern. He finally did win out in the contest, but by no means did he, the BlackBlogger, or I ever "scream", as ERV would later put it.

As ERV returned to her seat, disgusted, my face was turned toward the stage, but after a wave of muttering, turned again to look at her, as Luskin said something like "Did she just flip me off? She did, she flipped me off. Well, OK." I don't know what else there is to say when such a high scholarly authority as ERV resorts to 3rd-grade expressions of disapproval. Luskin was mortally wounded, of course. Crowd opinion, which had been against her b/c of its high concentration of Trinity Baptist cultists and the skilled presentations by West and Luskin, was turned immediately! From then on, everyone was hostile to ID and clamored to join the nearest secular humanist and Darwinian campus organisation, so powerful was the rebuttal from ERV's single finger!

My turn was next, actually, and I prefaced my question by stating that I have been on her blog for a few weeks commenting and have not been moderated. ERV and her commenters have stated they consider that I acted honorably in this. I would agree and appreciate that statement, and at the same time I failed to mention pertinent information, and in this I regret that I unintentionally turned the tables on Luskin, who I thought had done a fine job. I should have said something more like, "I've been commenting on her blog for a couple of weeks and ERV has never moderated any of my comments. I have, however, been treated with gratuitous and fairly powerful derision, irrelevant and prejudicial insult, and abundant profanity while there." This would have been a fuller statement of the actual fact of my interaction there, and I apologise openly to Mr. Luskin for my less than fair statement, which served to obscure the actual issues at hand and to, as it were, throw him under the bus on account of a minor, peripheral part of his presentation which ERV hubristically inflated and in which inflation I unwittingly assisted.

After a few more unremarkable questions, we adjourned and security asked us to leave the building but that we could stand around outside the front door for awhile if we wished. My friends and I gathered there, and later ERV and a group of her friends arrived. I, not wishing to lose the opportunity to discuss, walked over to a few of them as they were discussing the Wedge document. I later had the opportunity to talk with Aseem, the President of the Center For Inquiry, and Scott, the VP. Both were very cordial, but neither equipped to deal with the questions we were asking. For example, I asked them to provide their strongest general line of evidence that the variety of life that we see today is best explained by unguided nat sel working on random mutations from one or a few common ancestors. Scott responded "the fossil record". I asked him about the arguments that Henry Gee has recently forwarded, to which he had no answer, and then explained the massive assumptions that must be brought to bear in the case of EACH AND EVERY fossil. It's not evidence at all. We discussed the nature of evidence, the impossibility that naturalism is true, and how we as Christians can know that other religions are false (ie, via internal critique). Aseem, for whatever reason, didn't stick around for the pummeling his worldview was taking, but Scott exhibited an astonishing (for a college-age Darwinian proponent) level of intellectual honesty and stuck around.

Meanwhile, the BlackBlogger (as he told me on the phone the next day) had asked one of ERV's friends, who apparently is a past President of the CFI, to define the steps of the scientific method, which had actually appeared on the screen during the presentations that night. Said gentlemen responded with "first you make a hypothesis, then you perform an experiment, then you submit it to a peer-reviewed journal". Wrong answer. The BlackBlogger rightly and patronisingly patted him on the shoulder with a "OK, maybe I should go find someone who knows what they're talking about", went to ERV and said something to the effect of "I think you should educate your betas about what the scientific method is". "Betas" meaning "beta males", as opposed to alpha males. Not a really nice thing to say, but that's sure how her posse looked to us, and I don't know too many who'd accuse ERV of excessive niceness. BB and ERV then began what looked to me to be a fairly heated antagonistic conversation, part of which she has apparently chronicled here (he's the "creationist law student" she refers to). Among other things, he asked her to name "the 5 amino acids". What he meant to request, and misspoke, was the 5 nucleotides. He also asked a few other fairly elementary (for a grad-level student in the sciences) questions. The reason for this was the astonishing ignorance of one of her fanboys about the basic scientific method; he had heard a little about ERV but found it hard to believe that she could actually be a real scientist, given her inability during the Q&A period to engage questions asked of her and her penchant rather to mock the speakers and defend her blogging. I later recommended that he *ask* such a person about their positions before engaging them, since you don't always know what you're going to get, and he agreed.

Overall, a good evening for ID and a just short of embarrassing performance on the part of campus Darwinians. One hopes for a more honest and better-equipped showing at the upcoming Dembski-Ruse debate.

The many witticisms of ERV

I am considering applying for a master's degree program in Communications and English. I already have a great idea for my thesis - to analyse the numerous examples of profound, stoically objective, and grammatically and orthographically flawless expressions of the blogger known as ERV. The raw material is staggering, given her paper trail. I will share with you a few examples of what I have to work with.

LOL eeeeeeeeeeew!

*eeeeeeeeeeeegiddyclappingeeeeeeeeeeee*

Its not about being right. It was never about being right. Its about winning. AAAAAAAAAAHAHAHA!

as much as I would love to throw up at the sight of dinosaur fossils molested by a filthy Creationist (please, baby jesus, let his 'fossils' be fake)

LOL! BLAG FIGHT! BLAG FIGHT!

LOOOSER! LOOOOOOOOOSER!!! HAHAHA!

Boy, no wonder her comboxes are full of sycophantic tools! The withering barrage of rhetorical .50-caliber slugs of prosaic tours de force would be too much for any mere mortal to withstand.

Only sometimes

I find it ironic that on the one hand, atheists will tell you that while there is no grand Meaning in the universe, we can still enjoy our lives. We can still create our own meaning, for ourselves and by ourselves, generally within ourselves. This is simply another example of atheists believing in creating something out of nothing. Then many (though I doubt it's all) of the same atheists will then turn around and bemoan the large carbon footprint that a given human produces. Consider this quote from the TimesOnline of the soon-to-be United Kaliphate:

"Each baby born in Britain will, during his or her lifetime, burn carbon roughly equivalent to 2½ acres of old-growth oak woodland - an area the size of Trafalgar Square."

Let's say that humanity does 'succeed' in burning down all the pretty forests and 'ruining' all the lovely ecosystems that we'd otherwise enjoy as tourists, with the cool and rare animals, etc. Why not just create new meaning for ourselves out of burned-out wasteland? Is it that these people are just not as strong in the create-your-own-meaning Force? Maybe their midichlorian counts are low. "The Force is not strong with this one."

I'm guest blogging elsewhere today

Check it out at Atheism Is Dead.

I don't get $93,803 for no work

What a great story!

Summary - a Native American man sues the state, who employs him, for some kind of discrimination, gets transferred to another dept, and now draws $93K a year for doing literally nothing.
Let me say first off that I would love this situation. What is this guy, a complete idiot?
He says: "I don't know how I could get through the day without my iPod."

I do - get a master's degree! Get a seminary degree! Read through Calvin's Institutes, Schaff's History of the Christian Church, Plantinga's Warrant series! Spend an hour in the Bible and an hour in prayer every day! Go to night school, get a 2nd job, and catch up on sleep during the day job! Dang, the possibilities are nearly endless. And he has the gall to say: "Every day it's a struggle for me to bring in something I haven't read or listened to."
Awww, did he read through all the Dean Koontz and Dan Brown novels in the bookstore? Is he on his 15th listen-thru of the latest Justin Timberlake album? Sheesh.

It's so funny how the grass is always greener on the other side. This would be a dream "job" for me. If I were in that position, though, and I were chafing at the confinement, I'd make it a big public deal about my job. YouTube - a video of "The way I spend my time at work every day." A blog that I'd set up to make the same entry every day, to which I'd point all the time, just for the cheekiness and PR of it.

The article says: A member of the Passamaquoddy Tribe in Maine, he said he is being discriminated against because of his national origin and retaliated against for having sued the state.

You know, in the gud ol' days, them Injuns would know whut it is to be diskrmn...decrimina...oppressed because they'd be half-dead ever' night on account 'a' 18 hourz o' manyool labor.
Anyway, seriously, you're going to sue because the state pays you nearly 100 fazoozas a year to do nothing? And you're working for the state? What, you think you'd crack the 200G ceiling if you had an actual job where you actually work?


Hinton wants to be director of investigations for real investigating insurance fraud for the Insurance Fund. He said that responsibility was given to a GOP appointee, a white male, who is paid $140,800 a year, according to state records. Or, he said, he would be a good director of internal controls, a newly established job also given to a white male in October. The Insurance Fund is paying the newcomer $82,363.

So he could maybe get 140 a year, but he'd have to work. Or, he could get less money per year and have to work. Boy, does this guy have his priorities in order!


"He has nothing to do and has had nothing to do for the last two and a half years and what he had to do before that was relatively insignificant," said Obertubbesing. "It's an unfortunate situation."

All you working stiffs out there, like me, join me in a brief chorus: 'Lucky bum!'

Now, the irony meter spikes: He said Hinton thought things would improve when Eliot Spitzer became governor

Snicker, chortle, smirk. What a naïf.


"I'm ashamed of my situation. I'm embarrassed. Nobody cares. They don't care about Indians."

Presumably he has evidence of another "Indian" who is paid a medium-high salary by the state gov't to do nothing, which would add the plural "s" to "they don't care about Indians".
Seems to me they're treating him pretty darn well.

A realm of fantasy morals

Bjørn Østman said...


There is no correct or incorrect in terms of morals. Just opinions.

So it is not a fact that the Holocaust was evil. It's just SOME people's opinion that it was wrong.
If I rape and murder your wife and daughter and mutilate their bodies, it might be your opinion that that action is wrong, but it might be my opinion that my action is right. So there's no way to tell?
So any hope that we might make laws that are right and good are just a fantasy. Best we can hope for is that most people agree with those laws so that we'll have enough taxpayers to provide for a military and law enforcement force large and powerful enough to protect us from those who don't share the same opinions.
Sounds pretty arbitrary. Sounds pretty judgmental. Sounds like might makes right. And it is extremely counterintuitive, for what that's worth. What's more, I don't think you really believe it. You don't live your life that way, you just talk like it on some blog so you can advance your emptyheaded argument. Not saying something so inane and stupid would go a long way towards enhancing your credibility.

I challenge you to give your answer to my scenario.

Invasion of privacy

Bjørn Østman has been questioning me about God's revelation and the morality of doing foreign mission work.
I answer:

Specifically, in Rom 1 and 2 God communicates the following thru creation and thru the way He created people's hearts:
-He exists
-He is eternal
-Is powerful
-Is divine
-And has written His law in general on people's hearts


why does he not speak to them himself?

That is communication right there.
And there are other occurrences of God speaking to unblvrs in the Bible. I think what we're seeing here is that God didn't speak in the way YOU want Him to.


Why doesn't anyone who never heard about God from another man become a Christian?

1) I've heard many stories just like that, actually, where people had dreams and were prompted thereby to seek out a certain man at a certain place, went to that place, found the man (who happened to be a missionary) and was thereby converted.
2) If you check again those 2 psgs in Romans, the point of general revelation is that men might be w/o excuse. General revelation is not aimed at a positive conviction of sin and a need for a Savior, but rather that people would know that they are inadequate, and thus they will be condemned (if they don't repent).


God (supposedly) spoke to Moses and Abraham etc., so why not to other people today?

I'm not denying that God speaks to people today, though I do deny that He doesn't generally do so in the same way.


I am not of the belief that there is any moral absolutes.

OK, I'll remember that.
So, let's keep that in mind when you ask those questions about how God revealed Himself. You ask b/c He doesn't fulfill your expectations, but He hasn't done anything WRONG. Just different. I must ask how you feel that you have room to judge here.


It is my opinion that it is morally wrong to seek out people to convert them

And it's my opinion that it is morally right.
Is either of us correct? How can we know?


Otherwise it is extremely disrespectful of their beliefs, culture, and privacy.

And on what basis do you claim that it is morally preferable to respect people's beliefs, culture, and privacy?
Just for the record, I DO disrespect their beliefs and the religious part of their culture... b/c those beliefs are wrong. I respect the PEOPLE and their privacy and don't barge into houses to throw Bibles at people's heads, of course. Now, you think it's wrong to be disrespectful, maybe JoeBob says it's right to be disrespectful. Prove he's wrong and you're right, please.

Ferretology

The King of Ferrets, a precocious 15-yr-old, has been engaging me on the topic of God's nature and how that relates to epistemology. I tell you what - I wish I'd been thinking about stuff at this level when I was 15. And I also wish I'd met someone like me now when I was 15. So, good deal for him!


Where did God tell you you weren't a brain in a vat?

In the Bible.


And if you bring up a source quoting God, I can argue it actually being God, and of course God telling the truth.

Then you'd need to tell me how I can know ANYthing and not have a great reason to doubt EVERYthing if God is not telling the truth.


So God rounds to a single sig fig then?

He did there. You'd have a point if He said the circumf was diameter times 58 or something, but He didn't.


He could at least say 31.

Then you'd just complain that He only went to one sig fig. Seriously, let it go. Game over.


What about the insect legs?

Oops, missed that part. To what psg do you refer? And sure, take that one on the house, doesn't count against your total.


I gave a reason why he might want us to see the truth; do you have a reason not to?

A good God? No.
An evil god? Plenty of reasons.


This means the Bible is subject to the evolution of society, because it can be interpreted multiple different ways.

It's TEXT. It has objective meaning by itself.
Or maybe you think I can legitimately say that your comment means that you have repented of your sin and trusted Jesus as Savior and Lord, and want to move to my town to come join my church.
Now, is that legitimate interpretation of your comment? It's not, is it? Why not? B/c it doesn't match WHAT YOU SAID.


Their version of morality was based on empathy, but only for those they viewed as human (or possibly only those they viewed as God's chosen people

The laws are quite specific for all of that. I suggest you educate yourself on said laws and come back with specific examples.


since they specifically forbid enslaving other Israelites

No they didn't. Israelites could sell themselves into slavery to Israelites to repay debts, etc.


they probably viewed others as subhuman

They might have, b/c they were sinful human beings. Question is - does the Bible lead them to do so? No.


Do you think sociopaths, people who lack empathy, have trouble with morality?

I don't understand the question. What does "have trouble with morality" mean?


It's all based on our empathy!

Prove it. I know YOURS is, but I got that the 1st time. You don't have to keep repeating yourself.


I see raping children as bad because it is not something I would want to have happen to me, and I emphasize with the victim.

So?


There's no objective way to evaluate that

Bingo.
Alot of people think it's evil to believe that evolution is the mechanism by which the variety of life we see on Earth today came about. Alluvasudden, you won't agree. That's inconsistent.


How do they survive if they have a violent culture that sees nothing wrong with rape and murder?

Maybe they don't survive. You just got thru telling me that there's no objective value, so why place objective goodness value on surviving as a society? That's not good OR bad. It just IS. You're committing the naturalistic fallacy.


Did they get the idea that raping and murdering little girls works to keep God happy because they tried it and it worked, or something?

No, I'm introducing extreme examples to show that you can't live consistently with your own worldview. Of course God doesn't dig raping little children. I wonder why YOU have any justification to condemn it, though.


Divine command theory is, in fact, a pile of crap.

I don't hold to DCT, so maybe you should find someone who does and ask them to critique that post.


It's probably more arbitrary than the idea of an empathy-based moral system.

1) There's no way to tell that holding to DCT is morally preferable, so again, so what?
2) Even if my actual position were a result of God being arbitrary (which I might concede partially), God is the Creator of the universe. He is responsible for all the laws of physics and such, and the laws He has communicated are no less lawful and prescriptive and descriptive of the universe. Man can't set down morality arbitrarily b/c he's just one man among 6 billion others. He has no ontological position to dictate to other men.

Forgiveness-3

Continuing my discussion with rotsaP loeJ...

I honestly didn't think that the biblical teaching on different levels of, well, badness of sin would be in question.
Jesus Himself made those kinds of comments many times.
21"Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles had occurred in Tyre and Sidon which occurred in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. "Nevertheless I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. - Matt 11:21
Therefore I say to you, any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven people, but blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. - Matt 12:31
" Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense you make long prayers; therefore you will receive greater condemnation - Matt 23:14
"The second is this, ' YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these." - Mark 12:31
who devour widows' houses, and for appearance's sake offer long prayers; these will receive greater condemnation." - Mk 12:40
"For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little." - Lk 7:47
Jesus answered, " You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you from above; for this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin." - Jn 19:11


There are other NT examples, but hopefully that clarifies what I mean.
And yes, of course, any one sin, even a "small" one, is enough to condemn me to Hell forever. But OTOH, some sin leads to greater condemnation in Hell than others. An unrepentant dead Hitler is in a lower, hotter level of Hell than my grandma will be if she doesn't repent before she dies.


is it that Pilate's authority makes him less culpable for the crucifixion, or that Judas' lack of official status as a minister of secular justice increases his?

That's a good question.
On one side, I think it's irrelevant to our discussion, since obviously the fact that there is a greater sin remains.
My first guess would be that Judas spent no less than 3 years with God Himself incarnate, and yet he still thinks it's worth a mere 30 silver pieces to betray Him. Pilate had just met Jesus and knew little about Him.


But "weightier portions of the law" is a question of letter vs. spirit (the pharisees were using technicalities in order to justify being jerks)

Matt 23: 23"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.

24"You blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!"

I don't know if I agree with you on this one. Why did God spend so much breath and emphasis all thru the OT and reiterate it several times in the Gospels that "I desire obedience and not sacrifice"? Is it really a wash whether one tithes all his dill but shows no mercy or justice or whether one is very just and merciful and gives only 9% of his dill?


his great point is that 'unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and pharisees you are not fit to inherit the kingdom of heaven.'

True, and that's b/c His emphasis was there. It's far more important to preach the Gospel that'll get people saved from their sins, after all, than it is to discuss a finer point of theology.


my view is that the "something" may be anything at all, so long as it creates relational tension.

And I think there is the key! Buried within the first post, I said that, and I think it's key. Maybe I didn't say it or entitle it right, that may be. But just as constantly confronting my brethren for any little offense would rip apart our relations, so would my constant begging for forgiveness do the same. Don't you think?


Repentance is a necessarily selfless and virtuous action.

Which unblvrs CAN perform. Those acts are not meritorious before God, but they are virtuous and selfless.


I must acknowledge the objective basis of my sin

Yes, but people neglect to take things to their logical conclusions all the time. Atheist commenters on this blog are a perfect example.


the status of a sinner is such that he suppresses this knowledge with all his power, for otherwise how could he live with himself?

He can protect himself thru inconsistent thinking.


When he ceases to suppress it he becomes a Christian

Agreed.


you may disagree with my definition of repentance

I guess that is mostly what it comes down to.



-----------------------
On a related point, an excommunicated person must be a Christian. I don't agree that the excommunicant can have been faking.

What of 1 John 2, then?
18Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that (AW)antichrist is coming, (AX)even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour.

19(AY)They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, (AZ)so that it would be shown that they all are not of us.


And 2 Tim 2 and 1 Tim 1:

1 Tim 1:19keeping (BJ)faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and suffered shipwreck in regard to (BK)their faith.

20Among these are (BL)Hymenaeus and (BM)Alexander, whom I have (BN)handed over to Satan, so that they will be (BO)taught not to blaspheme.

2 Tim 2:16But (AM)avoid (AN)worldly and empty chatter, for it will lead to further ungodliness,

17and their talk will spread like [a]gangrene. Among them are (AO)Hymenaeus and Philetus,

18men who have gone astray from the truth saying that (AP)the resurrection has already taken place, and they upset (AQ)the faith of some.


Or Galatians 2:4But it was because of the (C)false brethren secretly brought in, who (D)had sneaked in to spy out our (E)liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, in order to (F)bring us into bondage.

5But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that (G)the truth of the gospel would remain with you.



Satan wants to destroy the church, no? And so one of the best ways to do that is to rip it apart from within, and to introduce false teachers and false brethren. Ch discipline is for kicking them out once they're revealed, don't you think?


The whole point is that the disciplined person is a brother who will be now treated like a stranger.

Well, he's assumed to be a brother up until the time of excomm. Now we're not so sure, but the way is open for him to come back, if he specifically repents. Much like an unblvr has to repent to join the church.


because non-Christians are not capable of real repentance outside of God's transformative work,

I don't know if I'd agree with that. Definitely I agree that he can't repent BEFORE GOD outside of the Holy Spirit working in him, but truly repenting of having committed evil against another in a totally non-Christian context? I don't know if there's any biblical revelation either way, is there? You think that most of the societies in the world in history have been founded and gone their way w/o ever having experienced true repentance over wrongs? Not that they'd consider those wrongs in any consistent worldview, but people are capable of gross, grand, monumental inconsistency!


so threatening them with excommunication ...makes as much sense as threatening them with violence.

Well, obviously they have some reason for coming to church; otherwise they wouldn't come. Now they've lost access to whatever value they placed on churchgoing. That might be big or small, but that's all one can do. And it's another chance to share the Gospel and also to sanctify the congregation thru the removal of bad leaven and thru teaching the Scr's teaching on ch disc and holiness.



(your idea about withholding forgiveness seems indistinguishable from this to me. Is there a distinction you're making, or would you simply say the one is a more formal version of the other?)

Hmm, yeah, I'd probably call it a more formal version.



-------------

1) Fair enough - Simon hadn't specifically wronged Peter.
2) I asked: Shall we be more forgiving than God? So, maybe you could help make progress towards that - are we indeed to be more forgiving than God?
You answer:
I would say yes, certainly, and of course.

Hmmm, I don't know if I can buy that, you know? God is THE exemplar for our actions and thoughts. Forgiveness is objectively a good action. And yet I can exceed God in a good action? Me?

3) I think it's better to say that my judgment might be shaky as far as extrapolating from withholding forgiveness in the context of ch disc to withholding it for unblvrs in certain circumstances, since I dealt with the part about excommunicating (secret) unblvrs above.

One thing I haven't seen you take into account, and correct me if I'm wrong, is the concept that we withhold forgiveness certain times for the good of the person, for love of them. Since this action would be motivated by pure love of the offender, does that have anythg at all to do with it?

Looking for a challenge

I don't think this is a particularly new set of ideas or anything, but I can't recall seeing them discussed often in the channels in which I travel on the worldwide Internetosphere, so I'd like to post them here and invite anyone who holds to Darwinianistical evolutionary theory to comment.

Given the great care that the Darwinian camp has taken to differentiate itself from the Intelligent Design stuff, one would think that certainly said camp would be highly, strongly interested in providing evidence for its position, absent ANY INTELLIGENCE involved whatsoever. Given that, I'd like evidence that evolution from one type of organism to another is occurring TODAY with the following qualifications:
1) A laboratory injects intelligence into the equation. No lab.
2) Experiments observed on a REPEATED basis, as good science should be.
3) No intelligent (ie, human) manipulation of the events.
4) With ALL normal environmental factors present. No control group, no outside interference from intelligent agents (ie, humans).
5) With ALL normal other factors present, such as predators, weather, fluctuations in prey, water, and other nourishment.
6) And a good way of judging when the line of organism has become a different type (just for utility's sake, but I'd call this slightly less interesting or necessary than the other 5).

In other words, is it unreasonable to think that, if you're presenting what you allege is evidence for a currently-acting process of unguided natural selection acting on random mutations, you could show some evidence of it that is not guided artificial selection acting on partially-random mutations? Is that too much to ask? If so, why?

If your response lies along the lines of: "That's too strict - you've defined most of the parameters for normal experimentation out of the question", does that not mean that you concede that you lack any good evidence for your position over and against the ID position? That your side has spoken far too quickly, with far too much certainty and fervency, with respect to how clear it is that Darwinian evolution is correct and ID is wrong? If not, why not?

Closed

Someone accused me of being closed-minded today.

He's so closed-minded. Closed-minded against closed-mindedness and against closed-minded people. He needs to be open to diversity and diverse people.

The Tom Foss Tossup

Tom Foss responded to a post I did a while back, thus continuing our interaction on the nature of morality. I unfortunately forgot to leave a comment on his blog notifying him of the response, so we happened to cross paths recently and I told him about the response. He wrote his post, and I finally have some time to knock out a response.

I don't plan to get to the peripheral issues in his post, such as the "worthy of killing" thing or the biblical psgs that Tom mentions as some sort of challenge to my position, as if citing Biblical Psg X would discomfit me, whose position is based on the Bible as far as I can base it. Perhaps I'll get to those at a later date.

Tom's central assumption is apparently that whatever helps human society continue to exist = morally acceptable.
Of course, I've been bringing this up the whole time. What does he say in response?

It starts with:
The start is the set of facts that require society to exist: namely, our desire for survival, our natural empathy for one another, and our mutual interdependence.

Tom has apparently not taken the next step with respect to these questions. For him it's enough to stop with society, but those of us who are a bit more, ahem, freethinking are not satisfied therewith.
So, I have to ask: How do we know that, in general, actions that further human and human societal survival are moral?
Why should I consider that someone's desires, or many people's desires, be the foundation for morality? What about desires makes fulfilling them moral? All desires? If not, how can we tell the difference, since desires are desires?
(I've already laid to rest this idea of basing morality on empathy, so we can leave that aside for now.)

He later refers to an earlier post of his, which I believe is simply the post to which I'm responding in my last response, seemingly to justify his foundation as society. Let's see what it has to say.

The "should" is determined by society, and at its core, by the necessary elements required for society to exist.

Why? How do you know?
He says he discusses this later in the post, so let's keep reading.

There is if the species is to continue. Granted, there are those individuals for whom that's not a concern. For the rest of us, that society exists is a given.

Completely unhelpful with respect to the question. We move on.


living together is necessary for prolonged survival, all of the time. Last I checked, humans couldn't asexually reproduce.

Again, unhelpful.


morals evolve as society progresses

As if anyone denied that morals evolve.
And of course "progresses" begs the question of whether it is progressing towards better or worse moral values. We're asking how we can know, to what standard we compare actions to find out whether they're good or bad.


Two, we come again to the closest thing society has to moral absolutes: the conditions necessary for society to exist.

Simply begs the question.


Much of law is arbitrary--arbitrary boundaries drawn in sand by democratic plurality or dictatorial edict. They vary from place to place, and that's not generally a problem.

And sometimes it is a problem, and people disagree and even fight. So how can we know?


It's not morally significant whether the highest speed limit in the state is 65 or 70 mph; the difference is arbitrary.

Notice how he doesn't bother backing this up with an argument. That's just the way it is.


More disparate cultures may disagree on more basic points, but even the simplest social animals have codes against killing members of the society and other basic, foundational principles.

Again, no one is denying that such moral standards exist. The question is whether they are right or wrong.

I don't see any other references in that earlier post. Our search for actual substantiation was in vain. Tom is a big fan of unsupported assertions.


Back to the later post...
The half that's wrong is that it's "enabling a natural process to take place." It's not; it's forcing a natural process to take place immediately rather than inevitably. Here in the real world, there's this thing called "time," and it has significance with regard to these natural processes.

How does he know?


we, as humans, however, would generally prefer existence to nonexistence. The necessity of society comes out of our desire to continue living.

And of course, preference does not equal morality. When will he get around to actually answering the questions I'm asking?


The prescription is this: given the facts that society exists, that we live in it, and that we generally benefit from it, our moral obligations are determined by the principles that ensure the continued existence of society, and thus assist our continued survival and benefit.

So, again, how does he know that it is morally good that society continue to exist?


No, in my view, humans couldn't have evolved otherwise--not and still be recognizable as humans.

Granting for the sake of argument that humans evolved from a different species, so what? Just b/c we evolved this way doesn't mean that we are right to behave in the way we behave.


Things happened according to one set of circumstances, and those circumstances dictate our morality.

I have to wonder whether Tom even understands what I'm asking. I kind of doubt it, b/c his response completely misses the mark.
No one is denying that people hold to moral codes. Are those codes right or wrong?


Society exists, we benefit from it.

Begs the question of how he knows what "benefit" means, without any objective moral standard to which to compare the status quo.


if we want to continue to survive and benefit from the comforts of society, then we ought to act in accordance with society's rules.

Once again he is stating a general fact, which I've never denied. He's answering the wrong question.


If we don't want to act in accordance with society's rules, then we ought to leave. We can't have our benefits and shirk the rules too.

Why ought we leave? Why not shirk the rules? What if the rules are bad? How can we know if the rules are bad and ought to be shirked?


I'm explaining that "ought" comes from "is."

He should take this up with David Hume. Of course, the way this is going, he'd probably title his paper "More on Hume" and provide a bunch of answers to Augustine or the Dalai Lama.


I said:
If it evolved that way, that's the moral right. Thus the danger of basing one's morality on humanity.
He responds:
Where on Earth did anyone say that?

As a matter of fact, Tom did:
No, in my view, humans couldn't have evolved otherwise--not and still be recognizable as humans.


Yes, Rhology, when the facts change, I change my position. What do you do?

This highlights the difference between our systems, and my question and his response illustrate that well.
On my view, when someone changes his behavior, I can know whether that change was for the worse or for the better.
On his view, if enough people change their view (though Tom can't tell us how many it takes), that changed view BECOMES the new "right".


As opposed to what? A system based on what an arbitrarily chosen deity supposedly said?

Yes, precisely. Tom apparently has difficulty with hypotheticals. But IF my position is true, then there is an objective standard by which to judge things good or bad. IF his position is true, there's not. Simple as that.


any book that advocates public execution as a punishment for laziness and rebellion is morally reprehensible.

This is an interesting statement. Perhaps Tom could also tell us (while he's spinning his wheels avoiding the question of how many = a societal "consensus") when the cut-off point is for a moral position to change. Notice how he's standing from his 21st-century position and judging people from ~3000 yrs ago. But that was THEIR societal consensus! Why the inconsistency? In 3000 yrs, does Tom think it'd be OK if someone looked at his moral positions and judged them to be "reprehensible" if the future man's positions were different? Would he be right if he did so? Approximately when does the switchover occur from "societal position, which defines 'right'" to "past societal position, reprehensible"?


Explicitly, the social consensus is represented in the law, though that's not always an accurate depiction of social values (see, for instance, Prohibition).

And of course, all these things he's complaining about in the Mosaic Law were, um, the law.


A few decades ago, homosexuality was generally assumed to be morally wrong; today, the social conversation is far, far more divided, and the consensus is shifting toward the contrary position.

So how long until he'll be able to say that the older position is morally reprehensible?


Real-world morals don't provide blanket black-and-white, always-right/always-wrong judgments.

Didn't he just finish telling us how "morally reprehensible" those acts commanded in the Bible were? Why didn't he apply his own standards to those?


What are "correct and incorrect desires"?

I don't know why this is hard at all. I am asking whether the thoughts I think are morally permissible? He misses the point completely when he refers to "thoughtcrime", since I'm not talking about the law. I want to know whether it's OK to think certain thoughts, morally speaking. How does his societal consensus model answer that question?
That leads me into another interesting question, actually. Society doesn't always discuss or poll itself about certain things. One's thought life is one example. If an action is not discussed, is it good or bad to commit that action? Again, is it right or wrong to think that societal consensus is the correct moral position?




Now, I move on to another point, in which I point out the total lack of clarity on the question of how he knows what the societal consensus is. He keeps saying "societal consensus" and all, but I've asked him many times how to define "consensus". Let's see if his answers are anything close to satisfying.


The consensus is not a matter of percentages, and I'm sure you're not stupid enough to think that it is. It's represented in the ongoing conversations about rights, the progression of laws, and the overall changing social attitude. (quoted from the Morality and Such post).

Notice how completely vague that is. ANYone could say that.

Let's go back to this, since it fits under this section as well:
Explicitly, the social consensus is represented in the law, though that's not always an accurate depiction of social values (see, for instance, Prohibition).

How he knows the difference between a law that does not line up with "societal values" and one that does, he doesn't say.


You want a percentage?

Yes. Is he going to be angry if I ask for a little more than just his say-so?


Take a damn poll.

Why doesn't HE take a poll? Maybe he forgot who's advocating which position.
Perhaps he's unfamiliar with Barna, Gallup, and those zillion other professional pollsters out there. Or is Tom saying that he hasn't actually done any research on this? He just makes his assumptions and runs with them.


Otherwise, you can just pay attention: what kinds of moral issues are being debated in the society?

Generally, when society is strongly debating a topic, I conclude that society is strongly debating that topic. So, is there simply no way to figure out whether that action is wrong until "society" "decides"?
What about the question: Is it morally right or wrong to think that morality is determined by societal consensus? Is THAT question under debate? Or can Tom cite some poll on that topic? Or rather, is it an axiomatic statement that Tom takes on faith and as a foundation, so that it is not itself dependent on the standard it expresses? Tom has a long way to go here.


as opposed to decisions made during an unobservable and unexaminable period of time by an invisible, undefined God working through an amorphous, undefined group of writers in an undefined area on undefined questions.

Tom is just speaking from ignorance here. He obviously hasn't bothered to acquaint himself with standard biblical scholarship on these questions. The period of time of Bible books' writing is hardly unknown. God is not undefined. Virtually all of the authors of the biblical books are known. And I have no idea what he means about "undefined questions" - has Tom ever read the Bible? It answers all sorts of questions, and asks others. One has simply to read it to know Tom is just shooting off his mouth here.

Definitely feeling the Tiber-love

A devoted son of Rome said:

It is clear that you are thoroughly convinced you're right, and are only interested in winning silly arguments rather than coming to any kind of charitable understanding of the matter.

With that in mind, the only question that really matters is, and I have asked you this already elsewhere, what are the spiritual and psychological reasons why you approach the teachings of the Catholic Church with a spirit of unreasonableness and dissent?

Did your daddy beat you as a boy, and now you're taking it all out on the Church? Were you the dumb kid at school who never answered any questions correctly in class, so now you go about bashing Catholics because you want to feel intellectually superior? Otherwise, there's really no good reason to hold the sort of opinions you have about the Catholic Church because, if you weren't blinded by whatever spiritual or psychological stumbling block that's in your head, you could do some clear-minded research and see that her teachings are in no way evil or malicious or contradictory.

Hey buddy, I'll have you know that I'm sending you my counseling bills.