Jim And Penny Caldwell's Archaeological Findings:

[Thought2Much]

Thanks for posting that explanation, BAA.

[Joshpantera]

Quote

It's the 'Cause' of everthing that If that 'seed' or Super Force has always been in existence (in one form or another) then you have something that wasn't caused and that is the hardest thing to comprehend.............

 

Now you're down to the mystery level.

 

In the end there has to exist something that was uncaused whether we call that the natural cosmos or a supernatural God. And I believe the natural cosmos as 'the uncaused cause' makes more sense then a supernatural magical being as the uncaused cause, though both options are indeed mind boggling because of the eternal aspect of both options.

 

If there's a greater surrounding cosmos such as a vast multiverse of existence then we're getting into existence as a whole as something that simply has always been regardless of our inability to fathom how in the world existence itself has always been in some form or another, uncreated and uncaused. But here's the thing, when you get deep into Joseph Campbell and his analysis of world mythology you can find that the myths of the world are basically all pointing back to this great underlying mystery of existence itself.

 

http://vimeo.com/36001078

 

It's simple really. People have taken the 'great unknown' and personified it as if it were literally a supreme being deity God, literally lives and thinks, literally favors some people (Israel) but not others (heathens). When that's merely a man made concept used to symbolize the 'great unknown' all along - a way of trying to talk about the great unknown as if it were known.

 

When you get down to understanding the myths and religions in this way the need to pursue ID and things of that nature tends to dissolve IMO. People were wondering "where did everything come from?" Well It's a mystery. And instead of leaving it that way, as the mystery of the great unknown, they instead chose to personify the great mystery and color and decorate it with all variety of personification, attributes, and human oriented emotions. They conjured up the idea that something had to intentionally design everything in nature in order for it to exist. And that mysterious something became an outside force, a transcendent God as the concept evolved. To understand the long evolution of the God concept tends to curb the question of who or what designed everything though, IMO. 

 

From my view, existence is something that has always been - in one form or another - and has always been self creating and self designing over and over again eternally without any way of really wrapping your mind around how it could have always been going on with no fixed absolute beginning. Imagine a vast cosmic sea like the multiverse and 11th dimensional hyperspace transcending what we see as the surrounding universe. There'd be whole universes rising and falling, entire evolutionary movements happening here and there where conditions permit on various planets, multiple worlds, etc. etc. There could be no absolute fixed beginning for the whole of it, nor any fixed absolute end as I see it. Just this vast expanse of existence which involves constant motion and change always taking place throughout the whole which amounts to our experience of time and the perception of space and so on. What could the designer possibly be aside from the cosmos itself constantly designing everything according to trial and error and not necessarily knowing the outcome but adapting to the conditions that spontaneously arise? The eternal cosmos always giving rise to aspects of itself. 

 

Well that's some more to consider in any event...

[bornagainathiest]

I've been dwelling on what you said BAA:

 

 

So why did the Designer need to make such a vast, greater universe, if we are His/Her/It's prime reason for creating anything in the first place? Why not just make one star (the Sun), plus the Earth and the Moon? That's all that's needed. Doing anything else makes no sense. It's incompetently, massively wasteful. It's serves no coherent purpose. It's ridiculous. It's overkill to a trillion, zillion decimal places.

 

The facts of the Big Bang and Cosmic Inflation tell me that there is no Intelligent Designer, BC.

 

 

 

 

I only understand your above statement if one's understanding of a Designer is something like the God of the Bible.  As I now well and truly appreciate how man-made that God is, courtesy of you guys here and with a lot of help from this site:

http://contradictionsinthebible.com/category/genesis/  

 

Hello again BC.

Yes, I did indeed have the anthropomorphic God of the Bible in mind when I was writing the above.  I took this line to show how ridiculous it is.

 

However, even if we pare away as much human psychology as we can (thanks Josh!  Campbell's the main man) - leaving us with just the bare facts of science, there are still severe constraints on what we can know, what we can reasonably assume and what we can reasonably extrapolate.  These constraints inform my objections, not just to the Intelligent Designer of the Christian Bible, but also my objection to the idea that there is anything like 'design' in entire (not just the observable) cosmos.

 

So, I'd better explain what these constraints are, hadn't I?

Well, it all comes down to a matter of statistics.  If I have just one example of a large population of anything (humans, trees, planets or observable universes) then I can't say very much about the nature of the whole, can I?  Whatever conclusions I draw from just one person, will be statistically meaningless, if I apply that conclusion to the entire human race.  For instance, I have a large mole on my right nostril.  Would I therefore be correct in assuming that every human has just such a feature?

 

Or, because the mimosa tree in my garden bears yellow flowers, does that mean that I can conclude that all trees on Earth do the same?  Do you see where this is going, BC?  Just because life on Earth displays what looks like ID, would I be right in concluding that all life-bearing planets in the universe do the same?  

 

Our sample of what we call Life and what we call a Life-Bearing planet and what we call evidence of ID is exactly... 1. 

We only have 1 example of Life (and no clear agreement as to how this should be defined).  We only have 1 example of of a Life-Bearing planet, the Earth.  We only have 1 idea of what ID is (again, with no clear-cut agreement on the issue), all examples hailing from the that 1 planet.

 

So, how can I possibly say anything that is statistically meaningful about the rest of the universe, from a sample of exactly 1?  In short, I don't think I can.  I think that the singularity of my sample severely constrains what I can say about the rest of the universe, especially about the complex matters of Intelligent Design.

 

However, cosmologists DO make assumptions an DO extrapolate about the wider universe.  What they do is to let the scientific facts and observations of the cosmos inform their assumptions and explanations.  Here are the three main principles of modern cosmology. 

• 1. The universal physics principle – the laws of physics are the same everywhere and everywhen;
• 2. The Copernican principle – the Earth is not in a special location within the Universe;
• 3. The Cosmological principle – at any given time the Universe is homogeneous and isotropic (uniform in all orientations) at large distances.

Ok, these are assumptions, but they are informed assumptions, based upon observations, data and hard evidence.

Now BC, even taking these three principles into account, I still feel severely constrained in what I can conclude about Intelligent Design, either as a dominant 'natural' principle across the universe or as a fundamental principle (natural or super-natural) of it's reason to exist.

 

1.

Because the laws of physics are the same everywhere and everywhen, does that therefore mean that because there is ID on Earth, there must also be ID everywhere else?

My answer to this is...our sample is too small for us to say.

 

2.

Because of the Copernican principle, nowhere is special and therefore what holds good on Earth (Intelligent Design) must also hold good everywhere else?

My answer to this is... our sample is too small for us to say.

 

3.

Because of the Cosmological principle, the universe displays uniformity.  Does that therefore mean that Intelligent Design is a uniformly-common feature of it?

My answer to this is... our sample is too small for us to say.

 

So, even with these informed assumptions in place, I'm still not able to say anything meaningful about ID, am I?

Do you see how I'm therefore forced to object to ID, by the constraints of these arguments, BC?

 

Once again, please ask me to explain anything that isn't clear.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

 

 

p.s.

I will deal with the rest of your post (the primordial 'seed', it's breakage, the cause, etc.) once you and I are happy that we've understood this message, ok?

Samll movements!  This is brain-wrenching stuff.

[Ravenstar]

Thanks BAA!  wow... now I need to study all these terms. 20 minutes... that's mind-boggling.

 

I can't wait to hear the press release on March 21st... yes, I can see how it could be very significant to be able to observe the CBM - kind of like a 'crime scene' investigation (without the crime!). Forensic investigators now take a 360 degree, 3D 'photograph' (more like a holograph) in some cases... to be able to determine all the parameters of a crime scene at leisure.

 

Same idea.. a whole lot more complicated. 

 

It's truly fascinating... and again thank you for posting all this great stuff!

[ExCBooster]

I think, too, on the Joseph Campbell side of Cosmology, as long as we're taking cultural universals as some kind of proof, that the idea of somegod as a Creator of sorts... is not actually Universal. There are lots of mythic traditions that don't have one, really, or it doesn't take the form of a watchmaker or universal Force, and a lot of the time, it doesn't even figure in later mythology, having been some awful heap of misshapen flesh, or gotten chopped up, exploded, died, scrambled, etc. Sometimes, the Everything was always already there, and there isn't a "creation myth," proper, or it's not considered relevant.

 

I just found the mother-lode of creation myths... might be worth a look.

 

Anyway, note that the one about Marduk and Tiamat has the creation of the universe have to do with the slaying of horrible, horrible monsters. A lot of them are like that, with the Ur-progenitors infinitely more horrible than their brood that comes after. Inevitably, there's a war... In that vein, a lot of the creator-things do not go on to become deity-mascots for a tribe, or even have interests at all in human politics. Lots of Kami are named as having popped into existence in the Kojiki, before we even get to any that figure in the narrative, let alone human politics. Many spontaneously arise, then hide away, never to figure in the myth later at all. I guess the real point here is the almost infinite variation of Creation Stories, across the very wide board, quite a lot of them involving no real "creator" in the Christian sense at all, of some infinitely powerful being that created itself. A lot of them "arise" out of nothing, with no creator, rhyme, reason, or explanation, and then have nothing to do with the further plot. For the people that had these kinds of mythologies, the question of creation wasn't relevant, or the question of "creation" itself was considered founded on an untrue premise. (The real issue, in the case of the Kojiki, has to do with the point of view of Shinto, anyway, that there are myriad Kami, big and small, and that Kami quite literally can't even sneeze without generating more Kami. Kami coming from nowhere and having little to do with anything just underlines the point. In rampantly polytheistic belief systems, it makes sense that there would be Gods out there that you know nothing about, just doing whatever-it-is that they do. It also makes sense to cover your A$$, Just. In. Case.) So, to make long mythology short, mythologies don't even require a creator, per se, and a lot of them aren't even founded on any kind of similar premise to Judeo-Christian style monotheism.

 

This tension, in other words, between "creator-narrative" and "science-facts" is generated entirely by the culture in which you find yourself - one dominated by a belief system that requires a "God/Creator" in order to be "true." Looking at other cultures, the tension doesn't exist at all. And if the problem or belief isn't truly universal, but rather an artefact of culture, why worry about it? The whole thing isn't even a debate, outside this particular the-Bible-is-Objective-Truth culture. And that's also why I think that fundies are xenophobic and really don't like anybody getting too informed about other cultures. Knowledge of other cultures is just one short step away from the outsider test of faith: "if I wasn't from this culture, would I believe this religion?"

[BlackCat]

 

 

Now you're down to the mystery level.

 

In the end there has to exist something that was uncaused whether we call that the natural cosmos or a supernatural God.   And I believe the natural cosmos as 'the uncaused cause' makes more sense then a supernatural magical being as the uncaused cause, though both options are indeed mind boggling because of the eternal aspect of both options.  I used to reason that if something has to have always existed and been 'uncaused', then why not 'God'?  This 'God' would not really be magical or supernatural, but the force behind the natural cosmos and its 'changing'. 

 

If there's a greater surrounding cosmos such as a vast multiverse of existence then we're getting into existence as a whole as something that simply has always been regardless of our inability to fathom how in the world existence itself has always been in some form or another, uncreated and uncaused. But here's the thing, when you get deep into Joseph Campbell and his analysis of world mythology you can find that the myths of the world are basically all pointing back to this great underlying mystery of existence itself.   Yes, He makes some similar points to what I've been learning about these past few months.   

 

http://vimeo.com/36001078

 

It's simple really. People have taken the 'great unknown' and personified it as if it were literally a supreme being deity God, literally lives and thinks, literally favors some people (Israel) but not others (heathens). When that's merely a man made concept used to symbolize the 'great unknown' all along - a way of trying to talk about the great unknown as if it were known. 

 

When you get down to understanding the myths and religions in this way the need to pursue ID and things of that nature tends to dissolve IMO. People were wondering "where did everything come from?" Well It's a mystery. And instead of leaving it that way, as the mystery of the great unknown, they instead chose to personify the great mystery and color and decorate it with all variety of personification, attributes, and human oriented emotions. They conjured up the idea that something had to intentionally design everything in nature in order for it to exist. And that mysterious something became an outside force, a transcendent God as the concept evolved. To understand the long evolution of the God concept tends to curb the question of who or what designed everything though, IMO.   I can clearly see how 'personal' gods  and religions have evolved, but surely the questions regarding existence and 'uncaused causes' still remain valid and pertinent to scientific enquiry? 

 

From my view, existence is something that has always been - in one form or another - and has always been self creating and self designing over and over again eternally without any way of really wrapping your mind around how it could have always been going on with no fixed absolute beginning. Imagine a vast cosmic sea like the multiverse and 11th dimensional hyperspace transcending what we see as the surrounding universe. There'd be whole universes rising and falling, entire evolutionary movements happening here and there where conditions permit on various planets, multiple worlds, etc. etc. There could be no absolute fixed beginning for the whole of it, nor any fixed absolute end as I see it. Just this vast expanse of existence which involves constant motion and change always taking place throughout the whole which amounts to our experience of time and the perception of space and so on. What could the designer possibly be aside from the cosmos itself constantly designing everything according to trial and error and not necessarily knowing the outcome but adapting to the conditions that spontaneously arise? The eternal cosmos always giving rise to aspects of itself.  This seems to make the most sense - and yet the idea of consciousness being 'special' seems to require an eternal intelligent consciousness...........

 

Well that's some more to consider in any event...

[BlackCat]

BAA- I've just spent two hours trying to convey my thoughts regarding your post.  I'm really struggling.  This really is brain wrenching stuff indeed.  I shall come back to you as soon as I can.    

[BlackCat]

Ok. I'll have another go at trying to reply to your post BAA.

 

Hello again BC.

Yes, I did indeed have the anthropomorphic God of the Bible in mind when I was writing the above.  I took this line to show how ridiculous it is.

 

However, even if we pare away as much human psychology as we can (thanks Josh!  Campbell's the main man) - leaving us with just the bare facts of science, there are still severe constraints on what we can know, what we can reasonably assume and what we can reasonably extrapolate.  These constraints inform my objections, not just to the Intelligent Designer of the Christian Bible, but also my objection to the idea that there is anything like 'design' in entire (not just the observable) cosmos.

 

So, I'd better explain what these constraints are, hadn't I?

Well, it all comes down to a matter of statistics.  If I have just one example of a large population of anything (humans, trees, planets or observable universes) then I can't say very much about the nature of the whole, can I?  Whatever conclusions I draw from just one person, will be statistically meaningless, if I apply that conclusion to the entire human race.  For instance, I have a large mole on my right nostril.  Would I therefore be correct in assuming that every human has just such a feature?

 

Or, because the mimosa tree in my garden bears yellow flowers, does that mean that I can conclude that all trees on Earth do the same?  Do you see where this is going, BC?  Just because life on Earth displays what looks like ID, would I be right in concluding that all life-bearing planets in the universe do the same?  I think you would be right or it would be logical to conclude that the same laws of physics etc would produce similar life forms to here on earth.  We know that other planets, suns, moons etc are the 'same' as ours, and so self replicating organisms would surely be similar wherever they may appear in the cosmos. 

 

Our sample of what we call Life and what we call a Life-Bearing planet and what we call evidence of ID is exactly... 1. 

We only have 1 example of Life (and no clear agreement as to how this should be defined).  We only have 1 example of of a Life-Bearing planet, the Earth.  We only have 1 idea of what ID is (again, with no clear-cut agreement on the issue), all examples hailing from the that 1 planet.

 

So, how can I possibly say anything that is statistically meaningful about the rest of the universe, from a sample of exactly 1?  In short, I don't think I can.  I think that the singularity of my sample severely constrains what I can say about the rest of the universe, especially about the complex matters of Intelligent Design.  I have always understood the universe to be spreading out in what seems to be an even fashion with matter and energy appearing in similar quantities etc.  So I thought our solar system was like a snap shot of the rest of the universe.  We can see distant galaxies that look similar to ours with similar planets, moons, star etc, so surely our example of '1' allows us to be sure about what the rest of the universe contains?

 

However, cosmologists DO make assumptions an DO extrapolate about the wider universe.  What they do is to let the scientific facts and observations of the cosmos inform their assumptions and explanations.  Here are the three main principles of modern cosmology. 

• 1. The universal physics principle – the laws of physics are the same everywhere and everywhen;
• 2. The Copernican principle – the Earth is not in a special location within the Universe;
• 3. The Cosmological principle – at any given time the Universe is homogeneous and isotropic (uniform in all orientations) at large distances.

Ok, these are assumptions, but they are informed assumptions, based upon observations, data and hard evidence.

Now BC, even taking these three principles into account, I still feel severely constrained in what I can conclude about Intelligent Design, either as a dominant 'natural' principle across the universe or as a fundamental principle (natural or super-natural) of it's reason to exist. 

 

1.

Because the laws of physics are the same everywhere and everywhen, does that therefore mean that because there is ID on Earth, there must also be ID everywhere else?

My answer to this is...our sample is too small for us to say.  Hmm, I'm struggling to follow this point.   If it could be known, that life has only ever occurred on our planet, so it's a 'one off',  then I don't see how that effects the proposition of ID.  Regarding the points I made above, I think it highly improbable that we are the only instance of 'life'.  I read an article (on a Christian web site, so not sure if it's accurate?) that claimed that in order for life here to be possible, the cosmos has to be the size it is- so the 'seed' that fractured in the Big Bang was exactly the right 'size' ? to go on to form planets, stars and us of course??

 

2.

Because of the Copernican principle, nowhere is special and therefore what holds good on Earth (Intelligent Design) must also hold good everywhere else?

My answer to this is... our sample is too small for us to say.  Because we can observe a good sized section of the universe, we can conclude surely, that if other planets happen to be positioned etc, like ours, then surely they have the same chances to produce life which would be similar to life here, and thus appear designed, like it does here? 

 

3.

Because of the Cosmological principle, the universe displays uniformity.  Does that therefore mean that Intelligent Design is a uniformly-common feature of it?

My answer to this is... our sample is too small for us to say.  Because we know that certain conditions are needed for life to be possible, and we can observe what looks like similar condiitons throughout the universe, again I think it is logical to assume ID is a common feature or even a rare feature.  It doesn't matter if ID looking life is common or rare surely?

 

So, even with these informed assumptions in place, I'm still not able to say anything meaningful about ID, am I?   

Do you see how I'm therefore forced to object to ID, by the constraints of these arguments, BC? Partly.  I agree we don't know enough, but I would therefore be neutral to ID, rather than object or reject it.  Well actually from our 'local' perspective I'm inclined to reject it, for all the reasons we've discussed up to now.  But considering ID from the perspective of an intelligence providing that 'seed' and causing the Big Bang, to enable life to eventually form, that has an appeal to me, but that is not based on any evidence, just my brain not being able to accept an eternal cosmos of changing energy/matter. 

 

Once again, please ask me to explain anything that isn't clear.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

 

 

p.s.

I will deal with the rest of your post (the primordial 'seed', it's breakage, the cause, etc.) once you and I are happy that we've understood this message, ok?

Samll movements!  This is brain-wrenching stuff.

[Akheia]

But how do creationists figure how big the seed must be? How do we test their ideas? What would falsify them? How can we know what they're saying is true? And how do billions upon billions of stars in the cosmos even impact Earth's formation and abiogenesis? That's like saying that if you flip a penny 50 times, it becomes more likely to flip heads after a while. NO, it is always 50/50. The astronomical stuff happening around Earth is all that impacts the formation of life on Earth, unless you're saying that these gods made a billion cosmic coin-flips hoping there'd be an Earth... which is 100% the wild hope of a desperate heart with nothing, NOTHING to substantiate it. Meanwhile, the universe certainly looks and acts as real science predicts.

 

Like Behe did with his irreducible complexity argument, making entire books' worth of equations basically pulled out of his ass, the creationists you mention in #1 are just speculating without any basis for their arguments whatsoever. It just sounds like moving the goalposts to me. Society is way too comfortable with the idea of there being a huge, ancient cosmos, so now creationists have moved the goalpost from "God faked us out by making the universe LOOK big and starlight LOOK like it took millions of years to get to us" to "yeah, it's super-big and super-old, and it had to be."

 

Still some pretty piss-poor gods if they couldn't work out a way to produce a planet of humans without wasting all that material. And we still don't know why they'd go to that trouble, what the goal was, and even who those gods might be, why they'd want the universe to have the appearance of happening entirely naturally, or why they'd want established science to refute creationist claims so thoroughly.

 

It's okay to want desperately to believe something, but don't stop there. Creationists have this habit of turning off their brains. When you're positive you have the answer, you stop learning. Don't. Keep learning. You're so close. Me, obviously, I reject creationism and its various claims utterly, because they simply don't stack up against centuries of established science. They're guesses, conjectures, and pulled-out-of-the-ass numbers, and their god is simply a god of the gaps--which is exactly what your yearned-for god sounds like. The more you learn, the further into the recesses this god must creep.

 

But here's the thing. Gods don't have to quiver in the unexplained corners of your knowledge. You need not turn off your brain just to believe in gods. The trap of fundamentalism is that it is black/white, this/that, and either/or (a good illustration of this is seeing what creationists think society will become if people reject creationism). Once you drop that burden, that shroud, you start to live again. Plenty of people follow religions traditions of various sorts and still embrace science fully and pursue secularism and humanism in society. Just follow the Ghostbuster rule and keep the streams from crossing.

[BlackCat]

When I believed in the Bible God, I'd never had a problem with the size of the universe.  I assumed there was a good reason why it was that size.  When BAA mentioned the size seeming like a waste (when considering a Bible type of God), in a earlier post, it got me wondering and so I googled something like 'is the size of the universe important?'  The only articles I could see that mentioned the points BAA made, were on Christian web sites.  This one got my attention.  Here is a quote from the relevant section of the article:

 

''The universe could not have been much smaller than it     is in order for nuclear fusion to have occurred during the first 3 minutes     after the Big Bang. Without this brief period of nucleosynthesis, the early universe would have consisted entirely of     hydrogen.⁹ Without helium (comprising ~24% of     the matter in the universe), heavy element     production in stars is not possible, so that no rocky planets would have     ever existed in the entire history of the universe.

Likewise, the universe could not have been a much more massive than it     is, or life would not have been possible. If the universe were just one part     in 10⁵⁹ more massive,¹⁰ the universe would have collapsed before life was     possible. Since there are only 10⁸⁰ baryons in the universe, this     means that an addition of just 10²¹ baryons (at 1.67�10⁻²⁷     kg/baryon equals 1.7 mg of matter - equal to a grain of sand) would have made     life impossible! The universe is exactly the size it must be for life to exist at     all.''  http://godandscience.org/apologetics/universe_too_large.html

 

I haven't been able to verify this yet.  Is this true guys??  By the way, I'm not interested in the religious content of that article or web site, only that quote.  I can't imagine that Rich Deem, would state something like that if it wasn't true??  Now if I assume he is correct....this is interesting, whether you believe in a 'Designer' or not. 

[Thought2Much]

When I believed in the Bible God, I'd never had a problem with the size of the universe.  I assumed there was a good reason why it was that size.  When BAA mentioned the size seeming like a waste (when considering a Bible type of God), in a earlier post, it got me wondering and so I googled something like 'is the size of the universe important?'  The only articles I could see that mentioned the points BAA made, were on Christian web sites.  This one got my attention.  Here is a quote from the relevant section of the article:

 

''The universe could not have been much smaller than it     is in order for nuclear fusion to have occurred during the first 3 minutes     after the Big Bang. Without this brief period of nucleosynthesis, the early universe would have consisted entirely of     hydrogen.⁹ Without helium (comprising ~24% of     the matter in the universe), heavy element     production in stars is not possible, so that no rocky planets would have     ever existed in the entire history of the universe.

Likewise, the universe could not have been a much more massive than it     is, or life would not have been possible. If the universe were just one part     in 10⁵⁹ more massive,¹⁰ the universe would have collapsed before life was     possible. Since there are only 10⁸⁰ baryons in the universe, this     means that an addition of just 10²¹ baryons (at 1.67�10⁻²⁷     kg/baryon equals 1.7 mg of matter - equal to a grain of sand) would have made     life impossible! The universe is exactly the size it must be for life to exist at     all.''  http://godandscience.org/apologetics/universe_too_large.html

 

I haven't been able to verify this yet.  Is this true guys??  By the way, I'm not interested in the religious content of that article or web site, only that quote.  I can't imagine that Rich Deem, would state something like that if it wasn't true??  Now if I assume he is correct....this is interesting, whether you believe in a 'Designer' or not. 

 

In a word, no. Even if the universe started out entirely made of hydrogen, once stars formed (which they probably would have even without helium) and started the process of fusion (which would occur in the largest stars because of gravitational pressure, even without helium), then the fusion process would create all of the heavier elements (including helium), just like all of the elements heavier than lithium beryllium that exist in our solar system were created in a star that went supernova billions of years ago.

 

I'm not buying the bit about if the universe were one grain of sand per cubic centimer more massive in the beginning, life would have been impossible. That just sounds like the kind of silly numbers that creationists make up all the time to show how "miraculous" our existence is.

[BlackCat]

 

When I believed in the Bible God, I'd never had a problem with the size of the universe.  I assumed there was a good reason why it was that size.  When BAA mentioned the size seeming like a waste (when considering a Bible type of God), in a earlier post, it got me wondering and so I googled something like 'is the size of the universe important?'  The only articles I could see that mentioned the points BAA made, were on Christian web sites.  This one got my attention.  Here is a quote from the relevant section of the article:

 

''The universe could not have been much smaller than it     is in order for nuclear fusion to have occurred during the first 3 minutes     after the Big Bang. Without this brief period of nucleosynthesis, the early universe would have consisted entirely of     hydrogen.⁹ Without helium (comprising ~24% of     the matter in the universe), heavy element     production in stars is not possible, so that no rocky planets would have     ever existed in the entire history of the universe.

Likewise, the universe could not have been a much more massive than it     is, or life would not have been possible. If the universe were just one part     in 10⁵⁹ more massive,¹⁰ the universe would have collapsed before life was     possible. Since there are only 10⁸⁰ baryons in the universe, this     means that an addition of just 10²¹ baryons (at 1.67�10⁻²⁷     kg/baryon equals 1.7 mg of matter - equal to a grain of sand) would have made     life impossible! The universe is exactly the size it must be for life to exist at     all.''  http://godandscience.org/apologetics/universe_too_large.html

 

I haven't been able to verify this yet.  Is this true guys??  By the way, I'm not interested in the religious content of that article or web site, only that quote.  I can't imagine that Rich Deem, would state something like that if it wasn't true??  Now if I assume he is correct....this is interesting, whether you believe in a 'Designer' or not. 

 

In a word, no. Even if the universe started out entirely made of hydrogen, once stars formed (which they probably would have even without helium) and started the process of fusion (which would occur in the largest stars because of gravitational pressure, even without helium), then the fusion process would create all of the heavier elements (including helium), just like all of the elements heavier than lithium beryllium that exist in our solar system were created in a star that went supernova billions of years ago.

 

I'm not buying the bit about if the universe were one grain of sand more massive in the beginning, life would have been impossible. That just sounds like the kind of silly numbers that creationists make up all the time to show how "miraculous" our existence is.

 

I can see how we have to be careful how we understand the limitations or constraints of how the universe formed  (if that is the case?).  Being in the right place at the right time (or being a certain size)  doesn't prove or disprove 'God'.  It shows that certain conditions are necessary for certain outcomes.  What that article suggests to me, is that the 'seed' in fracturing, is now spread out as our universe and reality: seed fracturing= our reality or: small seed = large universe.  So it's not about size.............however......I then wonder why that 'seed' happened to be what it was and why its fracturing then resulting in our 'large' reality.  This is where I have to be careful.  I used to believe that a Designer caused that seed to exist and then fracture- unleashing terrible power that brings life with its suffering and happiness. Prior to the Big Bang, that 'seed' was contained in some way.  What was containing it?  What caused it to 'break'?  Even if we imagine an infinite 'sea' of 'seeds' and Big Bangs, then what is 'holding' or sustaining this 'sea' and causing the Big Bangs?  The idea of a First Cause seemed appealing, as ultimately you have to stop somewhere, and why not stop with the thing that seems to makes sense of life?  The only thing I keep arriving at is an eternal force that sustains everthing eternally.  Ideas like 'intention' or 'design' spring to mind, when thinking about this force, and the 'end results' seem to scream 'intention', but that is no doubt an illusion due to our perspective, and how our minds work. 

 

'May the force' be understood one day....... 

[Ravenstar]

I don't think it was 'held' at all... see, before the BB there was no time... so you can't think of the seed as sitting in time, 'contained' because that would be a function of time.. there was no before the BB - because time didn't exist until the expansion of space in the BB. The 'seed' just was... eternal, out of time and space - in a state we really can't explain or comprehend well.

 

Hard to wrap the mind around, I know.

 

Maybe BAA can explain that better.

[Thought2Much]

If one subscribes to the theory that we are just one of many universes, then there may not have been any "seed" to speak of. Our universe may just be the result of two other universes colliding/intersecting. This seems to make more sense to me than the idea of a "seed" (or "ylem," as the concept was originally called) just sitting around for eternity until for some unknown reason "something" happened to break it. The concept of multiverses interacting and creating new universes also removes any necessity for any kind of "intention" for our universe; since there are potentially an infinite number of universes, the fact that the physics happened to work out in this one in a way that allows for life to form is nothing particularly special. Think of it as the Copernican principle applied on a multi-universal scale (we hold no special place in the universe, or in the multiverse).

[bornagainathiest]

Oh shuggles! 

 

Sorry guys, I'm falling behind here. 

Please maintain a holding pattern and I'll try and address BC's questions in post #333 first, sometime tomorrow.

 

Re: the size of the universe...

I've been careful to qualify what I mean by the words, 'the size of the universe' in post #303, where I tried to explain that the observable universe sits within the larger context of the much, much larger universe, beyond our visual limits.  "Any locality sits within a larger, global context."

Now, I'm sorry BC, but there's a phrase in computing that applies here.  GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT.  If you ask an imprecise or badly-worded question (.. I googled something like 'is the size of the universe important?') you won't get a sensible or helpful answer.

 

I suspect that you didn't make it clear if you were asking about the observable (local context) universe or about the rest of it, that lies beyond our visual horizon (global context).  I also note that Rich Deem's definition of the word 'universe' seems to be a purely local (observable universe only) one, that takes no account of the greater, global context in which our small portion sits.  BC, can you see how your poorly-worded question and Deem's strictly local view of what constitutes the universe, have conspired to confuse you?

 

Deem gets his science from this guy... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Ross_(creationist) ...and I'd trust neither of them.  Why?  Because they've got a vested interest and they're working to an agenda, just as much as the ID/IC crowd with their 'Wedge' document. If Ross' work is kosher and accepted by the mainstream scientific community, why can't it be found on Wikipedia?  Why is it that he feels the need to promote his stuff on a website of his own?  Why is it that no trustworthy and accredited scientific site will touch his work? This should sound alarm bells, BC!  Especially in the light of what you now know about how these religiously-motivated people practice their deceit.

(Please note that I was preparing to address the matters we're now discussing, in my future explanation of the primordial 'seed' and it's 'breakage'.  So, we've leapt ahead, without taking or fully understanding the necessary steps I was hoping to make.)

 

"The only articles I could see that mentioned the points BAA made, were on Christian web sites."

Yes, indeed!  But did you ask yourself why that was, BC?  Or did you ask yourself why no bona fide, accredited science websites held the answer to your question?  The answer is that the trustworthy science sites never ask that question.   Your question carried theological and philosophical baggage.  It was loaded with a non-scientific bias - even if you didn't realize it at the time.  Addressing theological or philosophical questions isn't within the remit of science... there are theologists and philosophers to ask and answer these questions. 

 

Please understand that this is not a put-down, ok?

Yes, you've erred, but that's not a big problem and we can learn from this.

BC, I just don't have the time to say more, but please hang in there and all will become clear - in time.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

 

 

 

[bornagainathiest]

 

When I believed in the Bible God, I'd never had a problem with the size of the universe.  I assumed there was a good reason why it was that size.  When BAA mentioned the size seeming like a waste (when considering a Bible type of God), in a earlier post, it got me wondering and so I googled something like 'is the size of the universe important?'  The only articles I could see that mentioned the points BAA made, were on Christian web sites.  This one got my attention.  Here is a quote from the relevant section of the article:

 

''The universe could not have been much smaller than it     is in order for nuclear fusion to have occurred during the first 3 minutes     after the Big Bang. Without this brief period of nucleosynthesis, the early universe would have consisted entirely of     hydrogen.⁹ Without helium (comprising ~24% of     the matter in the universe), heavy element     production in stars is not possible, so that no rocky planets would have     ever existed in the entire history of the universe.

Likewise, the universe could not have been a much more massive than it     is, or life would not have been possible. If the universe were just one part     in 10⁵⁹ more massive,¹⁰ the universe would have collapsed before life was     possible. Since there are only 10⁸⁰ baryons in the universe, this     means that an addition of just 10²¹ baryons (at 1.67�10⁻²⁷     kg/baryon equals 1.7 mg of matter - equal to a grain of sand) would have made     life impossible! The universe is exactly the size it must be for life to exist at     all.''  http://godandscience.org/apologetics/universe_too_large.html

 

I haven't been able to verify this yet.  Is this true guys??  By the way, I'm not interested in the religious content of that article or web site, only that quote.  I can't imagine that Rich Deem, would state something like that if it wasn't true??  Now if I assume he is correct....this is interesting, whether you believe in a 'Designer' or not. 

 

In a word, no. Even if the universe started out entirely made of hydrogen, once stars formed (which they probably would have even without helium) and started the process of fusion (which would occur in the largest stars because of gravitational pressure, even without helium), then the fusion process would create all of the heavier elements (including helium), just like all of the elements heavier than lithium beryllium that exist in our solar system were created in a star that went supernova billions of years ago.

 

I'm not buying the bit about if the universe were one grain of sand per cubic centimer more massive in the beginning, life would have been impossible. That just sounds like the kind of silly numbers that creationists make up all the time to show how "miraculous" our existence is.

Agree T2M. 

 

I don't buy that claim either. No reputable cosmologist ever expresses their science in as imprecise and vague terms as, one grain of sand'.  This kills the claim stone dead... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sand

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[Ravenstar]

Wait a minute.. I was under the impression that the early universe (shortly after the creation of baryons) WAS just hydrogen, and that it was fusion inside of the first gen. stars that created helium. That's how stars work right? Hydrogen to Helium to Lithium to Carbon to Neon to Oxygen.. etc... (depending on the gravity and heat of any particular star) and it takes Supernovae to create heavier elements.

[Thought2Much]

Wait a minute.. I was under the impression that the early universe (shortly after the creation of baryons) WAS just hydrogen, and that it was fusion inside of the first gen. stars that created helium. That's how stars work right? Hydrogen to Helium to Lithium to Carbon to Neon to Oxygen.. etc... (depending on the gravity and heat of any particular star) and it takes Supernovae to create heavier elements.

 

I was aware that there was hydrogen, helium, and a smattering of lithium, but I didn't know that it went all the way to beryllium until researching my answer to BlackCat's post just this week.

[bornagainathiest]

Dear BC,

 

Here's a true story for you, by way of an apology for being a little short with you yesterday.

 

When I was a 'young' Christian (no more than a few months after my spiritual re-birth) my thirst for answers was far greater than my patience and my self-control.  So I was apt to go off on tangents, rather than sticking with the teaching I was being given.  These forays into new areas of Bible research caused me to become unfocused and diverted my attention away from the basics, which I first needed to absorb and dwell on. 

 

I can even remember (with embarrasment) some of my earnest, but premature, questions.

"What about the Codex Siniaticus?  Don't parts of that ancient document disagree with the Bibles we read today?" 

"What about the Gnostic Gospels?  Why aren't they considered to be part of the Biblical canon too?"

"How can a Christian know where in the hierarchy (1 Corinthians 12:28) of the believers, God wants them to be?"

"Which is the right translation for Romans 12:1?  '...reasonable service...' or '...true and proper worship...'?"

"Isn't tithing an OT practice that Jesus condemned the Pharisees for?  So why do modern Christians still do it?

 

Not exactly the stuff a newborn Christian should have been throwing themselves into!  

Especially not at the expense of being well-grounded in the basics.   I can see that now, but at the time I was too eager and too keen to immerse myself fully into this new life.  Being an over-zealous truth-seeker, I wanted the truth there and then.  I wanted the answers urgently - far more than I wanted the self-discipline it took for me to ask the right questions at the right time.  I needed to fully comprehend the foundations of Christianity, before I could move onto anything else.

 

Gradually, I was able to curb my impatience and I eventually settled down to a more methodical approach to learning about the Bible and how Christianity worked. 

 

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

 

Now BC, I'm telling you this because I think I can see how there's a kind of parallel between how I was then and how you seem to be now.  Not a one-for-one, direct parallel for sure, but a more general one perhaps. 

 

Serious questions now. 

Am I mistaken here?  Am I out of line for suggesting this?  Have I made a serious error of judgement?

 

If so, please don't hesitate to tell me what you think.  I don't want to tread on your toes and I don't want to ride roughshod over you.  Rather, it would please me a great deal to share my objections to ID with you, in a way that you can readily absorb and understand.  If I failed to do this so far, then the failing is indeed mine... not yours.

 

The concepts involved are tricky ones to grasp because they require you to think about new and radical ideas - and to do so in a certain way.  That, 'certain way' seems to be the sticking point here.  My objections are founded upon science and to comprehend them you therefore need to think like a scientist first...

...before going on to examine other matters.

 

Can you see how there's a kind of correspondence between this scenario and the way I used to be as a young Christian?  First things first and the rest in good time.  Yes, we will go on to discuss the primordial 'seed' and it's 'breakage' - in the light of my objections to ID... but before we can do that, I need you to stick with me and to learn how science works, what it can do and what it cannot do.

 

Your questions relating to my post about those statistical constraints and the principles of cosmology (#328) tell me that I haven't made these things sufficiently clear to you.  Mea culpa!

 

Now, if it's ok with you and if we're still friends (hope so), would you like to re-visit these points with me and let me try to explain things better?

 

Respectfully,

 

BAA.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BlackCat]

If one subscribes to the theory that we are just one of many universes, then there may not have been any "seed" to speak of. Our universe may just be the result of two other universes colliding/intersecting. This seems to make more sense to me than the idea of a "seed" (or "ylem," as the concept was originally called) just sitting around for eternity until for some unknown reason "something" happened to break it. The concept of multiverses interacting and creating new universes also removes any necessity for any kind of "intention" for our universe; since there are potentially an infinite number of universes, the fact that the physics happened to work out in this one in a way that allows for life to form is nothing particularly special. Think of it as the Copernican principle applied on a multi-universal scale (we hold no special place in the universe, or in the multiverse).

This makes sense.  Thank you.

[BlackCat]

Dear BC,

 

Here's a true story for you, by way of an apology for being a little short with you yesterday.

 

When I was a 'young' Christian (no more than a few months after my spiritual re-birth) my thirst for answers was far greater than my patience and my self-control.  So I was apt to go off on tangents, rather than sticking with the teaching I was being given.  These forays into new areas of Bible research caused me to become unfocused and diverted my attention away from the basics, which I first needed to absorb and dwell on. 

 

I can even remember (with embarrasment) some of my earnest, but premature, questions.

"What about the Codex Siniaticus?  Don't parts of that ancient document disagree with the Bibles we read today?" 

"What about the Gnostic Gospels?  Why aren't they considered to be part of the Biblical canon too?"

"How can a Christian know where in the hierarchy (1 Corinthians 12:28) of the believers, God wants them to be?"

"Which is the right translation for Romans 12:1?  '...reasonable service...' or '...true and proper worship...'?"

"Isn't tithing an OT practice that Jesus condemned the Pharisees for?  So why do modern Christians still do it?

 

Not exactly the stuff a newborn Christian should have been throwing themselves into!  

Especially not at the expense of being well-grounded in the basics.   I can see that now, but at the time I was too eager and too keen to immerse myself fully into this new life.  Being an over-zealous truth-seeker, I wanted the truth there and then.  I wanted the answers urgently - far more than I wanted the self-discipline it took for me to ask the right questions at the right time.  I needed to fully comprehend the foundations of Christianity, before I could move onto anything else.

 

Gradually, I was able to curb my impatience and I eventually settled down to a more methodical approach to learning about the Bible and how Christianity worked. 

 

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

 

Now BC, I'm telling you this because I think I can see how there's a kind of parallel between how I was then and how you seem to be now.  Not a one-for-one, direct parallel for sure, but a more general one perhaps. 

 

Serious questions now. 

Am I mistaken here?  Am I out of line for suggesting this?  Have I made a serious error of judgement?

 

If so, please don't hesitate to tell me what you think.  I don't want to tread on your toes and I don't want to ride roughshod over you.  Rather, it would please me a great deal to share my objections to ID with you, in a way that you can readily absorb and understand.  If I failed to do this so far, then the failing is indeed mine... not yours.

 

The concepts involved are tricky ones to grasp because they require you to think about new and radical ideas - and to do so in a certain way.  That, 'certain way' seems to be the sticking point here.  My objections are founded upon science and to comprehend them you therefore need to think like a scientist first...

...before going on to examine other matters.

 

Can you see how there's a kind of correspondence between this scenario and the way I used to be as a young Christian?  First things first and the rest in good time.  Yes, we will go on to discuss the primordial 'seed' and it's 'breakage' - in the light of my objections to ID... but before we can do that, I need you to stick with me and to learn how science works, what it can do and what it cannot do.

 

Your questions relating to my post about those statistical constraints and the principles of cosmology (#328) tell me that I haven't made these things sufficiently clear to you.  Mea culpa!

 

Now, if it's ok with you and if we're still friends (hope so), would you like to re-visit these points with me and let me try to explain things better?

 

Respectfully,

 

BAA.

 

BAA, yes we're still friends, although I must admit I've been sulking these past few days.  I didn't mean to google shit, if that is what I did.  I wasn't trying to find some 'christian' support for why the observable universe is so large- I figured there must be a logical reason why it looks/is so large.  Yes, my curiosity does lead me to rush ahead and not think before I act (which you have seen me do on the other thread).   Please let's revisit these points and maybe I'll understand things better.  This is a very hard subject for me to understand and so I do struggle with it.  Thank you for trying to explain these things, and all the other guys here too, who have contributed. 

[BlackCat]

BAA- I want to try and explain where my thinking has been taking me: I was really struck by what you said in an earlier reply when you mentioned the size of the universe and why, if there was a God, He hadn't just made one planet, star and moon?  I actually found this question or rather the idea of only one planet, star and moon as strange, and hence why I googled the size of the universe.  I assumed there was a very good scientific reason why we have many planets, stars etc and if there was a God, I had always assumed 'He' would 'play by the rules' or work with what is possible.  Rich Deem's article stated mathematical claims that I can't imagine for a minute, a man like Deem would repeat, if they were bogus and not founded in science.  The purpose of Deem's article was to support his belief in creation and thus fine tuning, but I wasn't interested in that aspect of the article, but rather the idea that you can't have just one planet, star and moon.  There has to be a certain amount of energy to enable stars and planets etc and what I was trying to determine, (via that article) was if you could have a Big Bang that was capable of producing only one planet, star etc.  Here's a crude analogy that hopefully explains where my thinking was taking me:  you can't make a crumb without making the whole cake and so you can't have one planet, star and moon without a universe.  Surely we can determine with maths and physics, the necessary energy needed to form a planet, star and moon.  You explained to me how the 'Superforce' broke into the forces we now have, so it seems that you need the 'whole' (all the energy that makes up the forces) in order for 'parts' (planets, stars) to exist.  If it's the case that certain constraints of 'size' do have a bearing on whether a unvierse forms from a Big Bang, that can support life, this does not support ID or fine tuning, as Rich Deem and others would claim.  It could be the case that infinite 'Big Bangs' of various 'sizes' are 'exploding' infinitely and some aren't the right size to produce 'suitable' universes.  If you have infinity, then our 'suitable' universe is no surprise or isn't deliberate, it's just sheer luck. 

 

In a nutshell, I don't think the size of the universe has any bearing on whether there is a God and it doesn't prove or disprove ID.

[bornagainathiest]

BAA- I want to try and explain where my thinking has been taking me: I was really struck by what you said in an earlier reply when you mentioned the size of the universe and why, if there was a God, He hadn't just made one planet, star and moon?  I actually found this question or rather the idea of only one planet, star and moon as strange, and hence why I googled the size of the universe.  I assumed there was a very good scientific reason why we have many planets, stars etc and if there was a God, I had always assumed 'He' would 'play by the rules' or work with what is possible.  Rich Deem's article stated mathematical claims that I can't imagine for a minute, a man like Deem would repeat, if they were bogus and not founded in science.  The purpose of Deem's article was to support his belief in creation and thus fine tuning, but I wasn't interested in that aspect of the article, but rather the idea that you can't have just one planet, star and moon.  There has to be a certain amount of energy to enable stars and planets etc and what I was trying to determine, (via that article) was if you could have a Big Bang that was capable of producing only one planet, star etc.  Here's a crude analogy that hopefully explains where my thinking was taking me:  you can't make a crumb without making the whole cake and so you can't have one planet, star and moon without a universe.  Surely we can determine with maths and physics, the necessary energy needed to form a planet, star and moon.  You explained to me how the 'Superforce' broke into the forces we now have, so it seems that you need the 'whole' (all the energy that makes up the forces) in order for 'parts' (planets, stars) to exist.  If it's the case that certain constraints of 'size' do have a bearing on whether a unvierse forms from a Big Bang, that can support life, this does not support ID or fine tuning, as Rich Deem and others would claim.  It could be the case that infinite 'Big Bangs' of various 'sizes' are 'exploding' infinitely and some aren't the right size to produce 'suitable' universes.  If you have infinity, then our 'suitable' universe is no surprise or isn't deliberate, it's just sheer luck. 

 

In a nutshell, I don't think the size of the universe has any bearing on whether there is a God and it doesn't prove or disprove ID.

 

Hello again BC. 

 

Thanks for posting this reply, because you've made a complicated issue much easier to address. 

Yes, if size of the universe alone were the only factor in my objection to ID, then what you've just written would be entirely correct.  However, my objection to ID is not just based upon the size of the universe...alone.  No, my objection BC, hinges on the point I'm going to try and illustrate now. 

 

In a nutshell, it's a question of uniformity vs. diversity.

 A small, limited and uniform 'local' sample of a vastly-larger and extremely diverse 'global' whole can't be relied upon to give us a true and accurate picture of that whole.  If we try to understand the global whole, we have to make assumptions about what we cannot see, based on what we can.  But, if the greater, 'global' whole is fantastically diverse and varies drastically, from location to location, then the tiny 'local' sample we have to work with simply cannot reflect that diversity.  This means that our uniform sample will skew our assumptions and lead us to false conclusions.  I contend that this is what happens when people conclude that ID holds good across the universe.  For now though, let's return to our sailor, on his yacht, in the middle of the ocean.

 

The sailor can see only water and sky, extending all the way to his visual horizon.  His reality is totally uniform. Now let's imagine that he has next to no knowledge of what lies over that horizon.  He knows that the world curves and that something must be beyond the horizon.  He knows that the world doesn't end at this limit, but extends further... much, much further, in fact!   He realizes that the size of the reality he inhabits must be thousands of times larger than the small portion he can see.  His local portion makes up a tiny part of the global whole.  (Any locality sits within a larger, global context.)  So, if he takes his uniform portion as an ideal sample of what everything else is, then he will (wrongly) conclude that the whole surface of the planet is covered in water. Not true! Not accurate!  But this is the answer that he will get, if he applies what he can see to what he can't.

 

BC, this is a worked example of how using a tiny, unifrom sample of something (what lies within his visual horizon) fails to give the sailor a true and accurate picture of his diverse reality.  Imposing his local p.o.v. on the global whole forces him to conclude that he's sailing on a Waterworld!  Do you see and accept the basic thrust of this argument?

(Please put aside what you know and try to see this from the sailor's viewpoint of limited, local knowledge.)

Thanks.

 

Now for the BIG question!

Before I ask it, I first have to ask you to trust me on certain points and then for you to take these into account when you answer the question.  Please trust me on the following points, written in bold. (I will explain each of them and why they hang together as they do, but that will have to wait until after you've replied and answered the question in red, ok?) 

 

Cosmology refutes the Fine-Tuned Universe argument.  

Therefore, Fine-Tuning cannot be used to support Intelligent Design.

Therefore, only Earthly evidence can be used to support Intelligent Design.

But that evidence is uniform, limited and local - not diverse, global and universal.

Using local evidence in a non-local way runs the risk making of false conclusions. (The sailor!)

Because of this risk, it is unsafe to assume or conclude that ID must be elsewhere. 

Assumptions remain assumptions until they are supported by evidence.

Therefore, we cannot safely assume or conclude that ID exists anywhere BUT Earth.

If the Earth is special, this violates the Cosmological and Copernican principles.

If the Earth is not special, we can assume that ID should be present elsewhere.

But there is no evidence of this - only assumptions.

 

 

 

Q.

Taking the above points into account, if the only evidence for ID is here on Earth, can we reliably infer that ID must be present, anywhere else in the universe?

 

 

Thanks.

 

BAA.

[BlackCat]

Hello again BC. 

 

Thanks for posting this reply, because you've made a complicated issue much easier to address. 

Yes, if size of the universe alone were the only factor in my objection to ID, then what you've just written would be entirely correct.  However, my objection to ID is not just based upon the size of the universe...alone.  No, my objection BC, hinges on the point I'm going to try and illustrate now. 

 

In a nutshell, it's a question of uniformity vs. diversity.

 A small, limited and uniform 'local' sample of a vastly-larger and extremely diverse 'global' whole can't be relied upon to give us a true and accurate picture of that whole.  If we try to understand the global whole, we have to make assumptions about what we cannot see, based on what we can.  But, if the greater, 'global' whole is fantastically diverse and varies drastically, from location to location, then the tiny 'local' sample we have to work with simply cannot reflect that diversity.  This means that our uniform sample will skew our assumptions and lead us to false conclusions.  I contend that this is what happens when people conclude that ID holds good across the universe.  For now though, let's return to our sailor, on his yacht, in the middle of the ocean.

 

The sailor can see only water and sky, extending all the way to his visual horizon.  His reality is totally uniform. Now let's imagine that he has next to no knowledge of what lies over that horizon.  He knows that the world curves and that something must be beyond the horizon.  He knows that the world doesn't end at this limit, but extends further... much, much further, in fact!   He realizes that the size of the reality he inhabits must be thousands of times larger than the small portion he can see.  His local portion makes up a tiny part of the global whole.  (Any locality sits within a larger, global context.)  So, if he takes his uniform portion as an ideal sample of what everything else is, then he will (wrongly) conclude that the whole surface of the.

 

Now for the BIG question!

Before I ask it, I first have to ask you to trust me on certain points and then for you to take these into account when you answer the question.  Please trust me on the following points, written in bold. (I will explain each of them and why they hang together as they do, but that will have to wait until after you've replied and answered the question in red, ok?) 

 

Cosmology refutes the Fine-Tuned Universe argument.  

Therefore, Fine-Tuning cannot be used to support Intelligent Design.

Therefore, only Earthly evidence can be used to support Intelligent Design.

But that evidence is uniform, limited and local - not diverse, global and universal.

Using local evidence in a non-local way runs the risk making of false conclusions. (The sailor!)

Because of this risk, it is unsafe to assume or conclude that ID must be elsewhere. 

Assumptions remain assumptions until they are supported by evidence.

Therefore, we cannot safely assume or conclude that ID exists anywhere BUT Earth.

If the Earth is special, this violates the Cosmological and Copernican principles.

If the Earth is not special, we can assume that ID should be present elsewhere.

But there is no evidence of this - only assumptions.

 

 

 

Q.

Taking the above points into account, if the only evidence for ID is here on Earth, can we reliably infer that ID must be present, anywhere else in the universe?

 

 

Thanks.

 

BAA.

 

Hey BAA   My answer: No, we cannot reliably infer that ID must be present anywhere else in the universe (if we agree with all the points in bold).

 

I'm not sure I agree with all the points in bold, and so I shall await your futher explanations of those points. 

[boftx]

One can always have some fun by suggesting that evolution is a natural and logical consequence of ID.