For example, do you think that intelligent design in biology is false?
I think that the universe was created, fourteen-and-a-bit billion years ago, with a set of natural laws so designed as to end up at a desired configuration. Exactly what that configuration is, or whether the universe has reached it yet, is a question that I cannot answer.
I strongly suspect, though there may be some element of bias in this suspicion, that the presence of intelligence is somehow important to that eventual desired configuration. I am very much not convinced that the shape of the body that that intelligence finds itself inhabiting is at all important.
I think it is highly probable that science (in general) is more right than wrong about what happened in those fourteen-and-a-bit billion years, and that the parts that are not completely right will be made more right and less wrong by future generations of scientists.
...I’m not quite sure what you mean by “intelligent design”—I have a vague idea only—but hopefully the above will answer your question.
If so, consider what happens if you apply similar reasoning to the idea of revelation, i.e. that certain human claims are “truths descended from heaven”.
I think that some humans may claim revelations that they did not receive, possibly out of a desire for recognition.
The question would by why you would give special weight to some specific claims of revelation (in particular), if you wouldn’t give special weight to the claim that the bacterial flagellum (in particular) could not have evolved.
In other words, it is perfectly possible that some organs could not have evolved, and it is perfectly possible that some claims do not originate from human causes. But the problem is giving good enough reasons for accepting that in a particular case. “It looks like it couldn’t have evolved,” or “It looks like it didn’t have human sources” are not good enough.
...what does the bacterial flagellum have to do with anything? I think I am missing some important context here.
But the problem is giving good enough reasons for accepting that in a particular case. “It looks like it couldn’t have evolved,” or “It looks like it didn’t have human sources” are not good enough.
Well, the simplest argument for accepting some revelations would be that later events, unknown and unknowable at the time of the revelation, were later shown to be true (for example, predicting the time and place of a volcanic eruption or other natural disaster)
Michael Behe has used the bacterial flagellum as an example of something in biology which he supposes must have been directly designed and not evolved.
I don’t know of any examples of detailed predictions of the future where the 1) it is clearly established that the prediction was actually made before the thing happened; 2) it is clearly established that the thing happened as stated; 3) the thing has a substantial degree of unknowable detail. Regarding the third, I mean more detail than things like, “I will die on May 3, 2020.” It would be quite surprising if this turns out to be true, but not surprising enough to prove that I have some special source of knowledge, given the total number of predictions that are made by someone or other.
Given that you can satisfy all three conditions, I agree that this would be a good reason to suppose that someone has some special source of knowledge. That won’t make it easy for you to know which of his opinions are influenced by that source, unless you know exactly what the source is and how it affects his opinions in particular. So it still won’t easily give you a reason to accept particular revelations.
...a few minutes on Google suggests that biologists have by now worked out a few plausible ways in which a bacterial flagellum might have evolved. This seems reasonable to me; I assume that the biologists are competent and know their field.
I don’t know of any examples of detailed predictions of the future where the 1) it is clearly established that the prediction was actually made before the thing happened; 2) it is clearly established that the thing happened as stated; 3) the thing has a substantial degree of unknowable detail.
...I can think of a few biblical examples, but given the length of time between then and now (and how much even recent eyewitness accounts can be distorted) I can also see how all those examples would probably fail on point (2) at the very least. (I think I can probably find examples that pass on points (1) and (3), at least).
Ok. But one of the main reasons biologists have considered the flagellum issue is because Behe proposed it as something that couldn’t have evolved. So the point of that was that since there are basically an unlimited number of things in nature, many of them won’t have been considered in detail by scientists, or at least we might not be able to personally find those considerations (if they are only available in some obscure academic journal, for example). So if I take some animal or some organ, check to see if anyone has found a plausible way that it could have evolved, and find out that, as far as I can determine, no one has done that, it would foolish to conclude that it must not have been produced by evolution.
The point of that argument was this: The number of historical events is even larger than than the number of animals and organs in biology, so it will be even more true that many such events have had no good analysis by historians. So if I take one of these events and I don’t see how it could have had historical causes, and I don’t find any historians giving it a historical treatment, it would be foolish to conclude that it could not have had historical causes but must have had a supernatural cause.
In both cases, in theory you could draw such a conclusion without being unreasonable, but you would need to have very strong reasons indeed. This is illustrated by the example of the difficulty of establishing that a prediction actually implies some knowledge of the future, as you conceded here.
And again, even assuming that you established such a fact, it would not be easy to know what else follows from that fact.
So if I take some animal or some organ, check to see if anyone has found a plausible way that it could have evolved, and find out that, as far as I can determine, no one has done that, it would foolish to conclude that it must not have been produced by evolution.
Right. The absence of evidence of an evolutionary origin is not evidence of the absence of an evolutionary origin.
The point of that argument was this: The number of historical events is even larger than than the number of animals and organs in biology, so it will be even more true that many such events have had no good analysis by historians. So if I take one of these events and I don’t see how it could have had historical causes, and I don’t find any historians giving it a historical treatment, it would be foolish to conclude that it could not have had historical causes but must have had a supernatural cause.
Fair enough. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
So, in short, you’re suggesting that any claim of a divine origin for any historical event actually needs to be accompanied by at least some evidence suggesting a divine origin, and not merely a lack of evidence suggesting a mundane one?
I would agree with “at least some evidence,” but I also said, “very strong reasons indeed.”
Basically, we already have good evidence for this: “In many cases, some event appears to have meaningful evidence of a supernatural origin, but in fact it had natural historical causes.” Thus, unless you happen to be a Mormon, you probably believe that Joseph Smith’s religion had basically natural historical causes, despite the testimony of his witnesses that they saw the golden plates from which the Book of Mormon was translated (which presumably he would have a hard time coming up with naturally.) So there is some evidence of a supernatural origin there, but most people don’t think it had a supernatural origin anyway. The corresponding behavior in other cases would be to ask for pretty strong evidence (not just some) before you accept a claim like that.
As it happens, I am not a Mormon and I know virtually nothing about Joseph Smith. I shall simply class this whole golden plates business (about which I know nothing more than what you put in your comment) as “unknown, unclassified” until such time as I find out more. I would move it to neither the “natural historical causes” category nor the “divine causes” category until such time as I have sufficient evidence that suggests which category it should be in.
...you and I probably have different thresholds for “sufficient evidence”.
“The” bacterial flagellum (actually there are different kinds and I think only one kind is relevant here) was a leading example used by proponents of “intelligent design”, who claimed it was a complex system that couldn’t possibly have evolved incrementally.
Thanks. A brief googling suggests that biologists have figured out how it could have evolved from similar organs with different functions, which seems to neatly solve the issue.
I think that the universe was created, fourteen-and-a-bit billion years ago, with a set of natural laws so designed as to end up at a desired configuration. Exactly what that configuration is, or whether the universe has reached it yet, is a question that I cannot answer.
I strongly suspect, though there may be some element of bias in this suspicion, that the presence of intelligence is somehow important to that eventual desired configuration. I am very much not convinced that the shape of the body that that intelligence finds itself inhabiting is at all important.
I think it is highly probable that science (in general) is more right than wrong about what happened in those fourteen-and-a-bit billion years, and that the parts that are not completely right will be made more right and less wrong by future generations of scientists.
...I’m not quite sure what you mean by “intelligent design”—I have a vague idea only—but hopefully the above will answer your question.
I think that some humans may claim revelations that they did not receive, possibly out of a desire for recognition.
The question would by why you would give special weight to some specific claims of revelation (in particular), if you wouldn’t give special weight to the claim that the bacterial flagellum (in particular) could not have evolved.
In other words, it is perfectly possible that some organs could not have evolved, and it is perfectly possible that some claims do not originate from human causes. But the problem is giving good enough reasons for accepting that in a particular case. “It looks like it couldn’t have evolved,” or “It looks like it didn’t have human sources” are not good enough.
...what does the bacterial flagellum have to do with anything? I think I am missing some important context here.
Well, the simplest argument for accepting some revelations would be that later events, unknown and unknowable at the time of the revelation, were later shown to be true (for example, predicting the time and place of a volcanic eruption or other natural disaster)
Michael Behe has used the bacterial flagellum as an example of something in biology which he supposes must have been directly designed and not evolved.
I don’t know of any examples of detailed predictions of the future where the 1) it is clearly established that the prediction was actually made before the thing happened; 2) it is clearly established that the thing happened as stated; 3) the thing has a substantial degree of unknowable detail. Regarding the third, I mean more detail than things like, “I will die on May 3, 2020.” It would be quite surprising if this turns out to be true, but not surprising enough to prove that I have some special source of knowledge, given the total number of predictions that are made by someone or other.
Given that you can satisfy all three conditions, I agree that this would be a good reason to suppose that someone has some special source of knowledge. That won’t make it easy for you to know which of his opinions are influenced by that source, unless you know exactly what the source is and how it affects his opinions in particular. So it still won’t easily give you a reason to accept particular revelations.
...a few minutes on Google suggests that biologists have by now worked out a few plausible ways in which a bacterial flagellum might have evolved. This seems reasonable to me; I assume that the biologists are competent and know their field.
...I can think of a few biblical examples, but given the length of time between then and now (and how much even recent eyewitness accounts can be distorted) I can also see how all those examples would probably fail on point (2) at the very least. (I think I can probably find examples that pass on points (1) and (3), at least).
Ok. But one of the main reasons biologists have considered the flagellum issue is because Behe proposed it as something that couldn’t have evolved. So the point of that was that since there are basically an unlimited number of things in nature, many of them won’t have been considered in detail by scientists, or at least we might not be able to personally find those considerations (if they are only available in some obscure academic journal, for example). So if I take some animal or some organ, check to see if anyone has found a plausible way that it could have evolved, and find out that, as far as I can determine, no one has done that, it would foolish to conclude that it must not have been produced by evolution.
The point of that argument was this: The number of historical events is even larger than than the number of animals and organs in biology, so it will be even more true that many such events have had no good analysis by historians. So if I take one of these events and I don’t see how it could have had historical causes, and I don’t find any historians giving it a historical treatment, it would be foolish to conclude that it could not have had historical causes but must have had a supernatural cause.
In both cases, in theory you could draw such a conclusion without being unreasonable, but you would need to have very strong reasons indeed. This is illustrated by the example of the difficulty of establishing that a prediction actually implies some knowledge of the future, as you conceded here.
And again, even assuming that you established such a fact, it would not be easy to know what else follows from that fact.
Right. The absence of evidence of an evolutionary origin is not evidence of the absence of an evolutionary origin.
Fair enough. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
So, in short, you’re suggesting that any claim of a divine origin for any historical event actually needs to be accompanied by at least some evidence suggesting a divine origin, and not merely a lack of evidence suggesting a mundane one?
That seems reasonable to me.
I would agree with “at least some evidence,” but I also said, “very strong reasons indeed.”
Basically, we already have good evidence for this: “In many cases, some event appears to have meaningful evidence of a supernatural origin, but in fact it had natural historical causes.” Thus, unless you happen to be a Mormon, you probably believe that Joseph Smith’s religion had basically natural historical causes, despite the testimony of his witnesses that they saw the golden plates from which the Book of Mormon was translated (which presumably he would have a hard time coming up with naturally.) So there is some evidence of a supernatural origin there, but most people don’t think it had a supernatural origin anyway. The corresponding behavior in other cases would be to ask for pretty strong evidence (not just some) before you accept a claim like that.
As it happens, I am not a Mormon and I know virtually nothing about Joseph Smith. I shall simply class this whole golden plates business (about which I know nothing more than what you put in your comment) as “unknown, unclassified” until such time as I find out more. I would move it to neither the “natural historical causes” category nor the “divine causes” category until such time as I have sufficient evidence that suggests which category it should be in.
...you and I probably have different thresholds for “sufficient evidence”.
“The” bacterial flagellum (actually there are different kinds and I think only one kind is relevant here) was a leading example used by proponents of “intelligent design”, who claimed it was a complex system that couldn’t possibly have evolved incrementally.
Thanks. A brief googling suggests that biologists have figured out how it could have evolved from similar organs with different functions, which seems to neatly solve the issue.