Science-Religion. Which wins?

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:21am

Back on topic, everyone.

Evolution is an empirically and objectively established phenomenon. Again, natural selection facilitates the process of evolution through the gradual accumulation of traits favorable to survival. This is predominantly accomplished through mutation, sexual reproduction, horizontal gene structure, and population dynamics.

Mutations (which creationists teach other to dispute in such conversations) are frequently rogue, which is frequently understood. But deleterious mutations are not selectively accumulated since, by their very nature, they are not conducive to survival/fitness or, more precisely, reproductive success, which is the most salient determinant of ecological vigor. In studies on Drosophila melanogaster, induced mutation has an undesirable effect approximately seventy percent of the time (since it fundamentally alters the product of a gene usually in adverse fashion), while such provides a neutral or weakly beneficial effect the remaining thirty percent of the time ([Source](<a href=“Inaugural Article: Prevalence of positive selection among nearly neutral amino acid replacements in Drosophila - PMC”>Inaugural Article: Prevalence of positive selection among nearly neutral amino acid replacements in Drosophila - PMC)</a>). Organisms with genetic material that rapidly facilitates evolution, such as viruses or any genetic structure with an RNA basis, will evolve constantly and rapidly. In the case of viruses, the rapid rate of mutation (and hence evolution) enables for evasion of the immune system. So why is it necessary to obtain a separate annual flu shot and why is it that the common cold plagues each individual on several many occasions throughout the course of a normal lifetime? Indeed, because of evolution that occurs on a level temporally identifiable relative to the lifespan of the typical human.

[Mutation</a> rates among RNA viruses ? PNAS](<a href=“http://www.pnas.org/content/96/24/13910.long]Mutation”>http://www.pnas.org/content/96/24/13910.long)

[Rapid</a> evolution of RNA genomes – Holland et al. 215 (4540): 1577 – Science](<a href=“http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/215/4540/1577]Rapid”>http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/215/4540/1577)

Mutations often consist of large sections of chromosomes becoming duplicated via genetic recombination, which inserts secondary copies of a gene into a genome. Additional gene copies are a significant source of the raw material requisite for new genes to evolve. In truth, most new genes evolve from a set of pre-existing biochemically similar genes that are orthologous to those held by common ancestors.

[Mechanisms</a> of change in gene copy number](<a href=“Mechanisms of change in gene copy number - PMC”>Mechanisms of change in gene copy number - PMC)

[ScienceDirect</a> - Journal of Molecular Biology : Studying Genomes Through the Aeons: Protein Families, Pseudogenes and Proteome Evolution](<a href=“http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WK7-462F332-2&_user=10&_coverDate=05%2F17%2F2002&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=da81eabcc96a597094e99ae91249d1d2]ScienceDirect”>http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WK7-462F332-2&_user=10&_coverDate=05%2F17%2F2002&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=da81eabcc96a597094e99ae91249d1d2)

Chromosomal mutation is precisely what facilitated the initial divergence of modern-day Homo sapiens from our chimpanzee predecessors, when segments of DNA broke and rearranged. The cumulative result was a fusion of chromosome 2, which manifested, over a period of time, the palpable genotypic discrepancies that disunited the two species. Chromosomal mutations serve to accelerate the divergence of populations by rendering populations less likely to interbreed, and hence preserve the genetic differences held between populations.

[Testing</a> the Chromosomal Speciation Hypothesis for Humans and Chimpanzees](<a href=“Testing the Chromosomal Speciation Hypothesis for Humans and Chimpanzees - PMC”>Testing the Chromosomal Speciation Hypothesis for Humans and Chimpanzees - PMC)

[Chromosome</a> speciation: Humans, Drosophila, and mosquitoes ? PNAS](<a href=“http://www.pnas.org/content/102/suppl.1/6535.full]Chromosome”>http://www.pnas.org/content/102/suppl.1/6535.full)

However, often many cannot grasp evolution simply because of the failure to understand the power of accumulation. I will permit myself a brief analogy to illustrate the fundamentals of evolution as if occurring over the course of a human lifespan. Chances are, anyone skimming through this post doesn’t fundamentally appear too much differently than he or she did yesterday. In fact, most of us have not had a profound alteration in physical appearance within the past year. However, if you compare your present appearance to your appearance sixty or seventy years from today, you are bound to appear a bit differently due to the cumulative effects of cellular oxidation, telomere shortening, metabolic accrual, and whatever else. It is virtually inconceivable to strictly pinpoint with a firmly evident degree of resolution when this aging precisely occurred. Similarly, it is difficult to specifically identify when one species originated or “officially” diverged from another. Likewise, one isn’t necessarily a completely transformed person when the clock strikes midnight on his or her eighteenth birthday (marking the “official” minor to adult change in many legal aspects) and has not exactly gleaned a greater degree of maturity to drive a car when one turns sixteen than one didn’t have at the age of fifteen and 364 days. So even if one day in the human lifespan is akin to 100 generations of biological existence, there should not be a drastic evolutionary difference in such a period (excluding momentous occurrences) – but there inevitably will be when distended over a significant period of time for the proper effects of accumulation to initiate and influence change.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:24am

No, not enraged – just sensibly indignant or passionately distressed by having to argue against irrational dismissal, severely defective logic, casuistry, and those unwilling to accept and assimilate scientifically verified findings.

First of all, leafblade1354, thank you for your contributions.

As for the first question, no, the concept of free will is patently incompatible with the notion of omniscience, which is an essential intellectual capacity for nearly every god that has ever been mentally created throughout history. I established that argument in [Post</a> #708](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1065075425-post708.html]Post”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1065075425-post708.html). And regarding the probabilistic effects of quantum mechanics and the suspension of physical cause and effect on the subatomic level, this is not phenomena that is alienated from our understanding of natural interaction. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with probability being a central element in any mathematical explanation although the human brain has historically grasped the concept with much confusion and rebuff (including Einstein himself).

Although this is not directed at anyone in particular, throughout these kinds of debates, the most commonly abused tactic by the theist is using the lack of evidence on one side to mean evidence for the other. But it is ultimately a wasteful and illegitimate gambit for claim validation; rather, it merely escorts a position into a middle ground of uncertainty and can only be dismissed when empirical or logical claims demonstrate otherwise.

To uniformly illustrate the absurdity of the strategy (on a basis I believe that we can all mutually agree upon), to the Ra

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:27am

Perhaps you failed to notice my earlier post:

[Regarding</a> the biological origins of moral reasoning, ethics, and religion](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1065075512-post715.html]Regarding”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1065075512-post715.html)

You think it’s clever because you believe that it cannot be answered. The problem with the question is that it presumes that morality is a phenomenon isolated from consciousness and human experience and grounded, justified, or explained in terms of religious idealism or theological philosophy, which is overwhelmingly baseless and contrary to objective derivation and natural processes. What is the purpose of inappropriately treating it as a transcendental element? It’s comparable to extracting an individual’s liver and requesting a justification for why its existence can be properly vindicated while disregarding the body in which it initially constituted.

Morality is as structurally vital to the preservation and perpetuation of human society as an individual’s primary functional organs are indispensable to the human body. Although the purpose and operation of each can be analyzed in discrete fashion, individual explanations can only properly materialize within the context of the entire undivided system. Religious believers who ideologically view morality solely in terms of their god(s), religion, and philosophical leaning are as unfit to perceive this as someone who supposes that humans obtain and possess a liver through a process in alternative fashion to the genetic framework that underlies the development of every other organ.

The most uncluttered and declarative explanation for morality in human society is the fact that human social groups require predictable regulations and conduct to appropriately function. As social beings, we can no more exist without morality than we can deprived of our livers. This, in turn, may be viewed in populations that can be classified as more cognitively primitive.

The major difficulty in your position is that it doesn’t even adhere to your own criteria. It is a basic necessity to estrange oneself from the untenable belief that religion is an essential constituent of morality. If one is simply “moral” for the sake of avoiding threats of eternal punishment, reaping eternal rewards, conforming to religious scripture, or obeying some fatuous belief in supernatural surveillance, that isn’t morality. That’s selfishness.

[Invalidating</a> the inherent religious context of morality](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064933965-post244.html]Invalidating”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064933965-post244.html)

But your argument that the theist can simply assert that morality can be “explained” using natural law (instead of a biological, and by extension, a social context) is invalid as well since there is an utter absence of ethical uniformity. Ethical paradigms constantly shift within distinct cultures, depending on sociopolitical influence and through temporal progression. For instance, slavery was alive and well in the United State 150 years ago, and racism was vehemently expressed and ultimately “second nature” in many parts of the country until a few decades ago. In Islamist states today, women are explicitly considered as inferior beings and rape is disgustingly viewed as socially tolerable.

If natural law is ingrained in supernatural ordinance, why does it incessantly fluctuate (as if “God” is changing its mind)? Flagrant moral transgressions are profusely espoused within the Old Testament and, indeed, quite notably within the New Testament (e.g. slavery). That merely reflects the ideological sentiments of biblical authors. It wasn’t until human civilization had transcended from hunting-gathering to city-state-based domestic organization that the idea of law-giving gods and the need to invent religious scripture presented itself.

Indeed, morality is biologically inborn, but how can one simply dissolve such from the potentially corrupting influence of collective humanity? Humanity, as can be witnessed visibly and with great resolution, is extraordinarily susceptible to delusions and unprincipled conduct if the impetus is strong enough – particularly if fear and social conformity (which are not necessarily mutually exclusive in the psychological sense) are at fault. Just as many irrationally consider that the entrance of Uranus into Aquarius signifies an imminent physiological effect, many can be persuaded that the most heinous act is a proper, fulfilling, and ultimately beneficial duty (i.e. the conduct of brainwashed Nazi officers).

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:33am

No, not in other words or in any words whatsoever. One of the most fatuously scatterbrained comments repeated from theists is that they are surprised that secularists find murder (or any dishonorable act) immoral since they disregard religious principles (“atheists have no reason to care about others”). This is as if to suggest that without their god(s) and religion, they themselves would lead a dissolute, unconscionable life, which renders such a viewpoint inoperable and conspicuously invalid. In fact, it is very ironic that Christianity, as organized through its churches, is frequently the rearmost social establishment to accept or recognize an element of moral progress or any newly beneficial liberalization.

Would you honestly not behave morally if you did not believe in some god? I scarcely believe that any individual would unfetter his most profound anarchic or unprincipled tendencies in the absence of belief. (But if so, then one ought to steer a wide path around him.) If one is genuinely moral, the inevitable result is to conclude that one’s religion does not govern moral aptitude in the slightest sense imaginable. If one does believe that religious precepts dictate morality and that one’s conscience is voided in their absence, then that person is either inherently immoral or lumbered with a clouded rationale.

Regarding a separate point, it is widely recognized that sociopathy is a tragic consequence of a neurological malformation or malignant influence. Why, then, is it assumed that the opposite phenomenon, genuine morality, is non-affiliated with humanity, or wholly dissociated from the human element when each are conceptually embraced within the same context?

The factual premise that a better morality is the natural consequence of theism is faultily inexpert or even contrary to common-sense expectation. There is no data suggesting that non-theists commit more crime than theists. And indeed, even those with a sectarian view of history will concede that Christians have spent more time killing other Christians than “more hazardous” nemeses.

Axiological arguments, including Aquinas’ natural law, are fundamentally indisposed to the same set of untenable conclusions. Although the concept of universal human ideals and values is valid regarding some qualities – beauty, justice, truth, benevolence – concluding that these are ingrained through supernatural sentience rather than through a complex understanding of human mental processes is logically fallacious on two basic accounts (cum hoc ergo propter hoc and argumentum ad ignorantium).

All evidence points in a direction that moral conscience was selected for in the evolutionary sense. Chimpanzees, our closest genetic predecessor, experience shame and fear. Should I allow myself to conclude that they are fearing some god? Or is it simply a natural response in social animals?

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:37am

Name one instance of when the supernatural was used to validate a scientific truth. (Hint: there isn’t one and there never will be)

This is yet another example of your poor deductive skills by your embracing of a false dichotomy. I would greatly recommend that you read The Birth of the Mind: How a Tiny Number of Genes Creates The Complexities of Human Thought, How the Mind Works, A Universe Of Consciousness How Matter Becomes Imagination, and scientific papers from the field of neuroscience to properly educate yourself on the matter – but not that you’d actually be willing to accept scientific findings that contravene your position.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:39am

I think you are simply misinterpreting what foolfromhell was attempting to communicate. I addressed this earlier, so I will simply repost it:

“Your statements on the brain are not supported by scientific findings. Rather, you are degrading a fully reasonable belief (that complex wholes (such as the human brain) should be explained in terms of their parts) into a simpleminded and grossly misleading travesty (that the properties of an intricate whole are simply the sum of those same properties within the parts). “In terms of” comprises a profusion of immensely intricate causal actions, influences, and mathematical strategies of which summation is only the most elementary. Reductionism, your contention made out of your own dishonesty, misunderstanding, or both, in the “sum of the parts” sense, is profoundly absurd, and is nowhere to be located in the publications of well regarded scientists.”

I understand that you are attempting to make a scientific argument (or on your terms, an “according to naturalism” argument). You are simply misrepresenting it and demonstrating an ignorance of scientific findings because you don’t bother to properly enlighten yourself on the matter.

You don’t understand the true basis of human thought and turn in its implications into an imbecilic travesty.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:41am

Yes you do – you make vacuous and incorrect scientific claims and falsely categorize them as naturalism. In essence, it’s nothing more than lousy scientific interpretation on your part.

That’s absolutely incorrect. There is/are no superhuman controlling power(s), no figure of worship, or any other illogical rubbish. In fact, naturalism is antithetical to faith-based religious beliefs and lies intrinsic in the basic foundation that is so absolutely imperative and inevitable for the cornerstone of its continued achievement.

I will repost this: [Naturalism</a> Is an Essential Part of Science](<a href=“http://www.freeinquiry.com/naturalism.html]Naturalism”>http://www.freeinquiry.com/naturalism.html)

The doubly quoted statement is far more appropriately systemized as scientifically established reality – not the “naturalistic viewpoint.”

There is not a single reputable neuroscientist that would assent to one single point that you mention regarding human thought (aside from the obvious reality that the brain is composed of atoms, like all other matter). Rather, they are mortifying absurdities that distort and embellish your fallaciously perceived implications in order to accommodate an unshakable ideology. The facility with which we contemplate the world has no proficiency to glance inside itself or our other faculties in order to see what makes them function. This inevitably renders supernaturalists victims of an illusion – a misperception that our own psychology materialized from some divine means, inexplicable principle, or supreme essence.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:49am

I have already explained this. Foisting wrong ideas and contagious superstitions on impressionable young children is an unprincipled act, a form of mental abuse. The more proper question is why is it morally correct for one to dictate a young child’s view on the cosmos and humanity’s place in it? It is a sad fact that many children are cloistered away from opposing influences or repeatedly coached on how to provide baseless arguments for their own ideology’s superiority or to irrationally contravene any logical substantiation or objective evidence that diametrically disproves their faith.

Again, this is completely incorrect and is derived out of your cluelessness of how the brain actually perceives. So you hold to the conviction that this sky-fairy of yours intervened in the natural course of events and made Picasso an artist, for instance? I thought that you didn’t believe in determinism.

TheAscendancy · June 22, 2010, 3:49am

Wow, nice to see that the debate is still raging.

And while I’m far too lazy to go back and read everything that’s been discussed since my initial cursory perusal of this thread, I thought I’d add my two cents on morality.

I agree with mifune that that’s not the case whatsoever. I will, however, diverge from his idea of collective morality as a manifestation of survival advantages in an evolutionary process. I don’t think science, at this point, can empirically prove the origin of morality – but the aforementioned theory is still quite interesting.

That said, I will agree that morality can be easily independent of religion and that life without religion does NOT lead to existential nihilism, as morality can be derived from a multitude of sources. It was the state for Plato, teleological ends for Aristotle, the tyrant for Hobbes, reason for Locke, imposed respect for humanity for Kant, the Ubermesnch/individual for Nietzsche. There’s no reason that religion must dictate how to live the good life.

Although I’m an odd mix of a Hume skeptic/Nietzschean existentialist and can’t fully agree with that statement, I’m just curious, mifune. Have you read Adler? That statement seems frighteningly derivative of his works.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:55am

You on the other hand, need to desist from the completely fraudulent tactic of misrepresenting how the brain actually functions because your false account is fatuously inconsistent to derived findings. Your groundless absurdity fits the criteria for an argumentum ad ignorantium, a non sequitir, a cum hoc ergo propter hoc, and affirms the consequent. But I suppose that such an argument is on par for drawing out of a doctrine that supports a 6,000-year-old Earth, the coexistence of humans and dinosaurs, and the nonexistence of biological evolution.

Perhaps I will repost an earlier argument, which you conveniently didn’t respond to (in response to this quote of yours):

“Yes, they are. You provide the indiscriminate belief that some god created the physical matter, energy, and mechanism to initiate the universe. But if you are going to use such an empty and illogical “explanation,” then what created this god? Then, of course, the common argument is that it’s “everlasting.” But that is logically incongruous since an omniscient god that possesses free will supposedly has a full understanding of the eternity future. Further, humanity is predestined to corroborate with its comprehension of the future and thus does not have the free will digress from it. Hence, the free will of humanity contradicts the omniscience of a supernatural force.

Moreover, an omniscient god with free will is logically inconsistent and cannot exist because, by its very ontology, it would be bound to follow the future that it already knows, thus invalidating its own free will.

Also, labeling it as “everlasting” or “outside of time” is yet another logical violation since, due to its existence, it lives in a sequence of events that are obligated to occur within a temporal framework. And, by the very connotations of those concepts, it influences and mediates occurrence. But occurrences are events of which causation is inextricably linked, which demands the inclusion of the concept of time. In essence, the concepts of “everlasting” and “outside of time” are invalid, which can be readily understood through basic logical reasoning. In other words, with supernaturalism, one is still inseparably burdened with the infinite regress.

On the other hand, scientific conjecture of the universe as a large-scale quantum mechanical vacuum fluctuation is a logically sound theoretical basis since it is inherently immune from the fallacy of infinite regress. According to the mathematical laws of quantum mechanics, and through experimental verification, cause and effect are regularly suspended on the subatomic scale. Particles of matter curiously reverse their direction of motion or naturally materialize – and nothing about that represents a contravention of any physical laws. The implications of that reality are quite profound, given the plausibility of a spontaneous universe formed on an acausal basis. And given that the Big Bang can be studied back to the smallest fraction of a second (approximately 10^-11 s), cosmologists know that the Big Bang emerged from a very compressed, infinitesimal state, deemed a singularity. Consequently, quantum mechanical effects must have once applied on a cosmic scale.”

mifune · June 22, 2010, 3:57am

Well, there are many striking similarities in humanity’s idealisms regarding those four sample qualities (since such a degree is necessary for basic survival), which is precisely what I intend to convey, but not in the absolutist sense, of course.

And no, I have not read Adler.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 4:01am

I don’t. In the evolution versus creationism debate, the former irrevocably defeats the latter. Deliberating morality and the logical violations of supernatural entities holds far more appreciable merit.

As I have informed you on multiple occasions, evolution is not a belief, but rather an overwhelmingly substantial accumulation of objective evidence that establishes the phylogenetic relationships of biological life.

Although the timeline is conjecture, I wholly agree with your conclusion. Science relentlessly tests every single proposition that has been made about the human condition in accordance with technological frontiers and provides a de facto means of overturning scripture, superstition, and delusion whenever necessary. Religion must integrate scientific findings to maintain any degree of credibility, which will inevitably result in the secularization of the religious epic and any of its conceptual (and in many cases, extraneous) outgrowths. However, by the very existence of human psychology, it is virtually nonviable to entirely immunize humanity against its virulent propagation.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 4:04am

Any logical framework or syllogism that integrates the supernatural is indisputably founded on an illegitimate basis, typically through argumentum ad ignorantium although other fallacies are frequently employed, which invalidates the entire intention.

I already have:

[Regarding</a> the biological origins of moral reasoning, ethics, and religion](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1065075512-post715.html]Regarding”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1065075512-post715.html)

Of course you do. In other ideological realms, Holocaust denialists believe that they are reasonable as well. The same holds for astrologers who believe that their methods of rationale are fundamentally valid for fancying that Neptune’s entrance into Capricorn denotes a special physiological or interactive consequence. The same holds for tarot card readers, those who refuse to walk under ladders, and those who suffer from delusions of all varieties.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 4:05am

This, once again, is a horribly asinine assertion (argumentum ad ignorantium, cum hoc ergo propter hoc). Experience of supernatural thought or episode is not proof of the reality of any god-like form. It is, indeed, very analytically feeble to jump from brain activity to existence of the supernatural and fully demonstrates a decrepit facility with logical reasoning.

Of course you’re wrong. I have demonstrated logically and through impartial, scientific evidence that you are thoroughly incorrect in each of your baseless assertions.

This attests to the fact that you are indeed very intellectually calcified, essentially incorrigible in your assertions when the amount of evidence and logical rigor overwhelmingly defeats your position.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 4:09am

You didn’t correct anything whatsoever and merely demonstrated that you did not understand my basic point. These species exist as intermediary forms in the gap existing between the phylogenetic relationship between chimpanzees and modern-day humans.

Of course. And the firm amount of evidence that invalidates the position of Holocaust denialists is wholly reflected in the abundance that contravenes the erroneous position of creationists.

And on logical grounds, this god/creator concept of yours is patently wrong since it is necessary for the creator to have a creator and for the creator of the creator to have a creator and so on, in regressive fashion. The universe is not inconceivable when at the quantum level (where the universe began), when physical interaction is essentially suspended from the constraints of cause and effect. I have reiterated this on multiple occasions and will not delve into it once more.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 4:10am

First of all, it’s not a theory in the sense of conjecture because it is an objectively derived fact and indeed one of the most firmly known facts of our world. Secondly, it is absolutely impossible to simultaneously believe in the genesis account – and virtually all creation myths – and adhere to evolution because the contradictions are in substantial amplitude.

[Violations</a> in Genesis](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064967259-post468.html]Violations”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064967259-post468.html)

I am in complete agreement with Adenine’s response to this quote.

MIThopeful16 · June 22, 2010, 7:37am

well this thread died. Is this argument really that important? Will the world end? Because this is pretty pointless.

eastafrobeauty · June 22, 2010, 7:56am

Obviously I believe in God…but my entire life I’ve always wondered how God was created.

MosbyMarion · June 22, 2010, 8:47am

You originally claimed:

The implication of that statement is that the species you listed form a “continuous evolutionary progression”. In fact, the only progression that can be claimed from that is first Australopithecus, then Homo".

This is not a progression in any way shape or form. It is two creatures, of which you are claiming one is the ancestor of the other, without any evidence to support that claim.

mifune · June 22, 2010, 11:44am

The species I enumerated were merely illustrations of uncovered intermediary forms between chimpanzees and modern-day humans to respond to the common creationist platitude of “show me your intermediates.” I wasn’t attempting to provide a complete, exhaustive list (which would be pointless, tedious, and something that I don’t know by memory), but rather provide examples of now-extinct species that contribute to our present-day understanding Hominidae’s evolutionary progression. But this is descending into nothing more than a divergence based upon your own misinterpretation of my basic point.

Science-Religion. Which wins?

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