91
General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 12:47:04 PM »
What in particular do you not understand?
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92
General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 12:42:42 PM »"Natural geothermal processes" is no more protected from an argument for intelligent design than anything else. Your general position therefore becomes unintelligible and trivial.
If a natural geothermal process produces a strand of RNA, for example, then that counts as a reason to think RNA is not the product of design. It is still possible that RNA is designed but mere possibilities do not count as actual evidence and so are excluded when we try to determine whether the preponderance of the evidence says RNA is designed or not.
93
General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 12:27:43 PM »You just threw your baby out with that explanation, didn't you?
No. Please explain if you think otherwise.
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General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 12:23:26 PM »was G designed?
G has not been introduced yet. If G has qualities B, C, D, and E, and if there are no facts in evidence against G as a product of design, then we are justified in thinking G is designed.
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General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 12:21:05 PM »counterpoints have been offered and all you do is repeat the same thing over and over
I've seen no intelligible counterpoint. Please put a counterpoint forth in your own words.
96
General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 12:03:37 PM »Suppose further that we have no facts at all that say F is not designed.
What would such a fact look like?
Suppose we discover that F is on occasion formed in hydro-thermal vents on the ocean floor, a natural process. This fact would count as a reason to think F was not designed.
97
General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 10:19:23 AM »I don't agree that we have to find it more reasonable than not to think F is designed until and unless we obtain countervailing evidence to the contrary. Why? Where is that rule?
Read this closely again:
If every designed object we know of bears qualities B, C, D and E and if object F bears these qualities then it is more reasonable than not to think F is designed until and unless we obtain countervailing evidence to the contrary.
Suppose every designed object we know of bears qualities B, C, D and E. Suppose object F bears all these qualities. Suppose further that we have no facts at all that say F is not designed. In this case we are justified in thinking F is designed since the preponderance of the evidence says F is designed.
I'm saying that there is another dimension to the argument than the similarity between 2 objects. Namely, how and why one of the objects was created. The truth is that if object A is modeled on the bases of F (which all man-made creations are modeled according to the rules of the natural world) it logically proves nothing about F being designed, and only about A.
I have no idea how this relates to what I'm saying above. We're talking past each other. Make a syllogism.
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General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 10:07:03 AM »
I missed this.
A truly reliable criterion for detecting design, one more complete and nuanced than the general form I presented, would not likely classify your string of characters as an instance of design. If, however, your string did conform to an independently pre-set pattern, such as the grammatical and syntactical rules of the English language, then it would discern it as an instance of design.
But what if, there was more to it than what you could perceive? what if the sentence looked more like: "rhyqwi98atrbmhu4wbn4w219ud340esi81gn35y @)(&%h39fh983ui135u80hjf4h9tng4y 0483uty38h0hy08dwheu9gh974h24..."?
The sentence you saw was only what you could perceive, whereas, objectively, the lines of text had no thought or intent put into them.
A truly reliable criterion for detecting design, one more complete and nuanced than the general form I presented, would not likely classify your string of characters as an instance of design. If, however, your string did conform to an independently pre-set pattern, such as the grammatical and syntactical rules of the English language, then it would discern it as an instance of design.
99
General Off-Topic Board / Re: ITT GraphiteDirigible Explains Hume to Us
« on: June 22, 2007, 09:47:43 AM »Quote
To this first point: "likely presence of design" is highly disputable and impossible to prove.
This:
If every designed object we know of bears qualities B, C, D and E and if object F bears these qualities then it is more reasonable than not to think F is designed until and unless we obtain countervailing evidence to the contrary.
is meant as a general criterion for discerning the likelihood that some object in the natural world (i.e., "F") is a product of design. I'm reasoning inductively here, not doing math. Hume is perhaps most famous for saying one can't prove anything from induction. I am not out to prove anything inductively.
We're talking past each other. I suggest that if you wish to advance some Humean view that you start over and write it up as a simple, clear syllogism. I could then check your view out for basic inferential validity before we entangle ourselves further on questions of soundness.
100
General Off-Topic Board / Re: Fracture starring Ryan Gosling
« on: June 22, 2007, 08:49:57 AM »
My wife and I saw Fracture. We both liked it. My wife has no pre-law bias.