Originally posted by sonshipSorry, but he made me promise that I wouldn't give out his e-mail before he gave it to me.
LOL !! Got to hand it to you. You're funny.
You really should be on stage.
There's one leaving in five minutes.
Did you seriously ask him ? And if you did give me his email too.
Originally posted by sonshipLast I checked, I wasn't debating Arno. I was debating you.
You guys cannot disqualify every commenter on this matter just because he or she reflects something other than a knee jerk new atheist "Don't Let a Divine Foot in the Door" skeptical retort.
So we want to disqualify Arno Pensias from making a comment, do we?
Look, I get it - lots of scientists are theists. That's fine. But I can't just agree with them because they happen to be brilliant, or famous. I need to work this stuff out for myself.
A quote from him on the possible 'tunings' would be germane to the question I had hoped to get answered.
What we got instead was, "Oh yeah - well, this guy thinks you're wrong --- and he's way way smarter than you!"
Which flustered me when I was 5 years old, perhaps, but I have learned that there are slightly stronger arguments that can be made in a debate since that time.
Physicist Paul Davies has asserted that "There is now broad agreement among physicists and cosmologists that the Universe is in several respects ‘fine-tuned' for life". However, he continues, "the conclusion is not so much that the Universe is fine-tuned for life; rather it is fine-tuned for the building blocks and environments that life requires."
In 1961, the physicist Robert H. Dicke claimed that certain forces in physics, such as gravity and electromagnetism, must be perfectly fine-tuned for life to exist anywhere in the Universe. Fred Hoyle also argued for a fine-tuned Universe in his 1984 book Intelligent Universe. He compares "the chance of obtaining even a single functioning protein by chance combination of amino acids to a star system full of blind men solving Rubik's Cube simultaneously".
John Gribbin and Martin Rees wrote a detailed history and defence of the fine-tuning argument in their book Cosmic Coincidences (1989). According to Gribbin and Rees, carbon-based life was not haphazardly arrived at, but the deliberate end of a Universe "tailor-made for man."
As Stephen Hawking has noted, "The laws of science, as we know them at present, contain many fundamental numbers, like the size of the electric charge of the electron and the ratio of the masses of the proton and the electron. ... The remarkable fact is that the values of these numbers seem to have been very finely adjusted to make possible the development of life."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-tuned_Universe
“The great mystery is not why there is dark energy. The great mystery is why there is so little of it,” said Leonard Susskind of Stanford University, at a 2007 meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. “The fact that we are just on the knife edge of existence, [that] if dark energy were very much bigger we wouldn’t be here, that’s the mystery.” Even a slightly larger value of dark energy would have caused spacetime to expand so fast that galaxies wouldn’t have formed."
That night in Hawaii, Faber declared that there were only two possible explanations for fine-tuning. “One is that there is a God and that God made it that way,” she said. But for Faber, an atheist, divine intervention is not the answer.
“The only other approach that makes any sense is to argue that there really is an infinite, or a very big, ensemble of universes out there and we are in one,” she said.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/blogs/physics/2012/03/is-the-universe-fine-tuned-for-life/
Billions of universes reminds me of the billions of years argument to make the evilution of a frog into a prince seem possible.
Originally posted by sonshipI can and will disqualify every single commentator that:
You guys cannot disqualify every commenter on this matter just because he or she reflects something other than a knee jerk new atheist "Don't Let a Divine Foot in the Door" skeptical retort.
So we want to disqualify Arno Pensias from making a comment, do we?
1. Does not justify their argument within the quote you give.
2. Has not justified there argument in a location accessible to us that you can refer us to.
3. You are not willing to justify their argument for them.
You already quoted a few people that agreed with you near the beginning of the thread. You have proved sufficiently that there are people that agree with you. You have proved sufficiently that some of them have advanced university degrees and hold positions in the scientific community. Nobody has disputed these claims.
What you have not proven is that they have valid claims, and quoting more such people will not demonstrate this.
I came across this interesting factoid in a ted talk and it reminded me of our discussion of SETI possible life on other planets.
There are about 400 billion stars in our galaxy.
If we were to check each star and its planets for life, checking 1 star per second, it would take about 13,000 years to check them all. And thats just our galaxy. There are over 100 billion galaxies in the universe.
Originally posted by twhiteheadAnd--- based upon the pattern we have thus far established as it relates to life outside of this planet--- we would have wasted 13,000 years checking out our galaxy, were we able to do so.
I came across this interesting factoid in a ted talk and it reminded me of our discussion of SETI possible life on other planets.
There are about 400 billion stars in our galaxy.
If we were to check each star and its planets for life, checking 1 star per second, it would take about 13,000 years to check them all. And thats just our galaxy. There are over 100 billion galaxies in the universe.
- Joined
- 03 Jan 13
- Moves
- 13080
Originally posted by SwissGambitI didn't quote Pensias because I knew he was a religious person. I expect you to expect me to quote theist scientists. Of course they are going to say Fine Tuning points to God.
Last I checked, I wasn't debating Arno. I was debating you.
Look, I get it - lots of scientists are theists. That's fine. But I can't just agree with them because they happen to be brilliant, or famous. I need to work this stuff out for myself.
A quote from him on the possible 'tunings' would be germane to the question I had hoped to get ans ...[text shortened]... learned that there are slightly stronger arguments that can be made in a debate since that time.
But if you want to work on a problem all by yourself you might consider the matter of the Fibonacci series and why this scheme seems to be prevalent in nature.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number
Now I am not going to pretend that I can work through all these calculations myself. I don't have that much training in mathematics.
However, I take the word of those researchers who have remarked that this Fibonacci number sequence is replayed again and again in nature's "design" of various things.
It was recently discovered involved on a Quantum Mechanics level also.
If we are dealing with an planning, purposing Mind, this repetitive scheme which resurfaces in the mathematical structure of so many things, just might be a heavy hint that intelligence has built the scheme into creation.
Possible?
No?
Maybe ?
I think maybe a purposeful sign of intelligent design.
Fibonacci sequences appear in biological settings,[8] in two consecutive Fibonacci numbers, such as branching in trees, arrangement of leaves on a stem, the fruitlets of a pineapple,[9] the flowering of artichoke, an uncurling fern and the arrangement of a pine cone,[10] and the family tree of honeybees.[52] However, numerous poorly substantiated claims of Fibonacci numbers or golden sections in nature are found in popular sources, e.g., relating to the breeding of rabbits in Fibonacci's own unrealistic example, the seeds on a sunflower, the spirals of shells, and the curve of waves.[53]
Przemysław Prusinkiewicz advanced the idea that real instances can in part be understood as the expression of certain algebraic constraints on free groups, specifically as certain Lindenmayer grammars.[54]
Fibonacci numbers also appear in the description of the reproduction of a population of idealized honeybees, according to the following rules:
If an egg is laid by an unmated female, it hatches a male or drone bee.
If, however, an egg was fertilized by a male, it hatches a female.
Thus, a male bee always has one parent, and a female bee has two.
If one traces the ancestry of any male bee (1 bee), he has 1 parent (1 bee), 2 grandparents, 3 great-grandparents, 5 great-great-grandparents, and so on. This sequence of numbers of parents is the Fibonacci sequence. The number of ancestors at each level, Fn, is the number of female ancestors, which is Fn−1, plus the number of male ancestors, which is Fn−2.[57] This is under the unrealistic assumption that the ancestors at each level are otherwise unrelated.
Here's a video on Fibonacci series in nature:
The Golden Ratio in Nature
-
And just to show I can be objective, here's a pushback called
The Golden Ration & Fibonacci Numbers: Fact Verses Fiction
But I still like the evidence of Intelligence in the Golden Ratio though some abuses may have crept in by the over enthused:
Some Muslims are enthusiastic about the Fibonnaci phenomenon. IE.
Originally posted by sonshipFirst of all, the Fibonacci sequence has good reason for being involved in life and nature. But lets for a moment assume that there is no good reason for this and its just a coincidence:
I think maybe a purposeful sign of intelligent design.
Once again, you are making the fundamental statistical error of taking an observed coincidence, and calculating probabilities backwards - and coming to the wrong conclusions.
How many special sequences exist? How many may be 'observed in nature'? You actually have no idea, you didn't bother to look, because you only looked at the coincidence you found.
To demonstrate the problem with your logic, please write a string of 20 random letters - and I will demonstrate using your logic, that God made you write those particular letters.
Originally posted by twhiteheadThe number of stars we can potentially check is going to be a lot smaller than the total IMHO. If there are as you say, 400 bil of the suckers in our galaxy, I bet we couldn't evaluate more than a hundredth of them. So now we are down to a mere 130 years🙂
I came across this interesting factoid in a ted talk and it reminded me of our discussion of SETI possible life on other planets.
There are about 400 billion stars in our galaxy.
If we were to check each star and its planets for life, checking 1 star per second, it would take about 13,000 years to check them all. And thats just our galaxy. There are over 100 billion galaxies in the universe.
Seriously, I don't think we will need to evaluate stars to find extra-terrestrial life in the universe. I think we will find live on Mars (underground) and/or on one or more moons of Jupiter or Saturn.
It will be a wash which one of those sources we find life on first, here in our solar system on those moons or Mars or interstellar.
For sure if we find life on Europa for instance, it will be a hell of a lot easier to get there, not needing relativistic propulsion, than going to ANY star so it will be explored far sooner than any star.
Originally posted by FreakyKBHYou established a pattern how?
And--- based upon the pattern we have thus far established as it relates to life outside of this planet--- we would have wasted 13,000 years checking out our galaxy, were we able to do so.
No, don't tell me, I already know, you read it in the Bible.
I know you have religious reasons for thinking there is no life anywhere but on earth, but please stop pretending that you have logical reasons for it - because we both know that you don't.
Originally posted by FreakyKBHIn other words, you are of the opinion there is only life on Earth and nowhere else? Would that nowhere else include say, Europa, Mars, Callisto, or other moons around the outer planets, Jupiter, Saturn and so forth?
And--- based upon the pattern we have thus far established as it relates to life outside of this planet--- we would have wasted 13,000 years checking out our galaxy, were we able to do so.
If you were so lucky as to live to a time when it was proved one way or the other, suppose they found life on Europa or buried underground on Mars. What would that mean to your religious thinking?
Originally posted by FreakyKBHWasted?
And--- based upon the pattern we have thus far established as it relates to life outside of this planet--- we would have wasted 13,000 years checking out our galaxy, were we able to do so.
Knowledge = a waste of time ?
That is how religion held back scientific enquiry for centuries.
Originally posted by RJHindsYou are in for a rude awakening someday. But it wouldn't do any good anyway, you would just rationalize it all away when there IS life discovered elsewhere off Earth. "Oh, that just means my god is greater than I thought'' or some such rot.
What knowledge? That there is no life in other parts of the universe.
I say 13,000 years is a lot of time to waste to confirm what we already know.
- Joined
- 03 Jan 13
- Moves
- 13080
Originally posted by twhitehead
[b But lets for a moment assume that there is no good reason for this and its just a coincidence:
Once again, you are making the fundamental statistical error of taking an observed coincidence, and calculating probabilities backwards - and coming to the wrong conclusions.
How many special sequences exist? How many may be 'observed in nature'? You actually ...[text shortened]... ers - and I will demonstrate using your logic, that God made you write those particular letters.[/b]
]First of all, the Fibonacci sequence has good reason for being involved in life and nature.
First of all it should have no "good reason" to be involved in life and nature according to atheism because no "reason" was involved in the emergence of life. It was a purely mindless and unguided matter with no reasoning mind involved.
No mind involved means no reason involved.