I do wish we Christians weren’t quite so eager to fulfill the most cliche definitions of who we are… *sigh*

On the other hand, if one wants to discuss semiotics — which is WAY off course — I suggest giving Walker Percy (novelist and more) a go. His “Lost in the Cosmos” has an intriguing chapter on semiotics as it applies to God-questions and such.

The issue of language may or may not have anything to do with evolution… (again, Percy also was an evolutionist… and committed believer [Catholic]). But his point was that its origins, and the human ability to “name” itself, are highly mysterious and not easily explained by the rest of what *is* explained by Darwin.

I probably botched that explanation… blame me, not Percy.

You’ve not linked LAN to the evolution of DNA, which you ask me to answer (as a theory above addresses). I understand the complexity of language and it’s development in large species, but not at a molecular level – the communication is explainable through basic science.

However, if you would like to make any sort of logical argument for Chomsky (I’m sure he’d be impressed with your science so far) then be my guest.

“Prophecy, by any reasonable definition, is a prediction or knowledge of the future made by diety. Regardless of how you try to dodge it, there are numerous accepted (understood as such) prophecies in the Bible.”

Prophecy is a simple interpretation, as I’ve said above, of the Bible. When you read what you call a ‘prophecy’ you’re just interpreting what you’re reading what you presume to be God’s dictate word or revealed truth to the author.

The Anthropic Principal is a philosophical argument and a basic understanding of those who talk about it and you’ll understand it is continually use it as a philosophical excuse to incorporate the idea of a divine creator into this reality.

I think we reached your blik about God. Which I’m glad about – it only supports your incoherency when it comes to God and a divine creator.

I’m not sure I have the patience to read PAGE BY PAGE the Bible. But you know what Art, I’ll be sure to do it at some point.

Your, resorting to semantics to avoid having to stand in the corner is hilarious. I’ll assume by your last response, and this is my last response to you, that you dont understand the link between the laws of the universe (themodynamics, etc) and how it absolutely denies the plausibility, much less the probabilitly of evolution. The anthropic principle makes a mockery of your semantic antics. You were doing pretty good on some points for a while. Why you chose to bail and play word games is completely understandable. Good luck on your studies and may God remove the obstacles from your path to understanding Him and His Word and enable you to see that “the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead;” so that you are without excuse: “Because that, when they knew God,they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.”
You have no excuse, as smart as you are, for not reading page by page the most influential and widely read book of all time. Thanks for our discussion!!! Really!! Art

Passed on as a reasonable theory to your questions. Remember, everything is theory or high probability, you can’t have fact. Lets move on.

” You have not attempted to explain prophecy and I don’t expect you to.”

Prophecy is a verbal interpretation, or propositional interpretation, of the Bible, whereby it’s believed the authors were dictated to by God. Such a belief would be a literal interpretation of the Bible. Something I’ve addressed above. Lets move on.

“YOU– “The supernatural is beyond it’s intelligible grasps”
Your last few entries to this dialogue would indicate you don’t believe your own words.”

Evolution is a theory based within the universe, the natural, the material. God as an idea is supposedly beyond our Time-space, inherent, nature and therefore theoretically uncomprehendible. Lets move on.

“YOU– “You ask me to disprove the Bible (therefore God really). It is a logical fallacy to presume that because you hold God to be positively in existence it has to be disproved by those that don’t believe he is.”
You’ve jumped the tracks. The Bible is tangible!!!! Your argument is based on a biased and intentional misinterpretation of what you read. And, you use that to attack my intellectual honesty.”

Dahh!!! TANGIBLE!!! Yes, but if the content of the Bible is proven to be inaccurate, make-believe stories by those who couldn’t explain what was going on around them then the idea of God falls down really. Modern day miracles and experiences would seem like a foolish extrapolation of the ones that the Bible made up. If it isn’t proven true. Which is what I’m asking you to do. Lets move on.

“From what I’ve read and been taught, the DNA, RNA, mitochondria and other cells and/or parts of cells in our bodies definately “know” how and when to do things (and to self correct). And, even if they don’t “know”, something somewhere does the instructing and has from beginning. It is completely and totally illogical, mathematically absurd and completely faith based to believe it just started doing it as a chemical process.”

Who taught your Chemistry? Dr.Seuss? You talk as if you understand entropy and thermodynamics but a basic understanding in this will show you that ‘feasibility’ of a reaction (whether it is likely to occur or not) is not some guiding hand but simply a calculation based upon a reactions enthalpy and it’s entropy. They’re only atoms Art! Not autonomous agents! The THEORY WHICH IS THEORY I stated above, along with all the other ones the article suggests at the start, gives a THEORY as an explanation to how such an occurrence could happen. Molecules don’t ‘decide’ to react with eachother Art, they do so in the right conditions with the right chemical gradients, temperature, energy etc.

Go back and learn some Chemistry. Lets move on.

“Which is it? Do you believe in science or do you believe in the religion of evolution. You cannot believe in both. With the God of the BIble you suffer no such contradiction. My “ignorance”, as you put it, never puts me in the self-contradictory position that your faith in evolution puts you.”

Ahem Evolution, Ahem Science. I’m sorry, but you never made clear how any of your Science interlinked above. I think it went something along the lines of “Evolution contradicts maths! Thermodynamics *flicks through his old school books* Entropy! Urmm…. everything Science!”

You should move on.

Oh, just a few moments of Blasphemy you had;

You said “Your God” to me. I think you meant our God – or are you an non-believer!
You blasphemed against the found and collator of the Bible (Rome and the Catholic Church)
You suggested God to be an ‘anyone’, I think you meant anything. He’s not human – that would make him imperfect.
You claimed George Bush was lying when God spoke to him. God revealed himself to President Bush.
You continue to wear mixed clothing, and eat meat – the first 5 books would not be impressed.
I have experience no love from you, despite being your neighbour. Jesus would not be proud.
You probably own a gun. Thou shalt not kill remember.

Evolution is a reasoned belief. A far more justified argument than the Bible.

You say I use theories as fact but I clearly stated in my second post, of the two before yours, that I understood it was a theory.

Your Faith position allows you to comfortably dismiss Catholicism, why ever so? They’re justified in exactly the same way you are in believing in God.

“The evolutionairy world-view is blinding”.

Interesting. Maybe to the individual who follows it. What Christian’s fail to see is that those who ‘blindly follow’ Science aren’t blindly following something suggested to be ‘Eternally set’. I’ll repeat by saying Science is a very mature art. It reassesses ALL of it’s ideas, it has unanswered questions – you may be alluding to a few – but that doesn’t mean it’s got it all wrong – it just means it’s in a current paradigm that needs to be readdressed. But the difference between those that follow science and those that follow religion is that unlike the priest the scientist will tell all about his discoveries, and they will test, and reevaluate and cross-reference it until they fall into a new understanding of the universe. People didn’t revert back to the Bible when Einstein showed Newton’s concept of Relativity to be false – we praised his enquiring!

If the current understanding of Evolution is blinding, the true answer will be with the Scientist than with the Priest.

To reiterate, when you say Science is a faith – it really isn’t. Certainly there are fundamental flaws to science but this does not class it as a faith, just that its truths, as any philosopher of science will explain, are only highly probable (read some Hume).

“Read the Bible to better understand what you are talking about as a good philosophy student would”

But tell me Art! What am I reading when I open up onto Genesis? Am I looking at a non-propositional, human documentation? That simply describes man’s experiences with God and should be deemed allegorical? Or do I see it as literal? Do I moan when I see conflicting interpretations of the same event (Road to Damascus Miracle)? Should I read the concepts that Christians still take to be true, though they’re not in the Bible? Is God eternally set or do my prayers make him change his ways?

I study the Bible in my classes – we have to – philosophy of religion and whatnot, but the only interpretation I find from the Bible is that it is like any other novel – except they can’t put it under any genre because you Christians all argue over it. I’m not pig ignorant of the Bible Art. I read it – but I would never use the Bible to argue any religious point.

Your first comment
“evolutionary process that does not ignore the creation and transference of the information of the DNA code. ” Explained in the link!
Your second comment
“Where has anything ever been written that would allow you to believe that the devolopment of information could logically be anything but instantaneous existence of a receiver and sender-or it is not information is it?.”

It’s all above really in that link!
Both RNA and proteins were subsequently formed from the gases emitted in the big bang. [yes theory]
It’s suggested above that RNA and it’s subsequent Proteins, were all there with the chemicals. Under the right conditions the Polypeptides and RNA were formed in equilibria between salt oceans and alkaline pools.
You’ll have to expand on what your definition of a receiver is because the chemical reactions, under basic kinetic and collision theory, were forming RNA and proteins – random collisions caused them to be formed, not some sub-conscious atom autonomy – so you’ll need to specify where the holder of the information was, and what subsequently received it, in the theory above. It was all a very random process – but the right chemical gradients and equilibria seems to suggest it was repetitive.

“When I asked how the RNA knows that it is a code and how the code should be read and duplicated, the PHD’s were all at a loss to explain it and frustrated at me for asking.”

I suppose this may well be where the communication breakdown between us is. RNA doesn’t ‘know’ it codes for anything. Much in the same way that water doesn’t ‘know’ it is hydrogen and oxygen. RNA is the same make up as any molecules, the difference is that the theories above suggest some primitive ways in which it was made and how it’s inherent code (that you have to remember we call it, it doesn’t call itself a code) could be translated into proteins.

My view on the beginning of the universe?

Ahh your ignorance encourages me. As a good philosophy student I accept that Science is limited in what in can ‘prove’, and by ‘prove’ I mean show to be highly probable. The supernatural is beyond it’s intelligible grasps. My answer would most likely be that it’s either a brute fact – much in the same way as God – or that there is a deeply philosophical, and abstract, concept behind the universe. Have you looked into the nature of the atom and how it relates to the universe, interesting but certainly wild, explanations for things. My most honest opinion is that I really don’t consider it that often. There are far more practical philosophical issues to deal with.

You ask me to disprove the Bible (therefore God really). It is a logical fallacy to presume that because you hold God to be positively in existence it has to be disproved by those that don’t believe he is. It would be wiser, and more logically correct, to argue for the existence of God. The most obvious reason being that you are unable to truly prove something doesn’t exist and that under that premise you’re left with the possibility of everything existing, from unicorns to leprechauns – and to all the previous God’s.

“First hand knowlegde is something a philosophy blogger should understand and develop-rather than give excuses why you wont read or do proper homework. Intellectual honesty is integrity-it cannot be faked.”

Where is your intellectual honesty surrounding God? Don’t make me do my homework before you put use some intellect to prove something that is unobservable, illogical, undefinable and beyond time and space. I’ll wait on your conclusive first hand evidence…