Comment #30374

Posted by Intelligent Design Theorist Timmy on May 16, 2005 11:29 AM (e) (s)

PZ Myers alleges:

The rhopalium shows the upper and lower lens eyes flanked by two pairs of simpler eyes.
…
the two dark smudges on each side in the above picture are simple pigmented pits with photoreceptors in the center.

This is horsepookey. I have it on good authority from Dr. Behe that no ‘primitive’ eye, lacking any component of my eyeball, could ever be of any use, or evolve.

Comment #30378

Posted by PvM on May 16, 2005 11:50 AM (e) (s)

This is fascinating. Research has shown how the eyes/cilium form a sensory/motor unit without the need for a brain See

A simple visual system without neurons in jellyfish larvae

See also Cubozoan jellyfish: an Evo/Devo model for eyes and other sensory systems

Let’s hear how ID explains this…. Oh I forgot, ID fully accepts that

Johnson wrote:

“Evolution is the most plausible explanation for life if you’re using naturalistic terms, I’ll agree with that.”

So all that remains is filling the gaps in our knowledge with appeal to the supernatural. Back to the middle ages…

Comment #30384

Posted by rampancy on May 16, 2005 12:45 PM (e) (s)

Some questions:

1) Aren’t these Box Jellyfish supposed to be the *really* dangerous? Like, even more dangerous to humans than the dreaded Portugese Man-Of-War?

2) I remember reading in an old Nat. Geo. that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Box Jellyfish has any sort of “brain” or nervous system…at least not as we would usually define it. So what coordinates its movement?

Comment #30387

Posted by George on May 16, 2005 12:56 PM (e) (s)

So Johnson believes there is evidence that god shaped (“designed”) human life, if only science would look for it…

Wow, how does he suggest we look for this supernatural influence? - by the very essence of supernatural means beyond nature and as such is not observable or measureable…

Comment #30388

Posted by Russell on May 16, 2005 12:57 PM (e) (s)

rampancy wrote:

I remember reading in an old Nat. Geo. that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Box Jellyfish has any sort of “brain” or nervous system…at least not as we would usually define it. So what coordinates its movement?

Your problem, rampancy, is you’re myopically restricting yourself to naturalistic explanations. Who says the jellyfish’s movements aren’t coordinated by a supernatural agency?

Comment #30389

Posted by Bayesian Bouffant, FCD on May 16, 2005 01:02 PM (e) (s)

Off-topic: Early Earth chemistry

Building a Better Biosphere

Thirty years ago, geochemists took away the primordial soup that biologists thought they needed to cook up the first life on Earth. Now, atmospheric chemists are giving it back. They’re showing that the early Earth could have held onto much more of its volcanic hydrogen, a key ingredient in the recipe for making the organic compounds that may have led to the first life.
…

Comment #30400

Posted by bill on May 16, 2005 02:17 PM (e) (s)

2) I remember reading in an old Nat. Geo. that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Box Jellyfish has any sort of “brain” or nervous system…at least not as we would usually define it. So what coordinates its movement?

I don’t know.  You’d have to ask its cousin, Dembski.

(sorry, toejam, the devil made me do that.)

Comment #30435

Posted by rampancy on May 16, 2005 04:26 PM (e) (s)

Geesh. Ask a stupid question… :)

(I guess it’s off to Google and WoS for me…)

Comment #30436

Posted by Michael Finley on May 16, 2005 04:26 PM (e) (s)

PvM wrote:

Back to the middle ages…

Typically modern appeal to ‘progress’.

Comment #30441

Posted by rampancy on May 16, 2005 04:36 PM (e) (s)

So how would you define “progress” then, Finley?

Is the abandonment of centuries of achievement and development in the sciences to a return to the Fundamentalist Christian-based Arguement from Incredulity “progress” to you?

Perhaps you don’t consider the development of vaccines against Polio as a sign of “progress”…I’m sure that you’d much rather see the abandonment of traditional “materialist” medicine in favour of Benny Hinn-style Faith Healing, right?

Comment #30442

Posted by Traffic Demon on May 16, 2005 04:44 PM (e) (s)

But what good is half a… ah, hell, creationists still suck.

Comment #30444

Posted by Michael Finley on May 16, 2005 05:23 PM (e) (s)

At the bottom of PvM’s line about the Middle Ages (read “Dark Ages”) is the belief that any appeal to a divine cause in nature is contrary to reason.

Needless to say (or at least it should be), that’s a hard position to defend.

However, since I meant my response as a hit-and-run, and have no intention of hi-jacking this thread for a discussion of “religion and science,” I’ll leave it at that.

Comment #30445

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 16, 2005 05:33 PM (e) (s)

“However, since I meant my response as a hit-and-run”

oh, no, hit and run tactics have nothing to do with hijacking threads.

get lost, finley.

Comment #30446

Posted by Gary Hurd on May 16, 2005 05:33 PM (e) (s)

The part of the paper I found most interesting was that on the sensory stalk/bulb there were actually 4 kinds of eyes including the major evolutionary landmarks identified years ago by Nilsson.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v435/n7039/images/43515…

Sorry there are no images in comments.  Maybe PZ will add it to the OP.

Comment #30448

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 16, 2005 05:45 PM (e) (s)

@rampancy:

“1) Aren’t these Box Jellyfish supposed to be the *really* dangerous? Like, even more dangerous to humans than the dreaded Portugese Man-Of-War? “

IIRC, there are quite a few species that are categorized as “box jellyfish”, including the one known as the “sea wasp” (from Australia), which is probably the one you are thinking of.  I don’t think all box jellies are toxic to humans, but that one most assuredly is; and yes, it can be considered more dangerous than a man-o-war. 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&d…

2) I remember reading in an old Nat. Geo. that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Box Jellyfish has any sort of “brain” or nervous system…at least not as we would usually define it. So what coordinates its movement?

well, no brain or complex ganglia, but certainly a nervous system:

http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/invert.html…

“the jellyfish has a nervous system characterized by a series of interconnected nerve cells (a nerve net). The nerve net conducts impulses around the entire body of the jellyfish. The strength of a behavioral response is proportional to the stimulus strength. In other words, the stronger the stimulus, the larger the response.
Some jellyfish (for example, Aurelia) have specialized structures called “rhopalia”. These rhopalia have receptors for:

light (called ocelli)
balance (called statocysts)
chemical detection (olfaction),
touch (called sensory lappets)”

hope that helps.

cheers

Comment #30473

Posted by Just Bob on May 16, 2005 06:50 PM (e) (s)

2) I remember reading in an old Nat. Geo. that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Box Jellyfish has any sort of “brain” or nervous system…at least not as we would usually define it. So what coordinates its movement?

Jesus.

Comment #30479

Posted by steve on May 16, 2005 07:01 PM (e) (s)

2) I remember reading in an old Nat. Geo. that there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Box Jellyfish has any sort of “brain” or nervous system…at least not as we would usually define it. So what coordinates its movement?

“Christ is indispensable to any scientific theory.”—William Dembski

Comment #30552

Posted by PvM on May 16, 2005 10:56 PM (e) (s)

Finley wrote:

At the bottom of PvM’s line about the Middle Ages (read “Dark Ages”) is the belief that any appeal to a divine cause in nature is contrary to reason.

Needless to say (or at least it should be), that’s a hard position to defend.

Not at all, I am merely stating that appeal to divine cause in science is a reversal to the God of the Gaps.

Comment #30556

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 16, 2005 11:24 PM (e) (s)

“Not at all, I am merely stating that appeal to divine cause in science is a reversal to the God of the Gaps”

hmm, and here i thought appeal to a divine cause “in science” was a bit of an oxymoron?

moreover, how is appeal to the divine a reversal of god of the gaps?

you get more confusing every day, finley.

Comment #30557

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 16, 2005 11:26 PM (e) (s)

er, sorry, i see that it was PvM that posted that!

are you sure that’s what you wanted to say?

now i’m really confused.

Comment #30662

Posted by Michael Finley on May 17, 2005 01:42 PM (e) (s)

I’ve never minded the phrase ‘God of the gaps’. If there is a ‘gap’, i.e., an unexplained phenomenon, it needs to be filled. If natural causes cannot explain an observed fact, it is reasonable to consider alternative explanations, miracles.

What justifies the insistence that every unexplained phenomenon, present and future, will be explained by natural causes? I suspect it’s an inductive argument of the sort “Every unexplained phenomenon in the past has been explained by natural causes, therefore, ….” But the premise of this argument is false; there are many phenomena that were unexplained by natural causes in the past and remain unexplained by natural causes today. Such an induction, then, would have to use the weaker premise “Some unexplained phenomenon in the past has been explained by natural causes.” But what is supposed to follow from that?

Comment #30675

Posted by Jim Wynne on May 17, 2005 02:17 PM (e) (s)

Michael Finley wrote:

I’ve never minded the phrase ‘God of the gaps’. If there is a ‘gap’, i.e., an unexplained phenomenon, it needs to be filled. If natural causes cannot explain an observed fact, it is reasonable to consider alternative explanations, miracles.

I’m reminded of the practice at the Oscar ceremonies of having people poised in the audience to quickly fill the seat(s) of award winners so that when the cameras pan the audience no empty seats will be seen. Of course, no one cares if there are empty seats, and reasonable people, upon seeing empty seats, would deduce the fact that the seats were temporarily vacated by award winners.
The God of the Gaps is a similarly absurd placeholder and He must get pretty tired of having to relocate when more reasonable explanations come along.

Comment #30679

Posted by Michael Finley on May 17, 2005 02:40 PM (e) (s)

Jim Wynne wrote:

The God of the Gaps is a similarly absurd placeholder…

If asserting and justifying a conclusion were the same, then everyone would be clever.

Comment #30682

Posted by Jim Wynne on May 17, 2005 02:55 PM (e) (s)

Michael Finley wrote:

What justifies the insistence that every unexplained phenomenon, present and future, will be explained by natural causes?

Who insists that? That’s a strawman if I ever saw one. What justifies the assumptionthat gaps not presently explained by natural phenomena won’t be? Do you have evidence to the contrary that you’re not sharing with us, or are you just “clever beyond measure”?

Comment #30691

Posted by Michael Finley on May 17, 2005 03:09 PM (e) (s)

Jim Wynne wrote:

What justifies the assumption that gaps not presently explained by natural phenomena won’t be?

I don’t make such an assumption. I readily admit the possibility that every unexplained fact will be explained by natural causes. Can you admit that some unexplained facts may never be explained by natural causes?

In the absence of an explanation, why is an unknown natural explanation a more plausible possibility than an unknown miracle?

Comment #30700

Posted by Flint on May 17, 2005 03:27 PM (e) (s)

Finley just needs to find his personal god hiding somewhere in the objective universe. And Finley is intelligent enough for this to be a significant problem. After all, his god doesn’t DO anything tangible. For some, perhaps Finley’s god ‘answers’ prayers, but never does so with any useful specificity. Anyone who thinks otherwise should visit a casino, and watch whole roomfuls of people praying their cojones off, while the house collects a precisely calculable percentage day after day.

There are two explanations for the unexplained. Science’s version (unknown at this time) and Finley’s version (goddidit). And day by day, thanks to the efforts of an army of investigators, the unknown shrinks and therefore so does Finley’s god. Is there any wonder Finley is desperate to “see” the supernatural wherever the alternative isn’t (yet) stone obvious? Is it any wonder that whenever anyone points out that no working scientific theory has ever required the slightest lick of magic, Finely seems to pop up to shout methodological naturalism? And is it any wonder that Finley owes his own education, his health, his occupation, and his ability to bray his insecurities here to the very principles he is trying to distort as his faith requires? Dropping the supernatural (still undetected) in favor of the natural has in a few short centuries changed Finley’s world in all respects — probably including buying him the time to struggle against it.

Comment #30702

Posted by Russell on May 17, 2005 03:28 PM (e) (s)

I’ve never minded the phrase ‘God of the gaps’. If there is a ‘gap’, i.e., an unexplained phenomenon, it needs to be filled. If natural causes cannot explain an observed fact, it is reasonable to consider alternative explanations, miracles.

OK, that settles it. I won’t be reading any more Finley comments.

Comment #30707

Posted by Michael Finley on May 17, 2005 03:38 PM (e) (s)

Flint,

That’s the worst piece of psychology/sociology I’ve ever read. It’s a poor substitute for a straight-forward answer to my question. Let me try again.

There are two explanations for the unexplained. Science’s version (unknown at this time) and Finley’s version (goddidit).

What reason have you to prefer one over the other?

Comment #30716

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 17, 2005 03:56 PM (e) (s)

because one method has shown time and time again to produce useful results once technology catches up with “the gaps” so they can be tested, while the other has produced… nothing.

simple as that, finley.

Comment #30748

Posted by Man with No Personality on May 17, 2005 05:24 PM (e) (s)

Now, that’s unfair, Sir Toejam.  It’s managed to get some very nice buildings put up (by us imperfect mortals, mind you), and it’s also produced a great deal of writing, music, and hysterics.

Comment #30777

Posted by Ian Menzies on May 17, 2005 07:53 PM (e) (s)

What reason have you to prefer one over the other?

Unless you have some positive evidence that you’d like to share with the rest of us, one is a simple statement of fact, while the other is baseless conjecture.

Comment #30797

Posted by PvM on May 17, 2005 09:52 PM (e) (s)

Finley wrote:

I’ve never minded the phrase ‘God of the gaps’. If there is a ‘gap’, i.e., an unexplained phenomenon, it needs to be filled. If natural causes cannot explain an observed fact, it is reasonable to consider alternative explanations, miracles.

Why is it reasonable? And why is it that ID is looking for evidence for God in our ignorance? Why not accept the ‘we don’t know’ instead as a far more reasonable position. That’s what science does. It’s almost an insult to God that ID insists that we look for Him in areas we do not understand. History has shown this to be a very poor position.

So can you explain why we should accept that God lives in the gaps of our knowledge, a position which is both historically quite unsuccessful, and which basically is an argument from ignorance. Why not admit that ‘we don’t know’?

Comment #30803

Posted by Henry J on May 17, 2005 10:49 PM (e) (s)

Re “and it’s also produced a great deal of writing, music, and hysterics.”

hysterics?

Re “that no working scientific theory has ever required the slightest lick of magic,”

A thought: once a phenomena can be consistently observed (or produced), it would at that point (as likely as not) then get labeled as “natural”.

As for whether one should “prefer” an unknown “natural” explanation over an unknown “supernatural” (whatever that is) explanation, IMO the key word in both is “unknown”, and if it’s unknown it’s unknown. The distinction of “natural” vs. “supernatural” is irrelevant until something about it becomes known. That’s just by two cents worth on that.

Henry

Comment #30950

Posted by Jim Wynne on May 18, 2005 07:03 PM (e) (s)

Michael Finley wrote:

What reason have you to prefer one over the other?

Just off the top of my head, which I have a habit of using for something other than fatuous, self-absorbed rumination, how about those dirty methodological naturalists who had the audacity to believe that mental illness has a somatic basis, and is not caused by demon possession? I think that if I were one of the millions of paranoid schizophrenics who have gotten at least some of their lives back as a result of people preferring natural causes over gapgod I would have a tendency to prefer natural causes.

Comment #31013

Posted by Boronx on May 19, 2005 02:24 AM (e) (s)

Looking for supernatural causes is unreasonable.

If the link between a cause and an effect were reasonable, it would, in fact, be a natural cause and not a supernatural cause.

Comment #31102

Posted by Arden Chatfield on May 19, 2005 04:01 PM (e) (s)

“Looking for supernatural causes is unreasonable.”

Tho infinitely easier, and ANYONE is qualified to do it!

Comment #31137

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 19, 2005 06:22 PM (e) (s)

At the bottom of PvM’s line about the Middle Ages (read “Dark Ages”) is the belief that any appeal to a divine cause in nature is contrary to reason.

Contrary to reason?  depends on whose reason.  <shrug>

Contrary to science?  Yes.

Unless, of course, you think you can come up with a way to scientifically study the supernatural.

Oh wait, you’ve already given up trying, haven’t you … . .

{quote]However, since I meant my response as a hit-and-run, and have no intention of hi-jacking this thread for a discussion of “religion and science,” I’ll leave it at that.[/quote]

No you won’t.

Comment #31139

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 19, 2005 06:28 PM (e) (s)

I’ve never minded the phrase ‘God of the gaps’.

No IDer does, since “god of the gaps” is all ID *is*.  <shrug>

But I have a question for you, Finley.  Take a gap.  Any gap.  Cram your god into it.  Five years later, suppose that the gap is closed by further knowledge. 

Does this mean, in your view, that:

(1) god used to fill that gap, but stopped filling it at the very moment our non-god knowledge filled it,

or

(2) god was using the then-unknown knowledge to fill the gap, and we just happened to discover that,

or

(3) there never was any god in the gap to begin with.

I do understand that you won’t answer my question, Finley. Except maybe to once again refer to me as “Tireless Blowhard”.  But hey, I’m a big boy and I can take it. (yawn)  So please feel entirely free to call me whatever floats your boat, Finley. May I suggest “Ignorant Clod”, or maybe “Empty-Headed Moron”.  Or perhaps you would prefer to insult my mother as well —- may I suggest “Stinky Old Bitch” or “Ugly Old Hag Who Had A Really Stupid Stupid Son”.

Call me whatever you like, Finley. (shrug)

Just answer my goddamn questions.

Comment #31140

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 19, 2005 06:31 PM (e) (s)

There are two explanations for the unexplained. Science’s version (unknown at this time) and Finley’s version (goddidit).

What reason have you to prefer one over the other?

I’m curious, Finley ——- are you under the assumption that the two are mutually exclusive, and that we therefore must choose between one and the other?

If so, why do the vast majority of Christians, worldwide, NOT see them as mutually exclusive, and why is YOUR religious opinion on the matter any better than theirs, other than your say-so.

No need for you to answer, Finley — the question itself makes the point with crystal clarity.  And I do understand that you are lethally allergic to answering direct questions (as are *all* IDers).

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