simplicimus: Vodka Zombie: s2s2s2: Intelligent design does not point to an embodied intelligence of any kind.

LMAO!

It's designed by intelligence, but the thing that designed it isn't intelligent?

Hahaha...

More support for my theory of Unintelligent Design. 2 kidneys, 1 liver? Who came up with this scheme?

Must have been a teetotaler. Female teetotaler. Nervous female teetotaler.

And yeah, it's says a lot about this country when people still want to deny the fact theory of evolution.

Fixed that for you.

Nice work. Don't let anyone fool you with the Theory of Gravity, either.

Since it's only a theory he shouldn't mind if I throw him off this building. Who knows, he might go up.

twunt.

I'd love for someone to explain to me why there is no intelligence involved in how the universe works, tho.


Ironically you would not be intelligent enough to understand the answer.

G2V: s2s2s2: I'd love for someone to explain to me why there is no intelligence involved in how the universe works, tho.

I would consider this backwards.

I think the most logical course of action is to start with the fewest amount of things I can conceive of as possible, existing, and work my way forward. There may very well be intelligence involved in how the universe works. But why should I assume it? Because the universe could not have possibly randomly occurred to exist as it does now? But I can't prove that either.

If I can prove that, then I have reason to suppose there is intelligence involved. until then, all I am doing is adding a detail with no descriptive power (because then I have the exact same question, only modified slightly from "why does the universe exist" to "Why does the creator exist, who then created the universe?" )

I would never tell you that there is proof no creator exists.

Rather I would seek to tell you, there is reasonable proof the universe exists, and I consider it more sensible to start from there, rather than make assumptions.

Meh, since I am The Dreamer, you are all just figment of my imagination and when I wake/die, you will all go away.
Poof

s2s2s2: I agree that evolution that has been observed has happened, does happen. But evolution theory doesn't end there, does it?

I can't give you an example of anything regarding ID nor Evolution. I am not a scientist. I think I have a loose grasp of why scientists tend to reject ID. I'd love for someone to explain to me why there is no intelligence involved in how the universe works, tho.

Just one convincing argument.

How about the argument from poor design? The human body does not look like an efficient, intelligent design. It looks like an agglomeration of ad-hoc, good-enough solutions to problems, developed from pre-existing ad-hoc modifications to solve earlier problems. As a result we have (from an engineering point of view) terrible designs for our eyes, our knees, our backs, our lungs, our genitals, etc.

How about the ad-hoc nature of universal constants? Much is often made about how if certain universal constants were not what they are, life in general and human life in particular would be impossible (the anthropic principle). However, that list is relatively short compared to the list of universal constants that are simply arbitrary, many of which if different would provide a much better universe for humans, with more available energy, simplified engineering, and so on. Others would not change much practically, but would be much simpler and more elegant.

How about the ad-hoc and fuzzy definition of intelligence you are using? What does it mean to be intelligent? Most people use it as some vague approximation of human cognition, memory, attention and senses, all of which have defined limits and characteristics, as well as bises that make them highly specialized at certain tasks which we perform effortlessly (imagine a three dimensional physical world, associate words with concepts) and terrible at others, needing special training and effort (do calculus in your head), with yet others we can't do at all, despite being aware of them (imagine in your head a reality with eight dimensions as it would be experienced by an observer directly). This suggests that there are problems that we not only cannot solve, but are not even aware exist as problems - the unknown unknowns.

You are imagining something in some sense vaguely like a person as being responsible for all of reality. That is itself a result of a psychological bias in humans towards agency and patterns of activity. We see an event, we tend to look not just for a cause, but for a pattern of meaning and an intelligent agent behind that meaning even when there is absolutely no such agency involved. This trait manifests itself in many ways, including conspiracy theories, animism, and pareidola. This is all part and parcel of our evolved tendency to prefer Type I errors (false positives) to Type II errors (false negatives).

What am I taklking about now? In survival terms, false positives are much safer than false negatives. Consider:

I think I see a predator! Oops, just a shadow, never mind, go on with my day vs. I did not see that predator! Oops, now I am lunch
I think she wants to mate with me! Oops, nope, she's not interested, never mind, go on with my day vs. I did not notice she was interested, now I don't get to have kids.
I think that looks edible! Oops, nope, just a rock, not a tasty fruit or critter to eat, never mind, go on with my day vs. I did not notice that rabbit or the raspberry bush it is hiding in, not I am weak and starving and going to die.

See how the first cases are a lot less serious from a survival perspective? So we have a very strong tendency to err on the side of false positives. We see patterns where there are none. We see agency where there is only chance. We look for confirmation rather than disconfirmation. This tendency affects all of our behaviour.

So, no, metaphysics does not rule out the existence of an unknowable source of all creation. What it does rule out is the possibility of any knowledge of that, including the kind of evidence you are indirectly referring to. Anything of sufficient magnitude to actually qualify as an ultimate creative force is also equally beyond our capacity to understand or quantify in any way.

We also know that our tendency to assume intelligence that is somehow similar to us in observed events is an irrational bias, and not to be trusted. The inference of intelligence or design as something we can detect in the universe at large is a falsehood. It is just another way that your evolved brain lies to you, because truth and fact were never the driving selective pressures, survival in an indifferent to hostile environment was.

Put those two points together and you get a pretty convincing argument that even if there is some kind of entity out there, we haven't seen it, and when we think we have we are actually fooling ourselves. We aren,t observing intelligence. We are simply observing our own biases colouring our perceptions of reality.