Afterlife: Pinker's skeptical thought (Endings)

by dhw, Tuesday, June 09, 2020, 10:52 (1417 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw (under "neutrophiles"): For those of us who believe in evolution, EVERY system must have originated from new forms of cooperation between cells/cell communities. Once a system is established, it will work automatically. If it doesn’t, we could be in trouble, though just like bacteria, the intelligent cell communities may then find a way of adapting themselves, as with the example of high altitude readjustments. There is no point in your picking on individual examples of automatism and then claiming that they disprove cellular intelligence! And I have NEVER claimed that “each cell knows what it is doing and thinks what to do.”

DAVID: Our only difference then is the source of intelligent activity by cells. I have God as the source, and you don't know of a source, but God is possible.

Unfortunately, our fundamental difference is the NATURE of intelligent activity. You insist that each activity has been programmed or dabbled by your God, and the cells are automatons obeying his instructions, whereas I propose that cellular intelligence is autonomous.

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dhw: So what are you referring to when you tell us the odds are 50/50?

DAVID: On a chance basis it is either or, so only one is possible. 50/50 has always described that and therefore is never an opinion in and of itself. Personal choice is based on thoughtful analysis of the relevant facts.

dhw: 50/50 means there is an equal chance of each option being correct. 100% means dismissal of 50% of possible correctness. But I’m glad you recognize that those who have made their personal choice in favour of cellular intelligence must have based that choice on thoughtful analysis of the relevant facts.

DAVID: One makes a decision based on the degree of importance one gives to each fact.

Agreed. And if the facts in themselves leave the odds at 50/50, clearly your subjective assessment of them has no more validity than anyone else’s!

DAVID: I can't accept the complexity of the biology of life I fully understand without a designer.

dhw: And the atheist can’t accept the existence of an unknown, unknowable, hidden, inexplicable, sourceless, eternal, immaterial form of universal consciousness. You both refuse to take off your blinkers, but one of you is right. To each his own.

DAVID: But you agree design implies a designer, don't you?

dhw: Or designers. For instance, if all the increasing complexities of life were the product of intelligent cells cooperating, we would have millions of designers. The question then would be: how did the intelligent cell originate? And that question is on a par with: how did your God originate? And so back we go to “first cause”, as already discussed.

DAVID: It is easy to see intelligence in the purposeful activity of cells, since they are designed that way by their designer, who also is first cause.

Yes, their purposeful, autonomous intelligence could have been designed by a designer. And an atheist can say that their purposeful, autonomous intelligence, like life itself***, was the result of a lucky combination of mindless energy and matter, which is also first cause.

***Under "theoretical origin of life": "There are two explanations for the origins of life's building molecules: extraterrestrial delivery, such as via meteorites, and endogenous formation. The presence of amino acids and other biomolecules in meteorites points to the former.”
See what I mean?