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Originally Posted by Shubee
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Originally Posted by Buffy
Suffice it to say that he does not address... the issue that the Great Flood theory of geologic observations relies on a stochastic process that would require physical causes for the observed ordering that are in direct contradiction with known--and reproducible--laws of hydrodynamics. How this layering occurs in perfect correlation with a variety of dating methods is at the very least...many, many orders of magnitude more improbable than Evolution, and indeed, as I later stated, would really require the temporary suspension of physical laws in order to achieve.
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That's a very nicely stated claim. Can you also supply the proof? |
Sure, its easy. The Great Flood would require the complete physical displacement, up to and exceeding complete liquefaction of at least the top 5 miles of at least all of the continental surfaces of the Earth. Extremely large earthquakes can cause such liquefaction in pure sandy soils that are already partially hydrated, however the amount of energy required to do this planet wide, not just in sandy soils, would require far more energy than could be produced by any force other than a massive innundation of meteorites. If enough meteorites hit the Earth's surface to provide the requisite energy, even perfectly distributed, it would have resulted in both the complete evaporation of all water on the surface of the earth--ejecting most of it into space--and would have resulted in the entire surface of the earth becoming molten, obliterating all traces of "Pre-Adamite" species.
That's just one approach though: you could try to explain it by gravity weakening to a small fraction of its current value for the length of the deluge (although that would have caused some significant problems for folks on any boat floating in the ocean!), but even then, pure hydrologic soaking will not stir anything beyond the top layer, and there would also have to be an odd effect of the gravitational weakening that would cause layers to be formed in perfect alignment with carbon-14 concentrations, for which there is no known physical force.
We can go on and on like this if you'd like, but the fact is that it is indeed physically impossible to create what we see here in 40-days without breaking physical laws. If you'd like to show how its possible, please do so.
But this is just a sideshow of course, the fundamental flaw is still your first postulate "there is no limit to improbability in quantum theory." This is quite vague, and at the very least requires much more definition. As I read it, it translates into "if there is quantum randomness, then any state of reality is possible *instantaneously*," where--to apply your third postulate--"40 days and 40 nights is sufficiently short to constitute "instantaneous."
We can certainly conceive of *some universe* where the physical laws are such that something like this would happen, but *our universe* certainly has different ones, and *that* universe would look nothing like our own!
But within our own universe, time makes virtually anything possible, and the only thing that you add here is the "Creationist" notion that it was created this way, and nothing came before.
The question then becomes, why is this a necessary postulate? What explanatory power does it add to say that the Earth sprang into being instantaneously?
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Originally Posted by Shubee
Have you ever watched the series, The Ascent of Man on TV? Ascent means "movement upward from a lower to a higher state, degree, grade, or status; advancement." That's exactly what many evolutionary scientists teach.
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Well, of course the series was almost exclusively about the development of human *culture* and *knowledge* and had almost nothing to say about evolution.
Could you come up with a more relevant citation to try to prove this point? Its quite clearly fallacious, although it is a *frequently used* argument among those who argue against evolution. Again, this is an excellent example of a Straw Man argument.
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Originally Posted by Shubee
I prefer to look at the evidence scientifically. To me, the theory of devolution is as certain as the creation of the universe in an initial highly ordered state, which, by all accounts, is unquestionably increasingly decaying toward an inevitable cosmic death.
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Do you invest in the stock market? Over the long run it does indeed go up. Over the short-term you see all sorts of "devolution." Over the extremely long run, we'll probably become the next Rome and it will all go to hell in a handbasket....but then then next civilization will come along....what is devolution? You seem to argue that it is a monotonically decreasing function.
I would hope that as a mathematician that you would be able to distinguish between a monotonically decreasing function and a stochastic data set. I hope also you have an appreciation for how functions (in the real word, the physical laws) impose order on stochastic data: add a Poisson distributed data set to a sine wave, and you'll have a pretty jagged sine wave, but Fourier will still find the sine wave!
The notion of "complexity" is that where feedback loops in processes exist, over time, random inputs can change the elemental functions and add new ones by duplication and bifurcation.
These changes can either improve *or* damage the ability of the system to be suited to the *particular environment.*
As an example, fish have the ability to extract oxygen from water by absorbing it. Many fish have evolved very efficient mechanisms to perform this process, but now that they find themselves in heavily polluted environments, those with more efficient gills find they also more efficiently absorb toxins making them *less* well suited to the environment.
I would not digress into this elemental description of evolution except for the fact that you have so badly misstated its key premises.
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Originally Posted by Shubee
This thread is about quantum creationism, not mainstream creationist theory.
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Fair enough, but given that, you still need to deal with the objection that so far, your postulate *assumes* that "quantum randomness makes any configuration of physical matter possible in 'instantaneous' time scales," a notion that needs to be supported before we can go anywhere.
In the meantime, while "traditional Creationist" arguments might be argued to be off-topic, they are the inevitable next step, because unless you can provide a basis for the "anything is possible instantaneously" argument, then the physical laws that these "traditional" arguments try to explain away, are indeed germane to the discussion.
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Originally Posted by Shubee
There are mathematicians that believe that even events of zero probability can happen. I take the side of the mathematicians.
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Can you cite one?
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Originally Posted by Shubee
I have merely stated three postulates. Can you really prove that no fantastic quantum mechanical explanation exists that might justify the third postulate?
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Just to repeat, in order to justify even your first postulate, you must describe how quantum randomness makes anything possible instantaneously: from a purely mathematical viewpoint, you cannot make the effects of the functions that define a model disappear completely, no matter how much stochastic noise is created. I am not making any claim based on improbability here, simply a basic understanding of how interrelated functions in a model interact.
If you really wanted to go somewhere with this, I'd strongly recommend throwing out your second and third postulates for now, and simply deal with trying to prove that anything is always possible.
We gain our ends only with the laws of nature; we control her only by understanding her laws,
Buffy
