Is It Possible To Remake Creationism Into A Scientific Theory?

[CraigD]

Originally Posted by Shubee

I don't mind anyone saying that the probability for creation through quantum creationism is infinitesimal. How much more probable could the theory of evolution be? Look at it this way: Suppose the mathematical probability is 1/googolplex for some inanimate material on an earth-like planet to assemble itself into a great variety of living things in 3 days. Also suppose that the probability for a slow, multiple billion year life-creating process is 10^12 times greater.

Without evidence supporting these suppositions - for specific approximate numbers, specific calculations showing how they were arrived at – it strikes me as no more reasonable to suppose them than to suppose that a host of angels are physically sitting around my kitchen table offering firsthand testimony to the literal veracity of specific stories from the Bible book of Genesis.

I believe Buffy is correct in her assertion that Darwinian evolution is much more likely an explanation for present day observation than Biblical creationism. Shubee, do you have any evidence to support the suppositions you offer?

PS:

Originally Posted by Shubee

And you are probably aware that Hilbert's philosophy of mathematics has been summarized by the well-known attribution: "Mathematics is a game played according to certain simple rules with meaningless marks on paper."

IMHO, these sort of statements are some of the best brief summaries of formalism. I encountered one first in when I read GEB in 1980 – Hofstadter terms what they describe “typographical rules”, and uses the idea extensively throughout the book.

[questor]

Someone please explain to me why we have to argue floods and dates when we try to determine whether or not the universe was created? Why do we only consider a mythical happening one one infinintesimal planet?

[Moontanman]

Originally Posted by questor

Someone please explain to me why we have to argue floods and dates when we try to determine whether or not the universe was created? Why do we only consider a mythical happening one one infinintesimal planet?

Mainly because the Conservative Christian right demands it! Creationism has historically only applied to life on the Earth. You are the first creationist I know of who has claimed it applies only to the beginning of the universe instead. Creationism could be turned into science the way a turd could be jewelry, no matter how you shape it it's still shit.

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by Shubee

Actually, I don't see anything too unbelievable in Sean D. Pitman's explanation of The Fossil Record.

Well, of course not. Unfortunately Mr. Pitman is highly selective in his choice of "examples," and if you'd like to digress into a discussion of any of his points, I guess I'd be glad to entertain you. Suffice it to say that he does not address--mostly because he is promoting "Intelligent Design" as opposed to "Young Earth Creationism"--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--as both Craig and Freeztar have noted--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.

Originally Posted by Shubee

The theory of devolution agrees with Darwin that there are living things that reproduce with variation but says that all life is spiraling downward toward extinction and death, not upward to more glorious forms of life.

The "theory of devolution" is based almost exclusively on a purposeful misinterpretation of Evolution.

Evolution DOES NOT say that the result is "ever increasing complexity" or even "improvement." "Better" is a function of the *specific environment*, and is NOT some sort of abstract truth about superiority. As the article you linked does indeed show examples of "devolution" but that is fundamentally irrelevant in either finding fault with Evolution: Evolution makes no such claim, and to use this as the basis for finding such fault is a "Straw Man Argument."

As Bob Dylan once said, "the first one now will later be last, for the times they are a changin'." Hard to come up with a *better* evolutionary explanation for the "conundrum" you are trying to show here.

Oddly enough however, calls to devolution are in fact a great argument against Creationism, since it requires an explanation for why an Intelligent Creator would cause devolution to occur. Why would urchins and starfish be punished with the removal of their brains? What did they do to deserve such treatment?

Originally Posted by Shubee

As for evidence that supports my third postulate, I'm very impressed by the utter simplicity of the observation that many petrified trees in the fossil record extend vertically through millions and millions of years of sedimentary rock.

Well, I'd encourage you to read the paper by Dr. Harold Coffin "The Yellowstone Petrified "Forests" which is cited on that page: you'll find that it really does not support the argument that such layers around petrified trees is somehow unusual, and in fact in its addendum, it shows how the process is actually being replicated in Spirit Lake near Mt. St. Helens post its 1980 erruption!

Trees fossilize, and if they are surrounded by sediment that initially develops and washes away, that paper explains why they do indeed do so in situ, thus causing "millions of years"--something that is clearly creative license with the facts--of sediment to grow around them.

This is just one of the many ways in which "mainstream" Creationist theory has distorted existing data that actually disproves what it claims to prove.

Originally Posted by Shubee

Quantum indeterminancy is only a related concept. And quantum theory does make creationism possible. Physicists already admit that a highly ordered reality can suddenly materialize out of nothingness and then become increasingly disordered and decay into inevitable extinction and non-existence.

But none of what you've stated here makes "creationism possible." All you've pointed to is the fact that yes, complex systems--with the input of large amounts of energy (to ensure no violation of the laws of Conservation of Energy)--*can*--although not always--create more complexity "out of nothing," and then yes decay just as easily.

These processes can be demonstrated with very simple--and entirely mathematical--system, that require no call to an outside, metaphysical creator: they come into existence simply based on known and quite obvious laws of mathematics.

We can get into interesting philosophical arguments about the nature of mathematics of course, and the Platonic notion of mathematical truth as transcending "physical truth" (an excellent discussion of which you will find in Chapter 1 of Roger Penrose's Road to Reality, to utilize your own reference!): Is it possible to argue that the Creator could create mathematics arbitrarily to suit Her notions of what reality should be? If not, then given that what we see is entirely explainable through abstract mathematical truth, the notion of a Creator is not only unnecessary in the sense of Occam, it is by definition unprovable!

Originally Posted by Shubee

It's not astoundingly improbable. Evolutionists readily admit to ancient catastrophes all over the planet. And geologists teach multiple mega-floods as scientific fact. I think it's highly likely that there is no clear and indisputable fact that prevents all these multiple mega-floods and fantastic catastrophes from being simultaneous events.

Well, except for that carbon-14 data....you see, in spite of calls to its "inaccuracy" you apparently missed the point: you can *ignore* its exact alignment--which can easily be explained by error ranges due to specific environmental variations for which there is no direct evidence in specific samples--but still get *relative* datings that must align. Its as simple as this: layers that are obviously undisturbed can show differences in "accuracy" that are well within statistical deviations. You do not find items that are close in undisturbed physical strata that are hundreds of thousands or millions of years apart with no obvious explanation: the trees you reference above are dated to the strata *at their roots*, not randomly assorted as one would find in a typical "catastrophe."

Simply by making calls to "obvious catastrophes" of quite small scale, you do not explain how not only there was a global catastrophe, but that it had the ability to disturb layers of geological strata that cannot be moved by any amount of water thrown at it over a space of 40 days.

My favorite theory of the Great Flood is that of a natural dam/waterfall at the Bosporous that in a very short period of time broke and inundated a then mostly dry Black Sea, for which there is some significant--although not conclusive--physical evidence. The interesting thing about this particular theory is that it well-explains the historical story, while it shows that the effects of such a hydrological inundation--while quite devastating to the local inhabitants--did almost nothing to the geological record. In fact there's little physical evidence at all!

Have you asked yourself the question: what sort of hydrological action would be *required* to cause the evidence of geological strata to exist? Those provided by sites like Answers In Genesis are unfortunately laughably incomplete and provide nothing but issue after issue with the actual data that is never addressed because, well, there's no alternative explanation that would allow such geological evidence to be created by a "really big storm."

Monkey men all, in business suit, teachers and critics all dance the poot,
Buffy

[CraigD]

Originally Posted by questor

Someone please explain to me why we have to argue floods and dates when we try to determine whether or not the universe was created? Why do we only consider a mythical happening one one infinintesimal planet?

Forum-wide, we don’t. The idea that various religious creation stories are metaphorical rather than literal is an interesting, if centuries old, one, worthy of many threads. However, this thread is about the idea that a particular creation story could be literally, because, according to some interpretations of quantum physics, nearly anything can be true.

We’ve not yet much discussed in this thread the concept of interpretations of theories of quantum physics, as opposed to the theories themselves, in particular the many-worlds interpretation, which explains the probabilistic nature of quantum physics with the idea that everything that can happen actually does in some “alternate universe”, or world-line. According to this interpretation, in some universe other than our own, the most literal reading of the Genesis account actually happened. In another, the clearly factious one of Flying Spaghetti Monsterism happened. In another, a creation story never imagined in our universe happened.

In yet others, some past happened, then the universe spontaneously changed so that all evidence reveals that something different happened. In some “chaos” world-lines, pasts and futures are so disjoint that, for all practical purposes, causation is not a meaningful concept

In short, in some universe, any arbitrary creation story, including every completely senseless one, happened.

The MWI is well known and very controversial. One of the major objections to it is that, in it’s pure form, it’s physically irrelevant. The many world-lines are causally unconnected, which means that, by definition, they can’t interact in any way. In a sense, separate world-lines are less than imaginary, as even imaginary worlds are real in the sense that they exist as configurations of neurons and chemicals in the brains of the people imagining them. Alternate world are not even connected to our universe in this manner – there’s no causal link between them and our universe whatever.

IMHO, a similar objection applies to any sort of “quantum theory of creation”. Any arbitrary past might possibly have occurred, but the practical value of this, scientific or religious, is nothing.

[Shubee]

Originally Posted by Shubee

I prefer the view of science as given in David Hilbert's philosophy of physics …

Originally Posted by CraigD

There is a critical flaw with this approach: Hilbert’s approach to math, and by extension, physical science, generally known as formalism, ...

CraigD,

Your argument here is incorrect. It's true that Hilbert's original ideas on formalism were overly ambitious. But even the Wikipedia article you cite says, "Much of Hilbert's program can be salvaged by changing its goals slightly." Also, it's widely recognized by mathematicians that Hilbert's intellectual achievements on the foundations of mathematics were revolutionary. More to the point, there is simply no significant connection between David Hilbert's Philosophy of Physics and Hilbert's efforts to prove the consistency of mathematics.

[questor]

Since we can only observe one universe and barely understand it, why should we belabor some mathematical exercises which could theoretically allow for others? Maybe if the math was more pure, we wouldn't have the conjecture.
Since a majority of posters agree there is no God as is described in the Bible, (or other religious tomes) why don't we argue the possiblity that the world was created by some all powerful agent? If there was a BB, wouldn't there have to be a cause? If the universe is ordered and works by physical laws, does that not point to cause? There was cause or there was no cause. Is there any thing whatsoever that would point to no cause?

[Shubee]

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.

That's a very nicely stated claim. Can you also supply the proof?

Originally Posted by Buffy

The "theory of devolution" is based almost exclusively on a purposeful misinterpretation of Evolution.

Evolution DOES NOT say that the result is "ever increasing complexity" or even "improvement." "Better" is a function of the *specific environment*, and is NOT some sort of abstract truth about superiority. As the article you linked does indeed show examples of "devolution" but that is fundamentally irrelevant in either finding fault with Evolution: Evolution makes no such claim, and to use this as the basis for finding such fault is a "Straw Man Argument."

I regard the mechanism "survival of the fittest" as a tautology and consider the claim that scientists never insinuate religious, long-term conclusions for the theory of evolution as clever propaganda. If evolution in biology only means change over time, then I suppose that I'm a creationist-evolutionist that accepts natural selection.

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. See this video:

COSMOS - Clip 5

.

Originally Posted by Buffy

Oddly enough however, calls to devolution are in fact a great argument against Creationism, since it requires an explanation for why an Intelligent Creator would cause devolution to occur.

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.

Originally Posted by Buffy

This is just one of the many ways in which "mainstream" Creationist theory has distorted existing data that actually disproves what it claims to prove.

This thread is about quantum creationism, not mainstream creationist theory.

Originally Posted by Buffy

But none of what you've stated here makes "creationism possible."

There are physicists that believe that the fantastically improbable is impossible. There are mathematicians that believe that even events of zero probability can happen. I take the side of the mathematicians.

Originally Posted by Buffy

The notion of a Creator is not only unnecessary in the sense of Occam, it is by definition unprovable!

I am not invoking a Creator in the background for quantum creation theory. If there are mathematical statements in arithmetic that are unprovable, why should I be troubled by the existence of God being unprovable?

Originally Posted by Buffy

Simply by making calls to "obvious catastrophes" of quite small scale, you do not explain how not only there was a global catastrophe, but that it had the ability to disturb layers of geological strata that cannot be moved by any amount of water thrown at it over a space of 40 days.

Have you asked yourself the question: what sort of hydrological action would be *required* to cause the evidence of geological strata to exist? ... there's no alternative explanation that would allow such geological evidence to be created by a "really big storm."

I have merely stated three postulates. Can you really prove that no fantastic quantum mechanical explanation exists that might justify the third postulate?

Here's someone with enough imagination to at least believe that the third postulate is conceivable:

YouTube - The Biblical Flood Explained

[questor]

Suppose there was a flood in ancient times. Suppose someone built a large boat. Since the Bible is a collection of stories written by a primitive people about the very circumscribed area in which they lived, what do the above stories prove? Suppose the flood enveloped the whole planet, could the millions of varieties of life be packed into the Ark? How much water did they drink? Where did they get their food? What do any of the Biblical stories prove, even if correct?

[pgrmdave]

Originally Posted by questor

What do any of the Biblical stories prove, even if correct?

This is an important question to ask, and one too often overlooked.