----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 25 Jun 1999 06:23:15 +0800
From: "Stephen Jones" <sejones@ibm.net>
Subject: Re: MN - limitation of science or limitation on reality?
Reflectorites
On Tue, 22 Jun 1999 21:19:30 -0500 (CDT), Susan B wrote:
>SJ>I am terminating this thread, since we are starting to go around in circles
>>and I am sure there will be plenty of opportunities to address the same points
>>again, and again, and again...!
SB>too bad. The thread contained several of my questions I was hoping you would
>answer. I have to assume you simply don't have answers, only rhetoric.
Susan's response is one reason I terminated the thread. It is basically fruitless
going around and around in circles debating points from people like Susan who
don't even recognise my answers *are* answers!
I made it quite clear when I rejoined the Reflector that I no longer had the
time to debate each thread endlessly. What happened before and is happening
again is that every post I make gets jumped on by two or three people of the
same mindset who basically say the same thing. If I answer each of them, I get
another two or three messages to each of my two or three replies and it grows in
geometric progression!
I would dearly love to argue each and every response, but if I am to stay on
the Reflector, I *must* terminate threads after two or three cycles.
[...]
>SJ>There is no intention to be rude, indeed my intention is to *minimise*
>>rudeness. As stated in my first message I will post all my messages
>>to the Group, in order to minimise the personal factor:
SB>It doesn't work. All it does is make you sound like you are ignoring someone
>who is speaking to you and talking past them as if they are not there. What
>*ever* you post to this list is read by several (but not all, I'm sure) of
>the members of the list. You don't need to make a special effort to address
>them.
Susan still misses the point that my posts *are* to the list as a whole, not
to her personally. I will continue to address my posts to whom they are
*really* intended, ie. the List. If she interprets this as rudeness, after I have
assured her it isn't intended to be, then I can't help that.
Besides, when I was last on the Reflector, from time to time people would make a
song-and-dance about how they were not going to read my posts to them again.
So I started addressing respomse to those people to the List as a whole. Then
I was accused of retaliation! Posting to the List as a whole by default will
avoid that problem coming up in the future.
>SJ>However, I will still keep posting to the Group, and I would encourage others
>>to do likewise. If everybody did this, it would make it a more scholarly
>>debate.
SB>Talking past someone who is addressing you will not make the debate more
>scholarly. Only scholarship will do that.
Susan again misses the point. I am not talking past her. I am talking *to* the
whole List about something she has posted to the whole List. As a member of the
List she is welcome to respond to, or ignore, my posts.
This is my final word on the subject. I will ignore any further messages about
these two topics.
Steve
- --------------------------------------------------------------------
"All that is made seems planless to the darkened mind, because there are
more plans than it looked for. In these seas there are islands where the hairs
of the turf are so fine and so closely woven together that unless a man
looked long at them he would see neither hairs nor weaving at all, but only
the same and the flat. So with the Great Dance. Set your eyes on one
movement and it will lead you through all patterns and it will seem to you
the master movement. But the seeming will be true. Let no mouth open to
gainsay it. There seems no plan because it is all plan: there seems no centre
because it is all centre. Blessed be He!" (Lewis C.S., "Perelandra," The
Bodley Head: London, 1977, p251)
- --------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 18:56:58 -0500
From: Glenn Morton <grmorton@flash.net>
Subject: Re: Finely Tuned Razors, Bridges, and Flies [was Re: Snicker
Hi Brian,
Brian D Harper wrote:
> This will be my last message before signing off for awhile.
> Be back around July 6.
Shucks, lets continue this when you get back.
>
>
> At 08:59 PM 6/22/99 -0500, Glenn wrote:
> >Brian Harper wrote:
>
> >Well, I obviously disagree. Unfortunately, one seldom finds a
> >precise definition of fine-tuning in the literature and one
> >has to read between the lines. For example, the Sciama paper
> >I quoted from would be utter nonsense if fine-tuning were
> >tied to probability calculations.
>
> >Briefly looking through my papers on the AP, the closest thing
> >I found to a definition of fine-tuning is the following from
> >Leslie
>
> >#"Recently, many have argued that either reality as a whole,
> >#or else the spatiotemporal region which we can see, is
> >#"fine-tuned" to life's needs, by which they mean that tiny
> >#changes in its basic properties would have excluded life
> >#forms of any kind. (Talk of "fine-tuning" does not presuppose
> >#a divine fine-tuner.)"
> ># -- John Leslie "Introduction" to <Physical Cosmology and
> >#Philosophy>, edited by Leslie, Macmillan, New York, 1990.
> >
> >One of the things I do for a living is to try to develop
> >models. Leslie's definition of fine-tuning fits
> >perfectly with the way I would use the term in my own
> >work. Suppose I have some model Y which I want to produce
> >some response X (X in my case would usually be to fit
> >some data sets X1, X2, X3 etc. obtained in various special
> >cases). The model has several parameters a,b,c,d....
> >Parameter c, say, would be finely tuned wrt X if it must
> >fall in some very narrow range in order for Y-->X. I
> >would say c is finely tuned regardless of how it is obtained.
> >Probability doesn't have anything to do with it, unless
> >I were to make some bold claim that I had determined c
> >by picking numbers at random ;-).
Oh man are we seeing two sides of the same coin. The narrow range implicitly
assumes that if a wider range were used, then the universe would not be
finely tuned. It implies a comparison. If in your example above, c could
ONLY range from 5-6 (not because of some resultant hospitiable universe, but
because fundamentally c can only be between 5 and 6) then to find a universe
with c = 5.7 would not be considered fine tuning. But if c can assume ANY
value, but only values of 5-6 allow for life, then the universe is finely
tuned BECAUSE of the comparison between the possible range and the range with
acceptable results. . If any value of the nuclear carbon resonance would lead
to the creation of carbon in supernova, then the universe would not be finely
tuned. Correct? You MUST make an implicit comparison for fine tuning to
take place.
>
>
> Now let me go back to your final statement:
>
> "The choice of one out of an innumerable plethora
> of hostile possibilities is what makes the anthropic
> principle work." -- Glenn
>
> Not really. The main point I believe is the fine-tuning
> as defined above combined with the appearance that the
> laws of physics care about whether there is or isn't
> life. Recall Sciama's comment:
>
> "These finely tuned properties will probably also eventually
> be accounted for by fundamental theory. But why should fundamental
> theory _happen_ to lead to these properties?" -- D. Sciama
And lets hope that there are no arbitrary constants in that final fundamental
theory.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 21:00:10 -0500
From: Glenn Morton <grmorton@flash.net>
Subject: Fwd: More balance on claimed Neandertal-Modern
Stephen Jones wrote:
Reflectorites
> No doubt. But the fact is that the "other reports" weren't "bad" for
> the Out-of-Africa hypothesis (OoAH) side either. But this report is a
> little better for it.
Actually you are incorrect here. ANY hybrid is a threat to the extreme
Out of Africa proponents like Stringer. They believe
that Neanderthals were so different that they were an entirely separate
species. And if a separate species, then by definition,
Neanderthals and humans could not interbreed and produce fertile
offspring.
> Glenn makes it sound like its an uphill battle. I don't see it that
way
> at all. Every round to date has been won by the Out-of-Africa
hypothesis,
> and if this turns out to be a Neandertal-CroMagnon hybrid, it will be
> a minor exception that proves the rule.
No exception proves the rule. All exceptions DISPROVE the rule.
> See above. If there is any "tooth and nail" fighting it is on the
side of
> advocates for the Multiregional/Regional Continuity (MR/RCH)
hypothesis.
> The OoAH is now firmly established, and it is unlikely that the
MR/RCH
> will make much of a dent in it. If this fossil turns out to be a
hybrid, it will
>show how rare the interbreeding was. And since most (all?) hybrids
are
> sterile, it would mean that neandertals contributed nothing to the
modern
> human gene pool.
You are a bit behind the times Stephen. Out of Africa (OoA)
hypothesizes that all modern humans are descended from a
group of people who came out of Africa about 120,000 years ago. These
people are hypothesized to have been incapable of
interbreeding with H. erectus and Neanderthals and archaic H. sapiens.
Modern men, in this view totally replaced all earlier
populations. A big piece of the data supporting this view was that
mitochondrial DNA pointed to a common ancestor about
200,000 years ago. Paternal inheritance of mtDNA has been proven and
this means that Mitochondrial Eve is now placed at
400,000 years ago, long before the out of Africa hypothesis believes
that modern humans came out of Africa. THis means that
Eve was an H. erectus or an archaic Homo sapiens, (of which Neanderthal
is a regional variant).
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/Reuters19990310_1097.html
Secondly the OoA has taken a BIG hit with the hybrid. While you
continue to cite your own opinion, it would be nice if you
could show disproofs of the mtDNA paternal inheritance instead of just
spouting your opinion which is based upon nothing
more than your epistemological need for this not to be true. This child
has Neanderthal muscle insertions. The only way to get
them is via genetics. NO modern humans have these characteeristics.
> Presumably they were all MR/RCH advocates. I would be more impressed
if
> any OoAH people switched camps on the basis of this evidence.
Why, you won't switch camps regardless of how many people tell you that
your position is wrong. Just tonight you said that multiple people
criticize you for the same thing. have you considered taking the hint?
GM>As to the rejection of Schwartz and Stringer, that was almost to be
>expected. If Chris Stringer and Jeffrey Schwartz accepted it, almst
>everything they had ever written in their careers would be wrong.
> Not really, in the reports I have seen Stringer was prepared to
accept
> it if it is confirmed. He has written a lot more than just the OoAH.
He is
> already an eminent paleoanthropologist and even if this was a
Neandertal-
> CroMagnon hybrid, it would make no difference to the main lines of
the
> OoAH.
First, saying you will have an open mind is different than having one.
Secondly, it does make a big difference to them.
GM>I would also point out a disturbing sequence of events. Your
report, dated
>May 8, says that Trinkaus reported the result in a meeting the week
of
>May 1. Stringer had not seen the data until that meeting.
> Where does Glenn get that from? See below.
I documented it.
GM>But on April
>25, Stringer told the AP PRIOR to the May 1st meeting, "Dr. Chris
>Stringer, an expert on Neanderthals at the Museum of Natural History
in
>London, who is a leader of the out-of-Africa forces, said that he was
>willing to consider the Portuguese findings with an open mind. He
told
>The Associated Press that the current evidence was not sufficient to
>convince him of Dr. Trinkhaus's hybrid interpretation." John Noble,
New
>York Times, April 25, 1999
>http://www.nytimes.com/library/national/science/042599sci-human-fossil.html
>
>The original AP report was on the 16th of April so long before
Stringer
>had seen the data, he was rejecting it. Don't blame him if it would
mean
>that everything he has written about Neanderthal would be wrong.
>
>So before he had even seen the data, Stringer was telling the press
that
>the data was insufficient to convince him. That sounds quite the
>opposite of an open mind.
> Glenn should make sure of his facts before he starts casting
aspersions.
> As the Science News article I posted said, the fact is that the
fossil
> was actually found in *November 1998*:
The fossil was found in November. But only the team reporting the
discovery had seen it prior to the May 1 meeting. Stringer
hadn't seen it. That is pretty much normal procedure. The team didn't
report their results to their peers until then.
Everyone knew about the find. I knew about it from reports in January
of this year. But those press reports said nothing about
the nature of the fossil. Here is the first report in English I know
of about the child. Notice it said nothing special. When I saw
it, I didn't even pay much attention to it. I didn't put it in my data
base.
>>report<<
Posted 4 January 1999, 5 pm PST
Ancient Child Burial Uncovered
in Portugal
In a rock shelter in rural Portugal, archaeologists last month made a
rare find: a skeleton of a young child, apparently of our
own lineage, whose body was drenched in red ochre and buried with
ceremony perhaps 28,000 years ago. Researchers say
the skeleton is the first Paleolithic burial--and, once dated, may
prove to be the oldest well-preserved fossil from early
modern humans--to be found on the Iberian peninsula. And it is from a
pivotal era, one which saw the last of the Neandertals
and the first modern humans in southern Iberia.
Although the skull was pulverized, the lower jawbone, complete with
teeth, is intact, and the protruding chin clearly marks
the child as an anatomically modern human, says Joao Zilhao of the
University of Lisbon, Portugal's director of antiquities and
leader of the excavation team.
The find occurred in early December when two of Zilhao's field
assistants were inspecting rock art in a wooded valley
about 140 km north of Lisbon. They spotted sediments containing
charcoal and stone tools, says Zilhao. Further probing
yielded bones from a human forearm and left hand, and in feverish
excavations over the holidays they recovered almost a
complete skeleton.
The body had been buried with abundant red ochre, a practice
thought to be related to ochre's resemblance to dried
blood. A pierced piece of marine shell, probably a pendant, lay near
the throat, and animal bones were near the head and
feet. Such features are typical of early modern human burials in
central and eastern Europe, says Zilhao; this skeleton shows
that early humans maintained common cultural practices over a vast
area.
The bones were 2.5 meters below stone tools dated to about
21,000 years ago--suggesting that the bones could be as
old as 28,000 years. If so, "it is really one of the first modern
humans [in the region]--the ones that caused the extinction of
the Neandertals," says Zilhao. There are only two other burials of
this age in Western Europe.
Other researchers are excited by the news. Paleoanthropologist
Erik Trinkaus of the University of Washington, St. Louis,
rushed to Portugal this week to examine the skeleton. And if the ages
hold up, the find will be highly significant, says
anthropologist Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London.
"We have very little material [from] this critical
period" in Iberia, he says.
--Constance Holden
http://www.academicpress.com/inscight/01041999/grapha.htm
<<end report>>
Stringer was interviewed but didn't see the skeleton.GM>Body
proportions, reflected in
>femorotibial lengths and diaphyseal robusticity plus tibial condylar
>displacement, as well as mandibular symphyseal retreat and
>thoracohumeral muscle insertions, align the skeleton with the
>Neandertals.
> It will be interesting to see how specifically Neandertaloid these
features
> are. Presumably Stringer and Schwartz and the other unconvined
> paleoanthroplogists are aware of it and do not find it compelling.
The latest
> New Scientist, says:
> "But Stringer cautions against reading too much into this one
discovery. "If
> the skeleton is that of a hybrid, it [still] cannot answer the
questions of how
> common such matings were, whether hybrids were fertile and whether
their
> genes ever penetrated into early modern populations," he says. And
despite
> recent revelations, the DNA evidence still suggests that
interbreeding
> cannot have been widespread. "The evidence does fit with Neanderthals
> representing a deep and separate lineage to that of all modern
humans," he
> says." (Norris S., "Family Secrets," New Scientist, Vol. 162, No
2191, 19
> June 1999, p44)
This was 4000 years after the last Neanderthal. The continuation of the
Neanderthal traits in this child as well as in modern
Europeans (H-O mandibular foramen, large noses, occipital buns) show
that there was some genetic transfer. While
Neanderthals were a deep separate lineage of humans, so were the
Australian aborigines who are now believed to have
inhabited your country 80,000 years ago. And even though Neanderthals
may have split off from the rest of the hominids
600,000 years ago, that does not rule out interbreeding. Coyotes and
wolves/dogs split 1 million years ago and they can still
produce fertile offspring.
GM>This morphological mosaic indicates admixture between
>regional Neandertals and early modern humans dispersing into southern
>Iberia. It establishes the complexities of the Late Pleistocene
>emergence of modern humans and refutes strict replacement models of
>modern human origins.
> If it only "indicates" it, it hardly "establishes" it!
Stephen, do you understand genetics? You get certain traits through
genetics. Neanderthal muscle insertion points are
genetically controlled. There are no modern humans that I am aware of
that have that type of insertion. If there are none, then
the only explanation is that the child got those Neanderthal muscle
insertions via his heritage. Please cite data rather than your
opinion. On Sci.paleoanthropology the other day, someone suggested that
blond hair and blue eyes might have been a
Neanderthal trait. No other peoples throughout the world have blond hair
and blue eyes EXCEPT peoples who live in the
former Neanderthal territories or are descended from the same..
[...]
GM>Now, I would like to point out that in my note to the reflecton on
April
>24, 1999, I
>(http://www.calvin.edu/archive/evolution/199904/0260.html) mentioned
>that:
>
>"Neanderthal muscle attachments were different than ours.
>They were extremely strong and some people believe that this evolved
in
>response to the way they hunted big game (by getting them to charge
and
>at the last minute stepping aside and grabbing the animals fur and
>using short knives to stab the animal and the Neanderthal was carried
>along).
>
>No anatomically modern human has Neanderthal-type muscle attachments.
>If this boy had those types of attachements, then he was a hybrid, no
>doubt."
>
>Trinkaus et al are reporting that this child INDEED HAD SOME OF THE
>CHARACTERISTICALLY NEANDERTHAL MUSCLE ATTACHMENTS!!!!!!
>
>This child is a hybrid.
Glenn is going beyond the evidence. It does not actually say that
these
were "characteristically neandertal muscle attachments." If these
muscle
attachments really were unique to neandertals then Stringer (who is a
world authority on Neandertals), Schwartz and the other
anthropologists
and would not still be unconvinced.
Stephen, Trinkaus is also a world class authority on Neanderthal.
Stringer is more of an expert on early modern humans. But
Stringer is not the God of Anthropology. If you believe him so much,
why don't you believe him when he says mankind
evolved? You have a selective belief system that chooses an expert who
agrees with you and then you elevate his statment on
that issue to dogma. You think that if you can find one expert to agree
with you you can ignore anything against that view..
Consider what Trinkaus says about muscles.:
"First, the muscle and ligament attachment areas are consistently
enlarged and strongly marked. This implies large, highly
developed muscles and ligaments capable of generating and sustaining
great mechanical stress." ~ Erik Trinkaus, "Hard Times
among the Neanderthals," Natural History, 87:10(Dec. 1978), p. 58-63, p.
58
**
"Most of the robustness of Neanderthal arm bones is seen in muscle and
ligament attachments. All of the muscles that go from
the trunk or the shoulder blade to the upper end of the arm show massive
development. This applies in particular to the
muscles responsible for powerful downward movements of the arm and, to a
lesser extent, to muscles that stabilize the shoulder
during vigourous movements.
"Virtually every major muscle or ligament attachment on the hand bones
is clearly marked by a large roughened area or a crest,
especially the muscles used in grasping objects. In fact, Neanderthal
hand bones frequently have clear bony crests, where on
modern human ones it is barely possible to discern the attachment of the
muscole on the dried bone." ~ Erik Trinkaus, "Hard
Times among the Neanderthals," Natural History, 87:10(Dec. 1978), p.
58-63, p. 58-60
After arguing strenuously agianst the possibility, Stephen wants us to
believe:
> But having said all that, I personally am open to the possibility
that
> these muscle attachments *could* be uniquely diagnostic of
neandertals
> and hence that this *could* turn out to be a Neandertal-CroMagnon
hybrid.
Then why do you fight against it. You are no more open than Stringer.
You just want to appear open.
> But even if this were the case, I would not attach a great deal of
> importance to it. If Neandertal features can show up in a CroMagnon
> body, then where are all the other examples? At best it would show
> that Neandertals and CroMagnons rarely interbred, even though they
> could. That would underline the very real differences between
> Neandertals and early modern humans, and would really represent the
> last hurrah of the Multiregional/Regional Continuity hypotheses.
No, it could reflect the population numbers. Today most men in American
Indian tribes have European Y chromosomes.
Why? Because Europeans overwhelmed the sparse populations of Native
Americans.
"Clara, who had done much of the analysis, estimates that some 99
percent of the people who identify themselves as
Ahnishinahbaeojibway have Europoean patrilines. Reasons for this are
complex and purposeful. "Milford Wolpoff and
Rachael Caspari, Race and Human Evolution, (New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1997), p. 363-364
Does this mean that Native american men were unable to leave offspring
or only rarely mated with women? Of course not.
There was lots of intermarriage but Europeans overwhelmed their genetic
contribution.
Stephen quotes Carl Henry.
> "Be that as it may, it is the ethico-religious fact about man which
> marks him off most conspicuously from the animals. Only an age
> secular in spirit could concentrate its interest in Homo on
> morphological structure seeking to understand man's origin and
> nature by focusing solely on prehuman and sub-human forms, then
> naming man for the brute, and finding his imago at last among the
> beasts."
(Henry C.F.H., "Science and Religion," in Henry C.F.H., ed.,
"Contemporary Evangelical Thought: A Survey", 1968, p282)
We have a rare moment of agreement. It is the spirit not the looks that
set us apart from animals.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 23:19:17 -0700
From: Pim van Meurs <entheta@eskimo.com>
Subject: =?iso-8859-1?Q?RE=3A_=5Fscience=5Fcan=5Fstudy=5Fthe=5Feffect=5F?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?of=5Fan=5FIntelligent=5FDesigner=5Fon=5Fthe=09natural=5F?= =?iso-8859-1?Q?world?=
Pim:
>Yep. I also gave an example. We see something that appears to be =
designed,=20
>how do we know it truely was designed?
Hi Pim,
Bertvan: If it looked designed, I'd assume it was --until I had evidence =
it was the=20
result of random processes.=20
That's the problem, it looks designed to you but it isn't. Too many =
false positives that way.
Bertvan: True, rocks and mountains sometimes appear to=20
resemble something unrelated, and common sense tells us the resemblance =
was=20
accidental
Common sense is a poor judge.
Bertvan: However random processes can rarely be proved. =20
Nice strawman.
Bertvan: I assume everything which looked was designed. Perhaps your =
"common sense" tells you=20
anything not manufactured by humans is not designed. My "common sense" =
tells=20
me differently. Does your "common sense" have some sort of priority?
My common sense explains equally well and does not require an imaginary =
designer. Occam rips once again.
Bertvan: Are you defining design as describing only those artifacts =
which are=20
manufactured by humans?
I am saying that that's the only design we can try to recognize as such
Bertvan: As for the "apparent design" which I see in nature,=20
like you, I have no idea how it originated. =20
Good. So you agree that there is apparant design
Bertvan: Unlike you, I can't state with certainty it is not the result =
of any kind of intelligence. =20
Of course not. But then again there is no supporting evidence in your =
case now is there? And there are perfectly good arguments that need no =
intelligence to explain the observations. See the problem is that you =
are assuming something for which there is just no evidence. It's based =
on a potentially unreliable
observation. So how can you even hope to distinguish design from =
apparant design when you all but admit that you can't?
Bertvan: Again, are you defining intelligence as some trait common only =
to humans.
Not at all.
Bertvan: (And other organisms to a lesser degree)? Personally, I =
would define intelligence as=20
the ability to create order or rational designs, make rational =
choices--whatever it's source. I suggest humans posses the ability to =
some degree, but I wouldn't suggest intelligence, an abstract quality, =
couldn't exist in the absence of humans.=20
Nice strawman dear Bert since this is also not my argument.
Bertvan: If we get our definitions straightened out, and we still have =
an area of=20
disagreement (I suspect we would), do you agree that legitimate =
differences=20
of opinion can exist between intellignt people?
Of course but you should also agree that there is just no scientific =
evidence to support your "common sense". Your explanation fails the =
Occam test. Your explanation fails to be supported with any evidence.
That's why it's called faith dear Bert.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 23:22:41 -0700
From: Pim van Meurs <entheta@eskimo.com>
Subject: RE: science can study the effect of an Intelligent Designer on the natural world (was MN...))
>What about the killing of abortionists by Christians ? What about the=20
> >massacres in Serbia?
JB: What about the abortions themselves? I'll say the killing of =
abortion=20
doctors by people who called themselves Christians was wrong, but I'll =
also=20
say that abortion is just as wrong.=20
So morality is not related to Christanity?
JB: And what about the massacres in Serbia?=20
Are Christians responsible for them? How about the problems there've =
been in=20
Ethiopia and Eritrea? Or Rwanda? Iraq? India and Pakistan?
I am merely pointing out that Christian morality is not better (or =
worse) than non-christian morality.
>Christianity hardly has a reason to be proud of its track record and=20
> >certainly there is no proof that christianity is more moral or that a =
> >christian society is more moral than a non-christian one. In fact, =
>the=20
>Netherlands which is far less religious than the US has a far >better =
track=20
>record.
JB: Prove it. You're trying to use specific occurrences that seem to =
support=20
your point. Prove that Christianity shouldn't be proud of its track =
record.=20
Research has shown that religious people are not more moral than =
non-religious people. Should Christians be proud of their track record ? =
More proud than non-Christians? I doubt it.
JB: I agree there have been some problems stemming from it before, but =
prove=20
this is a 'track record'? Where are your facts about how religious each=20
country is? Did you ask a significant % of the population whether they =
were=20
religious or not? Did someone else?
That would be a start yes. Being a dutch native I do understand that =
culture quite well.=20
>Perhaps you should consider trying to get some facts?
JB: Remember that yourself.
Well, I am glad that you admit at least that you had no facts.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 23:24:58 -0700
From: Pim van Meurs <entheta@eskimo.com>
Subject: RE: It all fits...
Here is a recent New Scientist article at:
http://www.newscientist.com/ns/19990619/news.html
SK: which indicates there is a fine-tuning argument for design in the =
fact that=20
the Sun and moon have roughly the same apparent size in the sky and the=20
Earth, making perfect solar eclipses possible.
And what is so special about that?
SJ: Apparently for life to be viable, it needs a Sun our size, the =
distance
away it is, and an Earth and moon the size and distance apart they are:
So what does this prove? That life evolved because of the coincidence =
allowing it to evolve? Life adapted itself to the circumstances not the =
other way around. Solar eclipes as evidence for design. What will be =
next...
You're funny Steve.
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End of evolution-digest V1 #1502
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