Re: [asa] Apologetics Conference

I find this Craig-Dembski argument totally unconvincing as there are
enormous assumptions at every step (wrapped up in supposed maths and
philosophy). For the life of me I cannot see how this applies to natural
events.
Further how can Dembski be sure that he has all the information required for
each step? Further he and others prefer to ignore half the information
available as they ignore the vast history of the earth and universe.

Michael
----- Original Message -----
From: "jack syme" <drsyme@cablespeed.com>
To: "Don Nield" <d.nield@auckland.ac.nz>
Cc: "gordon brown" <gbrown@euclid.colorado.edu>; <dickfischer@verizon.net>;
<asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 4:00 AM
Subject: Re: [asa] Apologetics Conference

> Did you even read the article that I provided?
>
> From William Lane Craig:
>
> "Dembski outlines a ten-step Generic Chance Elimination Argument:
> 1.. One learns that some event has occurred.
>
> 2.. Examining the circumstances under which the event occurred, one finds
> that the event could only have been produced by a certain chance process
> (or processes).
>
> 3.. One identifies a pattern which characterizes the event.
>
> 4.. One calculates the probability of the event given the chance
> hypothesis.
>
> 5.. One determines what probabilistic resources were available for
> producing the event via the chance hypothesis.
>
> 6.. On the basis of the probabilistic resources, one calculates the
> probability of the event's occurring by chance once out of all the
> available opportunities to occur.
>
> 7.. One finds that the above probability is sufficiently small.
>
> 8.. One identifies a body of information which is independent of the
> event's occurrence.
>
> 9.. One determines that one can formulate the pattern referred to in step
> (3) on the basis of this body of independent information.
>
> 10.. One is warranted in inferring that the event did not occur by
> chance.
>
> This is a simplification of Dembski's analysis, which he develops and
> defends with painstaking rigor and detail.
>
> Dembski's analysis will be of interest to all persons who are concerned
> with detecting design, including forensic scientists, detectives,
> insurance fraud investigators, exposers of scientific data falsification,
> cryptographers, and SETI investigators. Intriguingly, it will also be of
> interest to natural theologians. For in contemporary cosmology the heated
> debate surrounding the fine-tuning of the universe and the so-called
> Anthropic Principle will be greatly clarified by Dembski's Law of Small
> Probability.
>
> Consider the application of the above Generic Chance Elimination Argument
> to the fine-tuning of the universe:
>
> 1.. One learns that the physical constants and quantities given in the
> Big Bang possess certain values.
>
> 2.. Examining the circumstances under which the Big Bang occurred, one
> finds that there is no Theory of Everything which would render physically
> necessary the values of all the constants and quantities, so they must be
> attributed to sheer accident.
>
> 3.. One discovers that the values of the constants and quantities are
> incomprehensibly fine-tuned for the existence of intelligent, carbon-based
> life.
>
> 4.. The probability of each value and of all the values together
> occurring by chance is vanishingly small.
>
> 5.. There is only one universe; it is illicit in the absence of evidence
> to multiply one's probabilistic resources (i.e., postulate a World
> Ensemble of universes) simply to avert the design inference.
>
> 6.. Given that the universe has occurred only once, the probability of
> the constants and quantities' all having the values they do remains
> vanishingly small.
>
> 7.. This probability is well within the bounds needed to eliminate
> chance.
>
> 8.. One has physical information concerning the necessary conditions for
> intelligent, carbon-based life (e.g., certain temperature range, existence
> of certain elements, certain gravitational and electro-magnetic forces,
> etc.).
>
> 9.. This information about the finely-tuned conditions requisite for a
> life- permitting universe is independent of the pattern discerned in step
> (3).
>
> 10.. One is warranted in inferring that the physical constants and
> quantities given in the Big Bang are not the result of chance.
>
> One is thus justified in inferring that the initial conditions of the
> universe are due to design."
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Don Nield" <d.nield@auckland.ac.nz>
> To: "jack syme" <drsyme@cablespeed.com>
> Cc: "gordon brown" <gbrown@euclid.colorado.edu>;
> <dickfischer@verizon.net>; <asa@calvin.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, November 15, 2006 10:00 PM
> Subject: Re: [asa] Apologetics Conference
>
>
>> jack syme wrote:
>>
>>> But isnt the fine tuning of the physical constants of the universe, used
>>> as an example of specified complexity by the ID folks?
>>
>> No. Specified complexity is something more specific than fine tuning.
>> Fine tuning (e.g. the anthropic principle) was around well before Dembski
>> introduced the concept of specified complexity. I have no problems with
>> fine tuning. I do have problems with specified complexity in biological
>> systems.
>> Don
>>
>>
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>
>
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Received on Thu Nov 16 02:40:09 2006