Fwd: Re: [asa] Apologetics Conference

So, don't make it a rock thrown out of a window. Make it a boulder,
loosened by strip
mining, rolling down a mountain and smashing through a house and killing
a sleeping
child (this happened in Virginia last year:
http://www.ohvec.org/links/news/archive/2005/fair_use/01_06.html
Although in this case the boulder had some help from some careless strip
miners,
boulders can and do roll down hills without intelligent intervention

I can see two "extremes" of explanations:
"Pure" intelligent design, where a genius evil mastermind with extensive
knowledge of the
terrain, the laws of physics and the layout of the unfortunate boy's
house intentionally sets
the boulder rolling with the express purpose of killing the child.

"Random and unguided" Boulder, loosened by natural and
non-human-related events
(soil erosion, etc) rolls down hill and kills child.

I don't see how Dembski's process is especially useful in distinguishing
those two
explantions (which clearly are both incorrect) or in leading to what is
considered the
correct explanation: intelligent human activity (strip mining) increased
the liklihood a
boulder would roll down the mountain: once the boulder was moving, the
child's death was
a random and unplanned consequence.

If you try to consider all the probabilities: from the mountain being
formed where it was,
that exact size and shape of boulder being deposited there, the child's
parents meeting,
conceiving him, moving into the house and placing his bed on that
particular wall, this can
only be considered an extremely improbable event. In the grand scheme of
things , the
actions of the strip miners in starting the boulder rolling probably
increases the probabilty
only very slightly. Yet they mining company is (rightly) blamed for the
child's death.

So, was this child's death "designed" or "chance"?

__
Louise M. Freeman, PhD
Psychology Dept
Mary Baldwin College
Staunton, VA 24401
540-887-7326
FAX 540-887-7121

-----Original Message-----
From: "David Opderbeck" <dopderbeck@gmail.com>
To: "Jim Armstrong" <jarmstro@qwest.net>
Cc: asa@calvin.edu
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 17:18:57 -0500
Subject: Re: [asa] Apologetics Conference

> Sure you would. Check its angle, velocity, etc. It likely would be
> pretty
> clear that it was thrown out the window.

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Received on Fri Nov 17 03:54:20 2006