Re: [asa] Dawkins and PZ Myers and their 'attitude'

*A designer God cannot be used to explain organized complexity because
any God capable of
designing anything would have to be complex enough to demand the same
kind of explanation in his own right. God presents an infinite regress
from which he cannot help us to escape.*

This is so exceedingly ignorant that it amazes me that anyone takes it
seriously. In addition to George's point about God's "simplicity," Dawkins
simply doesn't get that "God" is outside the created order and above
secondary causes. He just blithely blows on by the whole discussion of
primary and secondary causes in Christian theology and simply assumes what
we call "secondary" or "natural" causes *must* be the *only* causes.

If Dawkins wants to disprove a designer-god who is *part of creation* and
who can be accounted for by natural causes, well, fine. So what? The
Christian God is not part of the creation and by defnition is
*not*accounted for by natural causes. How can anyone purporting to
critique the
Christian tradition be so uneducated about this most basic of distinctions
between God and the creation?

Moreover, Dawkins doesn't seem to understand that he's actually laying the
groundwork for the scholastic evidence for God as the "uncaused cause." God
doesn't "present an infinite regress" -- *materialism* presents an infinite
regress (so how does Dawkins explain where matter came from?), which is
stopped only by an "unmoved mover" (per Aristotle) or "uncaused cause" (per
Aquinas: God).

On 4/7/07, PvM <pvm.pandas@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 4/7/07, Iain Strachan <igd.strachan@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I hadn't thought of it that way, but it strikes me that Dawkins's
> argument
> > is pretty silly. I think Dawkins's premise is that God must be more
> complex
> > than us to have created us. I actually think it's a false premise to
> assume
> > that you have to be more complex than what you create in the first
> place.
>
> Seems your disagreement is with Intelligent Design which arguments
> Dawkins skilfully uses against religion.
>
>
> > We haven't done it yet, but I don't think it's inconceivable that given
> the
> > rise in computer power, that one day someone will write an evolutionary
> > simulation in a computer that will give rise to "virtual" entities
> inside
> > the computer that are more complex than us. However, we as
> "programmers"
> > are at a different level of reality than the entities that exist within
> the
> > software simulation. I think Dawkins wants to reduce it all to one
> level.
> > In the radio broadcast, he suggested that a Designer must be more
> complex
> > than us, and so it must also have evolved, and as it's more complex,
> then it
> > is even more unlikely than us.
>
> You are pretty close here. He basically uses ID's arguments against ID
> and religion.
>
> > But his premise right at the start is that
> > this material world in which things evolve is the only one there
> is. But he
>
> Not really. After all, God is not ruled out a-priori.
>
> > then wants to use this to "prove" the non-existence of God (or to be
> more
> > precise, to demonstrate the near impossibility of God). But the thing
> he's
> > trying to prove is the premise he's assumed in the first place.
>
> Nope, that does not really accurately describe Dawkins' argument.
>
> <quote>
> A designer God cannot be used to explain organized complexity because
> any God capable of
> designing anything would have to be complex enough to demand the same
> kind of explanation in his own right. God presents an infinite regress
> from which he cannot help us to escape. This argument, as I shall show
> in the next chapter, demonstrates that God, though not technically
> disprovable, is very very improbable indeed.</quote>
>
> Dawkins also points out that
>
> <quote>Natural selection not only explains the whole of life; it also
> raises our consciousness to the power of science to explain how
> organized complexity can emerge from simple beginnings without any
> deliberate guidance. </quote>
>
>
>
>
> > I think this argument is wrong for the same reason that the Design
> argument
> > is wrong. When Paley stumbles upon the watch on the heath, the only
> reason
> > he is justified in assuming it had a watchmaker is that he knows that
> > watchmakers exist - there is independent empirical evidence of them -
> one
> > has seen a man making a watch. But no-one has seen God zapping a
> flagellum
> > into existence, so the analogy breaks down. The Design argument
> presumes
> > the existence of God from the start. By the same token the Dawkins
> argument
> > for the non-existence of God presumes the non-existence of God. Both
> sides
> > are flawed in assuming what you're trying to prove in the first
> place. (I
> > think there's some name for that logical fallacy, but the name escapes
> me
> > for the moment).
> >
> > Iain
> >
>
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Received on Sat Apr 7 22:12:41 2007