Yeah, once again I have indulged Creationists in the Debate of Ages. Well, what can I say? I enjoy the fun!

This debate is taking place – so far – between myself, an ardent Atheist and one who acknowledges the fact of Evolution as is shown by the evidence, and two “Adams” — Adam Estep and Adam Marchese. I jumped into this long conversation on a survey question: “Do you believe in God?” on Facebook.

The conversation format in this particular forum does not lend itself well to lengthy debates, as it displays responses in reverse-order. I have taken the liberty to reverse the order to make for easy reading.

Also, I have taken the liberty to correct many (but perhaps not all) of spelling errors – especially my own! I also have altered the format a bit to compensate for the limitations of the Facebook forum for this sort of a debate. For instance, I use paragraph indentation to show where a responder quoted statements from another participant.

This debate is ongoing, and I may occasionally update this blog with the latest additions from time to time.

And so it begins.

Terry Drinkwater:

…Well, frankly, Adam Marchese, I wouldn’t have a problem with the idea that God allowed us to have free will, if I found it compatible with His dual omnipotence and omniscience. Freedom is a virtue all its own. My problem is that it’s logically impossible for an omnipotent omniscient being to make free-willed creations.

Adam Estep Responds:

Adam…Come now I went to public school and Secular College. I know both sides of the argument you do not. Why Do I know? Because I cared too! I considered both sides and upon close study I feel Jesus is the most plausible answer. I studied the same science that you have and I am miles ahead of you in this debate because I understand both sides you do not. Thats not very scientific of you now is it?

He did not create sin! he created the choice ie…Free will…Allowing is not the cause! He created us for fellowship not as puppets. The reason why it was [called] sin is because it was against the natural order of creation and it was GOD’s designed.

Fred Responds:

Adam E, there is no such thing as “Free Will”. It’s an illusion our brains create.

Adam Marchese Responds:

It has to be one or the other to my understanding. God either allowed the imperfections of man or doesn’t have supreme power.

When did I say he caused man’s imperfections? I stated that he allowed man’s imperfections.

I’ll give you another example. A dam builder build a dam, but not just any dam he build a dam with one critical flaw at its base. A storm rolled through the land and the dam was destroyed and the town got flooded. The townspeople (the ones that survived) blamed the dam builder for allowing a flaw to exist within the dam. He claims that he did not in fact cause the dam to fail, which is true because the storm did, but he is directly responsible for it failing.

I know I shouldn’t say this, but… “Thats not very scientific of you now is it?”… “I considered both sides and upon close study I feel Jesus is the most plausible answer.”

So a gut feeling is scientific, in someone or something that doesn’t abide by the normal laws of nature. Very scientific indeed.

Alright, enough of the boorish afterthoughts they mean nothing. We need to stop turning to the dark side. Just like the spelling and grammar thing they matter not. (Used we so you don’t think that you are the only one being boorish, though you do have more points :))

Adam Estep Responds:

Adam E, there is no such thing as “Free Will”. It’s an illusion our brains create.

Fred, If I choose to step out in front of a speeding vehicle will the pain be an illusion as well?? FRED………LOL

Hey Adam I have enjoyed Debating with you…And respect your views…Speak them Bro

Regarding the actual debate: Do you believe that God knew the outcome of his creation before he began? Do you believe God had the power to change the outcome of his creation however he wanted, by creating it differently? Those appear to be the central questions of this discussion.

Terry,
I believe he new the limitless possibilities, However as a gift to his creation he affords us privacy to make our own decisions. He has the ability to focus on any given subject and see clearly the truth of the effect rendered by the cause. This is how he can Judge Righteously and still grant you autonomy…Your thoughts??

Fred Responds:

Adam E,

Our brains create this “virtual reality” out of the actual reality. Colors we see really aren’t there. The sounds we ‘hear’ are merely our brain’s virtual representation of the patters of compression and rarefaction in the air.

Our brains also create a virtual reality of its own self. Our brains are one hell of a qualia mapper.

Our perception of consciousness and choice, the sense of a “whole self”, internal body states represented as “hunger”, “satiation”, etc., the feelings of hot and cold, and yes, even pain.

All honed by evolution to enhance our survivability in a world too complex to deal with otherwise.

Quite fascinating, really. a “Natural Matrix”, if you will.

Adam Estep Responds:

Adam E,

Our brains create this “virtual reality” out of the actual reality. Colors we see really aren’t there. The sounds we ‘hear’ are merely our brain’s virtual representation of the patters of compression and rarefaction in the air. Our brains also create a virtual reality of its own self. Our brains are one hell of a qualia mapper. Our perception of consciousness and choice, the sense of a “whole self”, internal body states represented as “hunger”

Knowledge Is delivered courtesy of our 5 senses Which are designed to interpret our Complex surroundings. Colors are there they can be seen through prismatic refraction which yields the visible spectrum and all the constituent colors. The cool thing is out of white light you can get the rainbow and out of the individual constituent color you can get white light. The fact that the color white is the absence of color and black is a [combination] of the color spectrum demonstrates that colors are in fact not an illusion…Your thoughts??

Adam Marchese Responds:

“satiation”, etc., the feelings of hot and cold, and yes, even pain.

All honed by evolution to enhance our survivability in a world too complex to deal with otherwise.

Quite fascinating, really. a “Natural Matrix”, if you will.”

The universe is far queerer than we could suppose. Great.

Above is the rest of Fred’s statement…My last comment was in the second paragraph.

Fred,

Our Brains have a filter mechanism that allows us to get rid of petty details so our five senses can take in the information of reality. Nothing in Evolution dictates the need for speciation to evolve any more than one sense and the odds of that are one in a trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion and you want to multiply that times 5 as an accident. There is not enough time in eternity to back that data…O’ and by the way the odds are even greater because all this must happen within the life of our sun….Can’t, Won’t, and Didn’t happen that way! Sorry there is a GOD!

Fred Responds:

Adam E, You obviously don’t understand much about Evolution. Please visit http://www.talkorigins.org.

Once you’ve spent a few days on that site, come back and we can have a discussion.

Adam E, also google Chaos Theory, Stochastic Hill Climbing, Complex Adaptive Systems, Complex Dynamical Systems, Fractals, Self Organized Criticality, Artificial Life, and — well, that’s enough to keep you busy for a while.

Also Neural Darwinism: http://urlbit.us/h7b

Actually, there’s enough in those references to keep you busy for months. But one thing I do guarantee — if you do do your due diligence and understand even 1/10th of that, you’ll have to change many of your views and insights on the world around you.

Adam Estep Responds:

Fred, Sorry I do know evolution what would like to know? You got two options Fred which is really only one! Either you believe an Alien Race planted the seeds of life here to evolve, (Which begs a question) or you believe something came from nothing…Which are you?

on one hand you say a fruit fly can be observed in evolutionary mutation….and then turn right around and say it takes evolution take millions of years to occur…Both sides of the mouth.

[note that I never even spoke of the fruit fly!]

Chaos Theory- At the point of the random cause the effect is already determined…Fred please consider the plates tectonics and you will understand why it remains a theory that you cite as fact or scientific law. Par for the course. Fred I really like your intensity level of debate…Your thoughts??

Complex adaptive systems- It is just that Adaptive and Micro Evolution is a vastly different animal as opposed to Macro evolution. One might say your Neural Darwinism argument is founded here in theory as the Brain in memory formation adapts to store past events which is also a pretty strong argument against your illusions!

[Against my “illusions”? Strong argument? I don't follow his logic here.]

Fred Responds:

Adam, speciation has been observed. If you spent any time on http://talkorigins.com, you’d see that.

Thing is, I have debated Creationists for decades. And their story never changes. Many of their claims have long since been debunked, yet the use the same thing over and over again.

I see it as pointless to keep rehashing and redoing a lot of stuff just to put down the same tired out old excuses for “evidence” that Creationists always toss up, depending on the ignorance of their audiences to carry the day.

Adam, spend some REAL time going over the references, then come back to me. We are either going to debate on fresh new ground or not at all. The mere fact that you are trying to assign probabilities to biological evolution, or that you are using the term “macro evolution”, tells me right off the bat you really don’t understand Evolution, though you may think you do.

I have debated these very same issues 10 years ago and grow tired of repeating myself. But the information is out there if you really do care about the Truth.

So, go forth, young man, learn a thing or two, then come back. I’ll be around.

Because I strongly predict that if you really do give my references an honest workout, you will clearly see there is nothing to debate about.

And just because Evolution is Real does not mean you have to abandon your religion. Far from it.

Most religious people in the Western world outside of the US avoid making the mistake of trying to mix Religion and Science. They wisely keep them separate. Only Religious types in the US make that mistake for some odd reason. And yes, there are exceptions to the Rule, but that’s generally the Rule.

Adam Marchese Responds:

Fred, Sorry I do know evolution what would like to know? You got two options Fred which is really only one! Either you believe an Alien Race planted the seeds of life here to evolve, (Which begs a question) or you believe something came from nothing…Which are you?

[Adam makes this statement on the basis of his faulty understanding of probability theory with regards to how evolution works]

I would assume neither because no good scientist thinks that something came from nothing (like you). Presenting a false choice, but onwards. At what we can understand to be the start of the universe, there was an extremely hot and indefinitely small point that was for some unknown reason expanded into the many different galaxies. It is beyond human understanding at this point what the singularity was because it was before there was even a thing called 3-dimensional space.

on one hand you say a fruit fly can be observed in evolutionary mutation….and then turn right around and say it takes evolution take millions of years to occur…Both sides of the mouth.

[again, I never said one single thing about fruit flies!]

…The difference between Macro-evolution and Micro-evolution.

The difference between reality and illusion is perspective. No one has a true understanding of reality because we all view things differently. Watch this trick and see if you know exactly what he did the first time through.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tScm-eZInBE
[video about a magician doing slight-of-hand tricks with cards]

Have fun.

Fred Responds:

Adam M,

Firstly, I was speaking with Adam E, but no biggie. Same applies to you.

Secondly, what’s more incredible to believe — the universe emerged from nothing, or some uber-being created the universe — and now you have to get into the origins of this uber-being…

Which either came from nothing itself, or what itself created by an even bigger uber-being.

I would think the simpler explanation would be the more likely one — the universe came from nothing.

Beliefs are irreverent — I look at the science and try to decide what is the most likely; what makes the most sense.

Humans tend to want to pick an explanation that reflects human sentiment. Thing is, the Universe does not exist for human sentiment.

And there are some things that we simply cannot know. As scientists, we admit our ignorance, and try to come up with testable explanations in order to eliminate the ignorance.

But creating fanciful tales of uber-beings is no better than the “World rides on the back of Turtles” that used to be believed in ages past.

Better to take a VERY humble approach and:

1. Acknowledge that we simply DO NOT KNOW.

2. Reason from what we do know and understand.

3. Be mindful that humans tend to want to “find” anthropomorphic explanations.

4. Don’t jump to conclusions, but spend some time understanding the true awe and majesty of the Universe.

This is not something that can be done overnight. It takes a better part of a lifetime to acquire enough understanding to be able to see the Truth. People being as they are tend to be impatient and would rather take the “easy way out” — thus religion and myths about gods are created.

But, if you are truly into giving up childish ways, you will spend the time and effort to understand and appreciate your Universe.

Biological Evolution is all about gradualism. That’s why I mentioned “stochastic hill climbing” in the mix of things to google. Really go over my list in detail, even if you think you know it. This is not going to be settled in this single discourse here, but in much effort on your part to Know and Understand.

Adam Estep Responds:

FRED FRED??? I am using your terminology I call it adaptation you call it Macro evolution.

[Actually, that's not true. He is muddying the waters here big time.]

Learned it from the very same place you did [I doubt that!] I just don’t by it…Because you only have Guesstamations and Have a Religious Dogma in peddling speculation. When you Guys are proven wrong, and you quite frequently are, Then you cop out with well we need to revise our thoughts on the matter…

[He is upset about how the Scientific Process works – which requires us to constantly question what we think is true to greater and greater levels of scrutiny, and we do have to revise from time to time when we find out we were wrong about something. This is what Science is all about!!!]

How about offering the solution instead of generating more questions…You have been brainwashed and tempered by Psuedo Science to believe in some ones guess…You are correct fresh new ground is needed so I suggest you follow your own advice. Revisit Thermo dynamics, Entropy, and diffusion all of which you accept as law but takes the legs out from under Darwinian rhetoric!

[This is interesting here because it clearly demonstrates that he is unsettled with the uncertainty that comes with the Scientific Process. He clearly demands “absolute conclusions” that will never change or be subject to scrutiny in the future. Good luck. The one thing that is certain about the world we live in is uncertainty!]

Alien or something from nothing I don’t believe I got your answer? Why do I need to study these things again? I have learned them and read science journals weekly…Peer reviewed papers? How about asking a question instead of dismissing my level of education?

Just as the rest when you can’t get away from someone that can stand toe to toe with you on evolution [he calls this standing 'head to toe'? He's kidding, right?] you start dishing out insults. [he takes my challenges to his level of understanding as an 'insult'.] well I am not going to play that game with you. Offer up an answer the missing link so to speak. In scientific study you: you remember the Piltdown man don’t…the missing link jawbone of human ancestors…Added to all university text books and taught as fact…but it turned out to be a 10 year old jaw bone fragment of a swine! Fred no thanks! I think I will cleave to reason not bafoonery!

Fred the same can be said about a tv…Did it just come to pass or did someone make it? You can not know or ever explain the true origins of the universe with evolutionary thaughts [not sure what word he really wanted to type here, so I left it alone]…Yes AWE and MAJESTY but attributes of GOD…And since your science says you cannot get matter from non matter I am perplexed at your blindness to this implication…Point proven you practice faith just as I do…Forgive spelling and grammar…on a blackberry

[He is obviously trying the tactic that many frustrated theists do – trying to claim Science is a “Faith” as well.]

Fred Responds:

Adam E — Give me some references on your claim that we’ve been “proven wrong.”

Adam E — it seems to me that you are calling the Scientific Method “pseudoscience”. We Scientists always must face the facts that some new observation, more detailed, more accurate comes in, and we must revise in light of the new observations.

That’s just how science works! That’s where Humility before the Truth comes in!

Newton was proven wrong by Einstein. Yet, Newton was “right” within the accuracy of observations and measurements available to him in his time.

Newtonian physics is still used to fly space craft around the solar system because it’s “good enough” for that. However, to make the Global Positioning System work, Einstein’s General Relativity *had to* be taken into account. Why? Because of the exacting precision of all the clocks involved.

And who knows? Perhaps General Relativity one day may be “proven wrong”, but it will still be used for GPS because it’s good enough for that purpose.

Today we can sequence DNA much faster than ever before, so what we know about taxonomy will be and is being revised.

This is how Science works. We improve our accuracy over time. We make new observations. We are always trying to PROVE OURSELVES WRONG.

Also, it is clear you don’t understand thermodynamics. And yes, I check and recheck my knowledge all the time.

Do you understand about dissipative systems that are far from equilibrium?

Do you understand what happens to systems that sits on the edge of chaos and order?

Do you understand that *experiments* can be and have been constructed to TEST these theories?

Nope. I don’t think I’m the one brainwashed here. Far from it.

Adam E, you need to study them again because you missed something along the way. I am constantly revising my knowledge. New developments are always being made. New discoveries, new understanding.

I don’t think you’ve actually ever tried creating experiments to falsify the theories you now criticize. If you have, please show me. If you are right, then show me the experiments you have done to prove these things wrong.

Adam E, check out http://talkorigins.org for all your questions about “the missing link”, etc. It’s all there. LOOK IT UP.

I don’t know what your “education” is, but I go by what you say and what you claim. When you start babbling about assigning straight probabilities to what is obviously the result of a gradual stochastic hill climb, that speaks volumes to me.

If you are hiding your light, then cease to do so!

I am interested in debating you on NEW grounds, not the old tired out usual that have been debunked decades ago. Find something that is NOT on talkorigins.org or elsewhere, and then we can get started!

“And since your science says you cannot get matter from non matter I am perplexed at your blindness to this implication…”

Speaks volumes to me about your supposed level of education. Don’t take it as an insult, but as a statement of fact.

If you know anything about Quantum Physics, you know that matter appears out of nowhere and disappears into nowhere all the time. This is directly related to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.

In fact, at the event horizon of a Black Hole, some of those virtual particles *fall into* the black hole and others escape. This is known as Hawking Radiation, and basically the Black Hole eventually evaporates.

Then there is superstring theory, which I have questions about myself because it has yet to make a testable prediction, but it is truly compelling. Perhaps the LHC will shed some light on it someday. Who knows?

And when I speak of the Awe and Majesty of the Universe, it has nothing to do with a “god”. In fact, it would be far less majestic if that were the case.

If you throw your “god” into that equation, then the burden of proof is on you, not me. I am simply going by what is observable, what we know of science, what mysteries still lie out there, and what it all means.

If you simply say, “god did it”, what’s the fun in that? If, on the other hand, you recognize the self-organized beauty of Nature, it is simply astounding — especially when you have an understanding as to how this self-organization can come about.

Hence, all the reference that I’ve listed. And I’m sorry — I am not convinced you have a true grasp of any of these concepts. If you did, your language would be vastly different.

On the other hand, I do have a friend who is very much a Creationist, and him and I had these conversations — the same ones, in fact — 10 years ago. I presented him with evidence then. He kinda didn’t respond to it.

But he did tell me something — that he had a *need* to believe in a god. Not exactly in those words, mind you. But it was clear from what he told me about his personal experiences.

So, Adam E, may I venture a guess that YOU have this deep-seated intrinsic “need” to believe in a deity for whatever personal reasons you have — and as a result, it clouds your reason and logic in the arena of Science.

And I am saying that there’s no need for that. It should be perfectly possible for you to “have faith in God” and also accept the Scientific Method. Science should not be seen as a “threat” to your yearning for a “god”.

Take that as you will.

Adam Estep Responds:

Fred you can stop saying I don’t understand things just because i do not concur with you.

[Actually, I say he doesn't understand things because of the language he uses, and his lack of sound logic and reason in his arguments.]

..Is it really that hard for you to swallow that there exists educated people and Scientist that do not subscribe to Evolutions Dogma??

[No, but I am still waiting for them to produce solid evidence for their claims. In fact, I've been waiting for decades.]

And by the way intrinsic values are not conclusive to your beliefs…Dissipative Equilibrium nice words

[I actually said 'dissipative systems far from equilibrium'. Again a sign he really does not understand!]

but it does not let you out from under the bus of Entropy.

[But if he understood what that meant, it would be clear that entropy is not violated. We are talking local phenomenon in an open system vs. global phenomenon in a closed system!!!]

I can tell you are a highly intelligent person and I enjoy this discourse. You know as well as I for every explanation you can coin for your Psuedo Science I can counter with valid points establishing a dissipative Equilibrium between our exchanges.

[He is not even using the words correctly. Not only that, in one instance he calls me smart and the very next sentence he calls me a fool. Go figure!]

Fred reason with me…with science why are we here as opposed to not here? How can something be made from nothing? Why are things decaying to randomness instead of order? Metal rusts etc…this Destroys the Chaos theory but then so does Diffusion! Where did human conscience com from? Why does every thing procteate its own kind? Evolution has its solid points but it is eons from fact and it is a faith practiced. Your thoughts?

Fred straight from the front page of talkorigins…note the last few words:

I have divided this FAQ into several sections. Part 2 discusses several definitions of what a species is. Part 3 explains the context in which observations of speciation are made. Part 4 looks at the question, “How can we tell when a speciation event has occurred?” Part 5 describes a number of observed speciation events and several experiments which (in my opinion) failed to produce speciation. Part 6 is a list of references.

LOL…Fred the speciations observed were plant life…You can get the same effect from cross polinations…And you want me to take this we site as gospel??? Did you evlove reason? You so far have validated My stance! You have to do better than this. Make a solid point so I can seriously consider your Ideaologies…I welcome them…as I to revise my understanding when I see reason.

The fruit fly argument is pathetic as well and is clearly bio engineering…For all practical purposes man being intelligent Designer!

Fred Responds:

Like I said, I’ve had these discussions years ago, and don’t feel like rehashing the same old stuff. Research for yourself what Entropy means. There is local entropy and global entropy. I don’t feel like going into all the details here, but is is clear a glass to me that you don’t really understand Entropy.

You are either being Intellectually Dishonest, or, like I said, your judgment and understanding is being clouded by your internal “God just has to be true; let’s make everything fit”.

The evidence for biological evolution is simply overwhelming. The evidence for cosmological evolution is equally overwhelming. Is our knowledge perfect? No. But what we DO know is pretty darn convincing.

Dissipative systems that are far from equilibrium represent a local, or open system, where entropy appears to go in reverse. The law of entropy only applies to closed systems. The sum total of ALL the entropy in the ENTIRE universe ALWAYS increases, as far as we know. LOCAL entropy in OPEN systems is not required to follow this rule.

Dissipative systems far from equilibrium themselves are NOT governed by the differential equations of thermodynamics. Plain and simple.

Just go to http://talkorigins.org and other places and look this stuff up yourself. There is nothing new here. You are just rehashing the same tired out arguments that have been proven wrong years and decades ago.

Adam E,

I also don’t wish to get into a heavy-duty discussion of Genetics with you, simple stuff about diploid haploid issues, genetic crossovers, genotype-phenotype issues, and the like.

Your extremely naive language of “why does everything create its own kind…” is quite evident of your lack of understanding of Genetics.

It would be pointless for me to have a meaningful discussion with you about what constitutes “kind” in your extremely imprecise wording. It would be a waste of my time to get into speciation details with you, or how plants of different “kinds” have been cross-bred and evolutionarily shaped by Humans over the centuries, and a myriad other details.

As to “where does human consciousness comes from”, the very way you word that question implies you have a lack of understanding there as well.

Consciousness is an emergent process created by the brain, to put very simply. Really, consciousness is not singular, but the emergent phenomenon resulting from the interaction of many “agents” — read Marvin Minsky’s Society of Mind.

Experiments have been done all around that shows that our minds are directly linked to our brains. Without brain, there is no mind. You alter brain, you alter parts of mind. Tons of research on this; LOOK IT UP.

Adam E, to truly understand this Universe and how it works takes MUCH time and MUCH effort, and a humility before the Truth. It is all to easy to create specious questions to “poke holes” — and yet Creationists have yet to PROVIDE POSITIVE EVIDENCE to support their claims.

Very easy to poke at this, to poke at that, especially when your main audience is uninitiated. Your main audience is NOT the community of knowledgeable scientists, mathematicians, and the like. Your audience are people who have a limited understanding of science AT BEST, not beyond what they learned in High School (which is a joke, really), and have forgotten much of even that.

You will shine well with them because they don’t have the mental faculties to smell out your specious arguments. You will NOT fly with anyone who has a clue.

And my challenge to you, Adam, and to all Creationists out there, is to PRESENT YOUR DIRECT EVIDENCE to support your claims, or your hypothesis. Construe an experiment that will allow is to FALSIFY your claims.

If you claims are not falsifiable, then you claims are NOT SCIENCE. Plain and simple.

And, of course, it not science; it’s RELIGION! Duh!

Which gets back to what I’ve stated before — give up trying to mix religion and science. It does not work. Science requires and demands DIRECT EVIDENCE, REPEATABILITY, and FALSIFIABILITY. Religion require nothing more than BELIEF. The two are diametrically opposed. And that’s why you Creationists always try to poke holes in an intellectually dishonest manner. Because you know darn well your postulations are not supported by any evidence.

All the flag-waving and the fan fare to HIDE from the real STICKY POINT that lies at the heart of your claims.

Adam, in a nutshell:

In order for your Creationism to be a true Science, it must prove that your God Exists.

I don’t need to tell you that you cannot ever prove that your God exists. Let’s not even go there.

All you can do is spread FUD — Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt; with the hopes others will take your FUD as “evidence”.

Ignorance is not proof to the positive, Adam. It is faulty logic to claim that “Since A is unknown it implies B”. You can’t make a claim about B from your lack of knowledge about A.

All you can HONESTLY DO is admit the truth: that you are ignorant about A. Your admission of “I don’t know” is the most HONEST thing you can utter at this point.

This universe we live in is very complex at all scales from quantum mechanics to cosmology. And yes, we don’t know it all, but neither do you. But we scientists are at least willing to admit our ignorance on what we don’t know yet — are you willing to do the same?

Yes, Adam — I am looking for an honest admission FROM YOU and all Creationist out there that:

You simply don’t know whether or not God Exists.

Come on, Adam. Surprise me. Admit the Truth here. And your own beloved bible states that “The Truth will Set You Free”.

Because, really, I don’t think you can. Oh, you will rant and rave about how you have “personal experiences” and the like, but it won’t be anything beyond your subjective internalized view of the world.

But the reality is, you don’t have one shard of evidence that your God exists. Just admit the truth. Then we can go to the next step.

Adam Estep Responds:

Fred are you even considering what I have already said…I practice a Faith just as you do! Look at the English I have used and you can see the truth…End the end there is no proof of anything Just reason…You can’t even prove George Washington is buried in his grave with 100% degree of certainty! I have been saying this all along!

Fred Responds:

Adam E, I don’t practice a faith. I reason, as much as possible, from sound principles based on Mathematics and Science and Logic grounded in empiricism.

I am very big on empirical and observable evidence. I am extremely skeptical on anything not so well grounded.

But that’s a tactic I’ve seen often used by the theist when all else fails — to try to paint the empiricist in the same light of belief without solid foundation (what you call “faith”).

To test gravity, I can drop a rock and measure it’s rate of fall and see how well it compares with the equations that describe that fall. For astronomy, I can buy my own telescope and track the movement of the planets and see how well that jives with Kepler and Newton. And so on.

But Adam, what do you have to stand on? I can have anyone look through my telescope and come to the same conclusions that I did. I can write software that demonstrates how evolution works and have anyone run it on their computer, and there’s tons of software out there that already demonstrates this — just google for it.

But Adam, what software can I run do demonstrate your position? What set of mathematical equations do you have to describe the existence of your God? What verifiable and testable means do you have to test out your Creation “Theories”?

I don’t run on “faith”. If anything, I am very anti-faith. So don’t try to put me in the same boat with you.

Oh darn it, I can’t resist. Adam, you asked “did I evolve Reason?”

What kind of question is that? But let me deal with it, anyway.

Memetics — the science of how ideas are transmitted — is itself a system of evolution — memetic evolution.

Google Aaron Lynch and his book, Thought Contagions. Better yet, just buy the book and read it. Religion is one of the Thought Contagions he writes about — in fact, he makes the very ironic remark that the ideas Creationist put forward against Evolution were themselves the result of Memetic Evolution! Eventually it kept changing and changing it to the point you had something that would spread like wildfire. And obviously you were infected by it.

But Creationism does not seek new knowledge, which is why it hasn’t changed much in recent times. It is stuck in the form that best programs for its retransmission; indeed, were you to change it it probably would die the death it deserves!

Science, on the other hand, always seeks new knowledge, and so the findings of Science do change as we learn more and more.

<!– @page { margin: 0.79in } P { margin-bottom: 0.08in } H1 { margin-bottom: 0.08in } H1.western { font-family: “Arial”, sans-serif; font-size: 16pt } H1.cjk { font-family: “DejaVu Sans”; font-size: 16pt } H1.ctl { font-family: “DejaVu Sans”; font-size: 16pt } –>

Many years ago, a large prominent figure wrote an essay by the name, “The World as I see It.” In no way do I presume to even approach the stature of the man who wrote that — Albert Einstein.

However, we do live in a different world than Einstein’s in many respects. For starters, the geopolitical landscape is far different today than it was then. Today’s world affairs are borne on the back of what took place since Einstein’s time.

And yet, in many respects, not much have changed. We still have silly “tribal” conflicts and squabblings, and big “tribes” love to beat up on the smaller “tribes”, and the smaller “tribes” will fight back by any means possible against the bigger “tribes”.

But what about the major differences? In today’s world, we have a level of hyper-connectivity that has never existed before in the history of mankind — the Internet. We also have diversification of wealth at levels that have never existed before. We have mass travel, where anyone can travel great distances to any part of the world in just a few hours and some bucks. We also have far more people alive today than then. We also have diversified levels of education and knowledge that would’ve been the stuff of Science Fiction back in Einstein’s era. And many other wonders.

We also have the specter of ultra-powerful hyper-stable governments that are firmly entrenched and very controlling. We have military machines, weapons, and other technology that would’ve been beyond the imagination of many back then.

And for the first time in human history, humans have the power to wipe itself clean off the map at just the “push of a button”. Those, that “button” currently resides in the hands of the most powerful governments, but the danger increases as that power becomes more distributed among the lesser nations.

Alas, nuclear weapons are not the only threat to our existence. Biological threats exists as well, and as biotechnology progresses, the more possible it will become for anyone to engineer a biological threat that can wipe out large numbers of people.

On the other hand, big powerful governments and corporations are controlled by the hands of a few whose agendas and goals may not be in the best interests of the individual. Pharmaceutical companies may push governments to institute mandates for vaccines that may not be necessary or safe. Military contractors may influence governments to choose military options over diplomatic ones to keep themselves on the gravy train. Big Finance may convince governments to allow them to cowboy the economy. And so on.

Meanwhile, the “little guys” — you and I — are caught in the middle of all of this. Activities of the “Big Boys” may wipe us out individually without the Boys even knowing it, like kids horsing around in a playground trampling ants. Military conflicts sacrifice the lives of innocent men, women, and children to serve some geopolitical — or geo-corproate interest. Entire villages of the “little people” may be bombed out of existence in the efforts to “war against terrorism.”

If you are one of those villiagers, who is the true terrorist in your eyes as you watch your hut go up in flames or one of your kids fragged by an exploding bomb?

Or here in the US, you may be someone who have worked hard all of your life to have a “nest-egg” to rely on in your retirement — except the IRAs and the 401K investments were wiped out in value by downturns in the equities markets.

And it gets even better. Developing nations are creating greater and greater demands for resources that are finite both in absolute size and in the ability to exploit them for use. China and India are probably the two fastest growing in this regard, but there are others as well. Utilization of those resources also creates concomitant impacts on the environment, which is also limited in scope and its ability to adapt to human activities.

Where is all of this headed? What will be the end result?

My concerns are as follows:

1. The Forever Resource Wars — in some form or fashion, resource wars will not only continue, but grow in aggression amidst the deceptions, the propagandas, and the outright lies to “justify” the wars back at home. The allocation of intellectual and financial resources to fight the resource wars put a net drain on the global economy as a hole, not to mention destruction of wealth of the victim nations, deaths to millions of innocent lives, and a dimunition of what it means to be human.
2. Financial and Social Instabilities brought on by Dwindling Resources — as resources become increasingly scarce, prices will rise, destabilizing the financial and social picture on a global scale. More propaganda will be promulgated by the Big Governments to divert people away from the true problems to blame each other, only creating more unrest, socially and geo-politically, feeding the push for The Forever Resource Wars, and other nasties.
3. Ecological Impacts that may be Irreversible — Human activities on a global scale that results in the release of even more carbon and various pollutants into the atmosphere and the biosphere in general, which will have nonlinear and unpredictable impacts on the environment, which most likely will feed into Financial and Social Instabilities, among other things.
4. A Negative Synergism — an emergence of a global set of problems emerging from the interplay of the first 3, which in and of itself might take on an irreversible mode leading to a downward spiral of the overall well-being of humans on this planet.

Note that my above 4 concerns cannot be taken in isolation, but must all be considered. We may project  best-case scenarios and worst-case scenarios from the above, across time into the future.  Some may argue that there is no cause for concern, but it is hard to see how we should not be at least a little concerned given the issues at hand.

It is my estimation that the “Big Boys” will not appreciate the full impact of the above until it is too late — that is, until after its beyond the point of no return. And even if they did, what would they do? Would their major concern be what’s best for us individuals? Or what’s best for themselves? Would they seek to maintain status quo? Or do the right thing? What exactly would they do? That is the question of ages.

There are certain fallacies the “Big Boys” operate from. They are:

1. The Fallacy of Infinite Growth — this bedevils both the financial and resource markets. Both assume that they can continue to have “infinite growth” despite the very obvious and plain fact that resources and people are finite.
2. The Fallacy of “Might Makes Right” — just because loads of  “power” does not mean it’s a good thing to use that power against the individual. If it increases suffering somewhere, how is it ever “right”?
3. The Fallacy of the Assumption that the “Little Guy” can always be “controlled” — You can only fool individuals so many times before they catch on.

The immediate question that comes to mind is what can we do about it, as individuals? As individuals, we acquese power and control to the power elite, collectively, and those few that resist are put down by other individuals that have bought into the “power of authority”. Thus, you have police arresting people even if they’ve done no wrong, soliders kicking the doors in of innocent families even that family has done nothing wrong, etc. Ultimately, we are talking about the little guy being pitted against the little guy at the behest of the “Big Boys”.

But the Big Boys would not have any power or dominance unless there’s acquiescence. It’s just that plain and simple.

More on this later.

Well, you can really blame me on this one…

Over the many years, I have spent a considerable amount of time thinking about thinking, beliefs, and the human population in general. Mass human behavior, individual human behavior, politics, wars, religion, art, science, mathematics, networks, complex dynamical systems, and thought contagions.

It occurred to me that, among many other things, that many, many people behave more like mindless automatons than thinking beings. You can see it in advertising, politics, social services, the government in general, and just your average Joe. You see it in fervent believers of religion, the Republican party, the Democratic party, sports, everywhere. You see it in parents, teachers, police, lawyers, social workers, etc.

Basically, most people never — or almost never — bother to critically examine what they believe in. They seem to just jump from one belief frame to another without much thought as to whether or not it even makes sense, let alone if the beliefs themselves are even correct. They are “programmed” by some agent, which could be parents, friends, church leaders, politicians, or the media. They also act on those beliefs, and almost never bother to think about the consequences on acting on unfounded propositions. Even though the consequences are at hand, no learning seems to ever take place to lead them to the very necessary critical analysis of half-baked notions and fuzzy impressions.

But this does not apply to everyone, of course, as there are those who do critically examine notions and assumptions before inculcating the propositions as “beliefs”.

Still others, like myself, eschew the entire mechanism of belief itself. Ask yourself the following question:

Do beliefs determine truth?

I don’t think anyone, not even the Mindless Vessels of Beliefs (MVBs) themselves, would ever answer “yes” to that basic question. And yet the MVBs will go on most likely being MVBs, even after having admitted to the most important flaw in belief systems in general. They may wonder about it a bit and “go back to sleep”. Meanwhile, those who actually DO think already know about the inherent flaws in beliefs in general.

But let’s talk about this very fundamental question. If beliefs do NOT determine truth, then that immediately leads to two more questions:

1. Just how DOES one determine truth?
2. Just what DOES one do with all of these beliefs?

I will discuss those questions in future blogs. But for now, I want to speak more on beliefs and how people in general measure up.

Sometime after I came up with the idea of MVB, it occurred to me that there are finer layers in how people and beliefs interact. Also, “Mindless Vessel of Belief” sounds kinda harsh, even though I deem 80-90% of the population are MVBs. So I came up with a more general (and gentler) classification system, which I currently call “realms”. And so let me expound on them.

Realm 1: Autonomous Belief Agents

A Mindless Vessel of Belief (MVB) is a person who tends not to question beliefs, but simply acts on them. The “belief matrix”, if you will, drives said person’s activitives from moment to moment. Little, if any, thought is ever given to the “why” behind a belief. When a new proposition is introduced to said person, the new proposition is evaluated solely on the pre-existing belief matrix with little reference to anything substantive. In short, an Autonomous Belief Agent, or MVB, is largely driven by the beliefs themselves rather than knowledge.

I estimate that 80 to 90% of the world operates in this fashion. You get a good sense of this from observing political campaigns, religious organizations, many who operate in the “public sector” for a living where no thought is required, just undue obedience. It’s the type of thing that makes witch-hunts possible, allowed the Holocaust to become a reality, and allowed the United States to “justify” the war with Iraq.

Everywhere you look, from the media to sports to law reeks of this. Any place where people routinely act without rhyme or reason, without any sensibilities, and justify said actions with the excuse of “just doing my job”, etc.

I personally find it quite disturbing and perplexing that most of the world operates in this manner. Many of the often-touted ideals are rendered moot in lieu of the Autonomous Belief Agents, including the notions of “democracy”, “justice”, and “fairness”. The money-driven media, just to stay alive, is forced to kowtow to the MVB, reducing content to the type of drivel and mediocrity that appeals to the common MVB.

Realm 2: Belief Aware

Realm 2 types are somewhat aware and mindful of the nature of beliefs and their pitfalls, but still operate in that context. They do make some efforts at verifying that many of their beliefs are actually knowledge, but still believe(!) that beliefs are either a good thing to have, or at least there’s no way for humans to get around them. They are definitely measure better than your average MVB, but still operate in the context of what they consider “humanity”. Those that fall into this category are liberal arts majors, writers, and poets. Those who are particularly creative typically fall into this realm, as well as many scientists, engineers, and philosophers.

Realm 3: Belief Rejection

Realm 3 types are difficult for me to describe in human terms. Realm 3 speaks about a complete rejection of the entire notion of belief in lieu of Logic and Reason. A Realm 3 person has the ability to “step outside” of humanity and see the human condition for what it really is. A Realm 3 type is totally aware that “beliefs” are merely the backdrop for memes, and that much of what is considered “reality” is a construct of a extremely sophisticated neural process. Even beliefs themselves are a part of that same neural complexity, and as such is suspect.

The reason this is difficult to describe in human terms is because, well, the writer as well as the readers of this article are themselves human, and thus at some level the understanding of Realm 3 become infinitely recursive. For am I not using memetic transfer to convey these concepts to belief organs (your brain) about rejecting what many consider to be the cornerstone of all human existence?

I have not identified anyone other than myself as being in the Realm 3 category. The difficulty lies in distinguishing someone between Realm 3 and Realm 2. Unless the conversation goes directly to the heart of the matter, you would not know if someone who appeared to be Realm 2 is actually Realm 3. Others who fall into this category will most likely have never thought of it in these terms and may feel extremely uncomfortable discussing it with Realm 2 types, let alone Realm 1 people! So, I can give no estimate on what percentage of the population may fall into this category, though I suspect the numbers are very small.

On reflection, I would suspect that those doing research in the field of cognitive psychology would most likely be or on the road to becoming Realm 3 without even realizing it.

Realm 4: Self Rewrite

A person who is a realized Realm 3 is still human, despite the recognition of the fact that the human belief system is itself a construct. But the realization offers the possibility of being able to manipulate one’s own construct. That is to say, you, being a Realm 3 type can now develop the faculties to manipulate your own construction directly. You can, in essence, rewrite your own “programming” This is something I aspire to personally, and have had some limited success at it. It is largely uncharted waters, with new possibilities brimming around every corner. There are also dangers as well, because what happens if you do a bad rewrite unto yourself?

Due to the way our meat brains works, auto-rewriting is very difficult to achieve. What would be ideal is transhumanist approach of replacing or at least augmenting your meat brain with some new technology — Nanotech? Photonics? Quantum Computers? — to allow a much faster means to rewrite and resculpt the self. Such fantastic technology does not exist yet, of course, but it is fun to contemplate.

Realm 5: Peer Rewrite

Realm 5 is not necessarily a “higher” realm than the others — except Realm 1, perhaps. Basically the ability of one human to rewrite another human has been with us throughout the ages.  Today, governments of the world do it through control of the school systems and also control of the media. Primal emotions are typically used as the gateways to do peer rewrites, and the primal emotion of choice, I’m afraid to say, is fear. Religious institutions use the fear entry point quite frequently, as well as law enforcement, the IRS, the war propaganda organs, and many others.

Peer Rewrite occurs at all scales of society, including families. Parents by definition (re)write be belief matrices of their offspring, and teachers by definition rewrite their students.

Is Peer Rewrite necessarily a bad thing? In and of itself, no.  However, there are a multitude of ethical concerns, as well as much power in being able to rewrite your peers. If it is for reasons of exploitation or control, especially if it is to the detriment of the rewritetee, I consider this a bad thing in general. On the other hand, if a parent is rewriting his kid with the goal in mind of that kid having a happy, healthy and successful life, I would consider that a good thing.

I would consider a rewrite of a Realm 1 (MVB) person to become Realm 2 or better to be a very good thing, as long as it is approached with caution and with recognition  that you are, in effect, altering the course of another person’s future, and there may be some unexpected downsides in doing so, if, for instance, said person is unable to handle the realities of reality.  The very reason so many may be stuck in Realm 1 in the first play may stem from their inabilities to handle the truth about truth.

This is something I wrote in an IM to a friend not too long ago. It only includes my side of the conversation for privacy reasons. It is a conversation about beliefs, society, and hierarchical network structures I call “Transcendental Sets”.

(07:07:08 AM) fred: I suppose I am less interested in what motivates people, because in a sense, I already understand that in a general sense.
(07:08:24 AM) fred: People are “nodes” in a massive self-organizing dynamic quasi-hierarchical network I call “transcendental sets”
(07:09:09 AM) fred: Individual nodes receive programming by the memes they are hosting, and act accordingly.
(07:09:47 AM) fred: The memes themselves evolve because they exploit the “instruction set” of the nodes.
(07:10:12 AM) fred: The “instruction set” of the nodes are basically the same, but with variations.
(07:10:51 AM) fred: The “instruction set” of the nodes — the humans — are what you would generally refer to as “emotions”
(07:11:04 AM) fred: But there’s more to it than that.
(07:11:39 AM) fred: Evolution has shaped what we human nodes are today. The question is, of course, what kind of evolution?
(07:12:35 AM) fred: It has gone beyond the biological. Indeed, biological evolution in humans has itself been subsumed by higher-order evolving systems, of which memes is one.
(07:14:26 AM) fred: So, my view on this is not just from the individual perspective, but how the individual is influenced and controlled by the higher order systems the collective of individuals gave rise too.
(07:15:33 AM) fred: So then, I am more focused on understanding the bigger dynamic, the “big picture”, to use a hackneyed cliché
(07:15:53 AM) fred: (I know, clichés by definition ARE hackneyed!)
(07:17:35 AM) fred: A “feature” of complex dynamical systems with a substantially large growth rate is that they tend to organize themselves to states of criticality.
(07:18:14 AM) fred: When they reach those states, you have the avalanche effect, where a small disturbance can bring about great change.
(07:18:58 AM) fred: We have seen this many times in the past with great political movements that brought about sweeping social change — for better or for worse.
(07:20:07 AM) fred: The trick here is to predict when those moments of self-organized criticality are coming, and what to do to trigger the avalanche.
(07:20:23 AM) fred: Great sweeping change with minimal effort.
(07:21:58 AM) fred: So, the big nasty institutions of power that you might regard as a futile effort to bring about change, I do see possible ways to do it with effort levels in our grasp — but with much planning and observation to see the critical points coming ahead of time.
(07:23:08 AM) fred: The downside of this is, of course, is that there is the avalanche effect. You can trigger an avalanche, but it is damned near impossible to control it once it starts.
(07:24:33 AM) fred: How many revolutions and upheavals in the past were kicked off by a small group of individuals, but then got out of hand afterwards? The French Revolution is one fine example of this.
(07:28:13 AM) fred: So the other half of this is not only to be able to predict the exploitable critical points, but the avalanche afterwards.
(07:29:50 AM) fred: [Shelly] should pat herself on the back for being part of the effort to raise awareness of vote fraud issues and the need to have reliable audit trails, etc. — lately I heard congress was going to vote on a bill mandating paper ballots and the like.
(07:30:06 AM) fred: Hopefully that will take the form she hopes.
(07:30:36 AM) fred: You and I have given up on the voting system, but for slightly different reasons.
(07:32:45 AM) fred: I see voting as a highly ineffectual means to control the powercrats — that the main problem is the power itself being concentrated in the hands of a few who manipulate that voting system and are not truly concerned about “the needs of the people”.
(07:33:42 AM) fred: The voters themselves vote typically for silly reasons, and so become easy to manipulate by the politicians.
(07:34:10 AM) fred: And the choices given are poor at best.
(07:34:37 AM) fred: And the media effectively locks out any party that is not democrat or republican
(07:35:03 AM) fred: And that “party politics” itself is sub-optimal.
(07:35:57 AM) fred: Your approach — and I am with you on it — is to create alternatives. We definitely need that.
(07:36:47 AM) fred: While I’m all for that, we at the same time need to keep an eye on the 500-pound gorilla in the room with us that is the entrenched system of the powercrats.
(07:38:18 AM) fred: Whenever one of our alternatives start to become successful, they always try to shut it down. And they come at us from so many angles — both subtle and gross — that it’s all we can do to keep up with it, let alone what to do about it.
(07:38:39 AM) fred: Eventually, we have to take on the 500-pound gorilla
(07:39:34 AM) fred: And that’s where my focus lies. How do we keep the 500-pound gorilla from trouncing all of our efforts to create alternative systems that actually *work*.
(07:40:15 AM) fred: Anyway, I’ve given you enough to read on this — ironically — Independence Day.
(07:40:58 AM) fred: Even the meaning of this holiday is lost, as many now refer to it as “The 4th of July”. The original meaning and intent is completely lost.
(07:42:21 AM) fred: I don’t think for even an instant as millions chow down on smelly barbecue ribs and chug beer do their thoughts even go in the direction of what *Independence* is all about and how it applies to our lives currently.
(07:43:44 AM) fred: Today we are *far* more controlled by our own government than our “forefathers” were in their time when they decided to break away from England.
(07:45:02 AM) fred: The system of voluntary economic servitude that is now in place keeps the minions too busy to care, and gives them a carrot to grasp for so that they don’t revolt.
(07:45:36 AM) fred: The powercrats are loving it, of course.
(07:46:07 AM) fred: Well, enough of me already. Enjoy the holiday!