Moorad
-----Original Message-----
From: Pim van Meurs <entheta@eskimo.com>
To: 'Moorad Alexanian' <alexanian@uncwil.edu>; asa@calvin.edu
<asa@calvin.edu>; Pim van Meurs <entheta@eskimo.com>
Cc: evolution@calvin.edu <evolution@calvin.edu>
Date: Monday, April 12, 1999 11:31 AM
Subject: RE: extraterrestrial intelligence
Moorad: Man is a detector of the material and the supernatural. If you do
not agree
with this, you are not a man.
How convenient. If you do not agree with me then you are not a man...
Perhaps you should try a more scientific approach
MooradThat man is the most complicated "machine" around is obvious. Give me
a counterexample. Just one!
Why not try to support your own assertions ?
Moorad: What is self-evident to man may not be able to be written down as a
scientific theory.
Indeed, that is exactly what your own argument shows, you are unable to
treat it scientifically. It is all based upon your "belief"/
Moorad: Please tell me what love is in scientific terms---not the physical
manifestations
of it but its very essence.
What is the very essence of love ?
Moorad: Newton used Kepler's laws to develop a theory that gave rise to
such laws by means of mathematical logic. Of course, Einstein's theory
superceded Newton's theory. But all dealt with nonexistent models that
reassemble better and better the real thing. Man is the creator
of the theories of nature and reason is something that is not in the models
but in its creator--man reasons, matter does not. Accordingly, the reason
that we find in nature also needs a Creator. Obviously, this is not a proof
in the mathematical sense, but the contrary assumption---that there is no
creator--is less plausible.
On the contrary, you have neither increased nor decreased the plausibility.
Personal (dis)belief is just not very useful one way or the other. That man
creates theories is no evidence that there is reason in nature or that there
is a creator.