Re: Putting evolution to work on the assembly line

Steve Clark (ssclark@facstaff.wisc.edu)
Wed, 22 Jul 1998 17:43:03 -0500

At 04:42 PM 7/22/98 -0500, Ron Chitwood wrote:
>You did go into great detail. I was thinking of Sherlock Holmes and his
>use of Ockham's Razor. The possibility with the least amount of
>possibilities is usually the right one.
>
>In the case of God vs macroevolutionism, only one unprovable possibility is
>involved when one says, "God created....". There are 3 unprovable
>assumptions that must be made otherwise. 1. Environment was conducive to
>life, 2.Chance created life, 3. random selection increased the variety.

The analogy here is imperfect. Ron compares apples to oranges. Better
constructed analogies would either be that "God created..." and "nature
created...". Or the following:

1. Environment was conducive to life, 2. Chance created life, 3. Random
selection increased the variety.

and this

1. God made the environment conducive to life, 2. God created life, 3. God
increased the variety.

I don't think that invoking Ockham's Razor to argue in favor of a
creationist position is very compelling.

Cheers,

Steve
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Steven S. Clark, Ph.D. Ph: 608-263-9137
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