'Fighting Ignorance Since 1973"
We couldn’t do it without you, kanicbird.
What about a scientist who honestly doesn’t give a damn about healing people, but only is in it for profit? If your “love is all you need” hypothesis is correct, wouldn’t we see instances where the exact same substance, made in the same way, but by different manufacturers, have a marked difference in their effectiveness?
How do you account for the dramatic increase in life expectancy within the past 100 years, ever since the invention of antibiotics and vaccines, and the knowledge of the Germ Theory of Disease which has increased sanitation procedures?
Small quibble, sanitation has had more effect on life expectancy than antibiotics or vaccines.
Have you ever taken any medicine in your life, Kanicbird?
Yes.
To go into a bit more detail, what I currently do in a situation where some drug may be helpful is:
1: Ask God as a small child would ask his parent, let Him know what is distressing me, and ask for guidance and/or healing.
2: If I feel I get a reply, follow it, if not do what is a reasonable corse of action, which may be take some medicine.
So you are saying that following your deity’s advice would be an unreasonable course of action?
Basically that person will not negate the elder healer in the company, but have other effects, like charging people to receive the Love of God. Also the person who is the healing elder may be very low on the totem pole in the drug manufacturing company.
Yes, check out the generic vs brand name ADHD meds, many people have noticed a very large difference in effectiveness. But besides that, God has His church (His people) in every aspect of society, in drug companies, in organized crime, in government, in education, in the SDMB, in law enforcement, etc. so it is possible that the love of God can flow through generics as God has His people there also.
Gifts of the Love of God that work through drugs, I never denied it, just that it is very very inefficient, a large drain on resources, and unneeded. There is also a factor of quality of an individual life, which has to be factored in.
Once again, what particular science or sciences have you trained in?
Mad?
The simplest known forms of life looks designed to me.
I can directly observe the designed entities that I am claiming look designed.
I can not directly observe the entity I believe designed them, hence, can draw no such inferences.
Sure you can. Your definition of your deity is intentionally minimalistic, but you’re still left with some characteristics that can’t be avoided because they are integral to your arguments.
The deity exists. It is sentient, powerful and it is able to design things. Single celled organisms are not sentient or powerful, nor are they capable of designing things, ergo your deity is more complex and structured than “simple life”, and if “simple life” looks designed to you then by implication so must your deity.
If you mean designed to adapt into more complex structures over millions of years, I’d agree with you to some extent, but it’s still a far cry from designing a creature in God’s image, and that that creature is homo sapien.
Again, if you’re going to want me to accept a universe-designing deity is “complex”, you’re going to have to describe some of the traits/qualities it possesses that makes it complex. I will happily describe some of the complexity possessed by a single-cell organism in exchange. But I think you’re bluffing, so, “you first”.
To put it another way, I will not just simply take it on faith that you are correct.
ivan, you appear to be shooting up the wrong path. I don’t defend any positions relating to God designing stuff “in his own image”.
Ok… doesn’t seem very hard.
The most easiest trait/quality to pick out would probably be sentience. In order to design something it would have to be sentient, by pure definition, and I think it goes without saying that sentience requires a very high level of complexity. That comes straight off your stated premise, so I don’t have to observe anything to describe it.
If you can describe anything in a single-cell organism that has the level of design comparable to even the barest essentials of sentient life I will be very impressed.
If we’re talking inside the universe, sure. Just to form an idea requires a freakin’ myriad of chemical reactions to take place properly and in the correct order, as well as traverse any required spatial distance that the firing neurons of the mind help facilitate. So yep, that’s damn complex, and we’re only scratching the surface.
As for entities that aren’t restricted by such material and spatial limitations, I have no idea what kind of complexity sentience requires. Perhaps you can enlighten us?
At least as complex as us, naturally; we are obviously the bottom rung when it comes to sentience. And you can forget any nonsense about not being “restricted by such material and spatial limitations”; without some sort of restrictions, some sort of rules it cant have any structure at all. Sentience requires an underlying substrate.
Well uh, kind of winging it here, but I feel pretty confident to say that in order to create our universe, it has to be on some level capable of interacting with it. No matter how fancy and mysterious it’s powers are it can’t get past a straight up contradiction. I think from that I can assume it would be subject to at least some kind of material limitations.
Not “shooting up the wrong path”, more like “cutting you off at the pass”. Otherwise, what kind of second-rate God would it be, if it could create a universe from nothing, but couldn’t fashion a mere human being without billions of alterations?