“When examined carefully, scientific accounts of natural processes are never really about order emerging from chaos, or form emerging from formlessness. On the contrary, they are always about the unfolding of an order that was already implicit in the nature of things.
What Dawkins does not seem to appreciate is that his blind watchmaker is something ever more remarkable than Paley’s watches. Paley finds a “watch” and asks how such a thing could have come to be there by chance. Dawkins finds an immense automated factory that blindly constructs watches and feels that he has completely answered Paley’s point. But that is absurd. How can a factory that makes watches be less in need of explanation than that watches themselves?”
Stephen Barr, “Modern Physics and Ancient Faith,” 111
7 comments:
That's not what Dawkins is saying at all. A factory by necessity requires a designer. That is, it requires, at the least, a similarly complex explanation as the aforementioned watch lying on the beach.
Dawkins is saying that, according to Darwin's theory of Natural Selection, there need not be a designer to get a functional design.
If you read the first few pages of Charles Darwin's "Autobiography," Darwin addresses Paley's concern by explaining in more detail the mechanism of NS. He compares the hinge of a clam to that of a door, and goes on to elucidate how one can form by random chance, while the other require a designer.
Dawkins is simply redirecting our attention to this exact phenomenon.
My, my Tristan. First debating Denish, now out flanking Mr. Barr. No delusions of grandeur in your head, huh?
Because I disagree with someone on their position doesn't mean I suffer delusions of grandeur. Furthermore, if I can defend my position with a well supported argument I'm sure Stephen Barr would be greatful, it would give him the stage to defend his hypothesis.
After all, unlike some people I know, Stephen Barr and myself have read Dawkins work. And the reason I reference you to Darwin, is because he addresses the Paley issue in his day most admirably.
Also, in the arena of interdisciplinary work, we're all equals when it comes to areas outside of our specific fields.
If you hold that against me, then how do you defend the fact that you talk about Atheism, religion, or anything else outside your major expertise? You can't, and so don't be so naive as that, and you need not be worried about making a fool of yourself. Simply put, keep an open mind!
It's as simple as that.
I'm sure, if you appreciate Barr's quote as much as you seem to do, then you'll like other interdisciplinary authors as well, and I beseech you to take a gander at:
http://earlychristianreligion.org/
Holding a contrary position is one thing. Thinking that I would be a worthy opponent in a debate is quite another. At least in my mind.
Absurd. Delusions of grandeur. Being able to clarify misinformation does not make one delusional. It makes one informed.
Is your name Tristan Vick?
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