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Apologetics and Theology

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Moot

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #15 on: March 09, 2016, 10:29:59 AM »
Richard Dawkins is a philosophical abomination.

Then it should be trivially easy for you to point out the flaw in his reasoning.  What is it?
See post #7.

Lennox is strawmanning Dawkins argument. Craig isn't quite strawmanning but he's not being very chairitable. There are good objections to it though.

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Emuse

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #16 on: March 09, 2016, 10:33:02 AM »
I don't think either philosopher has really touched on Dawkins's point.

That is, if order and complexity are necessarily evidence of an external, intelligent designer then an ordered and complex designer must have an external intelligent designer too.  On the other hand, if something ordered and complex can lack an intelligent and external designer then the claim that complex and ordered biological organisms must have an external and intelligent designer doesn't go through on its own.

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Philip Rand

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #17 on: March 09, 2016, 10:37:23 AM »
Emuse... I don't believe you understand complexity...
A lover of horses and Mozart.

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Emuse

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #18 on: March 09, 2016, 10:40:57 AM »
Emuse... I don't believe you understand complexity...

Thankfully for me, personal incredulity is not an argument! :-p

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Philip Rand

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #19 on: March 09, 2016, 10:43:59 AM »
Well... for one thing chuck out the word "order" that is a term for entropy... complexity is a dynamic... though infinite stability implies infinite order, i.e. Big Bang conditions.
« Last Edit: March 10, 2016, 12:06:24 AM by Philip Rand »
A lover of horses and Mozart.

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Emuse

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #20 on: March 09, 2016, 12:12:37 PM »
Well... for one thing chuck out the word "order" that is a term for entropy... complexity is a dynamic...

"Order" in this context is taken to mean "non-random".  "Complex" is taken to mean "composed of more than one part where those parts are ontically distinct from one another".

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Brian_G

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #21 on: March 13, 2016, 08:03:42 AM »
I don't think either philosopher has really touched on Dawkins's point.

That is, if order and complexity are necessarily evidence of an external, intelligent designer then an ordered and complex designer must have an external intelligent designer too.  On the other hand, if something ordered and complex can lack an intelligent and external designer then the claim that complex and ordered biological organisms must have an external and intelligent designer doesn't go through on its own.

Dawkins seems to be completely oblivious to the arguments for God's simplicity.  If God were some complex arrangement of parts, he would require an explanation and thus wouldn't be God.  This is the one place where Dawkins gets his metaphysics right.  Complex things require an explanation outside themselves.  His problem is attributing complexity to God and ignoring the arguments to the contrary.

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pat1911

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Re: Richard Dawkins: Dawkins Complexity Argument
« Reply #22 on: March 14, 2016, 09:06:16 AM »
Richard Dawkins writes:

A designer god cannot be used to explain organized complexity because any god capable of designing anything would have to be complex enough to demand the same kind of explanation in his own right. God presents an infinite regress from which he cannot help us escape.

Let's think about this:

1/  If we use an holistic interpretation then when Dawkins writes "designer god" it can also mean "Maximally Great Being".

2/  It follows then then one attribute of a Maximally Great Being would be Maximally Great Complexity.

3/  Maximally Great Complexity can be interpreted as Infinite Complexity.

The interesting characteristic of all complexity computer simulations is that as complexity grows in the simulation all variables converge to a stable value, i.e. they do not deviate.

Now, what is interesting here is to consider the Fine Tuning Argument, i.e. there are no analytical relationships that allow us to know one fundamental physical constant uniquely in terms of the others.

The absence of analytical relationships suggests statistical relationships: i.e., that the constants are a random sample of the independent numbers from some master probability law.

If this is the case then Richard Dawkins comment on the "designer god" explains why the constants we see in the universe are what they are.

For if the "designer god" is indeed infinitely complex as Dawkins says then if we use computer complexity models as a bench mark then it suggest that the constants created at the moment of the Big Bang were in fact a deterministic result of the infinite complexity of the designer god... for at its limit infinite complexity means a stable universe being created, i.e. the master probability law of the physical constants are a direct result of the infinite complexity of the "designer god".

Well I will start out by saying as I always do is that Dawkins is an idiot. By the very writing of his theory he debunks it. The writer of the theory, by all logic should be much more complex than what is written. So there goes that theory.
Just like by the very action taken to write this post, logically, it would take a more complex individual to write it than the post itself is complex.

Dawkins was trying to hammer in everything into evolutionary theory, which postulates, at the moment, a bubble -up from simple to complex. That's what happens when you become one dimensional, you become a hammer and everything looks like a nail.