Slashdot Mirror

You've also been exposed to the sun for decades, but [presumably] don't have skin cancer.
http://skepticwiki.org/index.php/Argument_from_Incredulity

More like "hasty generalization" than incredulity if you're really itching to apply a fallacy.

You've also been exposed to the sun for decades, but [presumably] don't have skin cancer.
http://skepticwiki.org/index.php/Argument_from_Incredulity

Ohh, i know you guys. These, right?

http://skepticwiki.org/index.php/Freeman_On_The_Land

Did you just honestly compare the ownership of a person to the ownership of a work that conceivably took weeks, months or years to complete that resulted from the work of an individual, or a group of individuals? That is such a ridiculous, absurd comparison that I don't even know where to begin.

His analogy maps poorly, which makes it a bad argument. Your response is argument from incredulity, which makes it even worse.

Random links? I posted a link to the definition of science, and the wikipedia definition for ID. I'd hardly call that 'random'.

They are random because they do nothing to support your assertion. If I tell you that "flat earth" is science, and link to the definition of science and the Wikipedia on flat earth beliefs, that doesn't make it science.

I'd then encourage you to read the ID article and weigh honestly whether or not it meets the definition.

It clearly does not. ID is denial. It's "you are wrong, we are right, but we can't explain how or why." It has no explanatory models, no research, no nothing. Even the ID leadership admit this. They insist that it is science, though, despite not meeting even the lowest criteria for being even remotely similar to science.

Even a conservative creationist judge appointed by George W. Bush on recommendation from creationist senator Rick Santorum had to rule that ID was religion and therefore had no place in science class.

ID is relabeled creationism, as the Pandas book and its "cdesign proponentist". Actually, this is just one small piece of evidence showing the true face of ID, but it is perhaps the most amusing.

Going on a tangent, but it just occured to me how so many of the climate change deniers arguments echoes those of creationists. It would be interesting to know what the overlap between the two groups are - they certainly seems to share more than a few traits IMNSHO

Neuroscience is the field that is considered as the more scientifically rigorous counterpart to psychology. This is the science being used to duplicate the brain. The limitations of our current understandings that you are talking about are not limitations of science itself, just a limitation of our current level of understanding. There is no inherent limitation to the scientific process that bars it from being used to further our understanding in these areas. The recent creation of a new fundamental circuit component the "memristor" has opened up new possibilities in synthetic brain-like circuitry, which bodes well for more brain-like computer technology.

Simply because something is vastly complex does not mean it will never be possible to understand it in any useful way. Unless there is some specific reason that the brain is permanently impossible to understand, asserting that claim is an "argument from personal incredulity".

Less than one molecule per liter? That's the homeopathic equivalent to a placebo. The strong stuff is measured in molecules per cubic lightyear. Boy, it sure is a good thing we as a civilization don't treat health problems magic water, huh?

Broken Window Fallacy

Argument from incredulity. Your argument is quite similar to those used by creationists to argue that certain biological mechanisms could not possibly have arisen via evolution, and therefore evolution is wrong. Your faulty presumption is that wind farms should exist because you want them to exist. If you want them to exist, you should fund their creation, or persuade your friends, family, neighbors, etc, to fund their creation. What you should not do is force everyone to fund what you think is right. Whether or not wind farms should exist is up to people to freely decide.

Faith is the unavoidable gap between plausibility and belief -- of anything.

NO, it is NOT! YOU assume it is because YOU happen to think that way. But YOU have FAITH! What part of atheism NOT being a religion and NOT having faith do you NOT UNDERSTAND? Let me try to clarify here.

Obviously no human knows exactly how all of existence works. We do know that our knowledge was limited in the past, VERY limited compared to what we understand today. How ever there is of course the "gap" between the whole truth of how reality works, and what we understand up to this point. Now, your religion teachs you to fill in this gap with blind faith. Any difficult question that cannot be immediatly answered with the current pool of available knowledge can be easily explained away with the "god works in mysterious ways" routine. Pay attention, because this is where your way of thinking DRASTICALY differs from mine and that of every other self proclaimed atheist I know. We are comfortable with the fact that we DO NOT KNOW EVERYTHING. We do not need faith to fill in the gap, we are comfortable accepting that yes there is a gap in our knowledge. But we then also start working towards filling that gap in with the correct answers, when ever possible. Rather than sitting back and assuming it's magic and beyond our understanding. So no, your are completely wrong in stating that faith is some how a fundamental requirement in human thinking. Humans do not need faith to exist, to be "good people", or to reason. Faith is purely something that is being pushed on humanity by religion, it is NOT a reuqirment.

You state that Christianity is a "fairy tale with zero evidence." I gather you mean that no claim should be believed unless it's verifiable by evidence. This is naturally a popular refrain here on Slashdot.

But it doesn't work very well. For instance, what evidence would establish that the universe exists? If that's too academic, let me rephrase: what evidence could possibly establish that we don't live in the Matrix? Yet, most people consider belief in a real universe to be quite rational. And they are correct, even though this falls decidedly into your category of "fairy tale[s] with zero evidence."

Exactly how does logic and reason not work? Explain that please, because I am sitting here using my computer on the Internet and these things wouldn't be possible if logic and reason were wrong or didn't work! No, they work fine, YOU don't understand them!

Prove that we don't live in the matrix? If you understood how to create a logical argument you would know that, while it is possible to prove something exists, it is not possible to fully prove a negative, that something doesn't exist. For example, let's pretend I worship The Invisible Pink Unicorn. Prove to me that there is no such thing as an invisible pink unicorn. Because I am telling you right now, if you just had enough faith you could see it like I do!

How ever, we CAN prove that science works, that our existance is real and that we can minipulate it. The many accomplishments of science are readily visible even to those who have some sort of religious faith. I mean, look at you! You are sitting at a computer, using it to type a message stating that logic and reason don't always work. Doing so on something that would not exist if your statement was true. Yet you wouldn't argue that the computer is not there, it obviously is and you obviously know what it is because you are using one. It doesn't take blind faith to see that the physical hardware and conceptual software exist.

No, we may not be able to 100% disprove the existance of any gods, but that doesn't mean there is any real supporting evidence that the christian god (or any other popular religions god(s)) exists. Would I believe in a god if there were some proof? Of course I would! Am I being unreasonable by expecting there to be some sort of proof before allowing my self to believe in somet

List of transitional fossils
Intermediate forms

Also:

Talk Origins FAQ
and specifically:

Transitional vertebrates FAQ
More on intermediates

If you can explain what exactly is meant by "supports evolution", I'd gladly provide you with many more links. Or better yet, learn to use Google.

Read it and weep, creationist.

Couple of your links were broken:

List of transitional fossils
Intermediate forms

How is the world do fossils prove evolution? Where are the intermediate forms? What?! What do you mean there aren't any?

Then stop saying the fossil record "proves" evolution because it doesn't. It proves there were dinosaurs. It doesn't prove evolution at all.

Bull-cocky. He explicitly referred to intrinsic -- meaning biological -- differences in aptitude being dominant over social and discriminatory factors.

That was the second of his three reasons. The first, which he placed the most weight on, was differing levels of desire to work in "high-powered jobs". He also specifically mentions differences in preferences relevant to engineering positions.

in the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude

In many traits, including IQ, men appear to have a higher standard deviation than women. (This makes sense if you think about it; there are fundamental evolutionary reasons why it's better for nature to "gamble" with males than with females). So if you're looking at Nobel prize candidates, you may be 4 standard deviations out for males, but 5 for females. If you want to dispute the premises that's fine, but Summers's conclusions follow directly from them. (And if you do reject the premises, I hope you it's for a better reason than not liking the consequences). And again, this does not mean that any specific woman is incapable of being at the top of any field, nor does it justify sex discrimination.

Sure, "around", but how about "competing for promotions"?

Why would it be worse to compete with females than males for promotions?