Jamie, I love the way you twisted what I said, what I meant when I said I cannot show you wind or gravity is that you can feel wind when it blows (and I acknowledge the local weather channel they can tell you the windspeed but nonetheless you cannot SEE wind yourself except through its affects (i.e an object being blown around like leaves or whatever)

Jamie, rational thought I mean coherent rather than senseless, your hostility is astounding I but I suppose I should have tried to be MORE clear in what I was saying,

as a P.S.S. I am aware that the affects of wind and gravity are evidence of both but they are both immaterial nonetheless

sorry for the typos in my previous comment I just woke up a while ago.

“but how do you explain these flaws if we had been designed by a perfect all knowing being who loves us dont you think he would have ironed out some of the kinks?”

Jamie, we live in a fallen world due to the rebellion of man, of course things are going to be flawed BECAUSE we live in a fallen world, I’ve no doubt this has been explained to you.

Dear Jamie, Natural Selection cannot reasonably account for a rational mind, even Darwin in essence acknowledged that his theory could not explain RELIABLE cognitive reasoning.

In fact this was one of the things that troubled him most about his theory. Here’s why,If a person accepts the evolutionary naturalistic worldview then he must also accept that the ultimate source of people’s reasoning faculties was not itself rational (endowed with reason), personal (self-aware, intelligent), or teleological (purposive) in nature.

but rather, that the source was a nonrational, impersonal, purposeless process consisting of a combination of genetic mutations, variation, and environmental factors (natural selection).

Naturalism therefore postulates that a combination of random chance and blind impersonal natural processes (physical and chemical in nature) produced humanity’s rational faculties.

Darwin stated ““With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind?”

If your mind came about by blind,nonrational processes, it would be impossible to have a coherent thought. You said that a rational mind would be advantageous, but a blind, unrational process would cause only a blind,unrational mind.

“So why are we capable of rational thought well quite frankly john I’m not sure we could survive without rational thought which is why we have it.”

We can agree that we could not survive without rational thought, which begs the question what happened to all the organisms that supposedly evolved before rational thought since they would not have had the rationality to know they had to reproduce?

If you say “they died” then there would have been no organisms to propagate. You’ve adopted a self-defeating worldview.

Mr. Mullen, and your other naturalist readers, let me ask.

If you believe your mind came about through evolution and natural selection,purely naturalistic,unguided processes, how do you know if you are evolved enough to have a rational thought? That may sound offensive to you, but I find it is a ligitimate question.

\”If your mind came about by blind,nonrational processes, it would be impossible to have a coherent thought. You said that a rational mind would be advantageous, but a blind, unrational process would cause only a blind,unrational mind.\”

Natural selection is not blind merely without conscious thought. And it\’s lack of consciousness does not make it irrational either in fact a human mind examining the process and the outcome of that process would conclude that it is entirely rational. I find it interesting that God does not have to explain were he obtained his rationality.

\”We can agree that we could not survive without rational thought, which begs the question what happened to all the organisms that supposedly evolved before rational thought since they would not have had the rationality to know they had to reproduce?

If you say “they died” then there would have been no organisms to propagate. You’ve adopted a self-defeating worldview.\”

You are familiar with asexual reproduction right? Reproduction for lower life forms can be broken down to a series of chemical reactions all instinctively performed seemingly without conscious thought. Even among humans the desire to reproduce is rarely if ever a rational decision but rather based upon our instinctive desire for sex coupled with our irrational emotions for another person, reproduction is quite possibly the worst example of a rational thought process.

I never said that all life forms require the ability to make rational decisions based upon a conscious thought process but rather that humans could not do without it because our survival as a species is largely based upon our intelligence in which rationality is a part.

\”Mr. Mullen, and your other naturalist readers, let me ask.

If you believe your mind came about through evolution and natural selection,purely naturalistic,unguided processes, how do you know if you are evolved enough to have a rational thought? That may sound offensive to you, but I find it is a ligitimate question.\”

Well Mr. Question, and all my supernaturalist readers. I know I am capable of rational thought because there are a set of criteria which state what is necessary for a thought to be rational, if I meet these criteria then I have achieved a rational thought meaning that I am capable of rational thought.

You might say an organism reproduced asexually, but that would have created an organism genetically identical to the parent and would not have added any new information. You also might try using the argument of “Gene duplication” but that is just that, duplication of existing information.

Without NEW information added to the organism, you’d have a series of repetitive organisms, anyway if I understand the theory of evolution as Darwin proposed it by the way,it would be unconscious and blind. I told you earlier even Darwin noted that if his theory be true,then the human mind would not be trustworthy somehow though you overlooked that point.

You might say an organism reproduced asexually, but that would have created an organism genetically identical to the parent and would not have added any new information. You also might try using the argument of “Gene duplication” but that is just that, duplication of existing information.

Without NEW information added to the organism, you’d have a series of repetitive organisms, Therefore if rationality was not already there, it would not exist at all.

Anyway if I understand the theory of evolution as Darwin proposed it by the way,it would be unconscious and blind. I told you earlier even Darwin noted that if his theory be true,then the human mind would not be trustworthy somehow though you overlooked that point.

Dear Jamie, you said “Natural selection is not blind merely without conscious thought.” You go on to say “it\’s lack of consciousness does not make it irrational either ”

If something is “without conscious thought” how can it NOT be blind and irrational?

In John’s comment section you yourself said it takes consciousness to be rational, you are contradicting yourself.

By the way Richard Dawkins claims Natural selection IS a “Blind Watchmaker” so what do you say to him?

Edit, Richard said {evolution} would be a blind watchmaker, how can something blind and unconscious create something both organised and functional?

From John’s comment section

“Nov 22, 2009 jamie mullen

“rational thought needs a consciousness. ”

and then

“Natural selection is not blind merely without conscious thought. And it\’s lack of consciousness does not make it irrational either”

As I said, you are contradicting yourself Jamie,

I see I am coming to this discussion a bit late in the game. Jamie, your article was very well written, although I disagree with you on every point.

I will just address one comment – that the evidence for gravity and wind is demonstrable, while the evidence for God is not.

You can use your rational mind to describe gravity and wind, but can you explain how gravity and wind came to be? It required a great deal of study by very intelligent minds over the centuries to come up with just a description of the observable phenomena of gravity and wind Still, the greatest minds with the best education cannot describe how gravity came to be.

To create the conditions of our planet, incredibly intricate and complex systems of gravity, the mixture of gases in our atmosphere, the planets winds, and the amazing DNA chain that connects every living organism on the planet has today with its ancestors at the beginning of time.

The more that scientists learn about us and our world and the universe, the more they realize that the theory of evolution just does not cut it. Someday they will acknowledge God.

Jamie, earlier I said you twisted what I said.
I suppose “Twisting” might not have been the right word, but you did not comprehend the point I was making and the comparisons were not “nonsensical” You cannot PHYSICALLY see God,gravity,or wind, but you CAN see (and feel) the EFFECTS of all three, that was my point.

If you didn’t understand, then frankly I don’t know what to tell you, Perhaps I should have explained my point better though.

Sorry

” Okay that’s enough god hating for today”

Jamie admits he is a Godhater, wow. You danced around that one a while Mr. Mullen, what made you finally admit it?

Anyway, It amazes me that Godhaters are so willing to berate people of faith even though the Godhaters believe they’re basically nothing but a cosmic accident.

\”You might say an organism reproduced asexually, but that would have created an organism genetically identical to the parent and would not have added any new information.\”

Mutations still occur with asexual reproduction, for instance bacteria reproduce asexually but they are still able to mutate defences against antibiotics. It is true that asexual reproduction produces less genetic diversity than sexual reproduction but natural selection still applies.

\”I told you earlier even Darwin noted that if his theory be true,then the human mind would not be trustworthy somehow though you overlooked that point. \”

I did not overlook it, I ignored it because you provided no background for the quote (the book it was written in,the page number ect.) without that for all I know you just made it up. If you provide that information in order for me to read the quote in its proper context then I will respond to it.

\”Dear Jamie, you said \”Natural selection is not blind merely without conscious thought.\” You go on to say \”it\\’s lack of consciousness does not make it irrational either \” In John\’s comment section you yourself said it takes consciousness to be rational, you are contradicting yourself. By the way Richard Dawkins claims Natural selection IS a \”Blind Watchmaker\” so what do you say to him?\”

Actually I did not contradict myself, I almost did but I corrected myself in a second post. Consciouness is necesarry for rational thought but something can appear to a human mind as rational without it being the product of rational thought.
Let\’s go back to the example of the bacteria mutating a resistance to antibiotics, this would appear to be a rational thing to do because if they don\’t mutate then the antibiotics would kill them.
If I was a bacteria capable of conscious rational thought I would do the exact same thing but as far as we know bacteria are not capable of conscious thought but they are still capable of doing things that we humans recognize as rational.

\”If something is \”without conscious thought\” how can it NOT be blind and irrational?\”

lets look at an example from the animal kingdom. We are all familiar with a deer caught in the headlights right, a deer crossing the road, upon seeing a cars headlights will freeze meaning that unless the driver has a very quick reflexes will be hit and probably killed.
This was not a rational act on the part of the deer but the only reason the deer froze is because it associated the car with a predator and if it had been a predator freezing and waiting for the predator to move very well could have saved the deers life and therefore would have been rational.
It is conceivable that deers may posses a rudimentary form of consciouness but clearly not enough to facilitate rational thought because if it did the deer population probably would have figured out that cars are not predators, but even without rational thought deer are still able to act occasionaly in a rational manner (it should be stated that in neither scenario is the deer blind it reacts to both in a different manner but it definately reacts to both meaning it could not be blind.)

The main advantage to humans having rational thought is that it allows for us to recognize and search out rational action meaning we react rationally more regularly than if we did not, its interesting to note thought that even with our abilty to use rational thought we often act rationally without using it.
For instance when you accidentally touch your hand to a red hot stove top I bet you don\’t stop to think about if you should remove your hand you just do it instinctively.

Also I don\’t think blind watchmaker is a very good way to describe evolution to tell you the truth because evolution is not blind and it does not posses a conscious plan which a watchmaker does.

\\\”You might say an organism reproduced asexually, but that would have created an organism genetically identical to the parent and would not have added any new information.\\\”

Mutations still occur with asexual reproduction, for instance bacteria reproduce asexually but they are still able to mutate defences against antibiotics. It is true that asexual reproduction produces less genetic diversity than sexual reproduction but natural selection still applies.

\\\”I told you earlier even Darwin noted that if his theory be true,then the human mind would not be trustworthy somehow though you overlooked that point. \\\”

I did not overlook it, I ignored it because you provided no background for the quote (the book it was written in,the page number ect.) without that for all I know you just made it up. If you provide that information in order for me to read the quote in its proper context then I will respond to it.

\\\”Dear Jamie, you said \\\”Natural selection is not blind merely without conscious thought.\\\” You go on to say \\\”it\\\\’s lack of consciousness does not make it irrational either \\\” In John\\\’s comment section you yourself said it takes consciousness to be rational, you are contradicting yourself. By the way Richard Dawkins claims Natural selection IS a \\\”Blind Watchmaker\\\” so what do you say to him?\\\”

Actually I did not contradict myself, I almost did but I corrected myself in a second post. Consciouness is necesarry for rational thought but something can appear to a human mind as rational without it being the product of rational thought.
Let\\\’s go back to the example of the bacteria mutating a resistance to antibiotics, this would appear to be a rational thing to do because if they don\\\’t mutate then the antibiotics would kill them.
If I was a bacteria capable of conscious rational thought I would do the exact same thing but as far as we know bacteria are not capable of conscious thought but they are still capable of doing things that we humans recognize as rational.

\\\”If something is \\\”without conscious thought\\\” how can it NOT be blind and irrational?\\\”

lets look at an example from the animal kingdom. We are all familiar with a deer caught in the headlights right, a deer crossing the road, upon seeing a cars headlights will freeze meaning that unless the driver has a very quick reflexes will be hit and probably killed.
This was not a rational act on the part of the deer but the only reason the deer froze is because it associated the car with a predator and if it had been a predator freezing and waiting for the predator to move very well could have saved the deers life and therefore would have been rational.
It is conceivable that deers may posses a rudimentary form of consciouness but clearly not enough to facilitate rational thought because if it did the deer population probably would have figured out that cars are not predators, but even without rational thought deer are still able to act occasionaly in a rational manner (it should be stated that in neither scenario is the deer blind it reacts to both in a different manner but it definately reacts to both meaning it could not be blind.)

The main advantage to humans having rational thought is that it allows for us to recognize and search out rational action meaning we react rationally more regularly than if we did not, its interesting to note thought that even with our abilty to use rational thought we often act rationally without using it.
For instance when you accidentally touch your hand to a red hot stove top I bet you don\\\’t stop to think about if you should remove your hand you just do it instinctively.

Also I don\\\’t think blind watchmaker is a very good way to describe evolution to tell you the truth because evolution is not blind and it does not posses a conscious plan which a watchmaker does.

“You might say an organism reproduced asexually, but that would have created an organism genetically identical to the parent and would not have added any new information.”

Mutations still occur with asexual reproduction, for instance bacteria reproduce asexually but they are still able to mutate defences against antibiotics. It is true that asexual reproduction produces less genetic diversity than sexual reproduction but natural selection still applies.

“I told you earlier even Darwin noted that if his theory be true,then the human mind would not be trustworthy somehow though you overlooked that point. ”

I did not overlook it, I ignored it because you provided no background for the quote (the book it was written in,the page number ect.) without that for all I know you just made it up. If you provide that information in order for me to read the quote in its proper context then I will respond to it.

“Dear Jamie, you said “Natural selection is not blind merely without conscious thought.” You go on to say “it’s lack of consciousness does not make it irrational either ” In John’s comment section you yourself said it takes consciousness to be rational, you are contradicting yourself. By the way Richard Dawkins claims Natural selection IS a “Blind Watchmaker” so what do you say to him?”

Actually I did not contradict myself, I almost did but I corrected myself in a second post. Consciouness is necesarry for rational thought but something can appear to a human mind as rational without it being the product of rational thought.
Let’s go back to the example of the bacteria mutating a resistance to antibiotics, this would appear to be a rational thing to do because if they don’t mutate then the antibiotics would kill them.
If I was a bacteria capable of conscious rational thought I would do the exact same thing but as far as we know bacteria are not capable of conscious thought but they are still capable of doing things that we humans recognize as rational.

“If something is “without conscious thought” how can it NOT be blind and irrational?”

lets look at an example from the animal kingdom. We are all familiar with a deer caught in the headlights right, a deer crossing the road, upon seeing a cars headlights will freeze meaning that unless the driver has a very quick reflexes will be hit and probably killed.
This was not a rational act on the part of the deer but the only reason the deer froze is because it associated the car with a predator and if it had been a predator freezing and waiting for the predator to move very well could have saved the deers life and therefore would have been rational.
It is conceivable that deers may posses a rudimentary form of consciouness but clearly not enough to facilitate rational thought because if it did the deer population probably would have figured out that cars are not predators, but even without rational thought deer are still able to act occasionaly in a rational manner (it should be stated that in neither scenario is the deer blind it reacts to both in a different manner but it definately reacts to both meaning it could not be blind.)

The main advantage to humans having rational thought is that it allows for us to recognize and search out rational action meaning we react rationally more regularly than if we did not, its interesting to note thought that even with our abilty to use rational thought we often act rationally without using it.
For instance when you accidentally touch your hand to a red hot stove top I bet you don’t stop to think about if you should remove your hand you just do it instinctively.

Also I don’t think blind watchmaker is a very good way to describe evolution to tell you the truth because evolution is not blind and it does not posses a conscious plan which a watchmaker does.

The Darwin quote was from
Charles Darwin to W. Graham, July 3, 1881, in The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, ed. Francis Darwin (1897; repr., Boston: Elibron, 2005), As for calling evolution a blind watchmaker, Richard Dawkins called it that so if you have issue with the term,we didn\’t come up with it…We believe in God, Dawkins is the one thinking you came about by blind chance.

Atheism insults human intelligence, and I don\’t understand for the life of me why someone who thinks they came from a primordial soup is berating someone else for believing we were CREATED with a purpose in mind.

Are you just angry that we don\’t view this world and existence as meaningless and that we find Love,Joy,and Peace and meaning where you see emptiness?

You might say \”I find meaning, my own\” but your worldview imprisons you to thinking you were ultimately an accident.

Your Godhating is what\’s blocking you from the life and blessings God has for you if you\’ll acknowledge Him.

I, for one, it seems, am completely with you on this. You’re quite brave taking on the god-squad—kudos!!
BTW–you can go in the forum any day and argue your case in a yes/no god thread.

I know that the blind watchmaker was from dawkins.

As far as berating goes john sent me these three points and asked for my thoughts which is what this article was I don’t consider that berating.

I find it interesting how you have completely abandoned the pretense of making a valid argument and have just started making ad hominem attacks.

I know other people who would delete your comment for not being constructive but luckily I’m not one of those people.

lol, i thought it was suppose to be a funny article, the comedic part on the talking syndrome, boy was I wrong.
Nice debates anyhow.