If you aren’t reading Michael Flynn’s blog…

…you really should give it a look. Especially right now. Be forewarned, it will stretch your brain, possibly past break point.

Here’s a nice tidbit:

Thus intemperance severs the linkage between what we want and what we know. Each person judges his own desires to be good, even when this contradicts the universal judgement of reason. I would like to eat whatever I want and not get fat; but reason tells me I cannot. Reason tells me that for a healthy body, I should eat this and not that, and this much but not that much.(****) We recognize the moral dimension of this when we say “That food is bad for you.” On the other hand, someone who wants to eat can rationalize pigging out. So intemperance eventually becomes habituated.

He is relentlessly awesome.

Thank You, Mike Flynn

…for this excellent essay on evolution and creation versus evolutionism and creationism. In one simple, well written essay he states the argument that I’ve been trying for years to find the right words to express. I bet he banged this out in an hour, then went out for a beer, which is why he’s the world famous science fiction author and I’m… me.

This does get rather involved in Aristotle’s four causes, so if you are completely unfamiliar, some perusing of this wikipedia article may help.

Also the pun in the essay’s title is truly terrible, once you finally get it.

What has always bothered me, and what I have always tried to express is how fundamentally stupid the debate between evolution and creation is. I’ve always found this very intuitive, yet impossible to explain. It’s like comparing apples and doorknobs. I’ve started writing on this topic many times, but I’ve never been able to express it as well as he just did, so excuse me if I quote at length:

You cannot draw a metaphysical conclusion from the physics. But it is baldly asserted by evolutionists that the “fact” of evolution has “proven” God unnecessary. This is as if the fact of the piano and the physics of vibrating strings “proves” there is no need for the pianist, as the music has been completely explained by the acoustics. One suspects that a step is missing.

You cannot draw a metaphysical conclusion from the physics. But it is baldly asserted by IDers that the “fact” of irreducible complexity has “proven” a Designer necessary.
The statement is silly on several levels. First of all, in philosophy God is not an hypothesis put forward to explain particular physical phenomena. Oh, wait. I am repeating myself. It’s almost as if they were mirror images of…. Well, ah, hmm. Let’s continue.

And with these two opening paragraphs, he lays out the crux of each argument and highlights just why they are so stupid. They are mirror images of taking data from one discipline and attempting to force a conclusion in a completely different discipline. The idea is just bizarre. We can’t prove something about gene expression from protein activity (or vice versa!) and these things are even in the same field.

And then there’s this delicious little tidbit:

…evolution of whatever stripe is only “moving matter around.” Something that has the form of an ape changes into something that has the form of a man. Matter is transformed; it is not brought into being. Creation otoh is continuous and from nothing. It is not something that happened long ago; it is happening right now. It is not a hypothesis explaining how something apelike became something manlike. Rather it explains how nature has the power to do that in the first place.

This is something I have never been able to successfully express before. Evolution presupposes creation. Something must first exist, in order for it to evolve.

It is true that I tend to slip into the ID “God as extremely efficient cause” language. To this, I can only plead ignorance of metaphysical language, and state that Mr. Flynn’s essay distinguishes what I was attempting to express much better than I have ever done on my own. I could not express the distinction myself, because I did not understand that there was such a thing metaphysics

Philosophy, Meet Knitting

Knitting flat objects is unnatural.

Knitting’s final cause is to conserve warmth, a goal best achieved via knitting garments. Well, the human body is, in physical shape, a variety of tubes. Why should you knit flat things and seam them when you can inherently knit tubes?

This abasement of logic is brought to you by the letter constant c and my desperate need for another cup of coffee.

One Year Older…

…one year closer to menopause.

It’s been four months since I’ve posted, and a very rough four months it’s been. Summed up, 2 valley weddings, 2 gaming weekends, 1 graduation party, 1 camping trip to colorado, 1 friend’s new baby, 1 baptism, 2 nasty colds, 2 summer students at work, an unpleasant encounter with my former NFP teacher, innumerable embroidery projects, and miscarriage number two. I feel like I’ve been saving up all my leftover cheerfulness for when I’m around others so that I don’t depress the people I’m around.

And at work, Nosy persists on talking about all the women who’ve had babies over the summer and how much weight they’ve already lost. And she will not take a hint. Heck, I could be blunt and she wouldn’t get that either.

I don’t have time to write much now, but I felt like I had to jump right back in and say something.

Today is also my (for lack of better words) niece’s sixth birthday. Happy Birthday sweetie, though I know you’ll never read this.

[Edit] I didn’t mention how old I got, I just turned 27. It’s so not fair to feel young and old at the same time.