[MD] tiny skull... change... nothingness...

[David M]

Hi DMB

Can I just thank who ever it is giving you homework
and scaling your emails down to human proportions.

Please pass on my thanks. Hope you enjoy your
studies.

David M


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "david buchanan" <dmbuchanan at hotmail.com>
To: <moq_discuss at moqtalk.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 14, 2006 6:22 PM
Subject: Re: [MD] tiny skull... change... nothingness...


> Micha, Ham and all MOQers:
>
> I think I agree with Micha on both points. As I understand it, the MOQ 
> says
> that experience is reality, which is a way of saying that humanity is the
> measure of all things. Human reality is the only one we get. But I also
> wanted to point out that so-called "intelligent design" makes no sense. 
> The
> idea here is that the structure of reality exhibits a level of complexity
> such that it couldn't have emerged through pure chance. Its says an
> intelligent designer is the best way to explain the beauty and harmony of
> nature. This is totally bogus. All that is accomplished by this lame idea 
> is
> that it pushes the question back. It merely shifts the problem to an
> inscrutible metaphysical realm. I mean, if the universe is too complex to
> exist without an intelligent designer, then the intelligent designer must 
> be
> even more complex. How then do you explain the existence of this designer?
> Are we supposed to think that the creator was created by another creator 
> and
> so on in an infinite regression of intelligent designers? See, the
> intelligent design theory is logically flawed in a serious way, it doesn't
> help to explain anything and it actually makes the problem worse.
>
> I think the apparent harmony and design of the universe is much less
> mysterious from the human-centered perspective, were these beautiful
> patterns are actually of our own making. We don't discover this grand 
> design
> so much as we create it in the ways we choose to slice up and categorize
> things. I mean, the harmony of the crystaline spheres is no longer taken
> seriously by astronomers, but we've been trying to express the universe in
> terms of mathematical precision since the Pythagorian mystics. E=mc2 and 
> all
> that. But I think one of the MOQ's "big ideas" is that Newton didn't
> discover the law of gravity so much as he invented it.
>
> Somebody asked Pirsig if apples obeyed the law of gravity before Newton's
> invention. Pirsig said something like, "no, apples just fell".
>
> Okay, back to my homework.
>
> dmb
>
>
> Micha said:
>>The universe is neither intelligent, nor designed - it is. What design the
>>universe could have been is a misapplication of mathematical probability.
>>Before the fact there are probabilities, after the fact there are
>>certainties. The universe is. You anthropomorphize when you say the
>>universe
>>is intelligently designed, or could be. Which brings us to the certainty -
>>"man is the measure of all things". This is so simple, that it is easily
>>misunderstood, but even here, in this forum, we are attempting to be the
>>measure of reality, although most cannot see that - the need to deny the
>>truth of the statement "man is the measure of all things" through deities,
>>extraterrestrials, or alternative realities is stunning, and for me
>>incomprehensible and yet it is undeniable. But I cannot know the truth of
>>that statement for you, you must see it for yourself. My earlier posts on
>>this subject were an attempt to establish a starting point for a 
>>discussion
>>on Quality and Pirsig, which was Pirsig's starting point, and yet
>>completely
>>lost on those here - strange...in a Pirsig forum. But without 
>>understanding
>>of that initial statement, you cannot have a meaningful conversation on
>>Pirsig, so I will no longer try. I'll just monitor the fumbling, until the
>>lights are finally turned on, which of course assumes knowledge of light
>>and
>>that appears to be a stretch. ...So long, and thanks for the fish!
>
> Micah asked:
> The universe is intelligently designed? Compared to what other design?
>
> Ham replied:
> What other design can you compare it with?  Any design you come up with is
> included in the universe or is made possible by it.
>
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