User:JDitto/archive

This page contains significant discussions I find important. Go ahead and look if you want

"Reality" page - edit

After looking into the article in question, I got myself involved in the biggest revert war (with vandals) that I've ever had.
Well, I call it the biggest revert war because not only did it involve numerous perpetrators,  (like this article [1] which
is the article I've edited the most so far) but also several articles. 
Any article that was spelled similar to Reality was fair game, including the Spanish football club Real Madrid. 
Bizarre, isn't it? --JDitto 16:35, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Hello,

I can't edit the "reality" page. I am trying to add something to it, however the talk page, and the "reality" page itself are both protected from editing. Is there anyway to get this unprotected, I couldn't find out how to ask for it to be unprotected so I am asking here? Can you unprotect it so that it can be edited? I have some actul productive information to add to the page.

PolarPenguin 06:58, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

It seems that that article was mentioned by a certain Kolbert (sp?) who is on TV sometimes. It also seems that whenever this gentleman(lady?) mentions any article on Wikipedia, people rush to vandalize it.V-Man737 07:03, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

The same vandals are hitting other pages like Vermont as well. The "Kolbert" is Steven Colbert as far as I know. The children who are causing the vandalism should be going to bed in a few hours so you can make your changes then. The article will most likely only be protected for a short time. Dismas|^(talk) 07:12, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Shhhh! I was feigning ignorance for the sake of satire. ;-) V-Man737 07:36, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Come back in 2 days; the article will be unprotected by then. Carson 07:39, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Poison Dart Frogs and Communication

Originating from this ref desk question [2], the following is compiled from the User:24.147.86.187 talk page and 
my talk page. This [possibly still ongoing] conversation has been the longest discussion I've ever been to.
Instead of putting it all together on my talk page and filling it up, I believe it's much better to put it here.
--JDitto 16:35, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

You said that black and yellow animals invites mimicry, "which proves the evolutionary point even more so". For the record, having a yellow and black pattern 'code' for poison point to a Intelligent Creator, doesn't it? --JDitto 21:41, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh come off it JDitto! That sort of thing is very easy to evolve. (Clarification. That sort of thing evolves very easily. It evolves easily from first principles. A little thought easily reveals the way in which it can evolve. Clear?) Or are you being sarcastic? Skittle 23:01, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Personally I find it rather amusing that one would assume that an intelligent creator would create intentionally deceptive animals, just as I find it amusing that an intelligent creator would create, say, parasites. I find the "red in tooth and claw" model of evolution to be much more compelling in such instances — all it requires is that there be a little dynamism in the system and it will, on its own, end up with all sorts of unintuitive competitive strategies like mimicy, parasitism, and deception (and, on the more positive side, cooperation and gregariousness, among other things).

But I am fine with acknowledging that how one would interpret that sort of thing depends largely on one's starting point of view, in this case anyway (there are simply many assertions made by creationists and intelligent design advocates which are factually and logically incorrect, and that is not a matter of point of view, in my view). Darwin would see it as a marvelous version of evolution in act; Asa Gray would see it as a beautiful God-made language of life (that still played out in an evolutionary context, mind you). (I am assuming you are not asking me what the evolutionary interpretation of mimicry would be. If you are, the article on mimicry gives a fairly cogent set of interpretations of how different forms of mimicry are thought to potentially evolve.)

But still — why make ticks? Why make wasps that paralyze prey and have their larvae feast on it while it still lives? Why not make a more peaceful world? Either God loves violence, or the behavior of nature isn't how He expresses himself, in my view. But again, that's just one point of view — I don't intend it to be a rigorous argument, it is just an explanation of why I find that particular interpretation problematic. The evolutionary one, while perhaps troubling in its implications, carries no such logical problems in it for me — nasty things happen because they are, in some short or long term way, advantageous to the one being nasty. Once the system gets going (say God pushed it into being, if you want — it makes no difference), it operates on its own accord, according to the raw laws of nature. Makes a lot more sense to me than an interventionist deity who creates equal parts ugly with the beauty. --24.147.86.187 22:28, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

"Very easy to evolve"? What does that mean?

24, with all due respect, my view does not state that God created parasites with the original intention of using them for harm. God did not create evil--but He created the potential for it. He made us with free will, so we could choose whether or not to love Him. (If we had no choice, that wouldn't be love.)

However, the first people, Adam and Eve, chose to disobey God, making the rest of man imperfect. Since God is perfect, we're separated from God. The only way to be "perfect" once again is for someone blameless to take the punishment for us. Jesus did that.

You're right in saying it's violent for parasites to take advantage of hosts like that, but it's not impossible to think that even parasites too were once living harmoniously with us. [3] --JDitto 01:21, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

All I mean by "very easy to evolve" is "it does not take much of an intellectual leap of faith to see how that sort of property would evolve, if you saw natural selection as plausible." And free will works great as an explanation when you are talking about humans and other rational agents — I don't see how the tick has any free will. There is no non-violent option for the tick. It can't exactly decide to "change its lifestyle." It is what it is "programmed" to do. There's no plausible way that ticks in the days before The Fall would have been dining on anything else. The question is, who programmed it to be like that? A God that enjoys ticks, or a Nature that rewards those that find creative ways to survive? Even if ticks emerged after The Fall — which would contradict any literal reading of the Bible that I am aware of — it would still have been God that created them and made them bloodthirsty—gave them the hooks, the digestive systems that can proceed only blood, gave them the insticts which allows them to use their highly-specialized bodies to do a highly-specialized task. Man doesn't know how to do that, I'm afraid.

Anyway, I think if you find the Genesis story to be less of an intellectual leap than naturalism, we're probably not going to have very much to share with one another—to me the Genesis story has all of the hallmarks of a classic origin myth. Which doesn't mean it can't be useful — as a close friend of mine, a priest, has said, you don't have to believe the myth is true to live out its implications; Aesop's fables don't have be literal representations of the past in order to give important insights into what sorts of beings we are. I don't believe that the world was created in the way it describes it in Genesis, and I don't believe it was created in the way it is described in countless other myths, but that doesn't mean it lacks all value, of course.

But I do find it amusing that you use an evolutionary argument to try and support the idea of a benevolent tick or a benevolent parasitic wasp. I find it a little implausible—it seems like a pretty ad hoc way to deal with the problem of non-human "evil". I should probably note don't think ticks are "evil" in a real sense — they do what they have evolved to do. Their actions only become a moral issue, in my mind, if you try to explain them as reflections of the eye of an intervening God. If you push God's role up to that of a steward, though, that would remove the problem, but it would also require a self-consciously interpretive reading of the Bible. The other way out is, of course, to say that it is some extremely subtle part of God's plan, one that we can't possibly fathom, but I find that a little less intellectually honest than just proclaiming, "I DON'T KNOW!" and giving up on it. Which I think is honestly an acceptable answer, one that applies to many "scientific" questions as well. --24.147.86.187 05:36, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

sinned the whole world was cursed along with us. However, like man, Jesus provides hope for the 'creation' while going through 'futility'. [4] The "hooks, the digestive systems that can proceed only blood", is it possible that these systems arose after the world plunged into imperfection (through mutation, not evolution), just as like how humans' imperfect genes can give rise to people born with disorders? [5]

While it's quite true that a myth can provide valuable morals, taking the Bible as truth gives it more authority since that means we have a God to be accountable to. Therefore, it provides more reason for the world to remain in order, rather than having a "red in tooth and claw" attitude.

You've already undermined my view by repeatedly saying that your view is more "plausible" and applies to many scientific questions as well. I'm afraid that no matter how many times you say that your view is more "scientific", that we are not dealing with science. To investigate "the nature, causes, or principles of reality, knowledge, or values, based on logical reasoning rather than emprical methods" is the branch of philosophy. We can't scientifically explain the past, because science only works in the present. You cannot prove in a laboratory how life evolved in millions of years, or in my view, how God created everything. I realize that some have tried to create life from non-life by trying to simulate the random chance of evolution in a controlled environment (see the article on Origin of Life), but they are controversial and full of hypotheses. If I have still not convinced you please take a special look at this step of evolution: [6]

However, what we're doing is looking at the same thing yet having two different interpretations. For example, we both observe similarities between species from different kingdoms (eg poisonous frogs and wasps) and you say, "It does not take much of an intellectual leap of faith to see how that sort of property would evolve, if you saw natural selection as plausible." However, I say, "Look, their similarities not just in colour, but also the warning those colours share, indicate a common Designer." --JDitto 00:19, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, that was an interesting exchange of words. Hah, because of it, I completely forgot about the original question from which this discussion stemmed from! I only saw that wink recently, and the sight of it really made me laugh. Thank you for the conversation, you had really challenged my viewpoint and I had to look up quite a bit of stuff. Speaking of which, I should probably finish cleaning my closet now... :D --JDitto 05:18, 8 August 2007 (UTC)