How does nature know?

“‘If we take in our hand any volume: of divinity or school of metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames; For it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.’ [Hume] If, in order to be meaningful, a statement must be either mathematically sustained or scientifically verifiable, then David Hume’s statement itself is meaningless. It is a philosophical solvent that dissolves itself. The emperor has no clothes, while boasting the finest threads,” (*p.63).

“…the statistical probability of forming even a single enzyme, the building block of the gene, which is in turn the building block of the cell, is 1 in 10^40,000. The translation of that figure is that it would require more attempts for the formation of one enzyme than there are atoms in all the stars of all the galaxies in the entire known universe,” (*p.65).

“How does a universe, which itself developed from nothing, impart into every human strand of DNA enough specific information to cover six hundred thousand pages of information from nothing?” (*p. 66).

"Think of this for a moment. In eighteen milliliters of water (about two swallows full), there are 6 x 10^23 molecules of H2O. How much is 6 x 10^23? A good computer can carry out ten million counts per second. It would take that computer two billion years to count to 6 x 10^23.

“Look at it another way. A stack of five hundred sheets of paper is two to three inches high. How high would the stack be if it had 6 x 10^23 sheets? That stack would reach from the earth to the sun, not once, but more than one million times,” (*p. 80-81).

*All quotes above from Ravi Zacharias’ “Jesus Among Other Gods” (Thomas Nelson, 2000).

Spiders know how to make webs, birds know how to make nests, salmon and other animals know how to migrate, and many other animals just know what they are supposed to do without having to learn – and we wonder at how they know…but nature knows how to make spiders, birds, and all the rest of the living, breathing animals…including human beings with all of our thoughts and art and science and… is it not reasonable to ask: “How does nature know?” Are not living things more awesome artifacts than webs and nests?

Webs for spiders and nests for birds, I understand. But what evolutionary purpose does the evolution of living things serve… for nature?

Go here: goldennumber.net

[size=75][disclaimer: not equating God with scientifically manipulatable nature ][/size]

Technically, nature doesn’t “know”. One could also say that birds and spiders also do not technically “know”. Nature is a being… many beings… like birds and spiders… but it is also just stuff like nests and webs… Or would you say birds and spiders are not beings, either… that they are also just stuff like nests and webs… the question still remains… how can nature do life… how can birds and spiders do nests and webs… especially if they don’t technically “know”?

To me the machinistic nature of nature is like the paint of a painter – and God is the painter, and we are His co-painters (maybe this is why there is randomness… to squeeze in all the creative efforts into the machinery… through the pores of randomness).

There is no rational explanation for a prophet receiving the future if both A) past, present, and future are fixed (necessary to accept when accepting fulfilled prophecy) and B) there is no God to inform the prophet of the future. Why? Because if the past, present, and future are fixed, they cannot “unfix” without God’s allowing it. Prophecy is a form of unfixing, in that a prophet is informed of the future, rather than the future being beyond the prophet. [And I am not talking about coincidences, good guesses or manipulating states of affairs so that they come about the way they are ‘predicted’ to come about.] This won’t have any meaning for you if you have never experienced fulfilled prophecy, or don’t have faith in the fulfilled prophecy of the Bible. But – if there is fulfilled prophecy (if you can grant that), that means the past, present, and future are fixed, and there is a God to inform the prophet of the future. If there is no God – then one is justified in asking for an explanation. If there IS a God, however, it makes perfect sense. And there is a God.

If the past still exists to the future, and the future still exists to the past – is the matter of the future the same matter of the past… does the ‘no energy is created or destroyed’ law apply to the whole universe… where does the past/future matter exist, or is the past matter also the now and future matter?

Everything said about fulfilled prophecy could and has been said about all “created somethings” – if there is no God, there is something missing from the picture that the picture implies by its mere existence. It is an absurdity to even think “if there is no God”.

The only thing left is to say the past, present, and future are not fixed, and explain how the future leaked into the past (present) (via the prophet’s mind)… and why, everytime it does that, it just somehow comes out sounding like a message from God!

If the universe always existed (and that is not proven), it doesn’t need a creator for its existence but it needs a creator for the fact that the past/present/future are mixed. Why it exists (whether or not it always existed or had a beginning) still seems to be a good question to me.

If stuff is spontaneously coming into existence to this day, there is the question of how (since it hasn’t always existed, it needs a creator). It would be kinda funny if the quirky results of all the experiments quantum physicists are doing are examples of God messing around… and them never being able to figure that out. Talk about hilarious.

Even if you insist the material universe always existed – the mixing (of past, present, future) is creative action on the part of the Creator. Therefore, the universe is created and needs a Creator… but the Creator is not created and therefore does not need a Creator. As the Transcendent, He is the “More beyond which there is no more,” [338, Introduction to Philosophy / A Christian Perspective (Geisler, Feinberg)]. We are commanded to examine everything and hold on to that which is good. God is “that which is good”. God is what you get at the end of all the examining. There comes a point when you rest in that.

I think it’s pretty cool that humans can’t make life from scratch, the way the universe can. We can only reproduce the already existent raw material, naturally or with technology (test tube, cloning) – but never once have we made life from scratch. We do not have tools tiny enough for such a big project.

And I wonder if any human has considered making conditions favorable in some part of space in order to birth a star? Yeah right, like we’ll ever be able to do that. All we can do is watch the Master.

Perhaps aproaching statistics from a reverse order may need to be done with life. Life is more vast than what is on this mud puddle of a planet. Just the puny expeditions to space so far have shown that. meteorites that have landed here have shown some interesting things too. so perhaps we need to aproach from the opposite. Calibrate from existance not from nothing. i don’t beleive this has been done yet. it would be interesting to see how it is skewed from other studies. Perhaps by squaring studies answers may be found.

It doesn’t know. It is NOT a being. The universe just f*s sh up in random places, at random times, in random times, for random reasons.

Kriswest – I think it would be really awesome to find life in other parts of the universe. How that would be done, I have no idea. But it would be cool to see how God interacts with it. It would be cool to find out if angels are a form of such life.

ftheunion – Yeah. One could also say that birds and spiders also do not technically “know”. Nature is a being, though… many beings… like birds and spiders… but it is also just stuff like nests and webs… Or would you say birds and spiders are not beings, either… that they are also just stuff like nests and webs… the question still remains… how can nature do life… how can birds and spiders do nests and webs… especially if they don’t technically “know”?

Random reasons, eh? Hm. How does nature… reason, then, wouldya say?

In time we will find life on other planets… God of now as some know him will be in the future a God myth of the past…

Presumably, nature doesn’t “know” or “intend” anything. It’s all blind mechanism, with things, such as the delicate balance of cellular biology, coming about by random chance and the laws of physics (Stenger).

Given this, everything about human beings and human choice and will, if God does not exist—come about by constantly occurring mechanical accident.

I accidentally posted this post, for example, due to the interaction between the physical environment and my physical brain, accidentally possessing the neural capacity to post this post.

Jay M. Brewer
superchristianity.com

Well you might say that we have a microcosm of the universe here on earth. There are many things we may never comprehend about this world.

We know energies exist, we can’t see some of them but, through our bodies and with specific equipment we can feel them and measure them.
Not all of us can feel these energies, for what ever reason some can.
How do creatures know an earthquake or Tsunami is about to happen? They probably can sense vibrations of energy undectable to us, well most of us.

We at this point of our education must use the only tools we have to begin our studies of the universe. We must use these crude tools to build more sophisticated ones. then use those to build the next generation of tools., etc…

If a creator did all of this then we must presume that it had tools available to it far greater then we can imagine. Even thought is a tool, don’t forget that.

Directed energy and thought put together with a plan can possibly do wonders and appear as magic, but, its not it is just science. Remove sophistry of philosophy and theology, think like an engineer or mechanic.

Really, try it… Start mentally taking things apart. It does give you a new perspective. Look at the single cell organisms as tiny machines. Don’t make the mistake of thinking machines all have purpose, forget that part, it will only hinder you. Take those cells apart in your head and organize the parts as an engineer or mechanic would.What do you think about when you see it this way? What do you see? What do you understand?

Work your way up the ladder of matter and all existance known, theorized, faith and unimagined. It will be informative.

I don’t really understand this. Can you explain it? The best I can understand, you’re saying ‘take all the life-data of the universe into account and then see if the life-data on earth measures up’ – how is that possible? So that must not be what you are saying. So… what are you saying?

Why might one say that, besides the stuff in the OT about the temple on earth representing the temple in heaven, etcetera? Is that what you’re talking about?

You’re talking about electromagnetic energy only, right?

This is anti-life, anti-truth, and anti-love. Just pray (to God). And pray (to God) together. That sort of magic might be science, but it ain’t physical/natural science. Play with fire, get burned.

I like taking things apart, and it is not informative relevant to this thread (why don’t you cut to the chase and tell me the information?). Every machine has purpose, except vestigial organs (and they once did have purpose) – if you didn’t want me to think about it, why did you “prime” it? You’re not working your way up a ladder when you take things apart, you’re working your way down… or in, rather. You can’t work with the “unimagined” – it doesn’t exist. Your grammar in the sentence in bold makes it hard to understand you.

– phenomenal_grafitti

LOL! There was a section of Zacharias’ book that I was going to quote, but I didn’t thoroughly understand it, so I didn’t quote it. It was something about Hume objecting to the first-cause argument because it takes from math (when causality was en vogue, or something) and applies to philosophy – but the same thing is done when quantum theorists apply randomness to … . yadda yadda yadda I got lost at that point.

joekoba

God is not a myth, and He is eternal. Thanks for sharing your opinion.

Nature knows because it is a machine, all things, energies, matter molecules, etc… are all machines, machines within machines.

Not all machines have an overt purpose, some have seemingly no fathomable purpose what so ever. What purpose does a singe grain of silicate serve? One blade of grass? They are redundant machines with no real purpose other than redundancy. If you remove either will a catastrophe happen? A break down of some sort? What is the larger machine that those two things are a part of? Why so many redundancies? Then what is the next machine?

You have full belief in a God, that seems apparent from your statement.

All things in this universe are machines of one type or another. Even a God.

If all machines have purpose then what is God’s purpose? God would be a natural machine and you said all machines have purpose. Well, What possible reasons could its purpose be?

You want me to give you information, I want you to explore within yourself and find answers. The answers you seek can’t be handed to each other we each must find our own. We can share but, my answers may not fit you, chances are pretty good they won’t. That is one way how we grow. We share and try things that may or may not suit.

Within you, you already know and understand a part of how nature does know.

You are asking a question that would take thousands of years and thousands upon thousands of people working daily to find an exact encompassing answer.
We can find parts of it within ourselves. That is the best we can hope for. Until humanity can devote its resources to finding the answer.

Oh and yes animals theoretically sense electromagnetic energy as do we. But, what about energies we don’t know about yet?

For me, how nature knows, is as simple as a machine that has no overt purpose. It is all experimental or prototype. Nothing is what it will be. there is no telling what things will be. And though your God may have a purpose in mind and may be all knowing, all wise and all powerful in the end, your God is just a machine too. To know the purpose of nature in conjunction with your god, one would have to know the purpose of a creator. And that ain’t happening anytime soon.

But that is where I stand. It will not be where you stand.

God is the creator, not the creation. While intimately interacting with His creation, He is distinct from it. I don’t think He would object to being called a machine, in the sense that He operates according to rules (like logic). I like the way Zacharias mentioned “the love that defines all loves” – you could replace the word “love” and “loves” with the word “purpose”… to me the machinistic nature of nature is like the paint of a painter – and God is the painter, and we are His co-painters (maybe this is why there is randomness… to squeeze in all the creative efforts into the machinery… through the pores of randomness). I think that God has revealed Himself and the purpose of life to us, and I understand you have an adverse reaction to that, perhaps for very good reasons that have nothing actually to do with God as He really is.

I can’t really say anything about energies we don’t yet know exist. I’m sure there’s a lot to the universe we have yet to learn. I don’t need help from any magic-science or unidentified energies, because I already know the only One whose help I need… and He has warned against those other things. Going after those other things is settling for less, and I know people who went into it innocently enough, but coming away from it was hell. Daring kids often say “aw, Mom” when their proverbial party-pooper tells them not to play with fire, until they get burned. The same is true here.

<><

So did you want to discuss how nature knows or do you want to preach?
I can just kick back and let you preach if that is what you want, its cool by me.

If you’re asking why evolution occurs, then the simple answer is “We don’t know.”

If you’re saying that God is the reason it occurs, then my reply would be “whatever helps you sleep at night.”

I’m not going to attribute God to quantum physics just because we have no idea how it works.

Sorry if I missed your point.

Ichthus,

You start with a tired statistical claim that has been shown as a fallacy for years.

Look carefully at the last statement. Creationists conveniently ignore the the fact their statistics refer to a single occurance when the reality is that there would have been millions of evolutionary ‘experiments’ occurring simultaneously.

You might want to do further homework. The above quote was found at: talkorigins.org/origins/faqs … nists.html

You imply in your question that nature has ultimate purpose. It doesn’t.

tentative, you’ve mistaken this thread for one on creationism, I think. Neither is this thread about evolution (dorkydood).

The quote (inside tentative’s post) is not mine.

And, if I’m not mistaken, the Watchtower is a Jehovah’s Witness magazine. (I’m not a Jehovah’s Witness, in case you think I am.)

I’m not going to do any homework on this issue because it is not one I am interested in. However life happened, it’s a miracle that there’s anything at all (see my signature).

You sound pretty confident about that.

It’s weird. I was just skimming the Creative Writing thread the other day and you were quoting from the Bible in full agreement with it. Then you reply to my thread and it’s a complete 180. Do I have something in my teeth?

– kriswest

If you approached creation with the same sense of awe as I do, you would not consider it preaching, but conversation. If it does not appeal to your ears, perhaps it will appeal to others’ who will hear it the way it was meant… If you don’t like the conversation, kick back in a different thread – that’s what I’d do if I were you, but it’s up to you, of course.

Ichthus,

This is the quote from your OP. If you don’t recognize this as creationist argument, what were you trying to say? I think you are either being duplicitous or simply unaware when you say this thread has nothing to do with creationism or evolution. The intent of your quote was to prove that only GOD could create life. If you meant something else, by all means, please explain.

Your not going to do any homework? OK. Ignorance is another way to get through the day.

Yes, I’m quite confident that nature has no ultimate purpose. What we have learned and are learning is that life goes about its business without any necessary input from humans or any human-assigned “agency”.

Quoting from the bible? Oh yes, I often quote or reference things from a variety of sources if I think there is wisdom there. The bible has much wisdom as do a few other sources. There was no “180” in my statement in your thread. The subjects and context weren’t connected in any way.

Do you have something in your teeth? No idea, but I would guess that you’re biting at air…

creation is just mere science and while it is a marvel and full of intrigue. I have no sense of Awe for it, just apreciation and love for it.

I will kick back some where else thank you.

Whether or not the quotes were used to argue for God’s creating life, I was using the quotes to stand in awe. Since when is water “life”? Water is just water.

Of course God created life. He created the entire universe, beginning to end. He’s creating it now. How? I have no idea.

This thread is not arguing in favor of anything. This thread is standing in awe of the Creator’s work. I start off pointing out that it is okay to talk about these things, that it is still meaningful conversation… rather than sophistry and illusion to be committed to the flames, as Hume would say.

You admire Rembrandt or Picasso, and you express that admiration. Shakespeare is so admired that people question if he did it all himself. I admire God – and this thread is an expression of that.

– kriswest

Cool. See ya.

So you’re coming onto a philosophy forum, stating that the thread is dedicated to the awe you feel for the “Creator’s work,” and then not expecting any discussion at the huge assumption you’ve just slipped in? Excuse me, creator’s work? Whatchu talkin’ 'bout Willis?

I like to marvel at the complexity of nature too. I stand in awe, the way Einstein did, at the universe. How else could one view it? But when you attribute it to a Creator, in a religious philosophy forum, there’s going to be trouble, because most of us aren’t going to swallow that pill without good reason.

Something exists, rather than nothing.

You tell me why.

While you’re thinking of the answer… (and “it just happened” or “it’s always just been happening” is not a reasonable answer)…

Isn’t it cool how we are self-conscious paint… we are part of the picture and can arrange ourselves within the picture… that’s … wow!

I wish I was more eloquent. I mean, I pray I become more eloquent. But, not too eloquent.

Ichthus,

You really need to think about what you’re saying:

Really? And other than your obviously superior opinion, you know this for fact in what way?

Saying you’re in awe of the universe and the only possible explanation is God is an opinion, but you haven’t shown a shred of “reason” beyond that opinion.

To get out of a hole you must first stop digging.