The second law of thermodynamic

[Bread_of_Life]

Shane,

Yes, that's right, I'm a pawn of Satan come to destroy the lambs of God, just like WhysoBlind says.

No, actually, I'm not. WhysoBlind would like to think I am, because he's disastrously lost several arguments with me. Don't worry about him, he's just a wee bit bitter.

I'm here primarily to educate people about science. That's important, especially among the American evangelical Christian community. It's important everywhere in fact.

On this post though, which started scientific, I got into an argument with JLW about epistemology (Occam's Razor), first causes, probability, the concept of design, and finally about the concepts of infinity and zero. These sort of diversions often happen on Christian forums, and I welcome them, science can get repetitive after a while!

My nickname "Scientificatheist" makes it clear to everyone what I am - so that noone can be confused. I'm an atheist, and a scientist. Some atheists on the boards put a disclaimer before their posts warning people that they're atheists, not me! Don't have to! Pretty obvious from the handle.

horizoneast

I didn't know you were a calvanist? Well, as protestant as predeterminism, as they say where I come from!

[Gerioke]

Isnt't that Hawking fellow a believer?

Entropy what a word.

sounds like ant droppings

How do they get the caramel into the caramilk bar?

[Shane]

Scientific Athiest.

Please do not misinterpret this message, I mean it in the kindest way possible.

Your wisdom and all your worldly studies will not carry you 1 SECOND past the day you leave this world. You may think you have one every argument you have had on this board but on the day you leave this world you will realize that you have lost every single one. And you willl wish you truly gave God a chance

I get the impression that you are here just to argue and will therefore not truly look into both positions as you should. We may have a few quirky folks on the board with some strange ideas and you may think we are fools and unintelectual in our thinking but allas God has spoken about this.

Rom 1:22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools,

1Co 3:19 For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, "He catches the wise in their craftiness,"

Mans wisdom will never match Gods.

1Co 1:18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

1Co 1:19 For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart."

1Co 1:20 Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

1Co 1:21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.

1Co 1:22 For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom,

1Co 1:23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,

1Co 1:24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

1Co 1:25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

1Co 1:26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.

1Co 1:27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;

1Co 1:28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,

1Co 1:29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

1Co 1:30 He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and sanctification and redemption.

1Co 1:31 Therefore, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord."

1Co 2:1 And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom.

1Co 2:2 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

1Co 2:3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling,

1Co 2:4 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,

1Co 2:5 that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

1Co 2:6 Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away.

1Co 2:7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory.

1Co 2:8 None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

1Co 2:9 But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him"--

1Co 2:10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.

1Co 2:11 For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

1Co 2:12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.

1Co 2:13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.

1Co 2:14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

1Co 2:15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one.

1Co 2:16 "For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.

If you really do want to understand a bit more about us and what we believe read these passages above properly for once and start reading the Bible and a few good Christian books not the junk that is out there. Try Esword on the net and download an ESV and a Matthew Henry commentary. Take your nose out the science books a bit, and give God a decent chance. If you dont you will be the loser in the end, and what a loss that would be, I truly shudder at the thought and I will keep you in my prayers.

And no these are not just nice words like many so called Christians they are meant and you truly will be in my prayers.

God bless you my friend

[Bread_of_Life]

horizoneast

Sorry I was absent for a while mate, got an offer of a new job - so I've had the arduous task of breaking the news to my current employers (who took it badly, they'd just offered me a promotion, so I guess that figures), and filling out all the forms etc for the new job.

Only thought you were a calvanist because I've only ever heard them talking about God's "elect".

Also, just to make it clear, I'm not a atheist because Anthony Flew was, or anyone else famous. If I were the only person in the world to believe what I believe, I would still believe it - because it is right, not because it is famous or celebrated. The fact that Anthony Flew is convinced is beside the point, it doesn't impress me or challenge me. Sorry!

Shane

You may think you have one every argument you have had on this board

I don't, just all the ones with WhysoBlind.

WhysoBlind

This is laughable.

No, what is laughable is that you have the time to make a big long response to me here, when there are 3 other threads that you are still to make a response.

Does the half life of C-14 mean anything to you? The creation of C-14 in the atmosphere? Are these jerking memories in your head? Are they ringing any bells? They should. They are all arguments that you have abandoned, not because of lack of content or points from me, but because of lack of coherent answers from you.

The simple fact is virtually all of your arguments on all threads are based entirely on unproven theory.

Really? Was my argument about radioactive decay rates and the measurement of them based on an "unproven theory". I would hardly call calculus an unproven theory, nor the rest of mathematics on which my derivation was based?

Perhaps my arguments about the creation of in the upper atmosphere C-14 were based on an unproven theory? No, I would hardly call high energy physics an unproven theory either. Nor atmospheric physics. Perhaps you'd like to state an example? You've not been very good at stating examples so far in your posts - you are great at accusing me of things, but very reticent to back those accusations with fact. So much so that you had a thread closed down, because you degenerated to a barrage of insults. Does this ring a bell?

or else distort the facts so the uninformed are at a disadvantage.

Again, an example would be useful. It's easy to accuse anyone of anything. Look:

Whysoblind tortures guinea pigs as a hobby.

I just accused you of something. It's that easy. It'll be a lot harder for me to produce actual evidence of it happening though, because I made it up. Just like you're making up your allegations against me. So prove me wrong, state your evidence.

You label any scientist who comes to a non-atheistic conclussion about the origins of life and creation as an lunatic or a deciever,

No I havn't. I refer you to my most recent post to Horizoneast in the "Predictions and Evolution" topic, in which I explain that the opposite is the case - that it would in fact be unscientific to exclude the possibility of a creator. Perhaps you're just not keeping up with my posts?

You attempt to show that Christians are nut jobs, or ignorant, stupid, uneducated, etc, etc.

No, I attempted to show that you were ignorant about the very things you claimed to be knowledgeable. I succeeded. Now you're annoyed. I get that, it's a very human reaction - typical of a fallen species

Which, rather ironically, the "intellectual" atheistic and pagan communities are so plagued with,

Now I've got STDs? What next? LOL. I wonder if you even have stats to back this up - if so it'll be the first time I've ever heard you say anything for which you've had solid evidence. That is reason enough to doubt.

By the way, abstinence isn't the only way to avoid sexually transmitted diseases. Fidelity is too, even atheists do this occasionally . Or mutual STD tests. Or condoms. But hey, I don't expect your posts to be thorough or factual.

It is amazing that the very people who claim to be so enlightened murder themselves daily through their lust and wickedness, yet refuse to acknowledge said sin and stupidity, because in doing so they would of necessity be acknowledging God.

I know, I should really stop murdering myself through my wickedness, it's just so addictive.

Regarding science, it is you who simply cannot even pretend to offer proof of your beliefs and conclussions.

I have pretended. Very well in fact. You can see all the posts you abandoned where I pretended to have evidence SO well, that you couldn't come up with an answer, and started to insult me instead, and then left, rather than admit you were wrong in the first place. Perhaps you should actually refer to my posts, even link into them when you're making accusations, so that everyone knows just how much I make claims without evidencing them. Go on, I dare you.

[JLW001]

Yep, WhySoBlind, gravity is an inverse square relationship with distance. My mistake. Maybe I was thinking of the charge force or something.

SA, I'd like you to explain how you can say that your concept of infinite universe choices is compatible with the two ideas about infinity. I'd like you to show how you can build an argument that refutes the proofs below.

1). The first idea says that you can't have infinite choices or pieces of chocolate or pieces of anything because infinity is a concept, not a number. If we subscribe to this view, then there can't be infinitly many choices for the universe's state. Why? Because infinity is not a number.

2). The second idea is based upon the logic that Canton came up with. He showed that if we treat infinity as a number we must limit the operations that can be performed. That's all we have to do. Canton's logic said that we can't have indeterminant forms like infinity divided by infinity. He showed that 1 divided by infinity is zero. And that 1 divided by zero is infinity. So his logic shows a link between everything and nothing. Somewhat profound wouldn't you say? Anyway, this way of thinking dis-proves you idea of infinitly many universe choices and each choice being equal by showing that the probability for each choice is zero.

Probability of choice N = 1 / infinity

Now, what argument can you make against these proofs against your idea? Please use Math as that's the most easily understood logic and I don't have the intellect to allow me to follow other types of logic.

BTW, I do hope that you can see that all things in the natural world prove God's existence and they praise Him.

[Gerioke]

Who's smarter? Mr. Spock or Scientific Atheist

I say scientific Atheist is smarter than capt Kirk but Spock's got him beat.

Isn't C-14 the little robot on star wars?

[JLW001]

It is interesting that Mr. Flew would be convinced by the information code contained within DNA. Just a page or two back in this topic, I was trying to show SA that the existence of such a structure that contained all of the information necessary to build life, proved that our universe wasn't a random occurrence.

SA's hypothesis was that its not remarkable for such a structure to exist because the universe could have had infinitly many choices for its state and it just so happened that this was the state the universe just happened to fall into. He said it just appeared miraculous to us, but it wasn't. I had read on Dr. Hugh Ross's website that this kind of argument is called the gambler's fallacy.

I then showed SA how the mathematics showed that his argument led to the indeterminant form because in the case of infinite random events, that each event has zero probability. SA, then pulled the "infinity's not a number" trump card and so I can't divide 1 by infinity to reach the zero probability. Well, I showed that if infinity is not a number then the universe could not have infinite random states to "choose" from. So, either way, the infinite universal states argument crumbles.

And we are back to the wonders of the universe proving God's existence. DNA is just one of many wonders in our universe that prove God's existence. I hope and pray that SA will see these wonders and see the fact of Antony Flew's apostasy from the ranks of atheism as meaningful reasons to doubt what he has been taught. In fact I hope that he can clearly see God's hand and that he will reach out to grasp our Lord's offer of redemption.

SA, even if you thought that you couldn't come back to the Lord, He is there for your.

[Keith]

I was reading online and found this article. It reminded me of this thread. I admit I haven't spent much time reading here, so I hope this applies and that it might be found relevant/interesting. If not, I apologize for the interruption...

The Disintegration Process

According to the second law of thermodynamics, in any isolated system, the degree of disorder tends to increase with the passage of time. In our world, everything has a natural tendency to move from a higher state of order to a lower state of order. Energy - in the form of some effort or action - is required to prevent this process from taking place.

Entropy is used to measure the degree of disorder in a system. It causes our automobiles to break down and erodes the supports of bridges, leading to their eventual collapse. Entropy is the reason most electric gadgets last only a few years. Human mortality is related to the amount of entropy in our bodies.

The second law of thermodynamics is frequently cited by Christians as a manifestation of the sin nature. God originally created everything in a perfect state; when Adam and Eve disobeyed and fell from grace, the structure of all things was transformed to a flawed state.

We are all born captives of a disintegration process. Since the fall, everything has been affixed with an expiration date. Some material items may have a longer shelf-life than others, but in the end they all fall victim to decay. The next time your water heater goes on the fritz, you can blame Adam for your aggravation.

"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men"(Rom. 5:12).

Help, I'm Falling Apart

In my early days of youth, I viewed "aging" as something to look forward to. As I grew older, I could accomplish new, exciting feats. Aging allowed me to graduate from school, get a job, drive a car, and have my own living space. Once I hit my 20s, the benefits of aging quickly dissipated.

Now that I'm in my late 30s, I've noticed that age has gradually begun to take on a negative connotation. The most noticeable changes have been in the area of my health. During a 12-month period, I've observed several subtle signs that entropy is at work in my physical body. Here is a list of some of these minor problems:

My eyes have developed a slight near-sighted condition.

I have a few more lines in my face.

My weight has increased.

The hair on my head is thinning a bit.

In certain situations, I have trouble swallowing food.

My feet swell up more easily.

I get twitches in my right leg.

It seems to take me a little bit longer to remember facts and figures.

Eating starchy foods occasionally leaves me with an upset stomach.

I haven't turned into a hypochondriac, nor am I suffering from some type of grave illness. All these ailments are part of the natural result of the disintegration process. I could exercise more, stock up on health remedies, or try plastic surgery, but eventually the negative effects of aging will catch up with me. I am like the flower that grows, blooms, then fades.

I consider myself to be quite fit for my age. I'm sure some of you folks might be able to think of a longer list of conditions you are suffering. Many of my friends have developed health problems that have had a more profound impact on their quality of life. Because there is little we can do about the aging process, we generally resign ourselves to accept these aches and pains as a natural occurrence.

We tend to rely on the experience of others as our guide, and most folks are very satisfied with their general state of health. Even up to the very end, a positive attitude tends to reign.

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid" (John 14:27).

[Cerran]

in any isolated system

There is the key flaw in the argument. Using energy from a souce outside the system you can remove entropy from the system.

The earth is not a isolated system.

[JLW001]

That's right. You can make negative entropy changes, but they require work to be done on the system and that means positive entropy somewhere else. And actually more positive entropy is made elsewhere than the negative entropy made on the earth (absolute value comparison. So the net entropy change is positive.

The most important thing in thermodynamics is for the system to be defined. Once you define that, then the rest is much easier.