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Intelligent Evolution?

It’s widely acknowledged that many major advancements in technology and medicine have come about through chance or fluke.
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I'm going to pretend that you didn't say this, Mr. OP writer.
 
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But seriously now...if all of the major inventions and innovations over all of history were just found by chance, then why is engineering a profession? Was the car invented because some smooth rods and wheel-shaped objects once fell into place as a mobile vehicle once? Was the phone invented because someone once said something, and the forces of nature allowed a man 1,000 miles away to hear it?

No. The major inventions and innovations of our time stemmed from an individual thinking "I know of a better way to do this", and then he did it. I work in a company where this happens on a daily basis. I know because it's my job to do this. Every day, I look at what we do, and I think "I know how to do that better", and I make it happen. That's what being an engineer is all about. Hardly any of what I, or any other engineer in the entire world, has accomplished happened because of some chance event.

Sure, there are stories of inventions made by accident. Scotch-brite was invented because a 3M employee once spilled a chemical on his shoe that unexpectedly cleaned his shoe. Medicines intended for one purpose were actually determined to be useful for other purposes. But such medicines would never have come about if there wasn't that intelligent person devising ways to mix certain substances together in order to make that medicine.

In short, saying that most major inventions come about by chance is both totally wrong and gives no defense towards a naturalist argument.
 
 
mijopaalmc said:
What about penicillin?
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What about cars, computers, bridges, skyscrapers, cell phones, iPods, solar power plants, nuclear power plants, airplanes, or other major inventions that we use on a daily basis? Were they created by chance?
 
chippy said:
In short, saying that most major inventions come about by chance is both totally wrong and gives no defense towards a naturalist argument.
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That's not what he said.

He said: It’s widely acknowledged that many major advancements in technology and medicine have come about through chance or fluke.

Your strawman makes you look dishonest-- not him. And it is widely acknowledged that many major advancements have come about via a fluke-- by actual experts... not just self-appointed ones. Both Darwin and Mendel-- who have contributed greatly to our understanding of genetics and evolution came upon their specimens fairly randomly... If not for peas and finches... who knows where we'd be in the process of discovery.

http://www.simonsingh.net/Serendipity.html

I'm quite certain that the evolution of all information that makes all our greatest "hits" contains plenty of random bits of luck... just like all the great life forms that evolved via information encoded in DNA. And I'm not the only one saying so--experts in the field, multiply quoted have said as much as well.
 
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articulett said:
That's not what he said.

He said: It’s widely acknowledged that many major advancements in technology and medicine have come about through chance or fluke.

Your strawman makes you look dishonest-- not him.
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Let's leave ad hominem arguments out of this debate.

And it is widely acknowledged that many major advancements have come about via a fluke-- by actual experts... not just self-appointed ones.

http://www.simonsingh.net/Serendipity.html
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Does this article say anything about cars, computers, bridges, skyscrapers, cell phones, iPods, solar power plants, nuclear power plants, airplanes, or other major inventions that we use on a daily basis?
 
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articulett said:
Your strawman makes you look dishonest-- not him. And it is widely acknowledged that many major advancements have come about via a fluke-- by actual experts... not just self-appointed ones.
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Translation: "I only listen to people who agree with me and tune everyone else out."
 
articulett said:
I don't know what Mijo is typing
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You're not alone... I'd be very surprised if anyone has any idea what mijo is typing... simply because mijo has no idea what mijo is typing

For example:
mijopaalmc said:
The point of the "digression" on carbon was that the "analogists" has taken one property of carbon (i.e., its having six protons) claimed that that was the only important property of carbon. While it does actually the "carbonness" of carbon (anything that has more or less than six protons is by definition not carbon), it does not even begin to describe the most basic features of carbon in its various elemental allotropes
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If that isn't absurd enough, try this:
mijopaalmc said:
And articulett tell another lie. I never claimed to be ab expert on anything I said; I just said I disagreed with people whom articulett designates as experts and pointed out where other prominent mainstream (as in non-Creationist or non-ID) scientists said the same things I'm saying
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:dl:
@mijo: Get a grip on reality: you are going around in ever-decreasing circles saying nothing of substance in a language only tenuously related to English. If you want to pretend that there are 'prominent mainstream (non-woo) scientists' that promote anything even remotely like your brand of nonsense, then go right ahead... you're only fooling yourself
 
In re-reading the OP, I find that I strongly disagree with the whole opinion. Though I picked out the bit about major advancements coming by chance, I have to say, the whole assertion that technological development "evolving" on its own is just ridiculous. Yes, TVs and airplanes are better now than they were in the past. That's because engineers sat down and thought up ways to make them better. That's intelligent design.

Therefore, I have trouble understanding the point here. How is it that the intelligent design that drove the evolution of technology refutes the intelligent design of life theory?
 
six7s said:
You're not alone... I'd be very surprised if anyone has any idea what mijo is typing... simply because mijo has no idea what mijo is typing

For example:


If that isn't absurd enough, try this:

:dl:
@mijo: Get a grip on reality: you are going around in ever-decreasing circles saying nothing of substance in a language only tenuously related to English. If you want to pretend that there are 'prominent mainstream (non-woo) scientists' that promote anything even remotely like your brand of nonsense, then go right ahead... you're only fooling yourself
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Holy ****** Why are you being so mean?
 
Roman Numerals have no zero... it was the invention of 0 as a place holder that allowed higher math to flourish and the base ten system and binary codes and much technology that has grown from that. In essence anything based on this evolved from a system that involved randomness... until zero was invented as a placeholder--the rest could not follow. It was not the first way numbers were represented... but it allowed mathematical models to take of and human understanding with it.
 
articulett said:
Roman Numerals have no zero... it was the invention of 0 as a place holder that allowed higher math to flourish and the base ten system and binary codes and much technology that has grown from that. In essence anything based on this evolved from a system that involved randomness... until zero was invented as a placeholder--the rest could not follow. It was not the first way numbers were represented... but it allowed mathematical models to take of and human understanding with it.
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So if zero was INVENTED, that means it didn't just appear out of randomness, right? Some intelligent being came up with it?
 
articulett said:
I think Mijo has been worse in this thread... and your first post on this thread was a little nasty, wasn't it?
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I suppose it was; I apologize. Knowing how well we can debate when we're all angry, how about we decide to not be angry and just focus on the arguments, not the people?
 
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