Responding to Joshua Feuerstein
An individual by the name of Joshua Feuerstein posted a video to facebook in which he makes some bold claims. The video can be found here.
I would like to respond.
Dear Joshua,
Before I begin, I want you to take a moment to think about something nice that you have done. If possible, think about some truly charitable act you've performed for a stranger. You seem like a nice guy, and I don't want you to think that I'm attempting to suggest otherwise. It's not my intent to call you an idiot; the first thing you state in your video is that an atheist called you "idiotic, moronic, and stupid." I have no doubt that that was an unpleasant experience for you, and I am very sorry that it happened. I know that there are some atheists out there who are less the courteous, and it makes me sad to know that you've encountered one of them. But I am not suggesting that you are any of those things.
So, now that we know that you're a nice guy, and that I'm not trying to belittle you, I would like to address some errors you've made in your statements.
One of the first things you say is that evolution is not a science. You say that evolution was never observed. Strictly speaking, this is true, in the sense that no one has lived long enough to personally witness one species becoming a different species. But the error that you have made is thinking that observation has to be direct and first-hand. Observation can take place through indirect evidence. Yes, that evidence must be interpreted, and at first, the conclusions may be inaccurate, but as more evidence is gathered and additional viewpoints are considered and ruled out, the conclusions become more accurate.
I like to use the analogy of police detectives gathering information concerning a murder. At first, none of the detectives know what has happened; they have no evidence at all. When they first arrive on the scene, all they know is that somebody is dead. But they begin gathering evidence, which is all second-hand or third-hand. They look at the physical remains left by the act; the state of the body, the fingerprints left at the scene, the pattern of blood on the floor, the items disturbed in the struggle, and so forth. They also examine witness testimony; interviewing people who may have heard the altercation, talking to people who observed an argument between the victim and one or more of the suspects, etc. At first, the detectives may come to an erroneous conclusion as they have only a small portion of the available evidence. But as time goes on and they gather more information, they refine their search and eventually (hopefully) come to the correct conclusion and determine who the killer was. This all happens despite the fact that nobody observed the crime directly.
So it is with evolution. There is a plethora of evidence which supports the theory. Even though nobody has observed it firsthand, it has been observed indirectly, via evidence such as fossil remains, archaeological finds, genetic variation, and even the variation in the Italian Wall Lizards.
You state that evolution is 'only a theory,' and refer to it as 'one man's theory.' But what most people don't know is that in scientific terminology, the word 'theory' does not mean the same thing as it does in common language. Although it is used conversationally to mean 'an idea that hasn't been proven,' the scientific meaning of the word is 'a group of laws which explain an observed phenomenon, and is well supported by the evidence.' This is the reason that gravity is also referred to as a theory, as well as 'germ theory,' 'atomic theory,' and the theory of motion based on Newton's principles. In fact, if you're interested, you can read more on what a theory is as well as learning about some important and fundamental scientific theories over at How Stuff Works.
And as for it being 'one man's theory,' although Darwin was the first person to suggest the idea of evolution, that idea was taken, refined, and expanded by many other people. It is no longer one man's idea.
You then speak about the 'accidental cosmic bang.' The use of the word 'accidental' implies that it was a mistake. But mistakes can only take place if there was some intent behind it. The theory of evolution (and the big bang theory, which is more important in this case, because the big bang theory is completely unrelated to the theory of evolution) does not suggest that anything was 'an accident.' It may have happened without intent, but that does not make it 'accidental.' It happened because physics works that way. Matter was arranged in a specific situation which made the big bang inevitable. In the same way, abiogenesis (the concept of life arising spontaneously from non-living matter, which is also distinct from the theory of evolution) happened because the right substances were in the right place and being subjected to the right forces. It was not intentional, but it was not accidental either. It was inevitable, as a result of what was happening to materials that were in the right place at the right time.
You also say that the big bang 'created one cell' which 'mysteriously and magically developed different wills and different traits.' This is also incorrect. Abiogenesis does not attempt to claim that a single-celled organism came into being from nothing. It doesn't even suggest that a single-celled organism 'just happened' as a result of certain materials being brought together in the right way. Abiogenesis is still a little-understood area, and scientists are working to learn more about it. But one possible explanation is that in an area where the right materials (oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, etc) were being subjected to the right energies (movement and heat), such as a hydrothermal vent on the ocean floor, some of these substances were formed into some very simple self-replicating proteins. These proteins slowly picked up further protections, such as bonding with lipids, bonding together, etc. Over time, these proteins gained enough additional materials to be called a single-celled organism. But no one who is knowledgeable about science will claim that a big bang or any other event caused a single-celled organism to come into existence. It was the result of a lengthy time of chemical reactions.
And different wills and different traits can indeed result from this process of self-replicating proteins. Refer again to the Italian Wall Lizards mentioned above, and you'll see (among other changes) that this lizard population developed cecal valves in their gastrointestinal system which allows them to eat plants in addition to insects. That may seem like a small change, but over time, these changes keep adding up. In just the same way as these lizards spontaneously developed valves that their ancestors did not have, their legs became shorter, their heads broader, their bite more powerful. Over several more generations, further changes will occur. Hundreds of generations allow more changes, and thousands of generations indicate thousands of changes. Over time, there will be so many changes that these lizards will have become an entirely new kind of animal.
You ask 'how much faith does that take?' to believe in evolution resulting from a single-celled organism spontaneously created by a 'big bang.' But I have hopefully helped you to understand that faith is not necessary, because it's all easily explainable, and more to the point, there is evidence that supports the idea. Faith is belief without evidence. Thus, there is no faith involved in evolution at all.
You then go on to claim that the law of thermodynamics say that chaos can never produce order. This is not at all what the laws of thermodynamics say. You are referring here to the second law of thermodynamics, which states 'the entropy of an isolated system never decreases, because isolated systems always decay toward thermodynamic equilibrium, a state with maximum entropy.' In other words, a closed system (one which receives no energy from an external source) cannot become more ordered. Hopefully, the first thing you will notice is that the earth is not a closed system. It receives energy from the sun (and minute amounts from other sources as well, but the sun is by far the most important part). This continual input of energy from the sun allows the earth to become more ordered, as the amount of energy transferred away from the earth is much smaller than the amount being brought in.
You also say that 'a world that has order cannot happen by accident.' Ignoring the already-addressed issue of the word 'accident' implying a mistake, I will simply point out that a world that has order can happen 'by accident.' It is completely fitting with the observed laws of physics, most importantly the laws of gravity. I will not describe the process here, as it is entirely too lengthy to be succinctly detailed. But I will leave you with one suggestion for a starting point, which (if you so desire) can provide you with more resources and information: the Wikipedia article.
At one point in your video, you compare the big bang theory to a tornado rolling through a junkyard and magically producing a 'perfectly red, shiny, working lamborghini.' There are many flaws in this analogy, not the least of which is the fact that DNA, for all its complexity (being the item that would actually be produced by the tornado in your analogy), is much less complex than a lamborghini. A tornado would not produce the energies necessary, nor have the materials available, to create your automobile. Life did not arise in a manner at all analogous to your tornado.
You proceed to state that you believe in god 'because I've experienced him, I've felt him.' I do not doubt that you've had experiences that you attribute to your god. But people in India have 'experienced' Shiva. Is their personal experience to be discounted? Their experiences are just as genuine as yours. But what is actually going on here is that you have an experience that you attribute to god, even though there are other possible origins for the experiences that you have.
I would like to highly recommend that you watch the videos by a youtube user called Evid3nc3. He describes, in great detail, his deconversion from pentecostal christian to atheist. In particular, his video Personal Relationship (that's part one of a two part series). In particular, watch for time stamp 8:30 in part two, where he describes the way that he realises that all the experiences he's had with the divine are just his subconscious. He's been listening to his own subconscious mind all his life, and calling it 'god.'
Really, that covers all the important things in your video. But, as a lexophile, there is one more point that I want to address. You claim that the word 'universe' comes from 'uni,' which means 'one,' and 'verse,' which means 'a spoken statement.' In fact, the word originally comes from the latin terms which mean 'turned into one,' from the word 'unus,' one, and 'versus,' which is the past participle of the verb 'vertere,' which means 'to turn.'
Now, again, please understand that I don't intend to insult you in any way. I know you are most likely a kind and generous man, which I'm sure you can verify by merely contemplating some of the good things you've done for other people. My intent is simply to dispel some misunderstandings you have about the reality regarding our position.
I hope this has been informative to you.
I would like to respond.
Dear Joshua,
Before I begin, I want you to take a moment to think about something nice that you have done. If possible, think about some truly charitable act you've performed for a stranger. You seem like a nice guy, and I don't want you to think that I'm attempting to suggest otherwise. It's not my intent to call you an idiot; the first thing you state in your video is that an atheist called you "idiotic, moronic, and stupid." I have no doubt that that was an unpleasant experience for you, and I am very sorry that it happened. I know that there are some atheists out there who are less the courteous, and it makes me sad to know that you've encountered one of them. But I am not suggesting that you are any of those things.
So, now that we know that you're a nice guy, and that I'm not trying to belittle you, I would like to address some errors you've made in your statements.
One of the first things you say is that evolution is not a science. You say that evolution was never observed. Strictly speaking, this is true, in the sense that no one has lived long enough to personally witness one species becoming a different species. But the error that you have made is thinking that observation has to be direct and first-hand. Observation can take place through indirect evidence. Yes, that evidence must be interpreted, and at first, the conclusions may be inaccurate, but as more evidence is gathered and additional viewpoints are considered and ruled out, the conclusions become more accurate.
I like to use the analogy of police detectives gathering information concerning a murder. At first, none of the detectives know what has happened; they have no evidence at all. When they first arrive on the scene, all they know is that somebody is dead. But they begin gathering evidence, which is all second-hand or third-hand. They look at the physical remains left by the act; the state of the body, the fingerprints left at the scene, the pattern of blood on the floor, the items disturbed in the struggle, and so forth. They also examine witness testimony; interviewing people who may have heard the altercation, talking to people who observed an argument between the victim and one or more of the suspects, etc. At first, the detectives may come to an erroneous conclusion as they have only a small portion of the available evidence. But as time goes on and they gather more information, they refine their search and eventually (hopefully) come to the correct conclusion and determine who the killer was. This all happens despite the fact that nobody observed the crime directly.
So it is with evolution. There is a plethora of evidence which supports the theory. Even though nobody has observed it firsthand, it has been observed indirectly, via evidence such as fossil remains, archaeological finds, genetic variation, and even the variation in the Italian Wall Lizards.
You state that evolution is 'only a theory,' and refer to it as 'one man's theory.' But what most people don't know is that in scientific terminology, the word 'theory' does not mean the same thing as it does in common language. Although it is used conversationally to mean 'an idea that hasn't been proven,' the scientific meaning of the word is 'a group of laws which explain an observed phenomenon, and is well supported by the evidence.' This is the reason that gravity is also referred to as a theory, as well as 'germ theory,' 'atomic theory,' and the theory of motion based on Newton's principles. In fact, if you're interested, you can read more on what a theory is as well as learning about some important and fundamental scientific theories over at How Stuff Works.
And as for it being 'one man's theory,' although Darwin was the first person to suggest the idea of evolution, that idea was taken, refined, and expanded by many other people. It is no longer one man's idea.
You then speak about the 'accidental cosmic bang.' The use of the word 'accidental' implies that it was a mistake. But mistakes can only take place if there was some intent behind it. The theory of evolution (and the big bang theory, which is more important in this case, because the big bang theory is completely unrelated to the theory of evolution) does not suggest that anything was 'an accident.' It may have happened without intent, but that does not make it 'accidental.' It happened because physics works that way. Matter was arranged in a specific situation which made the big bang inevitable. In the same way, abiogenesis (the concept of life arising spontaneously from non-living matter, which is also distinct from the theory of evolution) happened because the right substances were in the right place and being subjected to the right forces. It was not intentional, but it was not accidental either. It was inevitable, as a result of what was happening to materials that were in the right place at the right time.
You also say that the big bang 'created one cell' which 'mysteriously and magically developed different wills and different traits.' This is also incorrect. Abiogenesis does not attempt to claim that a single-celled organism came into being from nothing. It doesn't even suggest that a single-celled organism 'just happened' as a result of certain materials being brought together in the right way. Abiogenesis is still a little-understood area, and scientists are working to learn more about it. But one possible explanation is that in an area where the right materials (oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, etc) were being subjected to the right energies (movement and heat), such as a hydrothermal vent on the ocean floor, some of these substances were formed into some very simple self-replicating proteins. These proteins slowly picked up further protections, such as bonding with lipids, bonding together, etc. Over time, these proteins gained enough additional materials to be called a single-celled organism. But no one who is knowledgeable about science will claim that a big bang or any other event caused a single-celled organism to come into existence. It was the result of a lengthy time of chemical reactions.
And different wills and different traits can indeed result from this process of self-replicating proteins. Refer again to the Italian Wall Lizards mentioned above, and you'll see (among other changes) that this lizard population developed cecal valves in their gastrointestinal system which allows them to eat plants in addition to insects. That may seem like a small change, but over time, these changes keep adding up. In just the same way as these lizards spontaneously developed valves that their ancestors did not have, their legs became shorter, their heads broader, their bite more powerful. Over several more generations, further changes will occur. Hundreds of generations allow more changes, and thousands of generations indicate thousands of changes. Over time, there will be so many changes that these lizards will have become an entirely new kind of animal.
You ask 'how much faith does that take?' to believe in evolution resulting from a single-celled organism spontaneously created by a 'big bang.' But I have hopefully helped you to understand that faith is not necessary, because it's all easily explainable, and more to the point, there is evidence that supports the idea. Faith is belief without evidence. Thus, there is no faith involved in evolution at all.
You then go on to claim that the law of thermodynamics say that chaos can never produce order. This is not at all what the laws of thermodynamics say. You are referring here to the second law of thermodynamics, which states 'the entropy of an isolated system never decreases, because isolated systems always decay toward thermodynamic equilibrium, a state with maximum entropy.' In other words, a closed system (one which receives no energy from an external source) cannot become more ordered. Hopefully, the first thing you will notice is that the earth is not a closed system. It receives energy from the sun (and minute amounts from other sources as well, but the sun is by far the most important part). This continual input of energy from the sun allows the earth to become more ordered, as the amount of energy transferred away from the earth is much smaller than the amount being brought in.
You also say that 'a world that has order cannot happen by accident.' Ignoring the already-addressed issue of the word 'accident' implying a mistake, I will simply point out that a world that has order can happen 'by accident.' It is completely fitting with the observed laws of physics, most importantly the laws of gravity. I will not describe the process here, as it is entirely too lengthy to be succinctly detailed. But I will leave you with one suggestion for a starting point, which (if you so desire) can provide you with more resources and information: the Wikipedia article.
At one point in your video, you compare the big bang theory to a tornado rolling through a junkyard and magically producing a 'perfectly red, shiny, working lamborghini.' There are many flaws in this analogy, not the least of which is the fact that DNA, for all its complexity (being the item that would actually be produced by the tornado in your analogy), is much less complex than a lamborghini. A tornado would not produce the energies necessary, nor have the materials available, to create your automobile. Life did not arise in a manner at all analogous to your tornado.
You proceed to state that you believe in god 'because I've experienced him, I've felt him.' I do not doubt that you've had experiences that you attribute to your god. But people in India have 'experienced' Shiva. Is their personal experience to be discounted? Their experiences are just as genuine as yours. But what is actually going on here is that you have an experience that you attribute to god, even though there are other possible origins for the experiences that you have.
I would like to highly recommend that you watch the videos by a youtube user called Evid3nc3. He describes, in great detail, his deconversion from pentecostal christian to atheist. In particular, his video Personal Relationship (that's part one of a two part series). In particular, watch for time stamp 8:30 in part two, where he describes the way that he realises that all the experiences he's had with the divine are just his subconscious. He's been listening to his own subconscious mind all his life, and calling it 'god.'
Really, that covers all the important things in your video. But, as a lexophile, there is one more point that I want to address. You claim that the word 'universe' comes from 'uni,' which means 'one,' and 'verse,' which means 'a spoken statement.' In fact, the word originally comes from the latin terms which mean 'turned into one,' from the word 'unus,' one, and 'versus,' which is the past participle of the verb 'vertere,' which means 'to turn.'
Now, again, please understand that I don't intend to insult you in any way. I know you are most likely a kind and generous man, which I'm sure you can verify by merely contemplating some of the good things you've done for other people. My intent is simply to dispel some misunderstandings you have about the reality regarding our position.
I hope this has been informative to you.