The Drake Equation Fallacy

originally posted by: Barcs

Then you can't say that intelligence only comes from intelligence!!! How do you not see that?

This is why God is referred to as "unbegotten". God never had to come to be, because God always existed.

This is a fundamental part of theology and philosophy.

a reply to: cooperton

This is why God is referred to as "unbegotten". God never had to come to be, because God always existed.

Seems more than logical to me that the Creator of the universe
would have to be everlasting to everlasting. We measure the movement
of heavenly bodies and call it time. The Creator of the universe would
not be captured in his creation. So how could time as we measure it be
of any significance to him. The universe could just be like an aquarium
in his front room to him. What goes on in the aquarium having zero effect.

But there I go lying again

originally posted by: carsforkids
a reply to: Barcs

It's exactly the same as the claim that there is a god.

No it isn't not rationally not logically not intellectually and not
even by common sense. Not to mention the loser odds atheism
is up against. You're ridiculous even to compare.

Science is a blah blah blah method of blah blah blah. Try not to have
an aneurysm.

Science doesn't have anything to do with proving Gods existence.

Prove a single thing you just said. God existing is an unfalsfiable claim and as a skeptic I treat all claims the same. If you can't back it up or demonstrate it, you have no logical justification to say what is more probable. You are literally just repeating your personal beliefs as fact when you have zero evidence. Please stop the dishonesty.

originally posted by: Grenade
a reply to: Barcs

So, Newton, Copernicus weren't scientists because we didn't have aviation or space travel to verify their claims?

I can see it's pointless debating you.

LMFAO! Where did I say that? You are really struggling to understand what I said. Yeah it's pointless to debate me when you keep talking nonsense.

I very clearly explained it. You can't even name a single test or show me how the scientific method was applied. I clearly outlined what constitutes as scientific theory and you respond with a dismissive straw man irrelevant to all of it.

originally posted by: cooperton

originally posted by: Barcs

Then you can't say that intelligence only comes from intelligence!!! How do you not see that?

This is why God is referred to as "unbegotten". God never had to come to be, because God always existed.

This is a fundamental part of theology and philosophy.

Irrelevant red herring. I don't care how you refer to God or what you believe. That doesn't magically make your special pleading fallacy disappear. If intelligence can only come from intelligence, you can't say that the intelligence in God just exists from nothing eternally because at that point, it didn't come from intelligence. Jesus Christ!!! Learn basic logic, bro.

originally posted by: Barcs

Irrelevant red herring. I don't care how you refer to God or what you believe. That doesn't magically make your special pleading fallacy disappear. If intelligence can only come from intelligence, you can't say that the intelligence in God just exists from nothing. Jesus Christ!!!

You presume that intelligence came from non-intelligence and support the Drake equation. Yet you think it is "special pleading" for me to postulate that intelligent things require intelligent creators?

You have tossed logic out the window.

a reply to: Barcs

Prove a single thing you just said. God existing is an unfalsfiable claim and as a skeptic I treat all claims the same. If you can't back it up or demonstrate it, you have no logical justification to say what is more probable. You are literally just repeating your personal beliefs as fact when you have zero evidence. Please stop the dishonesty.

Sorry I can speculate and postulate about God all I want.
As much as you wish you were a tyrant and could stop me
from showing the perfect sense of it all you can't. Why you
are so determined to be completely one hundred percent wrong
about something so important is on you. But you not
wanting others to read for themselves what they will never
read or hear any where else is fanatical. I got you're goat pal and
you've made it obvious. You want to drag others down with you
as far as I'm concerned. Science has nothing to do with proving
the existence of God and yet the only way you know how to argue
is thru science.

You must be joking!

a reply to: whereislogic

Just to be clear, factor fl (read it as f1 before) in the Drake equation is spelled out as such on wikipedia:

fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point

The underlying thinking when philosophers start speculating about any number above 0 regarding fl, is really:

fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life by chance at some point

Since it has been calculated that the development of life (the chemical evolution of life fron non-living matter, a.k.a. abiogenesis) by chance, is an impossibility (see earlier commentary for details and why the word "impossible" is an appropiate and truthful/accurate description), the value of fl is stuck at 0 (that is, if you add "by chance" in your consideration, and not sneakily talk past that crucial issue by merely saying "develop" as explained earlier). No amount of wishful thinking and dancing around the facts warrants any speculations above 0. Now swap out "life" with "pink unicorns" and the evidential situation is just the same. There's as much evidence of pink unicorns developing by chance on other planets as any other form of life, namely: none, nada, noppes. And the evidence we do have, points in the other direction, that it is impossible to have happened by chance. Some good marketing endeavors of the latter idea though ("any other form of life"). Leaving out the inconvenient facts I mentioned on page 6 in much more detail.

The following factors in the Drake equation are also discussed on page 6 by me (in the parts I didn't quote with my previous comment):

fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets

Source: wikipedia, see link earlier

Now of particular interest concerning the last factor there, may be my comment on page 39 about earth's magnetic field and atmosphere, and how those two dynamic shields are requirements to make earth a "habitable planet" (a planet that can support life). Are these requirements ever considered when philosophers are speculating about any number higher than 0 for ne? Habitability is not only about being the right distance from the right startype after all. At this point you may want to read back what I quoted from an article from 1990 in my first comment on page 6 (or the one from 2000).

As I asked near the end of my first 2 comments on page 6 (it's 1 comment split up because of space issues):

Even if other habitable planets exist, is there any evidence that life could originate on them by chance?

I've given my opinion in this comment regarding the answer to that question, but I noticed nobody else touched it. Even when responding to my commentary (or follow-up commentary). Not entirely sure, but I think the very word "chance" was avoided in any of the responses I've received to my commentary, as if it's a 'no-go zone', similar to this 'no-go zone' (no need to watch beyond 4:50, he has some weird way of phrasing things from that point onwards):

”Geocentrism was wasn't testable or falsifiable until thousands of years later when we began developing aviation and space travel technology and increased our knowledge substantially. ”

originally posted by: whereislogic
a reply to: whereislogic

Just to be clear, factor fl (read it as f1 before) in the Drake equation is spelled out as such on wikipedia:

fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life at some point

The underlying thinking when philosophers start speculating about any number above 0 regarding fl, is really:

fl = the fraction of planets that could support life that actually develop life by chance at some point

Since it has been calculated that the development of life (the chemical evolution of life fron non-living matter, a.k.a. abiogenesis) by chance, is an impossibility (see earlier commentary for details and why the word "impossible" is an appropiate and truthful/accurate description), the value of fl is stuck at 0 (that is, if you add "by chance" in your consideration, and not sneakily talk past that crucial issue by merely saying "develop" as explained earlier). No amount of wishful thinking and dancing around the facts warrants any speculations above 0. Now swap out "life" with "pink unicorns" and the evidential situation is just the same. There's as much evidence of pink unicorns developing by chance on other planets as any other form of life, namely: none, nada, noppes. And the evidence we do have, points in the other direction, that it is impossible to have happened by chance. Some good marketing endeavors of the latter idea though ("any other form of life"). Leaving out the inconvenient facts I mentioned on page 6 in much more detail.

The following factors in the Drake equation are also discussed on page 6 by me (in the parts I didn't quote with my previous comment):

fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets

Source: wikipedia, see link earlier

Now of particular interest concerning the last factor there, may be my comment on page 39 about earth's magnetic field and atmosphere, and how those two dynamic shields are requirements to make earth a "habitable planet" (a planet that can support life). Are these requirements ever considered when philosophers are speculating about any number higher than 0 for ne? Habitability is not only about being the right distance from the right startype after all. At this point you may want to read back what I quoted from an article from 1990 in my first comment on page 6 (or the one from 2000).

As I asked near the end of my first 2 comments on page 6 (it's 1 comment split up because of space issues):

Even if other habitable planets exist, is there any evidence that life could originate on them by chance?

I've given my opinion in this comment regarding the answer to that question, but I noticed nobody else touched it. Even when responding to my commentary (or follow-up commentary). Not entirely sure, but I think the very word "chance" was avoided in any of the responses I've received to my commentary, as if it's a 'no-go zone', similar to this 'no-go zone' (no need to watch beyond 4:50, he has some weird way of phrasing things from that point onwards):

Can we see the equation where you calculated the odds of life developing by chance? I would like to know how you arrived at the conclusion that it is impossible.

originally posted by: cooperton

originally posted by: Barcs

Then you can't say that intelligence only comes from intelligence!!! How do you not see that?

This is why God is referred to as "unbegotten". God never had to come to be, because God always existed.

This is a fundamental part of theology and philosophy.

I noticed you didn't say a fundamental part of biology or astronomy.

a reply to: whereislogic


Another outstanding post!

a reply to: TzarChasm

Tzar you are a gem in my book and I just wanna stress
that I would never mean to insult you. Respect heffe,
I wish I could carry myself the way you do. Admirable.

originally posted by: carsforkids
a reply to: TzarChasm

Tzar you are a gem in my book and I just wanna stress
that I would never mean to insult you. Respect heffe,
I wish I could carry myself the way you do. Admirable.

A less responsible user would be tempted to use their charm to change your mind on this Drake business

a reply to: TzarChasm

I'm fairly easy to charm my good member. Hem in a manly sort of way.

a reply to: whereislogic

My conclusion: The Drake equation is about as useful as an equation to speculate about the number of advanced civilizations of pink unicorns living on other planets in our universe, originating there by chance.

I was going to say its about as useful as a priest in a vaccine factory. Or a bible in a parachuting class.

You also didn't prove evolution is impossible, just far beyond your ability to fathom. A million years of stewing chemicals can have that effect.

a reply to: carsforkids

Originally posted by Joecroft
I mean, for example...couldn’t Angels be classified as other life existing out there...?

Originally posted by carsforkids
That' in my view is a good question. However with all the possibilities like
other dimensions it becomes impossible for me to even guess.

Yeah…It is a good question…Thanks…

We’re currently at 100 Billion Galaxies in our Universe alone…and that’s only based on what we can currently observe.

What you should be asking yourself (especially as you believe in a creator)…is Why would God create all that space…and have it devoid of any life except us here down on Earth…?…wouldn’t make much sense…right…?

Originally posted by carsforkids
The only thing I would dare to say is if a supreme being created the universe? Then by every example of creation we know of a Creator is never captured by
his creation.

“By every example of creation we know…?”

Not sure I follow what you mean by this…What other examples of creation do we know of…? Especially in the context that we are discussing here…i.e. the current (and Only) known Universe…

And I’m not sure what you mean by the other part either… “a Creator is never captured by his creation.”…?

Originally posted by carsforkids
So let's say the cosmos are teaming with life. The universe had a beginning
so that would mean that the universe was not always there teaming with life.
That would in turn mean that all the life out there had to have had a start.
It must have happened somewhere first.

Yes life had to have started somewhere….that’s true…but that’s not the aim of the Drake Equation…


The Drake Equation just focuses on finding out the chances of life existing in the universe. It’s only interested in the Numbers. The drake Equation does not infer that the universe was created by chance or by a creator. It’s completely neutral on those aspects. It only function is to show the chances of life existing out there, using Maths and probability.


Crazy Example for hypothetical purposes…

Let’s say I created The Universe (as God of Course) and it has 50 Billion Galaxies in it. You (Living on planet X) now create an equation to work out the chances of other life existing out there.

Your equation is only interested in finding out the probability of life existing out there and your equation would work whether the Universe was created by God or Not…

Make sense…?

- JC

a reply to: Joecroft

What you should be asking yourself (especially as you believe in a creator)…is Why would God create all that space…and have it devoid of any life except us here down on Earth…?…wouldn’t make much sense…right…?

No wouldn't make sense at all from this lil blue ball spec of it all.
And maybe what you assume about others and a supreme being doesn't
make much sense either.

Why would God create all that space out there?
Doesn't our space program give you the slightest hint?
You see I have pondered this and I like my speculation
far better. But that's all it is. My speculation beyond the
scriptures.

Not sure I follow what you mean by this…What other examples of creation do we know of…? Especially in the context that we are discussing here…i.e. the current (and Only) known Universe…

No no we are creative beings, we create art we build houses we create
children. All known examples of creation. Certainly nothing just pops or
oozes it's way into existence right?

a reply to: Joecroft

Your equation is only interested in finding out the probability of life existing out there and your equation would work whether the Universe was created by God or Not…

I absolutely love you!

No Barcs this member gets it Pal. lol

You are the first one to say it perfectly.

You get a cookie!

I could attach pink unicorns to the number of stars in the universe
if it's just an idea from the secular mind originating on Earth? Then
the universe most likely doesn't have any at all.