An Answer To The Watchmaker

WhyWon'tGodHealAmputees.com has a reply to the century-old argument called "The Wacthmaker."

Now, this argument has been torn to shreds so often it's puzzling that many still rely on it, by WWGHA puts the counter-argument in a new and novel way:

Today's "Intelligent Design" movement is based on an argument not unlike the one used by William Paley just before Darwin's day. Paley believed that if you found a watch in a forest, you would not assume it had formed there by itself. You would assume that it had been made ultimately by a "watchmaker."

By extension then, the human body is like a watch. The human body is complex -- "irreducibly" complex according to the "Intelligent Design" movement. And so one might argue as Paley did that the human body could not have formed by itself. It had to have been made by an "Intelligent Designer."

If the Intelligent Designer actually exists, here is a thought experiment for us to ponder.

Let's imagine that you were to walk into a jewelry store and look at the different watches in the jeweler's case. One of the watches catches your eye because its design is so unusual. The jeweler walks over and you ask him to describe the watch. He begins to rattle off several of its more interesting features.

"Here's something you don't find on many watches," the jeweler says. "When you wind up this watch, it begins to stink!" He winds the watch, and it is just as he says -- a definite odor, very slight at first, begins to waft from the watch. The jeweler tells you that the smell can grow quite profound through the course of the day, to the point where the watch becomes most annoying. You must apply a special ointment called a "deodorant" to the watch every morning in order to mask the smell, and will also have to wash the watch every night to get the ointment and the smell off. If you let the watch go two or three days without washing it, it will smell so bad that you will not want to be in the same room with it.

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You can read the rest of the article here.

What Have You Been Reading?

I was recently tagged by Notorious Apostate to partake in the "What Have You Been Reading?" meme. I have been strenuously avoiding anything approaching hard typing, but I can't put it off any longer. Here's a glimpse into The Horror That Is Doombreed:

1: One book that changed your life:

Billions & Billions by Carl Sagan.

This was Sagan's last book, in fact, he died before he could properly finish it and the afterword was written by his widow. From a lightly humourous look at our global ecosystem in The World That Came In The Mail, to a deceptively simple look at very large numbers in The Persian Chessboard, from a darkly worrying treatise on global warming in Ambush: The Warming Of The World, to a surprisingly hopeful piece on cooperation called Religion and Science: An Alliance, Sagan weaves his magic over science in an eye-opening book of this great man's last thoughts.

The afterword, though, is almost the most powerful part of all. Ann, Sagan's widow, writes a heart-wrenching account of her husband's last days, his courage against adversity and and the simple, overwhelming love they shared, and I, unashamedly, cried the first time I read it.

2: One Book You've Read More Than Once:

Night Watch by Terry Pratchett.

I read most books more than once, but Night Watch probably counts as the one I've read the most. Certainly, it's one of Pratchett's best.

3: One Book You'd Want On A Desert Island

This is a toughie. My first instinct is to cheat and think of a compendium, like The Lord Of The Rings, or The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, or something. Then I think of something silly, like Building A Boat And Getting The Hell Off Of A Desert Island For Dummies. Okay, then I think of being typically me and asking for The Bible so I'll always have firelighters.

Then I settle on The Hunt For Red October by Tom Clancy. I could, and have, read that book over and over and over again.

4: One Book That Made You Giddy:

The Messianic Legacy by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh & Henry Lincoln.

This book made my head spin. The incredible evidence for a 2000 year coverup of the truth about Christianity's origins is just breathtaking.

5: One Book You Wish Had Been Written:

U.S. Road Cav.

In the late eighties, a British company called Games Workshop started to publish novels based around their table-top roleplaying games. Several were printed for Warhammer, Warhammer 40,000, and some were published for a now-defunct game called Dark Future.

The game, set in the near-future, dealt with a blasted, wasted world, ruled over by gangs and the big corporations. The books were, originally, Route 666, Daemon Download, Comeback Tour, and Krokodil Tears, and traced the gathering of forces towards some massive apocalyptic End Of Days style final battle type of thing.

The fifth book in the series was supposed to be U.S. Road Cav, but GW dropped the Dark Future line before it was published.

6: One Book That Wracked You With Sobs:

Apart from Billions & Billions (see above), I would have to say The Sapphire Rose by David Eddings.

Kurik's death, and Talen's subsequent revenge. 'Nuff said.

7: One Book You Wish Had Never Been Written:

The Railway Children by Edith Nesbit.

It's not a bad book, per se, it's just that I was forced to read it at school, and then forced to watch the BBC TV version of it. And now this supremely useless crap is taking up space in my already overtaxed brain.

8: One Book You're Currently Reading:

The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

Is there any need for explanation beyond that fact that this is the greatest five-book trilogy ever written?

9: One Book You're Meaning To Read:

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk.

I'm told that the book differs considerably from the movie, so I'm interested in picking up a copy, if I can ever find one.

10: Now Tag Five Bloggers:

(who will hate me for doing so)

3vil g3nius
Simon
Marindazza

And.. I'm out of ideas..

Birthday Meme

I was randomly trawling aroung the blogosphere when I chanced upon a blog which mentioned "The Birthday Meme". Sadly, I don't remember which blog it was on.

The aim of the meme is to post your birthday, and then post three events, two births and one death from that day in history.

So, here goes:

20th June:

Events:

1214 - University of Oxford receives its charter.

1756 - British garrison imprisoned in the Black Hole of Calcutta.

1963 - The so-called "red telephone" was established between Soviet Union and United States following the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Births:

1389 - John, Duke of Bedford, regent of England (d. 1435)

1909 - Errol Flynn, Australian actor (d. 1959)

Deaths:

451 - Theodorid, King of the Visigoths

Interestingly, 20th June is also the Day of the Royal Victorian Order, and, in ancient Rome, was the day of the festival of Summanus, the god of nocturnal thunder.

Specialist kind of god, apparently.