Category Archives: Philosophy

Christian Libertarianism, Faith, Free will, Go Hard!, Justice, Revolution

God’s Grace, Libertarianism, and Anne Frank

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The Pharoh and the Midwives.

Being forced to choose the lesser of two evils is never a pleasant experience for an Idealist.
Though done for the right reasons, there is still a sense of compromise with evil.

Yet when I consider certain Moral dilemmas, which at times God allows us mere mortals to face, I am forced to admit that sometimes I would tell a lie rather than tell the truth, esp to protect others from tyranny or other dire evils… Trusting in God’s understanding and Grace.
Up until today I had no literal scriptural vindication for this position, only a trust in God’s Goodness, and Grace.

Yet it is with gratitude to the face book page called ‘if libertarians are crazy, who wants to be sane?… that I can now say a very important scripture in Exodus (Ex1vs15-21) actually vindicates making such a choice, by describing a Historic event whereby some Midwives were forced to choose between obeying a Murderous decree from a tyrant…which they knew was a morally evil command/’Law’, or instead doing what they believed was right… and disobeying it, and covering their tracks with a lie.

15” And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives, of which the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah:
16 And he said, When ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son, then ye shall kill him: but if it be a daughter, then she shall live.
17 But the midwives feared God, and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the men children alive.
18 And the king of Egypt called for the midwives, and said unto them, Why have ye done this thing, and have saved the men children alive?
19 And the midwives said unto Pharaoh, Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are lively, and are delivered ere the midwives come in unto them.
20 Therefore God dealt well with the midwives: and the people multiplied, and waxed very mighty.
21 And it came to pass, because the midwives feared God, that he made them houses.”
(Exodus 1vs15-21)

This portion of scripture is pregnant with Libertarian Ideals!
It is exactly the sort of vindication for my conviction that If I was a Christian Libertarian living in the Netherlands during the 1940’s Nazi occupation, that I would have been fulfilling my Christian duty by Disobeying the Official/ Legal obligation to turn in all the Jews, and instead to help hide them from the Demon Swastka… like many brave Christian Netherlanders actually did during the war… for example those who helped hide … Anne Frank and her Family.
I believe those Good souls were Christians because after the War her Father Otto,who survived the death camps, and though being a Jew, set up a charity to help poor European Christian’s with the money he received from his murdered Daughters dairy… the best selling ‘Diary of Anne Frank’.

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Anne Frank.

There can be no doubt that the Exodus story of the Egyptian Midwives, and the story of those whom hid Anne Frank, are perfectly matched, and that God blesses those brave enough to resist evil tyrannies for the sake of doing what is right, and He is prepared to forgive such things as telling lies under these curcumstances.

This does not make these lies ‘Good’. It only makes them ‘better’/ lesser evils than betraying innocent people to murderers, and because the world does throw such moral dilemma’s at us, and we sometimes have little or no time to think of perfect solutions, that God pours out his grace and mercy upon us… exactly as I hoped and trusted he would do… before I became aware of the Libertarian principles in this scripture.

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The Apostle Peter before the Sanhedrin.

I have always believed as Peter said when he disobeyed the Authorities command to cease preaching the Name of Jesus… that there is a limit to the obedience the Christian owes to any Human power, Law, or command.

Act’s 4…
13 “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus.
14 And beholding the man which was healed standing with them, they could say nothing against it.
15 But when they had commanded them to go aside out of the council, they conferred among themselves,
16 Saying, What shall we do to these men? for that indeed a notable miracle hath been done by them is manifest to all them that dwell in Jerusalem; and we cannot deny it.
17 But that it spread no further among the people, let us straitly threaten them, that they speak henceforth to no man in this name.
18 And they called them, and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus.
19 But Peter and John answered and said unto them, Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye.
20 For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.
21 So when they had further threatened them, they let them go, finding nothing how they might punish them, because of the people: for all men glorified God for that which was done.”

And again in Act’s 5 vs 29

29 Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men.

There are plenty of verses throughout the Bible which demonstrate this principle, yet Peter did not tell any lie to the Authorities, and was prepared to suffer for his forthright profession.
And this is clearly a different moral circumstance to the one in Exodus or the one facing the Christians in the Netherlands… as these circumstances involved the safety others…
*Oppressed Jews* under Satanic Attack.
God actually promised Abraham that He would “Bless them which bless thee and curse them which curse thee” … the Jew having a special relationship with God.
And the situation of Anne Frank and her family relied on their helpers not being found out or arrested, so that they could continue to aid them, thus Subterfuge is essential.
In such circumstances I am glad to know that God is not an uncompromising Moral Tyrant, but will have mercy upon the Brave soul who makes such a difficult moral decision.
He is indeed Full of Grace, understanding, and mercy.
I would also think this sort of grace is applicable for the Stratagems of the Righteous Commander in the deception required in warfare to overcome the Armies of Evil…eg Operation Mince Meat.

Today has been a great day!
I love it when I learn New Libertarian insights are buried in the Scriptures!
We now have another arrow in our Bow to shoot at those followers of Satan who preach that the Christian cant be a Libertarian, and must slavishly obey all Government decrees no matter how wicked, or that in warfare he must disregard common sence and march straight into cannon fire without devising cunning ways to fool the enemies into error.
Tim Wikiriwhi
King James Bible Believer, Dispensationalist, Libertarian, Christian.

C S Lewis, Consciousness, Intelligent Design, Matthew, Monism vs Dualism, Personal Identity

God vs. AI

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In this video from the 2012 Asia Consciousness Festival, AI researcher Ben Goertzel says

Imagine you had a collective of people, or they could be people and AIs, or some of them could be cyborgs (the people with brains jacked in to the computers), and imagine that they’re concerned with a number of things …

First, they’re concerned with measuring each other’s brain states and making scientific theories about what they observe …

Second, they observe more in the manner of a group of people meditating together, they’re actually subjectively perceiving each other’s consciousness while they’re doing this and so they can both measure each other’s states of consciousness empirically and neurally, or digitally if they’re AIs, and they can subjectively enter into collective mind states …

But there’s another ingredient, human beings have the annoying property that if you cut open our heads and mess with our brains we tend to die or become gibbering idiots or something but a computer program won’t necessarily have this feature and with molecular nanotechnology humans won’t necessarily have this feature either, so …

You can imagine this sort of ashram of consciousness scientists who are studying each other’s brains and minds and experiencing each other’s states of consciousness in a very refined way …

You can imagine this happening in a situation where the members of this community could actually alter and adjust each other’s brains experimentally and dynamically during the collective process…

Now, what you see here is the possibility of some form of collective understanding going beyond science as we have it now and going beyond religion as we have it now. Whether you can get this new form of understanding using humans as we exist now I’m not sure. It’s easy to envision with the AIs and cyborgs in the mix.

Artificial minds will be such that they can readily fuse into a single mind, or fissure into many separate minds. I suppose that in principle fission is easy, but that fusion is more problematic. An artificial mind may fissure into multiple separate minds, with the intent of fusing back into a single mind some time later, but the newly begotten minds, once split off, may have other ideas.

My God My God Why Have you

Here‘s what C. S. Lewis has to say about the super-personal God of the Trinity.

A good many people nowadays say, `I believe in a God, but not in a personal God.’ They feel that the mysterious something which is behind all other things must be more than a person. Now the Christians quite agree. But the Christians are the only people who offer any idea of what a being that is beyond personality could be like. All the other people, though they say that God is beyond personality, really think of Him as something impersonal: that is, as something less than personal. If you are looking for something super-personal, something more than a person, then it is not a question of choosing between the Christian idea and the other ideas. The Christian idea is the only one on the market.

Again, some people think that after this life, or perhaps after several lives, human souls will be ‘absorbed’ into God. But when they try to explain what they mean, they seem to be thinking of our being absorbed into God as one material thing is absorbed into another. They say it is like a drop of water slipping into the sea. But of course that is the end of the drop. If that is what happens to us, then being absorbed is the same as ceasing to exist. It is only the Christians who have any idea of how human souls can be taken into the life of God and yet remain themselves—in fact, be very much more themselves than they were before.

… The whole purpose for which we exist is to be thus taken into the life of God. Wrong ideas about what that life is will make it harder. And now, for a few minutes, I must ask you to follow rather carefully.

You know that in space you can move in three ways – to left or right, backwards or forwards, up or down. Every direction is either one of these three or a compromise between them. They are called the three Dimensions. Now notice :his. If you are using only one dimension, you could draw only a straight line. If you are using two; you could draw a figure: say, a square. And a square is made up of four straight lines. Now a step further. If you have three dimensions, you can then build what we call a solid body: say, a cube – a thing like a dice or a lump of sugar. And a cube is made up of six squares.

Do you see the point? A world of one dimension would be a straight line. In a two-dimensional world, you still get straight lines, but many lines make one figure. In a three-dimensional world, you still get figures but many figures make one solid body. In other words, as you advance to more real and more complicated levels, you do not leave behind you the things you found on the simpler levels: you still have them, but combined in new ways – in ways you could not imagine if you knew only the simpler levels.

Now the Christian account of God involves just the same principle. The human level is a simple and rather empty level. On the human level one person is one being, and any two persons are two separate beings – just as, in two dimensions (say on a flat sheet of paper) one square is one figure, and any two squares are two separate figures. On the Divine level you still find personalities; but up there you find them combined in new ways which we, who do not live on that level, cannot imagine. In God’s dimension, so to speak, you find a being who is three Persons while remaining one Being, just as a cube is six squares while remaining one cube. Of course we cannot fully conceive a Being like that: just as, if we were so made that we perceived only two dimensions in space we could never properly imagine a cube. But we can get a sort of faint notion of it. And when we do, we are then, for the first time in our lives, getting some positive idea, however faint, of something super-personal – something more than a person. It is something we could never have guessed, and yet, once we have been told, one almost feels one ought to have been able to guess it because it fits in so well with all the things we know already.

Is the mind of God like that of an AI? When, ultimately, we are “taken into the life of God,” do we become thee- or four-dimensional facets of the multi-dimensional being that is God? When God invaded his own creation, by sending his only begotten son to incarnate as a human being, was that a case of fission? I suggest that the person of Jesus was entirely separate from the person of his father when, on the cross, Jesus cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

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Consciousness, Gay, Nietzsche, Personal Identity

Do you want this again and innumerable times again?

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What if reincarnation and time travel are true and when you die you get reincarnated as yourself

What if some day or night a demon were to steal into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: “This life as you now live it and have lived it you will have to live once again and innumerable times again; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unspeakably small or great in your life must return to you, all in the same succession and sequence—even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned over again and again, and you with it, speck of dust!” Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: “You are a god, and never have I heard anything more divine.” If this thought gained power over you, as you are it would transform and possibly crush you; the question in each and every thing, “Do you want this again and innumerable times again?” would lie on your actions as the heaviest weight! Or how well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to long for nothing more fervently than for this ultimate eternal confirmation and seal?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science

Do you want this again and innumerable times again?

Atheism, Ayn Rand, Christian Libertarianism, Faith, Francis Schaeffer, Freedom, Justice, Logic, Materialism, Theism, There is a God!, Thomas Jefferson

Jefferson’s God. The Rock upon which Liberty is founded. (God save us from Atheism!)

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“And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever: that considering numbers, nature and natural means only, a revolution of the wheel of fortune, an exchange of situation, is among possible events: that it may become probable by supernatural interference!”

~ Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Q.XVIII (1782)

From one of the very best political/Christian Libertarian/ historical pages on Facebook ‘The Founders,Religion and Government’ Here:

Sir Bob Jones needs to take a good long hard look at himself, and admit that when he scoffs at Christianity, that he (and all Sowers of Atheism) work not as they claim for the betterment of society, but for the destruction of Freedom and morality… Read about that Here:

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Fanatical Antichrist Ayn Rand. Megalomaniac.

This quote from Jefferson also exposes the gross delusions of Ayn Rand and her fantical worshippers… their capacity to ignore Reality…

“America was created by men who broke with all political traditions and who originated a system unprecedented in history, relying on nothing but the “unaided” power of their own intellect.” | Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal.

^^^That is Patently false. Ayn Rand attempts to rob American Libertarianism of it’s Christian foundations, and enthrone Godless ‘Reason’.
She too is a wolf in sheep’s clothing… claiming to be a champion of liberty and rights, while attacking the very foundations of those Ideals.

The Late Great Christian Libertarian Francis Schaeffer explains just how absurd and dishonest Objectivism is here:
Materialism renders Man Nought. Meaning-less, Value-less, Right-less

In his candid biography ‘My life with Ayn Rand’, Her greatest disciple Nathaniel Branden (whom she dubbed ‘John Galt’) admitted she became completely divorced from reality. She was Tyrannical… demanding absolute submission to her dictates.
No room for freedom of thought.
You had the right to follow your own conscience…as long as it was 100% in alignment with their great leaders teachings.
And this is still be the defining trait of Objectivists today.
They have conformed themselves into little imitations… little graven images of their Atheist Deity.

Nathaniel Branden would eventually be caste out and demonized because he wanted to end his sexual/ adulterous relationship with Rand.
Incapible of tollerating such an honest evaluation of their Goddess. The most Rabid Rand worshippers have judged the Brandens as being Diablocal, and say that Ayn Rand was not an all-powerful Cult Leader, but a ‘pure of heart’ victem of the Brandens Cunning…

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Intolerant Objectivism is busy strangulating Liberatrain movements around the globe…

Read about the Failure of Objectivist Libertarianism Here:

Read how classical Libertarianism used to care… Here:

Free will, Freedom, New Inklings

Concerning the notion of Liberty, and of moral Agency.

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freedomwill

The plain and obvious meaning of the words Freedom and Liberty, in common speech, is The power, opportunity, or advantage, that any one has, to do as he pleases. Or in other words, his being free from hindrance or impediment in the way of doing, or conducting in any respect, as he wills. — And the contrary to Liberty, whatever name we call that by, is a person’s being hindered or unable to conduct as he will, or being necessitated to do otherwise.

If this which I have mentioned be the meaning of the word Liberty, in the ordinary use of language; as I trust that none that has ever learned to talk, and is unprejudiced, will deny; then it will follow, that in propriety of speech, neither Liberty, nor its contrary, can properly be ascribed to any being or thing, but that which has such a faculty, power or property, as is called will. For that which is possessed of no will, cannot have any power or opportunity of doing according to its will, nor be necessitated to act contrary to its will, nor be restrained from acting agreeably to it. And therefore to talk of Liberty, or the contrary, as belonging to the very Will itself, is not to speak good sense; if we judge of sense, and nonsense, by the original and proper signification of words.— For the Will itself is not an Agent that has a will: the power of choosing, itself, has not a power of choosing. That which has the power of volition is the man, or the soul, and not the power of volition itself. And he that has the Liberty of doing according to his will, is the Agent who is possessed of the Will; and not the Will which he is possessed of. We say with propriety, that a bird let loose has power and liberty to fly; but not that the bird’s power of flying has a power and Liberty of flying. To be free is the property of an Agent, who is possessed of powers and faculties, as much as to be cunning, valiant, bountiful, or zealous. But these qualities are the properties of persons; and not the properties of properties.

There are two things contrary to what is called Liberty in common speech. One is constraint; otherwise called force, compulsion, and coaction; which is a person’s being necessitated to do a thing contrary to his will. The other is restraint; which is, his being hindered, and not having power to do according to his will. But that which has no will, cannot be the subject of these things.— I need say the less on this bead, Mr. Locke having set the same thing forth, with so great clearness, in his Essay on the Human Understanding.

But one thing more I would observe concerning what is vulgarly called Liberty; namely, that power and opportunity for one to do and conduct as he will, or according to his choice, is all that is meant by it; without taking into the meaning of the word, any thing of the cause of that choice; or at all considering how the person came to have such a volition; whether it was caused by some external motive, or internal habitual bias; whether it was determined by some internal antecedent volition, or whether it happened without a cause; whether it was necessarily connected with something foregoing, or not connected. Let the person come by his choice any how, yet, if he is able, and there is nothing in the way to hinder his pursuing and executing his will, the man is perfectly free, according to, the primary and common notion of freedom.

– Jonathan Edwards, Freedom of the Will, 1754

Are you up for A Careful And Strict Inquiry Into The Modern Prevailing Notions Of That FREEDOM OF WILL Which Is Supposed To Be Essential To Moral Agency, Virtue And Vice, Reward And Punishment, Praise And Blame? Then feel free to come join us at the next meeting of the New Inklings. (Tuesday 30 April, 5:00 pm, Trax Bar and Cafe, Platform 1, Wellington Railway Station.)

Ayn Rand, Logic, Slayer

Objectivism causes brain damage

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Here are a couple of Randroid memes seen recently on Facebook. (Here and here.)

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Can you spot the obvious absurdity of these statements? Well, as one Facebook commenter explains

Quoting Ayn Rand is pretty absurd for starters, but “reality” and the consequences of ignoring reality are all part of the same set (reality) so it is making a distinction that doesn’t exist… so it really is saying nothing…

In other words, the consequences (of avoiding reality) are themselves part of reality. Therefore, Ayn Rand is saying that you can avoid reality and that you cannot avoid reality. She has arrived at a contradiction!

Ayn Rand’s work is littered with contradictions. They blend in with their context, so that her followers find them hard to spot. Which is why I bother to point them out. It’s a labour of love.

Ayn Rand was not much of a philosopher, but there’s no denying she had a wicked turn of phrase. This one’s my all-time favourite Rand sound-bite.

To arrive at a contradiction is to confess an error in one’s thinking. To maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one’s mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality.

Rand has arrived at a contradiction. But we all make errors in our thinking from time to time. So how do I back my claim that Objectivism causes brain damage? Well, to maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one’s mind … i.e., brain damage. And that’s what Objectivists do. They maintain Rand’s contradiction! You see, Rand never said

You can ignore reality, but you can’t ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.

And she never said

You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.

These memes are contradiction maintenance by paraphrase! Here’s what Rand actually said.

[Man] is free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss [that] he refuses to see.

Abortion, Hatebreed, Jeremiah, Personal Identity

Are you old enough?

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jeremiah_1_5

The word of the Lord came to me, saying,

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
    before you were born I set you apart;
    I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

“Alas, Sovereign Lord,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am too young.”

But the Lord said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am too young.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the Lord.

Then the Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.” (NIV)

Exodus, Laws of Nature, Metaphysics, Miracles, Monism vs Dualism, Trans-egoism

The Metaphysics of the Miraculous

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[Article by Mark I Rasskazov, Editor in Chief of the Transegoist Daily Journal. Syndicated.]

The Metaphysics of the Miraculous

My metaphysical model is monism, which means that I believe that there is one reality, and that everything in it is subject to a single set of physical laws (the Standard Model of Physics — until something better comes along). Now, most monists do not believe in miracles. Why? Because the term “miracle” typically denotes something which is supernatural — i.e., something which defies the laws of physics; something which requires that we appeal to metaphysical dualism: the idea that there are two planes of existence; a physical one, and a separate one, a spiritual one, which can override the physical.

The majority of people who believe in the existence of a Deity (or deities) accept some dualistic metaphysical model. I believe in God, and I accept a monistic model. I also believe in miracles. Is this a contradiction? No; but I’ve had to manipulate the concept of “miracle” somewhat.

It has been said: “That which seems miraculous is actually merely the unexplained.”

I consider that statement to be accurate.

I add one twist:

That which is, admittedly, physically explicable, yet is clearly not coincidental must be considered to be miraculous.

The Ten Plagues of Egypt can be explained as a severe natural disaster. Does that mean that it is coincidence that it happened to occur just as the time was right for the Israelis to leave?

The parting of the Red Sea in the book of Exodus has been explained as being the result of comet activity. Does this mean that it is coincidental that it occurred just as it began to look like the children of Israel had their backs against the wall?

When the Israelis arrived at the Promised Land, on two separate occasions, the walls of a city they were attacking spontaneously crumbled at a strategically advantageous moment. This could have easily been the result of seismic activity. Coincidence?

I think not.

What I think is that this entire universe is a magnificent machine, which operates in a flawless, albeit brutal and bittersweet manner.

God does have love for mankind. That’s not to say that He’s very nice. He’s not.

God’s miracles are physical events that He has set into motion long beforehand.

In that sense, inasmuch as God is sovereign, every waking moment that you experience is a clear and present miracle.

Do not squander the beautiful and terrifying miracle that is your life.

Free will, Isaiah, Romans

Is God unjust?

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Potter

What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses,

“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”

It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? (NIV)

Ayn Rand, Evolutionism, Fish, Intelligent Design, King James Bible, Matthew, New Testament, Semantics

You’re no fun(ction) any more

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dawkins_blind_spot

This post continues the discussion on Tim’s post The Ludicrous Claims of Evolution! Why not ESP?

In comments on Tim’s post, Terry (who is both an Evolutionist and an Objectivist) says

a camera is NOT an eye (nor is an audio recorder an ear, etc). A camera is a piece of equipment used to record images, whereas an eye is an organ of sight. The former mimics the functions of the latter, but apart from that they are worlds apart.

simply because human technology [has] been built so as to mimic certain biological functions does not justify grounds for claiming that the reverse applies and that biology can therefore ‘possibly’ mimic human inventions via the process of evolution. … Evolution is not a creative process – it is an entirely responsive process, which means that new functionality only develops and is maintained in response to the need to survive.

Terry has just committed Objectivism’s “stolen concept” fallacy and violated a fundamental tenet of Evolutionism! Doubleplusungood!

According to Evolutionism, there are no biological functions. The eye, for example, is an organ of sight, but the eye has no purpose. Its function is not to see. It has no function.

According to Evolutionism, there are no biological malfunctions, either. A blind eye, by definition, is not an organ of sight. A blind eye has not malfunctioned, because there is nothing it is supposed to do. An eye has no purpose to be fit for.

If it’s the case that the eye was designed for a purpose, as Creationists claim, then we can say that the function of the eye is to see, and that there is something wrong with an eye that does not see. It ain’t doing what it’s supposed to do, and if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch. But Evolutionism is quite explicit that no biological organ is designed for any purpose. As Dawkins says

Biology is the study of complicated things which give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose

and, as Terry himself puts it, “Evolution is not a creative process – it is an entirely responsive process.”

Evolution according to Evolutionists is a blind, stochastic process. Any appearance of design, purpose or function is just an appearance. The reason that we have eyes that see is simply because having eyes that see helped our ancestors to survive. But eyes do not, in virtue of their evolutionary history, ever acquire a purpose or a proper function.

All talk of biological functions is pre-Darwinian. Consistent Evolutionists should not talk of biological functions. If they do, they must explain that their use of the word ‘function’ is just shorthand for facts about an organism’s evolutionary history. If they don’t, they are guilty of Ayn Rand’s stolen concept fallacy.

The “stolen concept” fallacy, first identified by Ayn Rand, is the fallacy of using a concept while denying the validity of its genetic roots, i.e., of an earlier concept(s) on which it logically depends.

The concepts of ‘function’ and ‘purpose’ logically depend on the concept of a Creator. They are pre-Darwinian. Evolutionists have no right to use them.