| Author: Kerby Rials Subject: Apologetics Date: 10/19/2006 |
Imagine, as John Lennon might say, the latest Japanese robot, with a powerful computer inside. Everyone would like one, but it is expensive, of course. This robot can talk and process verbal commands and has an artificial intelligence routine that is better than any ever devised. Its voice recognition software is incredible, and it has mastered the inconsistencies, nuances and implied thought of human communication better than any translation program ever written. The code for this alone took decades of work and is more advanced than anything now on the market. But there is much more. The powerful computer weighs only 3 lbs. and works on a fraction of a volt. It can run for 80 years without repair! The designers have built into it its own electrical generator — it never needs to be plugged in, and needs no batteries! The computer, far from being fragile, can be immersed in water, and subjected to violent shock and still keep running. It can handle extremes of temperature which ruin most computers, as it has its own temperature control system that is so advanced it can handle temps as low as 20 below and as high as 110 without notable loss of function.
Magnetic fields do not affect its memory storage capacity, which uses a technology never before seen and not even understood by its competitors, who are decades behind its advances. The computer is coupled with robotic functions no less advanced — the robot uses no wheels, allowing it to function in the most rugged environment, unlike more rudimentary designs. The Japanese love baseball, and so are fascinated that the extremely fast computer and extremely rapid response of its servo motors allows it to hit a baseball thrown at 100 miles an hour, thanks to its stereoscopic vision. The power plant for such a machine is also new technology. Rather than being run on fossil fuels or dangerous nuclear power, it is able to process everyday inexpensive and safe biological materials in its internal power plant capable of producing hundreds of watts of power — far more than most electrical appliances. Structurally, the robot carries its power plant and computer in a very elastic and light structure weighing a total of 180 lbs, and using advanced biomechanics that others can not successfully duplicate. Its portable power generation system can operate on a wide variety of substances, making it suitable for operation just about anywhere. Probably most incredible about this robot is its ability to not only survive and operate successfully for up to EIGHTY years, sometimes without repair, but the fact that each robot-computer has built into it the ability to make additional robots! It has the entire design code AND manufacturing facilities to make additional robots within it! At no extra cost! The Japanese, who have astounded the world with this breakthrough robot computer, are themselves astounded many have reportedly rejected the fact that it was made by Japanese, preferring instead to believe that it was accidentally created in some way not yet known. These doubters, many of whom are suspected of anti-Japanese racist tendencies, have gone to great lengths to study the computer and developed various scenarios by which it might have created itself. None of these groups, of course, have as yet been able to prove their theories by creating even a most rudimentary computer in their laboratories using these methods. As yet, they are still trying to understand the one produced by the Japanese.
Recently they found an old garage door opener at a junkyard with an electric eye. They have announced that this is proof of their theories. Meanwhile, the Japanese have also developed an extremely advanced space station, which has put NASA and the European Space Agency back on their heels. It has the latest technology, including protective systems that are highly effective against asteroid strikes and radiation. It even has a large greenhouse system, perfectly balanced to produce enough oxygen for the crew and carbon dioxide for the plants. It has a water purification system that recycles all the water used by the crew and plants. It has a temperature control system that keeps the ship’s temperature continually within a safe range. Instead of a hard shell to resist the vacuum of space it uses a breakthrough technology in which the ship’s atmosphere is held like a blanket “outside” the ship, and yet does not dissipate. The ship’s systems are so balanced, that it can survive for hundreds of years without re-supply, all the while hurtling through space. Now the most amazing fact of this spaceship — the crew has come to believe that the spaceship assembled itself, and the incredibly intricate network of systems that keep it running were all thrown together by chance.
What can be done for this crew to help them to see that such a system has a designer? Is there no hope for them? What about those who deny that the robot-computer could have been created intentionally? Is it not natural to assume that such a conclusion is not one based on rationality, but on preference?