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Author Topic:   Intelligent Design Creationism
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 151 of 154 (200607)
04-20-2005 2:56 AM
Reply to: Message 148 by commike37
04-19-2005 9:59 PM


Re: Interesting Claim
I have got evidence that Luskin's statement is untrue and that the supposed examples did not exist. This does not necessarily imply that Luskin was lying - he might for instance have misinterpreted references to "specified complxity" as referring to the appication of the filter when they referred instead to the common meaning of the term.
The ID movement has a strong motivation to publish examples. Even examples that fail to find design would show that it could be used. You yourself claim that it is a "huge part of ID". So it must be embarassing that it seems to be completely unused even by the ID movement.
The ID movement has had more than 2 years to publish some of those "numerous" examples and to generate even more.
NO valid applications of the EF to biology have been published.
Conclusion : The ID movement had no valid examples at the conference and probably have none to this day.
This message has been edited by PaulK, 04-20-2005 05:28 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 148 by commike37, posted 04-19-2005 9:59 PM commike37 has not replied

  
Loudmouth
Inactive Member


Message 152 of 154 (200736)
04-20-2005 5:39 PM
Reply to: Message 150 by commike37
04-19-2005 11:59 PM


Re: Dembski's EF is a failure
quote:
Furthermore, specified complexity (meaning both specified and complex) is the criterion for design. If it fails this criterion it falls into chance.
Specified complexity is entirely a subjective term. It is not objective in any way. It is a quality that exists in Dembski's mind, and his mind only. His definition of both SPECIFIED and COMPLEX moves around willy-nilly on a case by case basis.
quote:
You could argue that we have insufficient information to make the calculations for the EF in a specific case, but that shouldn't generalize to say the EF is wrong in all scenarios. Insufficient information is simply not having enough information to use the EF (in situation X only), not a fatal flaw to the EF itself.
To apply the EF, according to Dembski himself, you have to know the entire causal history of what you are studying. For the bac flag, you would have to know exactly how it came about, including all precursors. Needless to say, it is impossible to apply the EF in the case of the bac flag.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 150 by commike37, posted 04-19-2005 11:59 PM commike37 has not replied

  
JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 153 of 154 (200783)
04-20-2005 9:24 PM
Reply to: Message 150 by commike37
04-19-2005 11:59 PM


Re: Dembski's EF is a failure
This is basically a repeat of what you just said in the last post, and what I refuted in my last post. I'm not going to refute this again.
It is indeed a repeat of what I have asked before, but you have not provided any refutiation or answer to the question. You claimed that people are using the EF, and your reference to someone else who makes the same unsupported claim is not evidence for the claim. Who is using the EF?. The way to support your claim is to proivide a reference to someone who is using the EF. You haven't even tried.
Here's what the evidence says: Dembski can not calculate the probability of chance for the backerial flagellum.
Here's what you say: Noone can calculate the probability of chance for anything.
As I clearly stated, twice before and now for the third time, I do not claim that Dembski's failure to calculate the probability of chance for the bacterial flagellum leads to the conclusion that no-one can calculate the probability of chance for the bacterial flagellum. It does not lead to the conclusion that no-one can calculate the the probability of chance for the bacterial flagellum. What does lead to the conclusion that no-one can calculate the probability of chance for the bacterial flagellum is the fact that nobody has the data required to do so. All you have to do is demonstrate that data, as I discuss below.
Although there are a lot of possibilities as to how something could have happened, many of these can be discounted because the probability is so minutely small (it's like we have a million grains of sand). What we instead must consider is the more probably ideas. Sure, we lose some accuracy doing this, but if the calculations lead to a 10*-20 probability when we only need a 10*-10, then that margin of error would be a nonfactor.
Interesting assertion. What evidence and/or calculations do you have to support it? How do you know what are the most probable dseas? What are the most probable ideas for the bacterial flagellum arising by chance, and why are these the most probable ideas?
Irrelevant.
I'm glad to see that you can refute what I said in a one-word, unexplained response
I expanded on that one word, and explained exactly why your response was irrelevant, in the rest of the post (to which you did not respond). As I wrote:
quote:
Since the last possible conclusion of Dembski's EF is not "insufficient information to reach a conclusion", it's snake oil. No matter what the nature of the tests are, the wrong last possible conclusion dooms it.
See that "No matter what the nature of the tests"? That's why the complexity/specification criterion is irrelevant.
Sure, you can list these flaws, we can debate them, but are any of them a true science-stopper?
Yup. Absolutely, unless the EF is totally reformulated, and maybe not even then. As I wrote,
quote:
Since the last possible conclusion of Dembski's EF is not "insufficient information to reach a conclusion", it's snake oil. No matter what the nature of the tests are, the wrong last possible conclusion dooms it.
And the total inability to get past the second test in the filter also dooms it.
And there are other fatal flaws, that are too complex and technical to go into detail here. See The advantages of theft over toil: the design inference and arguing from ignorance:
quote:
We show that if Dembski's filter were adopted as a scientific heuristic, some classical developments in science would not be rational, and that Dembski's assertion that the filter reliably identifies rarefied design requires ignoring the state of background knowledge. If background information changes even slightly, the filter's conclusion will vary wildly. Dembski fails to overcome Hume's objections to arguments from design.
and Information Theory, Evolutionary Computation, and Dembski's "Complex Specifed Information":
quote:
Intelligent design advocate William Dembski has introduced a measure of informa tion called "complex specifed information", or CSI. He claims that CSI is a reliable marker of design by intelligent agents. He puts forth a "Law of Conservation of Information" which states that chance and natural laws are incapable of generating CSI.
In particular, CSI cannot be generated by evolutionary computation. Dembski asserts that CSI is present in intelligent causes and in the flagellum of Escherichia coli, and concludes that neither have natural explanations. In this paper we examine Dembski's claims, point out significant errors in his reasoning, and conclude that there is no
reason to accept his assertions.
There's a difference between being not perfect and being fatally flawed.
Yup. But the EF is fatally flawed, as I pointed out over several messages now. And your only response has been more unsupported assertions and more failure to even try to support your previous asserions.
Neither evolution or ID are perfect, so we give them their proper treatment and teach the controversy in our schools.
Evolution is so far the best and only scientific theory extant. There's nothing else to teach. There's no scientific theory of ID. There's no applications of the EF; you have failed to come up with one despite repeated requests. There's no scientific controversy, just a few "Christian" sects trying to force their religion into science classes; note that they've totally given up on establishing ID as science and are concentrating on school boards. There's no disagreement among experts.
However, to exclude a certain form or origins science does not just mean that it's inferior, it means that it is completey and undoubtedly unscientific. You can nitpick mistakes with the EF here or there, but you can't prove it be completely and undoubtedly unscientific.
Sorry, the burden of proof is on you. You want the EF accepted as science, you (or the ID community) need to demonstrate that it is such and realistically address the criticisms. Not with mere assertions, not with packing school boards with creationists, but in the arena of science.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 150 by commike37, posted 04-19-2005 11:59 PM commike37 has not replied

  
JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 154 of 154 (200786)
04-20-2005 9:31 PM
Reply to: Message 148 by commike37
04-19-2005 9:59 PM


Re: Interesting Claim
So you want to claim without any evidence to prove this that Luskin lied and that all of these examples were fabricated?
We don't know. Remember the default "insufficient information to reach a conclusion"? Well, we have insufficient information to reach a conclusion. Maybe he lied, maybe he's 100% right, maybe he's honestly mistaken, maybe he's stretching the truth a bit to make a better story, mayybe all sorts of things I haven't thought of.
What we do know is
  1. The page contains only vague, unsupported claims about use of the EF.
  2. Luskin did not provide any references that we could use to gain more information.
  3. The page does not contain the requested example of use of the EF.
It's just another guy making an unsuported assertion. The fact that someeone else makes the same unsupported asserion that you do is not evidecne for your assertion.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 148 by commike37, posted 04-19-2005 9:59 PM commike37 has not replied

  
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