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Author Topic:   Building life in a lab - Synthetic Biologists
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 99 of 152 (239412)
09-01-2005 7:27 AM
Reply to: Message 98 by Wounded King
09-01-2005 6:22 AM


Re: Ring-fencing the start of life
woundedking writes:
What is your evidence for this? People can be made to believe some pretty bizarre things due to monkeying around with their brain, I'm not so convinced that they might not beleieve that they don't exist.
No matter how you monkey around with something you are only affecting the 'x' part of "I am 'x'" You might get a person to say the words "I am not". That's fiddling with some cognitive element of the brain. It's probably relatively straightforward - but for them to actually realise they are not, they have to be. To be or not to be may be the question. But there is no answer. Only mystery. That's what I mean. The only way to even suspect a person 'is not' is when they are dead. But of course death is another unfathomable mystery so not even that provides us with an answer. As far as evidence goes - I cannot produce evidence for something that no one seems to have found any evidence for - the location of something we know exists "I am"
(I'm not familiar with near death experiences but presumably no brain activity is apparent for the person to be pronounced dead - yet when such people 'come back' to life they have been the whole time the brain showed no function. I don't know though as I haven't investigated it)
The fact that we haven't done it yet is not solid evidence that it can't be done, that is gapism at its most blatant. similarly with abiogenesis there is a considerable body of work which gives us several reasonable scenarios for abiogenesis, we may never be able to know if one particular scenario is how it actually happened but it is a million miles away from a metaphysically unapproachable concept such as 'first cause'.
The fact that we haven't done it yet but presume we can is Scientism at it's most blatant. The most central element of who we are. The skeleton on which all cognitive function hangs and nothing. The very basis for all the rest. And no objective evidence. It's precisely like first cause - because it is another first cause - as is abiogenesis.
Setting up an experiment by which life can come into existance (say a strand of self-replicating RNA) may well be done. But not undirectedly - only by using intelligent analysis of what makes up life then setting up and intelligent experiment which intelligently presumes (but cannot know for sure) things about the conditions back then. That says nothing about how it came about. If it is claimed (as it no doubt would be) that another gap has been filled it is only because pseudoscience says so. No one can know - any experiment will be speculative. It can only say "it could have happened this way".
A book of evidence isn't a case. It's a book of evidence. Don't let a bucketful of assertion fool you into thinking otherwise.

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 98 by Wounded King, posted 09-01-2005 6:22 AM Wounded King has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 100 by Wounded King, posted 09-01-2005 7:57 AM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 101 of 152 (239437)
09-01-2005 8:24 AM
Reply to: Message 100 by Wounded King
09-01-2005 7:57 AM


Re: Ring-fencing the start of life
wounded king writes:
Just as well that isn't what I did then.
That you said "no reason to suppose we won't know" didn't include the other half "no reason to suppose we will" meant I jumped to the conclusion that you were an adherent to scientism. Sorry
I love that sound the goalposts make when you move them.
I was taking a leaf out of sciences book. Tentitive theory. If a gap in the theory is shown either modify the theory to accomodate it or the theory is dumped. Whats good for the goose...
Which is exactly what I was saying, but the level of the unknown between abiognesis and 'First cause' is considerable.
Many here would not agree with you. They pose causless singularity, Bang for no reason, something from nothing, unknown dimensions etc. All speculation. Precisely the same as abiogenesis. Only speculation is possible here too. Nothing concrete. Ever
You seem to be driving this toward some metaphysical twaddlefest on the impossibility of really 'knowing' anything.
You said it not me. Which is precisely the way it is when you think about it. Every piece of scientific knowledge is based, somewhere along the line on an unknown. Thus all knowledge is partial and tentitive. And it will always be.
Maybe that's why people start looking for God. They find the tentitive doesn't satisfy and want to know something true. Not tentitively true but actually true. It was the case for me anyway.
The alternative is to be tossed around in whatever direction the tentitive Titanic happens to be moving in at a particular moment in time. I found it made me a little queasy...
If you want to walk on water, you gotta get out of the boat
This message has been edited by iano, 01-Sep-2005 01:25 PM

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 100 by Wounded King, posted 09-01-2005 7:57 AM Wounded King has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 102 by Wounded King, posted 09-01-2005 8:38 AM iano has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 106 of 152 (239478)
09-01-2005 10:44 AM
Reply to: Message 103 by Ooook!
09-01-2005 9:06 AM


Re: Ring-fencing the start of life
ooook writes:
Aha! I think I've got the analogy now. But I've still got the same kind of questions about when we should declare the 'rim' is or whether it's possible to define where the spokes will end at all.
Thanks for helping me develop it. I'm clearer on what I meant too
You don't have to define where the spokes end. They'll do it for you. It becomes a question of whether you accept the spoke has ended. Its about whether you accept the Scientism view which kicks the ball into perpetual touch by saying "we don't know but we have no reason to think we won't - even if we're totally flummoxed and can't even begin to think of how we might progress"
Take first cause of the universe. It seems obvious to me anyway, that to try and find out what happened before the laws of nature came to being and how they came into being is an impossibility given that all our science just observes laws of nature in action. No laws no science. And it's science that has to travel along the spoke - not science fiction.
According to traditional creationism God and only God could explain the diversity of species on this planet.
Only God can explain the diversity of the species completely, Science does so tentively. That a tiny fraction of the total possible observations are explained by a particular hypothesis does not mean that (much spannered on) hypothesis can't be turned on its head. There is nothing unscientific about a flat earth if the science is limited to the observational methods that were available then. Nor is there any thing unscientific about geocentrism (lurkers please hold off on the irrelevant "that was down to theism" remarks) given the observational methods available then. Both have been completely turned on their heads by subsequent observations.
There is an understandable tendency to think that this cannot happen again. That our tentitive theories are somehow concrete steps along the path. But recently we thought that light was a particle until we discovered it was also a wave. As far as we know we don't know what it is. If the actual answer is discovered we can be pretty certain that neither wave nor particle it will be.
The same can happen with Evolution. Evolution is not fact. And no matter how close to fact folk think it is, on its head it most certainly can go. And science which is humble will accept that. It's the fundemental religion call scientism which doesn't
This message has been edited by iano, 01-Sep-2005 03:46 PM
This message has been edited by iano, 01-Sep-2005 03:48 PM

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 103 by Ooook!, posted 09-01-2005 9:06 AM Ooook! has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 107 by LauraG, posted 09-01-2005 11:13 AM iano has replied
 Message 114 by Ooook!, posted 09-01-2005 6:34 PM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 109 of 152 (239520)
09-01-2005 11:53 AM
Reply to: Message 107 by LauraG
09-01-2005 11:13 AM


Re: Ring-fencing the start of life
LauraG writes:
1 - Your wheel analogy makes god (the rim) finite and provable. According to you and to avoid a continuous god-of-the-gaps argument, how can god be turned on its head?
It doesn't make God finite, it makes explainable nature finite ( although that wouldn't be apparent from our current standpoint - there is plenty to keep us occupied for a long time to come: we are nowhere near having a solid disc of knowledge. Thank God...science is good.
Science cannot turn God on his head. Whenever science manages to fill in the disc there will be a ring of mystery enclosing it. What depth the ring extends to no-one will be able to find out -because there will be no way to penetrate it to know. Personally I don't think the disc will get filled in (the world won't, I think, be able to sustain itself long enough to get that far)
Which leads me to modify the hub/spoke/rim analogy (without changing it in any material way). It is hub/spoke/sphere. We will be enclosed in every direction we go. And the thickness of the sphere 'wall' will not be determinable Hmmm...that's better
2 - How does turning evolution on its head immediately point to god?
It doesn't. I was pointing out the nature of scientific endeavor and that humility (due to everything is tentitive) was more appropriate that declaring things to be fact (scientism) which you hear so often

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 107 by LauraG, posted 09-01-2005 11:13 AM LauraG has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 110 of 152 (239533)
09-01-2005 12:26 PM
Reply to: Message 108 by Brad McFall
09-01-2005 11:17 AM


Re: two edged sword-fencing-the start of life as we know it?
Hey Brad..
Just posted a 'spherical rim' then you posted geodesic. Like is that sychronistic or what....
Edit: hey Brad you got there before me! I hadn't read your post first (I'm sure I could dig up the Google-log of me looking up what geodesic means) Man. This IS freaky.
Edit: By the way - what do you think of hub/spoke/sphere as a representation of science vs mystery
This message has been edited by iano, 01-Sep-2005 05:28 PM
This message has been edited by iano, 01-Sep-2005 05:35 PM

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 108 by Brad McFall, posted 09-01-2005 11:17 AM Brad McFall has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 113 by Brad McFall, posted 09-01-2005 3:42 PM iano has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 111 of 152 (239551)
09-01-2005 1:16 PM
Reply to: Message 105 by LauraG
09-01-2005 10:23 AM


Re: Ring-fencing the start of life
LauraG writes:
I can't believe you're arguing unknowables in science, only to turn to an unknowable to explain why there are unknowables. Really, this isn't a case were "fighting fire with fire" works.
There are no unknowables within science (which investigates the natural world - spokes eventually becoming disc). It may be difficult it may take a long time but if it is natural then it cannot hide from science indefinitely. No unknowables in science
If you say (as you appear to) that there are no unknowables - period, then you are making a philosophical statement: there is only the natural, the objective, the empirically investigatable.
The objective evidence appears to be against that philosophy: eg: First cause/abiogenesis/"I am". If you like I can post some quotes of eminent scientists who hold the position that there are things outside science. Things which science will not be able to comment on. Mystery.
But first could you show how natural/objective/empirical is all there is (scientism)...in a natural, objective and empirical way of course...

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 105 by LauraG, posted 09-01-2005 10:23 AM LauraG has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 112 by LauraG, posted 09-01-2005 3:37 PM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 115 of 152 (239877)
09-02-2005 6:53 AM
Reply to: Message 112 by LauraG
09-01-2005 3:37 PM


Re: Ring-fencing the start of life
LauraG writes:
Your wheel analogy makes god (the rim) finite and provable. According to you and to avoid a continuous god-of-the-gaps argument, how can god be turned on its head?
iano writes:
Science cannot turn God on his head. Whenever science manages to fill in the disc there will be a ring of mystery enclosing it. What depth the ring extends to no-one will be able to find out -because there will be no way to penetrate it to know. Personally I don't think the disc will get filled in (the world won't, I think, be able to sustain itself long enough to get that far)
LauraG writes:
You'll notice that you didn't answer my question. I didn't ask how science could turn god on its head, I asked how god could be turned on its head. Also, please provide me with an answer to the following:
If we fill all the gaps in your wheel, we know everything that is to be known in the natural world. Why are you so sure there is a rim? Why do you suppose there will still be mystery after we know everything there is to know in the natural world... or are you just assuming the supernatural to defend the supernatural? ...'cause that would be circular reasoning, you know.
As I was trying to point out my anaology didn't make God finite and provable. The rim depth cannot be known so it cannot be said to be finite. Everything from the end of the spoke outwards is just mystery - (edit) not God. That naturalistic knowledge is finite would, I argue appear to have merit - given current mysteries where science (not scientism) holds it's hands up and says "we can't know".
edit: once the natural was a mystery. Science is the tool to comprehend that mystery. At the end of natural, science is no use, The mystery encountered there needs a different tool.
Edit:
Sorry. You asked how can God be turned on his head. Simple answer: if he is the mystery he can't be turned on his head. If he is not we'll never know whether he can be turned on his head or not
As to what happens at the end of knowledge?. I don't presume the supernatural (although I know it is there - but that's neither here nor there). I use examples such as First Cause to show that something exists and whilst we may travel down a path in our understanding of it we run out of the ability to know before we get to know. A point is reached where we can go no further. What was there before the laws of nature came into operation and how did/does it work is something at which science stops short. Philosophy takes over - but that is not objective or empirical nor observational thus is not knowledge in the sense I think you mean it.
This message has been edited by iano, 02-Sep-2005 12:22 PM
This message has been edited by iano, 02-Sep-2005 03:01 PM
This message has been edited by iano, 02-Sep-2005 04:00 PM

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 112 by LauraG, posted 09-01-2005 3:37 PM LauraG has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 119 of 152 (239924)
09-02-2005 11:37 AM
Reply to: Message 114 by Ooook!
09-01-2005 6:34 PM


Re: The tentative wheel
Yo!
ooook writes:
But I think it is fair to simplify things a bit and say that theories grow on top of each other as we understand more about the universe.
Good bits of theories are kept, less useful parts discarded, but understanding increases no matter what gets flipped on it's head because any new theory will have to explain all of the data that the old one did and then some (progress is always away from the hub if you like).
Whenever we get to having a single piece of knowledge that can be traced back to the hub without relying on an unestablished theory along the way then we could say "it is a process of two steps forward and one back....but we're getting there" It seems to me that everything we 'know' sits in space, not attached to a hub (question) or to the rim (answer). A screwdriver (intermediate knowledge) may be usefully employed as a lever (complete knowledge). But without complete knowledge we won't know it was a lever we should have been using all along.
If you're saying that the ToE as a whole is classified as a 'gap', or worse still 'on the rim',
ToE can only at best be seen as a screwdriver
truckloads of evidence
We're not here to discuss ToE per say but it is worth nothing that this statement would be more accurate if you were to add that the vessel the truckloads would need to fill in order to provide a complete picture - is the size of an ocean. I've heard ToE adherents accept that if the stages of development of a particular species from start to present day was represented by a sequence of 1 to 1000, the eg: fossil evidence available would go something like; ...290...297....501..543...687..910..1000.
How do you know when it stops?
As soon as you find out there is no way you can ever know for sure. That it will always remain a mystery. That the theory will always remain a theory never an answer. ToE suffers from this too. There can never be an observation that it happens as it takes too long to happen. A species mutating but remaining the same species is not macro-evolution. It can be said to fit the theory that's all. The fossil record has massive gaps and there is no sign of them being bridged. Despite millions of fossils being found there are no clear connecting links. There is some stuff that "could have come from here...and is headed towards there". It would be handy if these links in the chain could be attached to something concrete at either end. But they aren't. How many million more fossils need to be found to demonstrate something that should be straightforward given that everything has evolved from something else?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 114 by Ooook!, posted 09-01-2005 6:34 PM Ooook! has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 120 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-02-2005 2:01 PM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 121 of 152 (240005)
09-02-2005 2:49 PM
Reply to: Message 120 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic
09-02-2005 2:01 PM


Re: The tentative wheel
AEA writes:
An assumption based on limited information or knowledge; a conjecture.
AEA writes:
a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world; an organized system of accepted knowledge that applies in a variety of circumstances to explain a specific set of phenomena
No problems butting in. Sorry for slow responses but I've a few things on the boil and a project coming to completion at work. And there is only in theory 24 hours in the day
"Limited" and "well-substantiated". What defines well-substantiated here? What is the total amount of knowledge that would be required to describe the complete story and what amount of knowledge is actually available and what is the quality of the knowledge we have with respect to knowledge which would show something for sure. I'm not asking for a presentation of evolutionary evidence here - just making a point for....
The idea of well-substantiated is only a convention. There has been no theory which has come to be proved yet. We have nothing that we have established completely in order to be able to examine it from no knowledge-to-complete knowledge and thus calibrate other theories from it. Nothing with which to compare how far a theory is along the complete path and then say, for example that 40% along is 'well-substantiated. Without a datum, every comparative measurement is simply comparing one incomplete theory with another incomplete theory. The blind leading the blind as it were
Such convention is useless from the point of view of commenting objectively on 'well-substantiated'. ToE's 'well-substantiated' is completely subjective. It is safer to say limited when you don't know what the limits are.
Theodosius's comment are subjectively correct but objectively they are sheer bluster. We can observe things like the earth going around the sun. We can travel into space and confirm the earth is round (even though we don't have to to know that. Nobody has seen one species change into another. And until they do "Evolution is a process which has always gone on..." remains tentitive - not fact.

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 120 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-02-2005 2:01 PM AnEmpiricalAgnostic has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 122 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-02-2005 3:28 PM iano has replied
 Message 124 by Brad McFall, posted 09-05-2005 12:34 PM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 125 of 152 (240596)
09-05-2005 1:31 PM
Reply to: Message 122 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic
09-02-2005 3:28 PM


Re: The tentative wheel
AEA writes:
The ToE has enough substantiation to convince the neutral observer upon review of the evidence.
It has enough substantiation to convince - within the boundaries set for theories. I'm not arguing well substantiated. I'm asking how does one calibrate theory at all - given that there is no objective standard to compare a 'well-substantiated' theory with to find out whether it offers a 2% explanation or a 92% explanation of what happened.
Scientific theories are as strong as the evidence that substantiates them.
Same question here as above
I read the first of these links and as suspected equivocation is the norm. "What is a species" being first up. Seems like it is not really clear. And when all is said and done the experiements with flies and worms and plants produced.... flies and worms and plants. Surmising that evolution occurs because an obeservation agrees with it doesn't mean it occurs. In order to be sure it occurs you would need to objective evidence not circumstantial evidence. That's what I meant about mystery. Know one will know this because of the time scales that are supposed to be necessary for it.

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 122 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-02-2005 3:28 PM AnEmpiricalAgnostic has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 130 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-06-2005 11:58 AM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 126 of 152 (240597)
09-05-2005 1:38 PM
Reply to: Message 124 by Brad McFall
09-05-2005 12:34 PM


Re: The tentative wheel
iano writes:
This might invert some perimeter a meter or so, so it might matter but I have not found anyone reading my own posts as closely as I do. The trees between Oxford and Cambridge are way too straight. Iguess the earth got in my way.
I suspect that's because your bright. You are too bright for me anyway. I'm a learn-how-to-pass-exams-get-your-degree-then rely-on-your-natural-ability kind of mechanical engineer, who only started thinking about anything 4 years ago. A baby when it comes to thinking. Like I have this thing called the bible which explains it backwards, forwards and sideways - and still it is a rare enough event that I get that...
If you want me to get it Brad...then you gotta spell it out for me. Otherwise I can't know

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 124 by Brad McFall, posted 09-05-2005 12:34 PM Brad McFall has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 127 by Brad McFall, posted 09-05-2005 5:59 PM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 128 of 152 (240814)
09-06-2005 11:28 AM
Reply to: Message 127 by Brad McFall
09-05-2005 5:59 PM


Re: The tentative wheel
brad mcfall writes:
Keep the Bible, we need such in today'snow time.
It's all we need. And one day it won't be necessary at all. "Now we see dimly..."
I dont know but I find think about agriculture much better for humanities survival of the next 100s
If its seconds you mean then I'm more optimistic. if you mean hundreds then I'm afraid I wouldn't be placing bets on it. I ain't an end-is-nigh-er but it stands to (my) reason we'll trash ourselves before then
Thanks for the compliment. I dont think that the realms are seperate as AEA thinks in case he was a head of you and me in this thread, virtually.
For what reason do you think that. Remember I ain't that bright. And I don't have the werewithal to read up on Copernicus. There are only 24 hours in a day (I reckon)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 127 by Brad McFall, posted 09-05-2005 5:59 PM Brad McFall has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 131 of 152 (240973)
09-07-2005 7:46 AM
Reply to: Message 130 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic
09-06-2005 11:58 AM


Re: How do you eant an elephant?
iano writes:
It has enough substantiation to convince - within the boundaries set for theories. I'm not arguing well substantiated. I'm asking how does one calibrate theory at all - given that there is no objective standard to compare a 'well-substantiated' theory with to find out whether it offers a 2% explanation or a 92% explanation of what happened.
AEA writes:
One bite at a time iano. Even if a current valid theory only explains .001 of the universe then we can build on it and/or use it to develop other theories to get to .002. At least it’s moving in the right direction. Positing a supernatural explanation and stopping yields a big fat 0 in the advancement of mankind.
'Right direction' suffers the same problems as 'well-substantiated'. Against what is this direction being calibrated in order to know it is the right one. You posit advancement of mankind as the datum against which to measure. That is a completely subjective datum to chose: both in terms of advancement at all being the the correct datum and 'advancement' as you experience it being in fact advancement. Many would think man is going backwards. And they ain't all creationists
This is what I mean by moving goalposts. You said speciation has not been observed.
No I didn't. I couldn't have given that I had never heard the word speciation before I said you can't see one species turn into another. One worm turning into another worm is not a species changing into another. It is a species changing period. Thats micro-evolution not macro-evolution. Speciation is observational evidence that fits macro-evolution but it fits micro-evolution more completely. It's not moving goalposts, its defining what they are

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 130 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-06-2005 11:58 AM AnEmpiricalAgnostic has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 132 by ramoss, posted 09-07-2005 8:49 AM iano has not replied
 Message 133 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-07-2005 9:20 AM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 134 of 152 (241016)
09-07-2005 11:22 AM
Reply to: Message 133 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic
09-07-2005 9:20 AM


Re: How do you eant an elephant?
AEA writes:
Okay, now I think you are just arguing for argument’s sake. Do you NOT think acquiring knowledge about the universe we live in the “right direction”?
I am not arguing for arguings sake - although that is a trap to be avoided. Acquiring knowledge about the universe is no bad thing in itself. But it is open to debate as to whether the OUR acquisition of knowledge has been a good thing or a bad thing. You call it advancement and it has, no doubt, led to improvement for mankind. However there is an undoubted and very significant downside - as a result of this self-same knowledge. There are as many grounds to say the glass is half full as it is the glass is half empty. Every bit of knowledge gets used for both 'good' and 'bad'. As 'right directions' go I don't think the case for 'acquiring knowledge is the right direction' is a clear cut as you say.
(I work in the food industry and in 12 years I have yet (in all the many meeting I have been at) to hear the word 'nutrition' mentioned (yield increase, drip loss, binding fats within meats, how to disguise useful but undesirable ingredients in labelling etc etc do form the area of interest - money) . I could talk abit about the appliance of science in this field - but I don't want to put you off your dinner )
Actually, one species turning into another IS speciation.
http://www.biology.duke.edu/rausher/lec18_05.html.
The following is from an interesting article (linked above) on experiments to see if speciation could occur (the text includes statements in the context that presumes evolution is occuring so it is, I take it, not a creationist website)
[qs]I. Experimental evidence for allopatric speciation.
A. Speciation in laboratory populations
1. Speciation as a process in nature is very difficult to study because one is never sure exactly where it is occurring; it can also take a long time.
2. For these reasons, some investigators have attempted to try to bring speciation into the laboratory. In effect, they have set up experiments in which they have tried [/b]to cause speciation [/b] to occur, and observed what happens. The first example I wish to discuss today is an experiment of this type.[/qs]
Which brings us back nicely to the issue of abiogenesis. I posed that manipulating elements to create life says nothing about whether abiogenesis occurred. No experiment could produce life in an undirected and unintelligent way. Scientists applying the full force of intelligence, time and money can do it but that is a quite different thing altogether. One could say the space shuttle could appear out of a pile of nuts and bolts because the application of intelligence time and money showed it could be done. In fact, the appearance of a space shuttle from junk must be considered more likely given that the application of intelligence, time and money has produced a result - whereas abiogenesists haven't. (If you think I'm arguing for arguing sakes by producting such a patently absurd comparison then by all means indicate where it is patently absurd).
The same appears to be true of speciation. In reading the above section I would ask you to note the following:
In nature (where evolution has supposedly happened a) one is never sure if it occuring b) it takes a very long time for it to happen (which makes it unlikely that anyone will ever know). Yet the (evolutionary) author says it is going on. Why? Classic evolutionary thinking. Evolution is assumed from the outset therefore speciation must be going on. Now a scientist in a lab who starts out with a theory that speciation happens and sets up an experiment to cause it to happen can expect, quite often, to be rewarded with the result he has caused to happen. I design machinery from time to time to fit a specific purpose. Although I enjoy doing it and am taxed in dealing with all the constraints which push in on my initally simplistic Occams Razor style design, I am not surprised (although I am pleased) when eventually the final product does what I am trying to make it do.
But so what? Concluding that something happens in nature from a completely artificial (and massively simplistic lab experiment, the conditions of which don't happen in nature, says nothing about the thing actually happening in nature. It's another could be - not another is. Science has brought it's full might to bear to design a space shuttle.
This all fits the theory but I can't help wondering what couldn't fit the theory if enough effort is employed in order to cause it to fit. Don't you see even a touch of science-of-the-gaps here? Is this knowledge not in fact pseudo-knowledge? An experiment whose conclusions (man can design a situation whereby flies undergo 'speciation') are extrapolated to say speciation is occurring (without mans directed intervention) in nature. The word speciation appears to describe the lab result. Is there a reason to transpose it into the natural world?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 133 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-07-2005 9:20 AM AnEmpiricalAgnostic has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 135 by ramoss, posted 09-07-2005 11:41 AM iano has replied
 Message 136 by AnEmpiricalAgnostic, posted 09-07-2005 12:59 PM iano has replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1931 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 137 of 152 (241086)
09-07-2005 3:54 PM
Reply to: Message 135 by ramoss
09-07-2005 11:41 AM


Re: How do you eant an elephant?
ramoss writes:
Not quite right. While we won't know how it happened from a historical point of view, the experiments can show it MIGHT have happened. There are probably many paths to get from just plain organic chemical reactions to the condition we can reconise as life. It won't be a 'brute force' method, but only observing what happens to various chemicals in certain conditions. That won't say that things happened exactly that way, but it will show how things very well could have happened without the need of some mythical being tampering with things.
I admire your willingness to place some limits on what can be deduced from experiment. Could I push a little more. Looking at your own words:
"probably" how probably? Is it one chance in 10 to power 20,20,40,50,60? And if there is an actual figure given for the probability, how was it arrived at? I'd stand to be corrected but my guess is there isn't one
"might" again this is a shot in the dark. With no knowledge as to conditions then, any conditions now as to what was happening then is sheer guesswork. There is nothing for probability to get a grip on
"probably many paths..." At the moment there are none. Thus again, no way to say anything about probability of them. If life (say we start at a single strand of self-replicating RNA) could be created easily and under a wide range of conditions then this statment would have some basis for being considered reasonable. At the moment there is no reason to hold to it. So it shouldn't be held.
"various chemicals in certain conditions..." ie: lab made life. Which is the same with lab-made speciation: There is a sign posted outside it saying "Intelligence at work". If life is created it will only because if this - life designed by intelligence. I'm not trying to paint you into a corner here but I must reiterate that such life can say nothing about the accidental origin of life then, It is a sheer impossibility. They are two different things altogether. Apples and pears. Ne'er the twain shall meet.
"it will show how things very well could" Very well implies reasonably. But there can be no basis to say this. Unless perhaps someone trips over a dead simple way of creating life. At the moment it looks as if the conditions and sequence of events is staggeringly complex - otherwise 40 years of trying concoct life would have come up with something other that proteins and amino acids. And the more complexity is added the more remote those conditions could even be speculatively said to have been the conditions around at the start of life.
Folk can speculate about what science will find out in future. But at the moment the situation is that life could not have occurred accidentally as their is no basis for making that positive statement - and it is a positive statment. If one was basing their position on the evidence at the moment, then that is the conclusion they must come to. There is nothing evident now that indicates that the problem is going to get easier over time. No basis for hope.
If folk want to plug away and investigate it thats fine. But talking about probably is philosophy not science.

Romans 10:9-10: " if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved....."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 135 by ramoss, posted 09-07-2005 11:41 AM ramoss has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 147 by ramoss, posted 09-10-2005 3:03 PM iano has replied

  
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