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Author Topic:   Moving towards an ID mechanism.
randman 
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Message 36 of 141 (262154)
11-21-2005 7:52 PM
Reply to: Message 35 by GDR
11-21-2005 7:10 PM


Re: how do you respond to Wheeler?
I remember now, GDR. I was thinking of cavediver and the guy with the weirder sounding moniker where we all participated, and forgot you were like me in asking those guys some questions about General Relativity and the like.
By the way, I enjoyed thinking of Barbour's thesis immensely.
My own take is that space and time are not absolute qualities of existence but relative aspects of existence.
This message has been edited by randman, 11-21-2005 07:53 PM

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
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Message 37 of 141 (262156)
11-21-2005 7:55 PM
Reply to: Message 33 by Wounded King
11-21-2005 6:45 PM


Does that make ID viable science now?
Seems a big complaint is that ID did not posit a mechanism. With that study and other ideas, should ID be considered a viable scientific theory?

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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 39 of 141 (262184)
11-21-2005 8:56 PM
Reply to: Message 38 by crashfrog
11-21-2005 8:44 PM


Re: Does that make ID viable science now?
Collapsing quantum states doesn't appear to have any usefulness in, say, chemistry.
That's only because you don't understand QM. It does seem like magic which is why some of the best quantum physicists said no one can "understand" it. I think he was wrong, and he wasn't saying he and others could not use it, observe it, predict it, etc,...but that it was so far off from prior paradigms (seems like magic) that you just have to first accept the observations.
Btw, QM is more than collapsing of the wave function. It involves entanglement which does affect chemistry.
Besides, you missed WK's link.
A quantum mechanical model of adaptive mutation.
The principle that mutations occur randomly with respect to the direction of evolutionary change has been challenged by the phenomenon of adaptive mutations. There is currently no entirely satisfactory theory to account for how a cell can selectively mutate certain genes in response to environmental signals. However, spontaneous mutations are initiated by quantum events such as the shift of a single proton (hydrogen atom) from one site to an adjacent one. We consider here the wave function describing the quantum state of the genome as being in a coherent linear superposition of states describing both the shifted and unshifted protons.
A quantum mechanical model of adaptive mutation - PubMed
I don't have access to the whole article, but clearly these scientists do believe quantum phenomena and principles play a role in adaptive mutations.
Are they proclaiming magic too?

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 43 of 141 (262199)
11-21-2005 9:09 PM
Reply to: Message 40 by GDR
11-21-2005 9:01 PM


Re: how do you respond to Wheeler?
Never been a union man myself.
The comment that really got me thinking was Don Page's comment on Barbour's work, when he said that eventually we will not only find that time is illusionary but so is space. Where do you go from there?
Same thing with me. To me, GR and QM sort of shows this. If at the speed of light, time and distance equal 0, then it seems that time and space are not absolute qualities, but maybe I am missing something there.
It seems even clearer in QM because of the basic undefined and immaterial state which then injects a form into time and space, suggesting a deeper informational structure within the universe.
I'll have to check the book out.

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
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Message 44 of 141 (262242)
11-22-2005 12:21 AM
Reply to: Message 41 by crashfrog
11-21-2005 9:06 PM


Re: Does that make ID viable science now?
Well, regardless of that paper, the principle of entanglement can affect chemistry and is considered as a factor in materials research and development.

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 45 of 141 (262247)
11-22-2005 12:41 AM
Reply to: Message 41 by crashfrog
11-21-2005 9:06 PM


pretty interesting reading
I don't know that much about adaptive mutations, but at the same time, there appears to be many scientists that accept the phenomenon as real. What's more interesting to me are the claims that "biological phenomena involve the movements of fundamental particles ...and thus are properly described by quantum rather than classical mechanics."
I am not positive about that claim, but it does seem it would make sense for certain biological phenomena, even if not all as the paper asserts.

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 48 of 141 (262398)
11-22-2005 11:56 AM
Reply to: Message 47 by crashfrog
11-22-2005 9:17 AM


Re: pretty interesting reading
First off, to be honest with you crash, I think your are actually doing what you accuse me of doing and writing off physicists, some giants in the field, such as Wheeler, as advocating magic or cockamamie ideas. It shows you don't understand their theories.
On the subject of adaptive mutations, I have not studied enough to know to discount the opinion of the experts here. WK linked to that study, and I trust his opinion of whether this is "on the table" as a legitimate idea or whether it's cockamamie as you put it.
On the topic of evolution, that is where I have given a great study to see if the data and facts are what evos claim they are, and in my opinion, they are not. So I feel comfortable rejecting it based on the fact it seems largely based on misrepresentations.
I have a request of you from this point out on this thread. If you want to discuss the OP concerning a potential ID mechanism in QM, and specifically the It from Bit model of explaining physical phenomena, please do so. But if you cannot discuss these ideas because you do not understand them, please take the time to understand them first. So far, you seem unaware of what Wheeler and others are talking about.
Or, if you just want to pop in and comment on the areas you do know something, that's fine too, but don't pretend scientific theories you know nothing about are cockamamie just because you have a hard time understanding them.
As far as the study WK linked to, I think the basic claim that quantum mechanics rather than classical mechanics plays a governing role in mutations due to the scope involved is worth determining if that is accurate or not. If it is accurate, then we should be discussing mutations in light of QM, and it's not a cockamamie idea regardless of whether adaptive mutations have been shown to be real or not.

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 Message 47 by crashfrog, posted 11-22-2005 9:17 AM crashfrog has replied

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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 51 of 141 (262421)
11-22-2005 12:53 PM
Reply to: Message 49 by crashfrog
11-22-2005 12:28 PM


Re: pretty interesting reading
The It from Bit is Wheeler's idea that others have adopted as well, such as experimenters like Zeilinger who has had some remarkable success and the physicists he mentors.
Though Wheeler's promotion of ideas like the anthropomorphic principle can seem like ID, he really is not, to my knowledge, directly involved in discussing ID versus evolution, and I think he probably accepts evolution, but maybe if we learned of his beliefs in more detail, they could appear a little different than TOE models.
For example, this has been said of Wheeler, but not sure it is right, that he would say the universe evolved along all the potential paths possible in a multitude of states, all present, a multi-verse, until consciousness evolved and collapsed that multi-verse into one state. Now, whether he still thinks that or not, it gives you some inkling of what he things QM demonstrates about the fundamental princples of the universe.
So the application of these ideas to ID may or may not be held by the physicists discussing the ideas, but unless you try to get a grasp of the concepts, you cannot really assess whether they are applicable to ID or not, can you?

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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 52 of 141 (262424)
11-22-2005 1:05 PM
Reply to: Message 50 by mick
11-22-2005 12:40 PM


Re: it from bit
My understanding is that in the photon experiments, information content is imposed upon the photon by measuring it in such a way as it is forced to give a binary response to the act of observation.
Yep. That's it and stated better than I my attempt.
If we are to try to apply this idea to the origin of form in biology, then we would need to be able to specify the mechanism by which information content is imposed on (or elicited from) biological existence.
Well, in a way, that is jumping the gun, imo. First, I think we just need to get a good grasp of the idea itself, which contains within it the idea that the physical form, the "answer", something takes is in response to the way it is questioned. If you know that, then there is potentially an ability to directly engineer form, physicality, from the primary information state that defines and provides parameters to reality.
Wheeler's analogy of the 20 questions game is relevant here. Normally, the answer is a given, but here the answer is not given, just the range. The correct response depends on the question asked. So the universe is the one responding, and it has not one but many possible answers.
The observer asks a question which forms a response that is now the correct response but didn't was not the correct one prior. That process repeats itself with the next question until out of the 20 questions, a correct answer has formed.
The fallacy of science before QM was to think that the answer was the same all along before the questions were asked. This is really what Wheeler is getting at, to a degree.
So in this process, we can see how intelligence can manipulate the process to make certain answers appear instead of others, to make certain physical responses appear rather than others; hence an ID mechanism in my opinion. It is not therefore necessary to show who the Observer was since we have shown the mechanism and effect.
We can infer gravity, test for it, etc,..without ever being able to show gravity directly, and that's we do, or did, depending on whether one believes gravity waves have been discovered. We don't insist no theory of gravity is valid because it is not directly known what gravity is, only what it does. In fact, by showing an ID mechanism, we show more than what we can demonstrate with gravity. All we can show with gravity is the effects of it.
We still don't know what it is, or didn't until a few years ago (assuming the gravity wave claims are correct).

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 53 of 141 (262434)
11-22-2005 1:32 PM
Reply to: Message 50 by mick
11-22-2005 12:40 PM


Re: it from bit
My only problem with your OP is that this idea of "it from bit" isn't actually a mechanism as far as the origin of biological form is concerned, because the observer, observed and apparatus are all "black boxes".
In response to this 2nd half of your post, let me first say I am going to be cut short here due to time constraints, and may not be back until Monday.
On the claim that the "observed" is a black box, I think that's clearly wrong as what is observed is physical reality. On the topic of Observer, Max Plank in response to studying quantum mechanics reflected on the basic Information state which is fundamental existence this way.
There is no matter as such! All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind. This Mind is the matrix of all matter."
Sounds a lot like ID, doesn't it. My point then is first to see that this basic ID mechanism is not just relevant to creating new species, but is part and parcel of fundamental existence. The transfer from information superpositional states into a single state in physical form is something that is always occuring, always present, and is how things are and work, at least how I am reading this.
So the third question is what about the apparatus? My first response is we don't exactly the evolutionary paths of many things, but evos claim they nonetheless evolved. They don't know the apparatus but merely point to a mechanism of mutations and variations being selected for.
So let's look at the It from Bit. The apparatus need not be anything more than the surrounding world itself, just influenced by an Intelligent Designer. This would be more like super-evolution where evolution is how things came to be, but aided by this ID mechanism. So QM would be used to produce non-random mutations to direct evolution in a manner that would not occur otherwise.
But at the same time, we can't ignore other potential implications here, considering the parallels with concepts we consider a Designer having, such as intelligence.
For example, where does the Information come from? I think all too often the unspoken assumption is that the physical is there, and then we study the information about it as if the information is secondary or an aspect to the thing itself with the physical aspect being primary. What QM shows is that the physical aspect is not even necessarily present all the time, at least not in a defined state, whereas the informational aspect exists well-defined all the time as a multiple of potentials.
I need to bone up a little on physics, but it's sort of like saying the physical state is a mere by-product of the fundamental virtual state of all things.
So what creates the fundamental virtual state?
Is it reasonable to infer that it is likely that an Intelligent Designer could create within that virtual state something new and directly produce it in the physical world?
If that is considered unreasonable, what if we discover how to do that and actually directly engineer some aspect of reality? Would that be sufficient evidence of ID?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 50 by mick, posted 11-22-2005 12:40 PM mick has replied

Replies to this message:
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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 55 of 141 (262487)
11-22-2005 3:56 PM
Reply to: Message 54 by mick
11-22-2005 2:42 PM


Re: it from bit
That sounds very similar to the rather odd premise of ID that we don't need to know who the designer is. We are not actually left with a mechanism at all - we are left with wishful thinking:
Due to time constraints, I can't respond to the whole post in as much depth as I want, but your statement is shown to be wrong already by the example of how science treats gravity, or treated gravity. We know gravity exists purely by studying it's effects. We don't know "the who" of what gravity is. We guessed it was gravity waves, but either never detected such waves or did not for many years (I understand in the past few years there are some claims to have detected gravity waves).
Look, events at the quantum level do not incorporate "the whole universe".
Can you prove that? Wheeler and Zeilinger think they do.
Quantum events will not be "relevant to creating new species" simply because the wave function of an object the size of a living organism is, compared to the size of the that organism's world, unutterably tiny.
But the governing factor for reproduction is DNA which is currently being argued is governed by quantum mechanics in the paper WK cited. At best, your argument is that QM would be more supportive of guided evolution via ID assistance than creating whole creatures from scratch. Imo though, you still cannot elimenate the latter possibility due the reasons given in my posts earlier.
The wave function that describes the possible superpositions of quantum entities works at the level of subatomic particles; at the level of chickens or rabbits it is irrelevant and classical mechanics maintains.
No, it's not irrevalent. Classical mechanics works because of the high statistical predictive probability, but it's not absolute. The concept of the It from Bit is that the whole universe itself and everything in it is based to some degree "at the bottom of everything" on QM principles.
Just stating Wheeler and Zeilinger are wrong isn't going to cut it. Why do you think they are wrong?
That isn't a response to my question, it's a claim about the quality of evolutionary biology.
No, it's pointing out the hypocrisy of holding your critics' theory to a higher evidentiary standard than you hold your own.
Quantum mechanics is simply seen as a "God-friendly" theory and that's why it's claimed to be part of the ID mechanism.
No, quantum mechanics is a highly accurate theory that changes the paradigm of how we view physical reality, and evolutionary theories are thus out of date if they do not incorporate QM into evolutionary theory. It's not just that it is God-friendly. It's that it defines physical things as first virtual, or as Wheeler says "undefined" and "unreal."
Does quantum mechanics require the existence of a conscious observer in order for the physical form of entities to be made apparent? I don't think so.
Obviously, Wheeler disagrees. Not saying he is automatically right, but clearly he states things only exist in an immaterial, undefined state until observation or the potential for observation. He even makes the point that our observations today affect what happened in the past. That's his claim.
I think before you write it off, you need to give it a fair hearing.
This message has been edited by randman, 11-22-2005 04:42 PM

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randman 
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Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 60 of 141 (263773)
11-28-2005 1:31 PM
Reply to: Message 57 by cavediver
11-26-2005 7:40 AM


where's the beef?
Cavediver, with all due respect, just coming and making unsupported statements because you don't have time, explaining the math shows this or that, is simply avoiding some of most basic concepts within QM, at least the interpretations discussed on this thread. I realize that math is very important. At the same time, the neat thing about QM is that the double-split experiment and related delayed-choice experiments are experiments with real objects, not just mathematical concepts.
You seem to be avoiding that entirely, and you also don't seem to understand what I, nor Wheeler is talking about. I know you should since you are educated in this field and could probably explain Wheeler's words in everyday language, but you prefer to just make bare assertions hiding behind the math.
No one is claiming QM is magic, but it is the study of what matter and energy are at it's fundamental level. The fact you think anyone has invoked magic suggests you don't understand their claims.
Why not take their claims seriously? That matter and energy are quantized because information is quantized.
One thing Wheeler is very clear on, and I beleive is solidly supported by the evidence, and that is the fundamental state of things prior to observation is undefined, which to me suggests the fundamental "physical" state is non-material and informational, and discrete or somewhat discrete physical form is a derived property from that information state. That's not invoking magic, but laying out the process whereby physical matter exists.
Why are you dodging that issue?

This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 62 of 141 (263907)
11-28-2005 7:23 PM
Reply to: Message 61 by Brad McFall
11-28-2005 5:10 PM


Re: where's the beet?
Brad, can you break that down a bit?

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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 66 of 141 (264165)
11-29-2005 3:16 PM
Reply to: Message 65 by cavediver
11-29-2005 2:43 PM


Re: where's the beef?
Cavediver, I am aware different physicists think about this differently, but assertations from authority don't help much, and you appear to agree with me in one respect in the following.
In fact, some of my own studies of the holographic principle went way past this stuff.
The holographic principle agrees with my basic contention about what QM shows.
No, only observational properties are undefined in that without observation, they do not exist. The "fundemental state of things" is very well defined. It is all a matter of what you are calling fundemental. You have to go deeper...
I am going deeper. Perhaps you are not understanding what I am saying here or what is being said. No one is claiming the fundamental state is not defined in one sense. The use of the terms "undefined" or "unreal" by Wheeler, which I use by extension, are within a context, and a context you should know about and thus it perplexes me to see you dodge the issue.
The "undefined" and "unreal" comments deal with form. They exist as a potential for various forms, a potential for physical discreteness. That potential is definitely real and defined, but not as single state, which is generally what people think of when they think of something as physical.
I refer to that existence as information or an information or virtual state, and go on to talk about Zeilinger's work in trying to define how it works within the It from Bit paradigm.
What's your beef with my descriptions?
Virtual and holographic are very similar terms, and yet you seem quite pleased with your use of holographic, but act like my use of virtual (in a layman's sense) is absurd, or the result of not being as educated in this area.
Imo, you are not addressing the issue of the It from Bit concept, but just saying, well, you don't understand it because we can explain it from math. Well, so what if you can explain from math. No is saying math should not apply, but none of that changes the basic issue here of what the fundamental state of things are.
Moreover, the fact you think stating things are fully deterministic somehow invalidates or applies to what I have posted shows you are not looking closely at it, nor considering it. Btw, I don't want to get sidetracked into indeterminancy discussions because that really has no bearing on what I am saying here.
What I am saying is that matter from our perspective as a discrete form comes into being, or is derived from, this more fundamental state which whether calls the process holographic or whatever, the former concept of what is real, or physical, is shown to be derived property of a larger framework of potentials.

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 Message 65 by cavediver, posted 11-29-2005 2:43 PM cavediver has replied

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 Message 67 by cavediver, posted 11-29-2005 3:40 PM randman has replied

  
randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 68 of 141 (264182)
11-29-2005 3:58 PM
Reply to: Message 67 by cavediver
11-29-2005 3:40 PM


Re: where's the beef?
If your basic contention is that observed reality is emergent from some deeper reality substantially different from our (3+1)d perspective, then I agree...
Then, we agree here.
just about every approach to TOE suggests this.
I disagree very strongly here, but maybe I don't understand the point. How do approaches to ToE contain or suggest theories of a deeper reality?
As I said, these proposed underlying realities have form and substance and are described mathematically.
Exactly as I have stated, proposed, and fully in line with an Intelligent Design mechanism. Once again, I don't see how you are in disagreement with me here on the facts. Maybe you just dislike the wording.
You are speaking in laymanese and it doesn't make a lot of sense.
Sometimes the fact one cannot discuss something in everyday language means they don't understand it as well as they think or cannot envision what they do understand that well due to limits in the way they think about the world. I think what I have stated is pretty darn clear, if you just stop and think about.
You say the world is a holographic projection of a deeper reality. Well, in layman's terms, the world is what is physical, not the deeper reality. So what we think of as physical is a derived state from that deeper reality. That deeper reality is ordered, and thus the idea of information.
Zeilinger seeks to explain quantum mechanics as a result of elementary particles containing an elementary bit, right? So that information of the bit is spend, the particle cannot possess the information for the previous superpositional state, but is in a single state because the Bit was spent, and thus it collapses to a single form or however you want to look at it. This is where your comments could be useful, if you can ever come to see that the holographic perspective and my terminology express the same basic idea in terms of there being a deeper reality.
No, I am saying that it is nothing special. It is is merely a way of putting words to the underlying mathematical concepts. It is just an idea.
That's bull crap, cavediver. We already agreed it does show something very special, the existence of a deeper reality. So it's not "just an idea." It's a very powerful idea and if we understand and can utilyze that realm, we may well produce quantum computers and all sorts of things.
In terms of the macroscopic world, the study WK linked to claims mutations are governed by QM, not classical mechanics, and if that's the case, then it affects the macro-world in a major way specifically evolutionary mechanisms.
There have been tests indicating atoms and molecules exhibit wave-like properties, and the quantum world seems to, in fact, extend a little further than once believed. So claiming that QM does not affect or has nothing to do with the macro-world appears to have been premature. Certainly, Wheeler's applications of QM to the universe as a whole suggest he disagrees strongly with you on that.
This message has been edited by randman, 11-29-2005 04:05 PM

This message is a reply to:
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