Information Theory and Intelligent Design.

(Paraphrased from another thread)Here's the problem. This is how adding "information" by mutation works. We begin with a DNA molecule. In one of a number of different ways, when it is copied the new molecule is different from the old one, different because the gene sequences are no longer identical. Sometimes there's stuff missing, sometime there's extra stuff, sometimes some of the stuff has changed.Sometimes the change is meaningless, sometimes the change alters how the gene works. In the second situation, what creos call "new information" has been added. No laws of thermodynamics have been violated. There was no author. It was simply an error in copying, a mutation.That these changes occur is indisputable. That these different kinds of effects can result is indisputable. Creos can argue until they are blue in the face, but no matter how persuasive their analogies are, they cannot overcome readily observable facts.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin FranklinWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

This response completely missed the point.The changes in DNA that we can observe result in an increase in "information" without an author, without a designer. The fact that we start with DNA is irrelevant. DNA mutations can result in an increase in "information" absent any outside influence.Your argument is akin to saying evolution can't be accepted as scientific until we can prove how abiogensis happened.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin FranklinWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

It occurs to me that we are all pursuing this in the wrong direction.Information is indeed massless. However, Meyer's demonstration is irrelevant to his proposition, as are all the other examples everyone has discussed.The real question relates not to the information, but to the medium of carrying it. For example, an abacus is framework of beads and rods. To those who can read one, the position of the beads conveys a number. The mass of the abacus doesn't vary depending on the position of the beads. However, the position of the beads determines a number.What is happening with the abacus, and all of the cases we've been discussing is that matter of some sort is conveying information, whether it's beads on rods, magnetic patterns on a disk, ink on paper, or bases in DNA. Mass is irrelevant to the information, but position is essential. Move the beads, the number changes. Shift magnetic patterns, the content of the disk changes. Print the ink differently, the message on the paper is different. Change the bases in DNA, and the organism will be different.Obviously, when understood this way, there's nothing whatsoever the least bit inconsistent with a materialistic process creating "information," because materialistic processes are more than capable of acting on material.We've all been wrong in how we've been trying to argue against Meyer, but he was wrong from the get go regardless.Edited by subbie, : No reason given.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin FranklinWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat

True, but irrelevant to the point that Meyer is trying to make. I'm not saying that the rebuttals were incorrect. They simply didn't really address Meyer's argument.His thesis is that information is massless and thus nothing material can act upon it. Therefore, materialistic explanations for "information" in DNA are off the mark.He is 100% correct that information is massless. Information is like thought. How much does a thought weigh?The point is not whether or not information is massless. The real question, for purposes of refuting the thrust Meyer's argument is whether materialistic processes can act upon DNA to change the information contained in it. "Information" in DNA is a result of a particular sequence of bases. One can take a particular collection of bases and, in one arrangement, that collection is meaningless. In another arrangement that might have the same mass as the first, the collection describes a living organism. There is not necessarily a correlation between the mass of the medium and the content of the information. In most cases, it's the arrangment of the matter in the medium that's important.Your point is important. Information can be encoded in a limitless variety of ways. Perhaps an interesting offshoot would be to try to envision a way of capturing information without any medium whatsoever. But that point by itself doesn't address Meyer's claim that only non-materialistic processes can act on information. It's the recognition that the particular arrangement of matter is what's important for purposes of transmitting information, rather than the mass of the matter, that's key.

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Those who would sacrifice an essential liberty for a temporary security will lose both, and deserve neither. -- Benjamin FranklinWe see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat