How does Complexity demonstrate Design

Dark Star:I am curious ... If you are not a proponent of Intelligent Design (ID), why do you post on a topic about ID?It seems like someone totally uninterested in fishing writing a letter to a fishing magazine about how to make baskets -- irrelevant.Or confused?

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

I am curious because ID and creationism are mutually exclusive when you think the precepts through to their logical conclusions.Therefore a creationsist arguing for ID is arguing against creationism.In fact taking ID to its logical conclusion means that it would accept the scientific evidence from every possible field to verify the concept.There is also no explicit or implicit need to involve a biblical view in ID, and this renders any reference to the bible irrelevant to the concept.Call me a skeptic, but it seems to me that most people are confused about ID, especially those who promote it.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Nice paste job with the blue text. If the author were here it might be worth looking at. If you paraphrased it or extended it with your own thoughts, it might be worth looking at. Otherwise it is a violation of the guidelines. Beliefs? The belief involved is in the operation of the scientific method. If there were another theory that explained the same data with the same or greater degree of accuracy and if it was testable to determine if it were in fact a more rational explanation of the scientific data, then, yes, hardcore scientists would accept it as a more valid theory.That is after all how science works.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

More blue blocks of pasted work of others .... with little personal contribution.The first block is simply the argument from incredulity, and is no evidence of anything except possible a failure of imagination. It also seems to come from a site with no real university affilitation ("we don't have classrooms or grant degrees") nor does the author appear to have a degree in biology (material science and mechanical engineering strangely do not qualify).The second block appears to be a statement of opinion, and is from a site that advertises "Integrating Science and Faith" and is affiliated with the Seventh Day Adventists ("The Institute uses both science and revelation to study the question of origins because it considers the exclusive use of science as too narrow an approach. The Institute serves the Seventh-day Adventist church in two major areas: research and communication."). It is curious that the "professor" of Biology and Paleontology is not listed with any kind of degree.I point this out because you ask if we should accept work of other scientists(while admitting that you are not one).For this question to be valid the work of needs to be verified as (1) being scientific, and (2) actually done by scientists in their field of expertise. The usual forum for this is in peer reviewed scientific journals.Note that any preconception of results invalidates work as scientific.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Quote mining is an old trick used by the unscrupulous. The fact is that science is open to new ideas, all they need to do is follow the rules of the scientific process: hard data analysis generates a theory that results in a prediction that if false disproves the theory but if true validates it until a better theory comes along that does a better job. That is all that is required. Don’t whine about belief and not being accepted, just do the work. What you imply about hardcore evolutionists (a term that shows bias btw) does not apply to true scientists, and while it may apply to some non-scientific people it has no effect on the science of evolution. Science is founded on the scientific work, not on the people and what they believe: it is the evidence, theories, predictions and tests of the theories that make the difference.Just so you know what I mean about unscrupulous quote mining, your posts could be combed over and quoted to show you support evolution.I also reiterate that creationism has a basic conflict with the concept of ID, and that ID properly pursued would be totally unbiased in its acceptance of all branches of science, and their scientific data, facts and theories. If you want to discuss this aspect further, there is a topic on this at http://EvC Forum: Is ID properly pursued?Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Why? All you have posted is that you find it incredible to believe that DNA could have evolved, but you give no evidence of it being impossible.This is just argument from incredulity and evidence of a lack of imagination.DNA is assembled from amino acids, not atom by atom, and there are only 20 that are used, each of them readily available. See http://www.serv.net/~only1egg/biology/amino.htmlYou can look at a kaleidoscope from two ends: from one it appears to show an intricate pattern, while from the other it is just a jumble of beads. The jumble is the reality, the pattern is in the eye of the beholder, and is not the physical reality.apparent complexity is often just viewing the pattern through a narrow lens.enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Dawkins mentions something like this too in Blind Watchmaker. If you use DNA as a digital pattern and encode the Encyclopedia Britannica into an appropriate digital pattern, the DNA strand is long enough to hold it several times over. What this means in real practice though is unknown, as an "Encyclopedia DNA" strand would not likely produce a viable form of life.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

DNA is not complex so much as it is long, and the minimum length (LUCA) has not been determined.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

So you are saying that over complexity is a sign of little to poor design?There are also natural rock formations that look complex to the point of appearing life-like. Is this type of complexity is mistaken for design as well?

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Hypothetical creationist argument irrelevant to ID.creationism has a basic conflict with ID that prevents one from being legitimately used for the other.ID does not necessarily have a problem with "macro"evolution -- the reasons are many, but can also be found on:"Macro" vs "Micro" genetic "kind" mechanism?
http://EvC Forum: "Macro" vs "Micro" genetic "kind" mechanism?at the genetic level (DNA) there is nothing to distinguish "micro" from "macro" nor is there any mechanism available that says one is okay and the other is not.enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

you mean http://< !--UB EvC Forum: Investigation of Biblical science errors -->http://EvC Forum: Investigation of Biblical science errorsor Message 105enjoy

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

you can look at the coding with the raw text button - the easy way is to copy the url from the web address window and just paste it into the reply window (the link is made automatically on this site). The only problem is to make sure you have the link to the correct message -- I usually use the {"This message is a reply to:"} link and then pick the correct {"Replies to this message:"} link to set it up to copy. glad to help.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

This is a simplistic tautology, so it is true by self-evidence (they don't understand because they don't understand) -- it also doesn't mean anything, and thus is not a proof of anything.Certainly what is not proved is that living things need to understand what they do by accident. They just need to live and keep on doing what they are doing, with accidents, mutations, deaths, survival and reproduction. Without showing a need for things to understand what they do the statement is meaningless. The first part of this assumes that (a) things need to be meaningful to us and further that (b) we need to exist to give them meaning. Neither one of these assumptions is valid nor is any justification for making either assumption presented. An obvious justification is to show some form of intelligence is needed, but then these assumptions have that built into them, falsifying the results.The second part of this has been shown to be meaningless by the refutation of (a) above: things do not need to understand. Your weak argument in (a) undermines the foundation out from under (b). Your weak argument in the first part of (b) shows that nothing meaningful has been communicated by either (a) or (b).What you are left with is an argument from incredulity that there must be intelligence because you want there to be intelligence. It looks pretty, but it doesn't prove anything, sorry.These logical failures also infect your repeated arguments of the same form with the words "Accident" and "Information".All evolution needs is accidents, selection and replication. You have shown no need to assume intelligence in any of these operations.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Ah yes, the inability to refute the argument, therefore the arrogant declaration of victory with an air of superiority to assuage the bruised ego approach. Ted Holden (aka redwolf) ended up that way too: incapable of defending his position in the face of facts that proved him wrong. He was a little more fun though; it took him several posts before he backed into defeat, while it appears you have only taken one. Sad.To repeat: I showed your argument to be logically flawed with holes large enough to allow an elephant to walk through pulling a circus and that completely invalidated your argument in the process -- unless you refute those points, you are without an argument.Now you can play the game or run off with your tail between your legs like redwolf.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Again, you have not refuted my argument but attacked the messenger with weak bravado (it's called ad hominem and it is a logical fallacy). In fact it looks like that is all that is left in your arsenal, as there is nothing else in your post.So sorry you don't have the skills to play. Watch out you don't trip on those shoes as you run away. Thank you for playing, enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}