Is ID scientific ? Yet another approach to the question.

Are the continuities available the biological continuities of slow evolutionary change over long time periods? Or are they the slow accumulation of scientific knowledge that we gather through "standing on the shoulders" of those who went before us?Or maybe I didn't understand... So you, BSM, are a discontinuity. I couldn't find an understanding of what applying recursion to tissue would mean. It must mean using some tissue to produce other tissue, and the produced tissue then has the ability to produce the original tissue. It sounds like The Riddler's way of saying "cloning." Could you elaborate a bit on what you meant by this part of your post? It sounds interesting. I know you've posted some interesting proposals of how to use tissue previously, but I can't remember them well. What is the discontinuity that you suspect? Did you mention it in this thread, or in another thread?Still working hard my friend, still working hard. Thanks for all your efforts.Ben

Hi WK. The point I was trying to make was:
If virtually all DNA is found to be imbued with purpose, then this is predicted by, and evidence for Intelligent design. It also refutes the evolutionary notion of random processes and "leftover junk". Of course there is damaged individual DNA today but that doesn't preclude prior purpose.Likewise, the evolutionary view of the human appendix as a worthless leftover organ is controversial among physiologists and may end up as I believe "Junk DNA" will - an embarrassment for evolutionists. Other such arguments made in a prior post - Ditto. I may be wrong but one thing we can probably all agree is: these are exciting times of scientific discovery!Not sure where the bulk of current research is coming from or each researcher's views of origins - but it's a good guess that they are all over the map much like the general population. The important thing is that research is not tainted by bias or premature conclusions.

What do you mean by "purpose" here, and how is this purpose measured? Or is "purpose" a subjective term?

I can't speak for Annafan, but I can and will speak for myself.It's not that I believe that all ID proponents are religiously motivated, it's that I have yet to find one that isn't.You can say that attacks on one's belief system aren't attacks on one's argument, but clearly you are new to this debate.The reason I attack motivation is that ALL creationist arguments boil down to just that.Here's 99% of the arguements boiled down -
A creationist/ IDer makes an outrageous statement (ie Great Flood), then sites "facts" which are at best misunderstood and at worst totally fraudulent. (all animals were alive at the same time, but the process of fossilization artificially makes all the dinosaurs sink to the bottom of strata)Someone with an actual understanding of the facts points out the mistakes / misunderstandings in their statement. (The process of fossilization is well understood. Fossil do not sink between strata. If they did, there would be pieces of the above strata found with the fossil)The creationist replies with - "The Bible is fact! God set this up to trick people."From then on the argument consists of either-
Creationist - YES! Biologist - Um, no. Repeat.Or goes to -
Biologist - Can you offer some evidence which supports your theory.
Creationist - I don't have to, what I believe is my business, you can't disprove my religion.If someone want to have a SERIOUS debate about ID, I'd be happy to discuss it. But, what I'm not willing to do is cowtow to religious fanatics who want to cram their belief system down everyone else's throat.

I may have missed something in an earlier post, but I fail to see the logic in this statement.I will grant you that the term "junk DNA" is maybe the wrong term, but couldn't/wouldn't evolution account for DNA's usefullness.The suggestion that there are left over chunks of DNA which are long forgotten evolutionary cast offs may be in fact incorrect, however, to my mind that indicates a problem with the mechanics of evolution, not with the theory of evolution.Additionally, I think we would need to better understand this term "useful". For example, sickle cell anemia is an affliction, it's caused by two recessive genes. However, if you are a carrier with only one of the genes, you have an increased resistance to malaria.In Africa, this is very useful. In Manhattan, it's not.I would think that everything coded in the DNA sequence was at some point useful, but may not be useful now. How do we determine if this is proof of evolution or proof of ID.You could say, "See, this is useful, it fights off malaria. Therefore ID"I could say, "See, this is left over, people who aren't exposed to malaria are dying from sickle cell, therefore evolution."Who is right?Same can be said for wisdom teeth. They're great if you expect people to have lost a tooth or two before they reach 18.I'm sure people here could name a hundred more examples.

I guess I don't understand that reasoning - no intelligence that we're aware of is able to design something that even approaches the complexity of a single living cell.Therefore - intelligence must have done it!I don't get it. If the best intelligences we're aware of can't even get us halfway there, isn't that a pretty good indication that something other than intelligence was responsible in the first place? Well, I'll make a deal with you. Us evolutionists will stop calling creationists and ID'ists liars for Jesus and religiously motivated as soon as you can get the creationists and ID'ists to stop referring to use evolutionists as "godless", "amoral", "haters of God's authority", "rapists and murderers", "arrogant", "small-minded", "blinded by assumptions", "sinners deserving of death", and other charming terms.Oh, and you have to get them to stop lying for Jesus, too. If you can do all that we'll play nicey-nice with the creationists. After all they did start it.

Well, I certainly don't automatically consider every ID proponent a religious fundy. It doesn't have to be that outspoken. It can just as well be a more hidden, fundamental desire for "skyhooks", as in the analogy used by Daniel C. Dennet.Science looks for naturalistic explanations, in a sort of "bottom-up" approach. In Dennet's analogy, those naturalistic explanations are considered "cranes". They firmly stand on established knowledge and step-by-step build up new knowledge, or new "cranes". Proposing an intelligent designer, in contrast, is referring to a magical "skyhook" that doesn't have, or need, any foundation at all and can carry all weight that is desired, as far up as is desired. Essentially a deus ex machina that doesn't contribute anything useful.

I just want t ask a few questions. First, I do believe in a creator. I believe that a creator cannot be disproven, yet cannot be proven.The fact is, either we were made by God or we weren't. No one at this present time can explain existance. Though I think it's a bit wierd why most scientists would not like to accept a possibility of a God. ID may be able to be refuted through opinionized beliefs, yet the fact remains that it is still a possibility. Actually there are only two possibilities. (Meaning there is a 50/50 chance of one being correct.)
One being that all existance and even our own creation was completely random and happened by chance and a whole lot of time. Second, we were created by an intelligent designer who had a purpose for all existance. Scientifically, how can you prove or disprove either?
The fact is, we are here. And we got here by some act either willful or not. I don't see anything wrong in a ID hypothesis and even a theory. As long as a possibility remains, then why not scientifically try to either prove it or disprove it?
So there are two possibilities, and then there are three possible beliefs. Belief 1atheist) I refuse to have any faith an intelligent designer because I would rather not believe in a God.
Belief 2theist) I exist, therefore there must be a designer. I choose to believe my designer created us with intelligence and purpose and I would rather believe in ID.
belief 3agnostic) I don't know, show me some solid evidence and I can be swayed either way.belief 3: doesn't change the truth of the only two possibilities.So beliefs of origin are really a choice of preference. How could I expect to prove to anyone the existance of a God when they choose not to believe in one? And how could someone who chooses not to believe in a God expect to change the viewpoint of someone who Chooses to believe in ID?
So if both possibilities are potential truths waiting only to be proven, then why exclude one from the textbooks.
Anthony Flew, a notorious frontrunner for the 'Evolution proves there is no God' belief, has had changed his viewpoint changed because he realized in himself that ID was indeed a possibility that could not be disproven. If you only teach proveable science then we must eliminate all hypothesis on origins. Unfortunately the study of origins drives all scientists. So can we scientifically have any faith in ID? Yes, because mathmatics has shown that Abiogenisis/Spontaneous generation, take just as much, if not more faith to belief. Does this mean even Athesists have faith? I believe it does due to the fact that ID cannot be, at this present moment be disproven. So their belief is in one of the two possibilities.This message has been edited by Physrho, 09-08-2005 09:04 PM

It's not just weird, it's false. Studies show that, at least in America, around half of all scientists believe in the existence of God.But you'll rarely find even an atheist who denies the possibility of God; it's the reality of God that we don't accept.Other than that, though, the reasoning in your post bears absolutely no resemblance to any reliable process by which we might determine what is accurate and what is not.

Those are clearly wrong since it presupposes that disbelief in ID requires an Atheist position. The greatest opposition to Classic Biblical Creationism and ID comes from Churches. It is Theists that are at the forefront in support of the TOE and opposing ID and Creationism.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Annafan, this is actually a reply to post 35 in "ID taken to the end". I understood your questions / points about this thread there better than here, so I'm responding to that post but pulling the discussion back over here. I look at it this way. IF we accept that evolution could not have produce, or simply did not produce, a structure that we observe (and I KNOW this is a huge IF, but let's see where it leads to), THEN we have to change the way we think about the origins of what we see today.ID is one way to do that. It allows for structures that are "designed." As I showed previously in the other thread, it also can allow for mutation, for natural selection, and evolution. ONLY if you make your designer some kind of God. As we've seen over and over, "God" cannot be scientific; "God" can do anything, anytime, any way. So, assume a non-God designer. IF we accept that some structures are not explained by evolution, can we determine if they are designed and, if so, can we determine anything about the designer? But that's what I've been trying to explain. Scientific theory often follows this path: first explain something descriptively and, if you can do that successfully, THEN derive further evidence which can tell you what's in the black box. That worked for evolution, that worked for Newton's theory of gravity... it's not out of the question it could work for ID. Now this is a completely different problem. I think we're in the business of understanding how biology on the Earth works; if we discovered we were engineered by extraterrestrials, taht would be a HUGE breakthrough in understanding, and it would fundamentally alter how we view the history of the earth and the history of how evolution has worked in our world.You're right though; we would still have other questions relating to orgins. But as we've said, evolution is NOT a question of "ultimate" origins; abiogenesis is. If we discovered we were engineered by aliens, that would be a HUGE step in another direction for chemists. They would no longer study old earth chemistry, but would need to figure out the origin (location) of the extraterrestrials, they'd have to see if they could reduce life to basic origins through a theory like evolution, and then they'd need to study the ancient chemical makeup of that origin (location). That would be HUGE, HUGE. Not irrelevant at all. You've basically just described how we study cognition. We're constantly having this problem. We have one big black box (the human mind). We propose some smaller black boxes to fill the big black box. We try to make them consistent with each other. Then, we tackle the smaller black boxes. If we discover we thought about one of the black boxes incorrectly, since all the boxes are dependent on each other, we often have to start from scratch.This is a bit of a simplification, but the basic point remains: in this point, I don't see that ID is any worse off or invalid than other approaches we accept.By the way, at this point I'm not talking about ID as the existing theories; like we've discussed, they don't even qualify. I'm talking about ID in general. In general, if we can support the major premise (that there are structures that are not explained by evolution), it's not a worthless enterprise.Ben

Pardon me if my post here is jumbled, I'm trying to transpose arguments from another thread to here.The big problem I have with ID right now is this:Some IDers are basically YECs hiding behind a different title. They say Goddidit, and expect the argument to stand at that.Other IDers are almost ToE supporters but with a fatalist twist. "Things are as they are because they were always destined to be such. There's nothing random about the events."Still others are claiming ID is nothing more than ToE without abiogenisis. (Which, by the way, IS ToE. ToE doesn't require abiogenisis).If the big argument in ID is that macro-evolution only happens at the hand of some Almighty Power, then let's discuss that. But, YEC IDers are saying that macro-evolution doesn't happen at all, that every species that exists/existed does/did so since the beginning of time oh those 6000 years ago.Can someone please, in a nutshell, explain to me what ID is. Not what it isn't. (ie "Theory of Evolution is wrong because...")Here's an example of a statement I am looking for (though I'm probably wrong)"Intelligent Design states that a force (God or Aliens) came down and started life on Earth, then though (method) steered that life over the course of (6000 or 450million) years. The processes of this steering are a, b, c, d. The evidence for this steering are e, f, g, h. We can observe more examples of this steering in i, j, k, l."I can't seem to find anyone who will say that.I see lots of "Here's the problem with ToE" or "How can ToE explain X".

The approach I am advocating goes contra what Lewontin presented in the late 60s.He said ,

quote:

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There is a host of problems in biology, however, that has been much neglected in these twenty exciting years, because the answers to them cannot be meaningfully framed in molecular and cellular terms. That is, the main trend of analytic biology, because it has become subcellular, has been away from a consideration of questions like: “What determines the rate of evolution of a character?” “Why are there many more species and so many fewer individuals of each species in the tropics than in the tundra?” “Why has sex appeared, disappeared, and taken on curious and aberrant forms in evolution?” Some of the most obvious and generally important questions in biology belong in this realm and remain unanswered. . Now such questions can be framed in molecular terms but not usefully, just as an apple can be described in quantum mechanical terms (in theory); but no one wants to know anyting about an apple that a quantum mechanical description will tell him.

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Population Biology and Evolution
"My uncle helps me." Victor Hugofive minutes times ...
=============================================Why is it that Lewontin could not found a utilitarianism and find a utility in an analytic of subcellularized statements about whole organism biology? He said that no one cares for an apple in quantum mechanical terms but this only applies if one was to insist on bringing all of quantum mechanics to bear on any particular biological dissection reduced to modern perspectives. But what he should have said was that the questions can be framed (by removing things that would not have biological existence on its levels of magnitude ( weak forces without dissipation, quark interactions, anti-matter)) and if used in phenomenological thermodynamics( which DID exist in his times) synthesize even creationist notions of creation and biology. Instead from the fact that there were no useful theories of macrothermodynamics at the time( Gladyshev was publishing in the early 70s) nor readings of the biophysics retarding the changes remedially at worst, in the same population, he asserts THE ANSWER even though he really did not have but the form of the question. This will do fine when writing an English essay but is not realistic when one can easily think of analogies of macro economics and macro evolution. I swear this is how it needs to be read. Let the elites write contrarily. I would love to see it. It would only be an anti-creationist piece when this, what I synthesized need not necessarily be. It could be. Lewontin thinks that he has to apologize for topology when he lastly writes THE TRIPLE HELIX(aka extinction) but what was needed was the recognition that there are kinds of determinisms in biology that are not suffiently Laplacian (see Cause and Correlation in Biology ) not more dynamic covering functions.Ok, so what I am doing IS WHAT LEWONTIN ASSERTED WAS NOT USEFUL. First off it is very useful for creatioinists. Secondly it contains a taste of the best sort towards human engineering biological formations. Thirdly it does not but can relie on purely biological methodological leanings (such as Croizat’s) and Fourthly it enables one to PARTITION causal structures such that quantum physics might be seperably applied depending on ones’ own physical predilection. Thus even philosophies of matter that I do not see as utiliatarian but could exist are supported in my thought. (recursions of tissue etc). This does not mean that one can take any kind of higher level question (Why are there more numbers in tropics than tundra) and immediately translate the question into an answerable praxis but it does contain a continuity of thought that enables one to figure out what answers the processs in thought might supply. I will give you a better handle on how computer motiviated recusivity can help “see” tissue divisions after I have read more of Winfree’s ideas on DNA computers. This is not exactly the idea as you expressed it, as I have it, but I might be able to think what you wrote as well. I’ll just have to try. For now consider Weyl in response to Lewontin. The issue is particular to “drug delivery vehicles” but I want to try to generalize the thought first before I speak particularly on Weyl’s use of “recursion”.

quote:

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In order to subject a continuum to mathematical treatment it is necessary to assume that it is divided up into ”elementary pieces’ and that this division is constantly refined by reapeated subdivision according to a fixed scheme (which in the one-dimensional case consists in the bipartition of each elementary segment). The effect is that the continuum is spun over with a subdivision net of increasing density. Thus, properly speaking, every continuum has its own arithmetical scheme which is already completely determined by the combinatorial description of the manner in which the individual elementary pieces of initial division border on each other; we call this the ”topological skeleton’ of the manifold. The introduction of numbers as coordinates by reference to the particular division scheme of the open one-dimensional continuum is an act of violence whose only practical vindication is the special calculatory manageability of the ordinary number continuum with its four basic operations . It is an important but difficult mathematical question to decide when two such skeletons are equivalent

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Weyl p 90 Philosophy of Mathematics and Natural Science 1949.If there was more demand for it others will figure it out independently of my approach. In fact I think there is nothing particularly original in what I think. I have just tried to remain honest to my interest in biology from the start. That is all. Evolution schmevolution is not the bipartition.If you want some more particulars from your post addressed simply point me to the section in you post above.This message has been edited by Brad McFall, 09-10-2005 03:32 PM

Intelligent design. Usually these discussions end up in a fray of semantics. "what do you mean by intelligence?" What do you mean by design?" etc..ad nausem.It jerks atheist bobbers when any inkling of god rears its head in a discussion, much less the class room. Words like psuedo science and "creationism in a new pair of shoes" begin to crop up. All so predicatable.I for one hope we never find the answers out because then what the fuck would we have to talk about? Reality TV?Age old phlosophy and arguments recycled and rehashed. The bottom line is that nature is just as mysterious as any god or Intelligent designer one would care to postulate.What one man calls god another calls nature.
There is no practical way to know if the universe is a product of design from a designer, or just is. Period.
Humans have only been around for a geologically short period of time and on the grander scheme of things are fairley insignificant. It is only important that there be a designer to those people who for what ever reasons choose to believe that it is so. It gives them a warm fuzzy. Perhaps it keeps them out of the pit of nihlism.You may now return to your regularly scheduled debate.
1.61803 signing out.

How energy manifest reality through the fundelmental forces which allows for such a thing as an apple.
I think the Beatles said it best.
"Because the Earth is round, it blows my mind.
Because....the Earth is round.
Because the wind is strong it makes me high.
Because the wind. Is strong.
Because the sky is blue, it makes me cry.
Because....the sky.....is blue."