Does randomness exist?

Cavediver, thankyou. You have explained my point better than I have.But still, in regards to the posts by Nwr and EZscince:

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Not everything that happens in a computer is deterministic.

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I really beg to differ. The interrupt controller bothers the cpu when there's a task to be done, right? Those tasks are things such as transferring data drom drives, updating the mouse position, etc. Those things are caused by the actions of the user or the needs of a program. A computer is a deterministic machine. A source.

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Drewsky writes:

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The problem is that any randomness that might occur is simply the result of not knowing the precise "mindstate" of the aphids

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Completely irrelevant.

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No, actually that's exactly what I wish to discuss in this thread.

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Drewsky writes:

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My point is that your experiment just falls into my category of
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...the culmination of simply too many variables acting on something to make easy predictions

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I have news for you. 99% of experiments fall into that category to some degree

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Yes, I know. I was asking about what happens in the other 1% of experiments.

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Drewsky writes:

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I suppose what I was really wanting to know about was the nature of Quantum mechanics and their (apparently truly) random nature.

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Then maybe you should have been more specific.

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That wasn't really necessary to get the discussion going. And besides, I wasn't really sure about it originally.

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Drewsky writes:

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It means that there are things that happen without a cause at all.

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Bingo. Big light just come on?

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Oh, come on. Have some respect. "Infinitely recurring first causes" is not necessarily an easy concept to accept.

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.. all matter in the universe is being manipulated by an infinite number of first causes.

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This statement does not follow. It is overtly telological and in direct contradiction to what you said before it

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I disagree. To have "true randomness" is to have an event with no cause. If it has a cause, then it can be traced backwards and theoretically, predicted. If QM is inherently random, then that does in fact mean that there are infinite first causes affecting all matter in the universe.This message has been edited by Drewsky, 04-20-2006 09:44 PM

If one has incomplete information about the thermal state of the [black hole.] Albeit this paper is dated 3 years ago. I believe we wont know the answer until there is a complete theory of quantum gravity. JMO. So little time, so many papers to read.

Heh, then how does one reconcile that the universe may be without a cause?

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"One is punished most for ones virtues" Fredrick Neitzche

I wouldn't take too much notice of that paper. Notie how it has not been published. The complaints are not very justified when you look at similar issues in quantum field theory on Earth. That too involves trans-Planckian physics but it works none-the-less... to a precision previously unheard of in experimental science!

Neat. That's kind of like randomness that comes from the user.

Randomness is purely a matter of perspective is it not? In it's pure form it cannot exist since one thing leads to another.

So your claim is that if a mutation is not beneficial, that is evidence it is random, and so all mutations are random.Sorry but that doesn't wash. What if all the non-beneficial mutations are random and the others non-random? What if all mutations are part of a pattern from design?What if nothing is random?The whole notion of randomness is an inherently unprovable assumption.

No, I don't claim that. I claim that the word random isn't an absolute word, it's used contrastually. As I said - nothing is random, in a sense. In another sense entirely, things are random. It depends on what you mean by the word random. The word random can be argued is meaningless, but the word has pragmatic value. Randomness is not an assumption let alone an unprovable one. The theory of evolution does not rely on some inherent randomness factor. Any given mutation that happens is random in respect to the survivability of the organism that has the mutation from the point of view of us.It's an entirely practical word that most people understand very easily, but some people get all twisted and confused about it. It's kind of like when the word random is used in computer science. Random Access Memory throws people left right and centre.It is used to contrast against ideas like 'sequential' and 'rolling out' (evolutio). The theory of evolution states that there isn't a series of mutations that will happen one after the other stored somewhere; each mutation that happens happens as the result of a chaotic machinations of a highly complex enviromental scenario and not as part of a script.If you can find a script - you get to update evolutionary theory. As it stands - it doesn't matter if it's part of a script to do the science since considering it essentially random gets the job done. Science always welcomes refinement though - so its Nobeltastic if you can locate some kind of script. Then we'd call them prescribed mutations or scriptual mutation or perhaps even Randman mutations

Can you substantiate that? Specifically, perhaps show several places where the phrase "random mutations" is used, and how it's clear they are using the term, random, in the manner you present. Can you substantiate that? It sure appears that there is a script at times.Edited by randman, : No reason given.

Yes - I referenced Dawkins as using it in that manner as well as stating that from another point of view mutations are not random. Uses in the primary literature for random mutations is to simply refer to them as being stochastic in nature. The things that may weigh the probabilities include the environment and the structure of the DNA molecule, possibly epigenetic effects etc etc. What has not been shown to have an effect on the ultimate probabilities involved is the potential end product viz survivability/fecundity etc.No more than who kicks off in football can affect the coin toss.You'll see other references such as 'blind' and 'groping' to explain mutations, which have the same kind of implication. I can't prove a negative if that is what you are asking. I can just tell you the way that the word random is being used. Perhaps the Discovery Institute can put some of its considerable resources towards investigating it and producing a paper that demonstrates a probable script.

Yeah... you may wish to hop on to the indeterminism boat if you utilize reason mainly.I actually come from the other side, I'm a libertarian.

So your stance is that adaptive mutations are not real?There is clear evidence with the emergence of things like the mammalian ear, that if these features do come about via mutations, that mutations are not random but work according to some predisposition.Did you ever read any of JAD's stuff and links to evo sources stating the same thing?

Ain't cognitive biases grand?

DS, does that post contribute, in any way, to furthering the discussion.If you believe that Randman is wrong then offer your reasoning.

Quite the contrary. Things that either
a) turn on existing genes by epigenetic means
b) increase mutation rates under certain circumstancesare entirely real. I wouldn't be surprised if certain mutation pressures are expressed as a result of the above. It's all very nice - but that isn't related to the definition of random. Let's say that either some or no mutations are random - that doesn't change the definition of 'random mutation'. You said that biologists have never defined 'random' in 'random mutation'. That's not true.Perhaps your beef isn't in the definition of random at all; it's that you don't think mutations are random, that they might be prescripted or such.