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Author Topic:   Distinguishing "designs"
NosyNed
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Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 1 of 73 (414490)
08-04-2007 12:26 PM


This belongs in ID.
The "design inference" has gotten a lot of traffic at EvC recently. The ID movement claims that where you see apparent design there must have been a designer.
My view is that we have two examples of design types and design processes which produce them.
1) Human (known intelligent) Design.
These designs strive to be as simple and clearly understandable as is possible for the situation. They use standard parts in many cases. They borrow from one another across whole classes of product. (spark plugs in cars and lawn mowers).
2) Evolutionary Algorithms Design (known to be unintelligent).
These designs can be weirdly incomprehensible. They may have totally non-functional parts in them. Parts only arise from what was there before not from what is used anywhere else.
My contention is that we can make a very clear separation between the two classes of outcomes. Biological organisms look like the product of the second "design" process.
ABE
On and Off Topic
I'd like to see this include a discussion of design and the characteristics of it.
This is about the "design" of biological organisms. It is not about the origin of life or the laws of nature. They are the background in which we are working.
Edited by NosyNed, : added a bit

Replies to this message:
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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 4 of 73 (414552)
08-04-2007 6:42 PM
Reply to: Message 3 by RAZD
08-04-2007 5:41 PM


Re: on the other hand ...
But these algorithms are designed (known to be intelligent), so the evidence of such systems in operation would be evidence for the design of those systems ...
We are talking about the output of such algorithms. If we back up to the formation of the laws of chemistry etc. We are in a different realm than ID is working when it comes to the apparent design of living things.
Weather the naturally occurring evolutionary algorithm can arise without being intelligently designed is the next question. I don't know if there is enough information available to answer that question right now. I haven't thought about it enough. Maybe that is the next topic.
The problem is that the sample of that kind of thing that we have, the evolutionary algorithms we use, are deliberately modeled on the biological one. We haven't thought of another kind that isn't modeled on those so unlike the outputs of our design and the outputs of evolutionary algorithms we don't have anything to compare and contrast.
I might also argue that the specific implementation of the algorithms is designed by us but that the basic form of the algorithm is simply copied from nature. Whether that algorithm is "designed" is then the next question. I'd say that it is a simple consequence of imperfect reproduction under selection and that is going to be hard to call "designed". I'd be interested in your comments on that in the thread you start to discuss it.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 27 of 73 (414998)
08-07-2007 4:19 PM
Reply to: Message 21 by Doddy
08-07-2007 3:07 AM


Good or Bad Isn't the Original Issue
My OP point wasn't that the pparent designs are good or bad but that they fall into two categories: one of these is that produced by observed evolutionary algorithms and that we see, on a small scale, produced in living things.
Comparing these two classes of apparent design we see that living things follow the evolutionary process produced type (good or bad -- with the right selective pressures I don't see why it can't be very, very good indeed.).
Since the samples of this kind of apparent design that we know about are all produced without intelligence in the design process it is a resonably position to say that this is indeed apparent only. Good or bad they are not intelligent designs.
The homology argument was put forward. This also supports the evolutionary process rather than the ID process. In human designs we see not homology as it shows up in living things but the precise design (in fact the actual object -- e.g., radios in cars). We don't see old solutions re-sculpted to handle new environments in intelligent design. We see a "start-over" kind of solution.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 29 of 73 (415062)
08-08-2007 12:53 AM
Reply to: Message 28 by Doddy
08-07-2007 8:28 PM


Samples and Solutions
NosyNed writes:
Since the samples of this kind of apparent design that we know about are all produced without intelligence in the design process it is a resonably position to say that this is indeed apparent only.
Goddy writes:
You can't just assume that what we see in living things is made without intelligence in order to prove that the design we see in living things is produced without intelligence. It begs the question.
I wasn't assuming that. The samples in living things are NOT all life just those smaller samples that we have observed to evolve.
NosyNed writes:
We don't see old solutions re-sculpted to handle new environments in intelligent design.
Goddy writes:
I see no reason why a designer would not co-opt an existing framework or object to solve a problem. Just as a car manufacturer may use an existing engine for a new car model, a designer may use the motor of a Type III Secretory System for a motor in a flagellum.
And the use of an existing engine as an engine is hardly comparable to a secretory system being turned into a motor. That is exactly the difference I'm talking about. A somewhat stretched analogy might be the starter motor in one model being beefed up by redirecting A/C output through it to make it into the main driving motor for the rear wheels to make a higher traction 4 wheel drive car out of a front wheel drive. That is what we see in live it is not what we see in humanly designed things.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 42 of 73 (420574)
09-08-2007 2:01 PM


Bump for Rob
Rob goes on about design in other threads but is absent from this one.

  
NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 43 of 73 (436621)
11-26-2007 8:28 PM


Bump for Nem Jugg
This thread is the place where you can explain how the "design" of life does look like it is the product of intelligently design as compared to the other kind of design we know about.
This is based on your message Message 290
From that message:
The apparent design of life is NOT from "nothing" or from "random" processes. I would have thought you would have finally understood that by now.
Edited by NosyNed, : No reason given.

  
NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 45 of 73 (443079)
12-23-2007 5:51 PM
Reply to: Message 44 by Cold Foreign Object
12-23-2007 5:46 PM


Ned ignored a non reply
That is right because it is straightforward logic.
Design indicates Designer.
Evolution special pleads design to not indicate Designer based on mandatory philosophical requirements that do not allow God as an explanation or interpretation or, of course, a conclusion.
When observation is ignored in favor of an antonym ("design" indicates mindless processes) then (Atheist) philosophy parading as science is confirmed.
Maybe Ray you should actually read this thread then.
The point is that we have known apparent designs that we also know are NOT designed by an designer. There are processes which can produce them.
The designs that you point to as evidence are exactly those kind of designs. Thus the evidence you use is powerful evidence that there is no intelligent designer.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 49 of 73 (443808)
12-26-2007 8:12 PM
Reply to: Message 47 by Cold Foreign Object
12-26-2007 5:52 PM


Idiotic Games with Semantics
Ray, the English language doesn't have good words for these things.
If you don't know what is meant by "apparent designs" then you need to learn a whole lot about this subject.
The word design carries many connotations. The word "apparent" is used to avoid them when they are inappropriate. That is when we wish to remain neutral on the issue of a designer.
If you don't like the word apparent I'll take it out. We have more than one kind of design available for us to observe.
Two of the kinds of design process produce outputs that people have treated as artifacts of intelligent processes. Now we understand that one of the kinds of process produces a very different kind of design that the other.
Since the look of design that we see in nature is exactly NOT the kind of design that has a foreseeing guiding designer we can, with the available evidence today, conclude that those things are designed by the process that we KNOW produces that "look".
Your playing with semantics is not answering that distinction and starts to quickly look a bit childish.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 53 of 73 (444178)
12-28-2007 2:27 PM
Reply to: Message 52 by Cold Foreign Object
12-28-2007 12:51 PM


Distinguishing them
Most you your post is a waste of the bits to store it. Your paranoia about other peoples motives is a waste of time.
You do finally get to the topic of the thread.
The design we see in nature is real corresponding to Designer; from bat sonar to feathers to army ants. You cannot have it both ways: you cannot admit something looks designed but then turn around and deny Designer. All you are saying is that natural selection produces the "look" of design but the same, of course, is an unintelligent process.
I am not saying that it produces the "look" of the kind of design you are talking about.
It appears that you insist on using the word design to mean intelligently designed. Since that is the case we will have to avoid the word altogether.
Humans are the only designers that you can show me in action. The outcome of their work as a particular "form".
Evolutionary processes (natural or man made) produce work of a different "form". Bats and ants are exactly this kind of form not the former kind.
You have managed to avoid explaining that with all your bafflegab and misdirection.
By attempting to say that a "look" of design exists you are saying it was produced by natural selection. Darwin says NO! Design does not exist (nor is it an outcome) in the "action of natural selection."
If you disagree then please include references or source cites.
Darwin was using the word "design" exactly like you do. I use the word "design" in the same way someone might comment on the design of a snowflake. It is this confusion of different meanings of the term that makes it impossible for us to use the word at all.
The forms produced are outcomes of different processes. The outcomes have different natures depending on the producing process. We can compare the nature of the outcomes to make a judgement about the process used.
Bats and ants are NOT intelligently designed based on this comparison.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 55 of 73 (444418)
12-29-2007 11:37 AM
Reply to: Message 54 by sinequanon
12-29-2007 5:34 AM


A Third Type?
A Third Type?
Interesting point Sin ... This process uses a wide rangeing search for variation (as mutations do in biological processes) and then a selection process. But the selection process is applied with some thought.
Is it possible to distinguish this from the biological evolutionary process? I haven't thought about it enough yet. When we use this with evolutionary algorithms or in artificial selection we get outcomes that look like the biological forms. But is there a distinction?

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 59 of 73 (445152)
01-01-2008 11:47 AM
Reply to: Message 58 by sinequanon
01-01-2008 7:32 AM


Re: A part of what?
I could equally interpret the car and the lawn mower as ecosystems in which the form, 'spark plug', exists.
This could be similar to finding a particular bacteria in organisms of different species, or finding a particular bird nesting in various types of shrub.
I don't think I get the point you are making. Can you make the logical steps clearer?

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 61 of 73 (445218)
01-01-2008 2:27 PM
Reply to: Message 60 by sinequanon
01-01-2008 1:06 PM


borrowed parts
I understand better now.
It is somewhat fuzzy. It is amusing that is actually difficult to define where "I" leave off and "not-I" starts. However, I think there is a clear difference (for organisms as complex as mammals) between things which are fundamental parts of them that are formed from their nuclear DNA ( ) and reproduce through their sexual reproductive processes and things which arrive from the outside.
(I am avoiding the nitpicking details that suggest that our important gut organisms may not be found in other than humans.)
The dust and grime which gathers one a lawn mower or the oxygen it uses to run are, in the analogy we are using clearly not as much a "part of it" as the spark plugs are. We do not find a mammal with a octopuses eye even thought it might be slightly better for some uses.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 64 of 73 (447002)
01-07-2008 6:44 PM
Reply to: Message 63 by Cold Foreign Object
01-07-2008 6:33 PM


Semantic Games
We've already played that game Ray. Tiresome now.
Deal with the actual issue or refrain from using an argument you can't support.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 66 of 73 (447025)
01-07-2008 7:54 PM
Reply to: Message 65 by Cold Foreign Object
01-07-2008 7:26 PM


Definition of "design"
In previous centuries the word design meant the output from human work.
We now have to be careful to note that there are at least two ways to produce outputs. This has all been discussed above.
Did you have trouble reading it?

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 70 of 73 (447071)
01-07-2008 11:25 PM
Reply to: Message 67 by Cold Foreign Object
01-07-2008 8:59 PM


Re: Definition of "design"
Message 49 and others
Design: The "design" of an object is it's form and the interrelationship of it's parts.
We are aware of at least two different kinds of processes that produce objects with "interesting" forms and part relationships.
Paley was aware of only one process that produces objects with interesting forms and relationships of parts. He explicitly tried to compare an object that we know is produced by one kind of process to one that exhibits the characteristics objects that we know have been produced by another process.
Watches exhibit the charateristics of objects arising from one process; living things exhibit the characteristics of the other process.
Of course, Paley is an example of the kind of bias and blindness that you often toss around. He was trying to find a particular answer. That combined with his ignorance of what we learned over a century later lead him to wrong conclusions.
Edited by NosyNed, : To fix a totally screwed up post.

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