A Designer Consistent with the Physical Evidence

The topic of this thread is not "What's wrong with evolution?"The topic of this thread is not "What's wrong with Coyote?"The topic of this thread is not "What's wrong with EvC Forum?"If you'd like to criticize evolution then find a thread in the [forum=-5] forum where you can bust on evolution all you like. This thread is in the [forum=-10] forum, and so unsurprisingly we're discussing intelligent design, not evolution.If you'd like to get personal with evolutionists then find another board. At EvC Forum we keep discussions focused on the topic rather than on the people discussing the topic.In other words, unless you have something to contribute that is on-topic, please don't post to this thread.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Grammar.

Tony, I think your digressions have gone on long enough. Responding to complaints that you're not addressing the topic is only drawing you even further off-topic.This thread is about the physical evidence for the designer. You should only be posting to this thread if you have something to say about the topic.--Percy

There's a reason why you're only able to reply with "Aye, Aye Tony" instead of "Hey guys, Tony's right, and here's why..."We are all well aware that there are many people out there who believe unsubstantiated nonsense. Were this not true then the ranks of flim-flam artists (like homeopathists, faith healers, promoters of magic fuel additives that will give you a hundred miles to the gallon, and so on) would be considerably thinner.The goal here at EvC Forum is to examine the claims of one purported area of flim-flam known as creationism. We believe that by subjecting these claims to examination, in this case by requesting evidence for the designer of ID, they will be revealed to be completely unsubstantiated. Tony is ignoring the requests for evidence, which is why the last couple pages have turned into a torrent of requests for evidence.You piping in with "Aye, Aye Tony" only emphasizes the lack of any evidence. It wouldn't matter if a million people posted "Aye, Aye Tony" to this thread, there still wouldn't be any evidence.Because creationists lobby school boards, text book publishers and legislatures for representation in public school science classrooms, it is essential that we examine the legitimacy of creationism's claims to be real science. The foundation of any scientific investigation is evidence, data, observations, etc. That when engaged in discussion creationists talk about anything but is instructive.Those participating in this discussion on the creationist side, or ID side to be more specific, need to help move the discussion forward by addressing the topic (what you were saying "Aye, Aye" to was off-topic) and supporting your positions with evidence. Every claim you make has to be able to be tied to facts from the real world. Anything else is fantasy.--Percy

Much of your source material appears to be an article by Jonathan Sarfati titled World record enzymes. It appears over at the Creation Ministries International website.I guess we've already drifted pretty far from the original topic as characterized by the opening post (see Message 1). If you go back and give it a read you'll see just how far. Anyway, I guess a little more drift won't hurt.You're presenting evidence that a designer *does* exist, while recently we were looking for evidence that gives some indication of the nature of the designer, and originally whether the evidence was consistent with a omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, benevolent designer.Richard Wolfenden would probably be surprised to see his writings used in support of creationist arguments. When he wondered how natural selection might have originally produced the enzymes, it wasn't an expression of skepticism but one of honest curiousity, because part of what his lab does is synthesize such enzymes. His hope is that understanding how natural selection did it would inform the efforts at his own lab. Check out his webpage where he describes the nature of his work: Richard Wolfenden's webpage at the University of North Carolina, Chapel HillSince the beginning of time man has attributed what he doesn't understand to unknown and unseen forces, usually a god or gods. DNA doesn't leave fossil evidence, so there is no direct evidence for almost all of the evolutionary history of DNA. There will always be uncountable DNA structures and behaviors about which you can say, "We do not know how this evolved." Where one can go wrong is interpreting this as, "We do not see how this could have evolved," turning it from an expression of lack of knowledge to one of skepticism about the sufficiency of natural processes.Those who believe things we do not know in a scientific sense are evidence of a designer (or creator or gods or god or God or call it what you will) will always be with us, because it is their nature and because there will always be things we do not know. All we can do is point out that in all of science across all the centuries nothing we've ever figured out has had a designer or God as the answer. As our science has expanded the gaps into which gods can fit have grown smaller and smaller. Where once gods were mighty and ruled the entire universe, they have now shrunk to the size of microbiological enzymes inhabiting the space between molecules of DNA.--Percy

Actually, in short-scale countries, which includes the US and the UK but evidently doesn't include Australia if your understanding is typical down there, a trillion is 10¹².--PercyEdited by Percy, : Edit for clarity.

A lot of activity in this thread last night, I've still got 20 messages to go and don't know what course this thread is now taking, but when I rhetorically asked back in Message 196 whether anyone had anything to say about physical evidence for the designer I wasn't trying to provide a clear characterization of the topic. I was just hoping to return the focus to evidence-based arguments. If we actually resume discussing the precise topic I'd consider that a bonus.--Percy

I wondered how long it would take you before you trotted out the old "not impressed" accompanied by sarcasm fallacy. I'm not impressed, either. Now what?That's a rhetorical question. The point is that EvC Forum differentiates itself from other discussion boards by requiring that participants actually rebut arguments rather than just call them names, which is just a form of evasion. And your position isn't a priori?Again, that's a rhetorical question. The point is that what we're seeking here is the evidence and arguments you can muster for your position, not demonstrations of your skill with dismissive tactics. And you don't have territory that you have chosen to believe?That's another rhetorical question. What is the point of issuing accusations that you are just as guilty of as anyone else?When you get a free moment, why not compose an actual rebuttal to what Cavediver said. (Yep, rhetorical again!)--Percy

I want to make sure we're all talking about the same thing. Is there any special reason why you're using the term "Darwinian Evolution, (D.E.)" instead of just "evolution?" Everyone else is talking about "evolution," by which they mean the modern synthesis of Darwin's original theory with the science of genetics. Are you using the term D.E. because you want to exclude genetics? Or perhaps there's some other reason? If not, then just call it "evolution" like everyone else.While you're correct that evolution is undirected, the way you make this point by arguing that increases in complexity are required implies that you don't understand how evolution works. Increased complexity is a very likely outcome of evolution, but it is not a requirement. Increased complexity is likely because it isn't much of an exaggeration to say that a genome never forgets. A person who rarely throws anything away will have a house that keeps growing in complexity, and a rough analogy can be drawn with a genome. It is important to understand that you and Cavediver are only talking analogously about information. Information theory is mathematical, and while it's possible to make meaningful points with analogies where transformations are performed on sentences, the likelihood that you're both interpreting the analogy the same way seems slight to me.The process by which mutation produces increased information can be illustrated very simply. Say a population has a particular gene for eye color that has three alleles (varieties), green, blue and yellow. Each allele is represented by a specific series of bases (CAGT for cytosine, adenine, guanine and thymine):

• GGAACG (green eyes)
• GGAACA (blue eyes)
• GGCACG (yellow eyes)

During reproduction there are three possible messages that this gene might pass on to offspring, so the amount of information this gene can communicate within the population is log₂3 = 1.585 bits.Now lets say that during one particular reproductive event that there is a copying error in just one base in this gene for eye color, and what had been the allele CGCACG (yellow eyes) became CGCACA, and the resulting offspring has brown eyes. So now there are four alleles in the population for this gene:

• GGAACG (green eyes)
• GGAACA (blue eyes)
• GGCACG (yellow eyes)
• GGCACA (brown eyes)

This means that there are now four possible messages that this gene might pass on to offspring, so the amount of information this gene can now communicate within the population has become log₂4 = 2 bits. The amount of information in the genome of the population that is contributed by this gene has increased from 1.585 bits to 2 bits, an increase of .415 bits, and of course the amount of information in the entire genome has therefore increased by the same amount.Notice that this increase in information violated no physical law, including 2LOT.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Typo.Edited by Percy, : Spelling.

Natural selection is a non-random pruning process driven by the environment, and so it does not produce increases in information. In fact, I think it could only decrease the amount of information in the genome of a population.Increases in information come about through mutation, and perhaps also through the allele remixing of sexual reproduction and at the cellular level through processes like conjugation.Please see the latter half of Message 310 for an explanation of how mutations increase information in the genome. Since almost every reproductive event results in mutation, obviously increases in information happen all the time.--Percy

I appreciate that your intention was improved clarity, but the result is confusion. You're saying this not on the basis of any actual information or evidence, but because you believe that mutations cannot create new information. You are mistaken in this belief. Please see the latter half of Message 310.--Percy

Whether any gene is expressed is a function of many things, the one we're most familiar with being the dominant/recessive characteristic. In sexual species a mutation does not need to be present in both parents in order to be expressed in the offspring, and so it is possible for a mutation to express itself in the first generation of its appearance. And of course in non-sexual species this isn't an issue. Actually, it wasn't an analogy, I didn't specify the type of reproduction, and it was an example of a single mutation, not allele mixing such as would occur with sexual reproduction. If it helps, it is simplest to think of the example organism as a sighted asexual species with eye color.You weren't specific about what portions of my example you took issue with, so help me figure this out. Our organism has three alleles for eye color:

• GGAACG (green eyes)
• GGAACA (blue eyes)
• GGCACG (yellow eyes)

Since there are three messages in the message set for this gene, the amount of information it can communicate is log₂3 = 1.585 bits. This is just straightforward information theory, I'm just setting the table right now, there shouldn't be anything here to take issue with. I think this is what you prefer to call complex specified information, and I'll attempt to accommodate you.Now we look at a single reproductive event where an organism with the allele for yellow eyes (CGCACG) produces an offspring with a mutation in this gene so that it is now CGCACA, and the offspring has brown eyes. Our message set has now become:

• GGAACG (green eyes)
• GGAACA (blue eyes)
• GGCACG (yellow eyes)
• GGCACA (brown eyes)

There are now four messages in the message set for this gene, and the amount of information it can communicate is log₂4 = 2 bits, an increase of .415 bits.You had several objections to this. One is that the mutation for brown eyes is polymorphic, and I have to completely agree. Having multiple alleles for a gene is the very definition of polymorphism, and increasing the number of alleles is, at heart, the way that mutation increases the amount of information in a genome. You later say: So you're asking us to describe the type of new information that is required by evolution to rpovide new functions, and my mutation example is exactly that. Mutations are ultimately how evolution provides new function, and I provided an example of a mutation providing a new function, and showed how from an information theoretic perspective that it represented new information. If you think it doesn't provide new information then you have to explain how the message set growing from 3 messages via mutation to become 4 is not an increase in information. log₂4 - log₂3 = +.415 is the simple math that you have to address.Another of your objections dealt with complex specified complexity: My example began with an organism with an eye-color gene with three alleles, and you call this complex specified information (you actually used the term "ordered complexity", but hopefully this is a synonym). I then said there was a mutation that added an allele, and you're saying that the added allele is not complex specified information.But what if I had instead begun my example by saying that the organism originally had four alleles for eye color like this:

• GGAACG (green eyes)
• GGAACA (blue eyes)
• GGCACG (yellow eyes)
• GGCACA (brown eyes)

You would have said this is the complex specified information for that gene and had no problem with it, just as you did when I began my example with a three-allele gene. So if the allele for brown eyes is complex specified information when it is part of the original genome, how is it not complex specified information when it arises through mutation?--Percy

Hi NanoGeckoFirst you call evolution a fairy tale, then you launch into a diatribe where you call evolution a religion with no evidence that's promoted with smoke and mirrors and just-so stories. You sound like a disciple of Fred Williams where the game is to work in as many denigrating labels as possible into each paragraph.The validity of your accusations is measured by how well they correspond to reality. By this measure they fair poorly, but much more significantly is the openness with which you concede your religious motivation.Such openness, especially Bible quotes in a science thread, does cause you serious problems if your goal is to convince school boards, legislatures and text book publishers that intelligent design is science and not religion. The Discovery Institute has made a career maintaining that intelligent design is legitimate science, but they're fighting a losing battle because rank and file adherents such as yourself just can't seem to keep religion out of their science.--Percy

Discussion has resumed over at Evolving New Information.--Percy