What exactly is ID?

Hi Brad,Things seem to have calmed down in this thread, so I'm going to attempt to resume participating in the discussion. The only part of this that is accurately about Shannon information is when you say, "We will both agree on only dialing seven digits (which carry equal amounts of information)." That one string of digits is a phone number you can call to get 'information' (and I put it in scare quotes to denote that now I'm referring to the everyday meaning of information, not Shannon's) has no bearing on issues related to information theory. As Shannon himself wrote in his seminal paper introducing the field of information theory (A Mathematical Theory of Communication): One of your digit strings could be the phone number for Oxford University's Department of Cosmology and it would contain no more information than any other random digit string of the same length. In information theory it is important not to confuse information with meaning. Information theory is the problem of how to communicate a string of digits (more accurately, bits) from point A to point B. What the digits mean is irrelevant. I know that meaning isn't irrelevant to people, but it is irrelevant to information theory.--Percy

I'm guessing its the same 1-800 number I gave Nuggin )Seriously though, you proved my point for me. Once you "thought" of a number it then became more functional for this exercise then all other seven digit numbers. In fact no other numbers except that one you were thinking of would have fit the criteria for being "the number you were thinking of."

The actual arguments and evidential claims in favour of ID are agnostic about who or what the designer is. Irreducible complexity, conservation of information, the obviousness of design in nature etc. etc. Whatever.Those predominantly (but I maintain not exclusively) presently making those arguments and claims in a very high profile manner are not at all agnostic about who or what the designer is. They are creationist Christians. I don’t dispute that at all.But what I do not understand is why you guys are so determined to conflate the arguments in favour of ID with the people that are currently advocating those arguments?Why do you think creationists have adopted ID so passionately? I would say it is because ID is more acceptable to a much wider audience than more specific descriptions of God. ID resonates with people’s intuitive common sense about notions of evidence, science and there being some sort of less specified higher intelligence ultimately behind the majesty and non-randomness of nature. A higher being that many might accept without necessarily being tied to any particular religion at all. There are many more people willing to accept the argument it can’t all just be down to random chance than there are willing to accept either any form of biblical literalism or more general Judeo-Christian specific notions of God.By simply saying ID is nonsense because creationism is obviously nonsense and all IDists are creationists really — as you are doing here - does no good to the pro-science cause in my opinion. It alienates those (whom I would argue are vast in number) who hold a vague and largely unconsidered notion of an intelligent designer but who are not in any way part of the creationist lobby. It pushes those people away from actually considering the issues and evidence straight into the eager arms of the creationists who are willing to adopt whatever strategy achieves the most publicly popular outcome in their favour. The wedge in action.To my mind it is far better, indeed necessary, to make the scientific case against ID on it’s own merits. Intelligent Design is evidentially bankrupt. We can show that regardless of who is making the pro-ID arguments. Given the current climate we should be exposing ID for what it is to the most people possible. Not just creo-bashing for it’s own sake.By conflating the actual arguments of ID with the creationist movement most vocally and strategically making those arguments I think you guys are playing directly into the hands of Christian fundamentalists. By playing the PR game on their terms.

I meant to address Message 828 to your post and somehow ended up replying to an older post of Nuggin's. Anyway - Here is a reply to notify you of that post.I wouldn't want anyone to miss my gems of wisdom and insight..........

Just to add that I agree 100% with Straggler on this. Of course we know the origins of ID, but there are sufficient exceptions (>0) to the rule that IDists are creationists to make it dishonest of us to claim that they are one and the same.

Hi Drew,So you don't have time for debate but you have time to discuss your uninformed intuitions with similar minded people? To what end? So you can all feel good about how you agree with each other and Stephen Meyer? So that by sheer weight of accord you can suddenly make all of the evidence contrary to your preconceptions disappear?Nothing in your post seems to have even a passing resemblance to evidence. Not only are you relying on second hand figures given to you by Smooth Operator, but you seem convinced that intuition and common sense are superior substitutes for actual knowledge and research.The fact that you can only think of one example of a beneficial mutation just goes to show that you are only familiar with them from web sites rather than the actual scientific literature, indeeed even just reading EvC forum it shouldn't take you more than a few searches to turn up many further examples of beneficial mutations outwith bacteria, i.e. mutations protective from atherosclerosis, HIV infection, pesticide resistance.Or is this yet another ID/Creationist version of 'beneficial' which is unrelated to simply confering a survival/reproductive benefit on the organism?As you yourself concede subsequently pretty much the entire rest of your evidence is simply appealing to the authority of Meyer and Behe. You say that we can't counter the evidence itself and since you haven't actually presented any you are correct.I have to say though the point that the actual amount of 'functional' information compared to the information for the whole protein is a small proportion seems to my mind to be an argument against an ID interpretation, it means that as has often been pointed out, all of those calculations of information/CSI/functional information based on the full length of a protein/DNA sequence have been inflated. It is worthwhile noting that protein binding sites do not need to be re-evolved to appear in diverse protein families, there is plenty of scope for swapping such sites between genes allowing for novel recombinations of binding sites and other active sites. So in theory each type of site need only evolve de novo once.To restrict yourself only to conversing with Brad H who seems to be from exactly the same branch of intuition/web based understanding (No chromosomal mutations in bacteria?) , seems to be a way of cutting out any dissenting voice that might introduce actual factual infromation into your discussion. Why do you think this is a good thing to do?At the moment you don't seem to be discussing 'What exactly is ID?' but rather giving a practical demonstration of why ID isn't considered a credible science.TTFN,WK

Well, he has said that he considers Adam and Eve literal people. So, I would venture a guess and say yes, he does think there is evidence for it. Which I am prety sure he also considers evidence for creationism. There is the Adam and Eve quote. And can you honestly say Dembski thinks the evidence he cites for ID is not also evidence for creationism?

---

I hunt for the truthI am the one Orgasmatron, the outstretched grasping hand
My image is of agony, my servants rape the land
Obsequious and arrogant, clandestine and vain
Two thousand years of misery, of torture in my name
Hypocrisy made paramount, paranoia the law
My name is called religion, sadistic, sacred whore.
-Lyrics by Lemmy Kilmister of Motorhead

Entirely true, but that doesn't make the numbers themselves anything more than what they are - which are numbers.I could think up a meta-number which is "all the number-strings everywhere, ever" and it wouldn't mean a thing, but it would still fit the criteria of "guess what I'm thinking of".the point I'm trying to make, and strangely enough you seem to agree with me although I'll bet you say you don't, is that information is information whether it's understood or not.with your two original numbers, the only "meaning" of the 1-800 number was what YOU gave it. I could equally say that, since I can't call a 1-800 from Europe, but I *can* call Ireland (which is the 26 number) that the 26 number is the "information" and the 1-800 is not.If you didn't mean it that way, then (seeing as I *did* jump in) it's entirely possible I've misunderstood what you meant, but you seemed to be saying that because YOU found your number to be useful, that the numbers themselves within the string were somehow imbued with more value than the other number string - which I don't think is a valid assumption.

Lets get real here Raz, if I copied and pasted material here, obtained from another web site and I used your logic that they were all brand new letters that only exist here for the first time, how long do you think I would last before I got booted for plagiarism? A copy of something does not explain its origination. Yes and how many thousands of years do you suppose that rocks and sticks have existed? But if you flew over an island and saw rocks and sticks arranged in a pattern of three dots, three dashes, and then three dots, the significance would not be in the fact that you observed sticks and rocks, but rather in the fact that they were arranged to spell out SOS in Morris code. And that is the point here. Nucleotides are arranged to effect the proteins in such a way that an eye is built, or fingers and finger nails, or a beating heart. Biological machinery transmitting building information to other biological machines. Not only that they are capable of self replication and adaptation to various environmental changes. "Copied" information does NOT explain where the original came from. Actually yes Raz, I am. But I am not stating that they always happen without genetic changes. There are actually a number of mechanisms that can bring about changes in a populations traits. However what I am stating is that I have never heard of a phenotype changing as a result of "observed" added (new) information to the chromosomal DNA. And that is the only thing (as far as biological evidence goes) that can convince any reasonably minded skeptic of universal common decent. But on the other hand, on this thread we are discussing ID. Intelligent design proponents suggests that information in the DNA code of all living organisms is highly complex and highly specified. Thus far in all of the history of the human experience we have only observed this kind of csi formed by intelligent causes and therefore we conclude that the csi observed in DNA must also have an intelligent cause. (PERIOD) No Bible verses, no God or gods, no Aliens, and no "MAGIC WIZARDS" mentioned in deriving that conclusion.

I think you are mistaking what I mean Percy. I know that the specificity is not Shannon theory, only the complexity is. Shannon theory can not measure specificity of information, only its "ability" to carry complex information. What I mean is that a phone number that connects me to my wife's cell phone is a specific 7 digit number. But according to Shannon's theory it carries the exact same measure of complexity as any 7 digit non repetitive number. But only one 7 digit number will connect me to my wife. That is where we are getting confused with the two different types of information. One type is complex and the other is specific. Together they are coined as csi. And csi is only observed in things with an intelligent source.

So the 1st number is not a telephone number.
The 2nd number is not the accurate population of microbes in the puddle on the street, while the 1st one happens to be.You are applying a SPECIFIC filter and then proclaiming because ONE filter works ONE way, ALL filters must work the same way - that's a load of crap.Just because you ONLY understand the numbers in ONE particular way does not mean that that is the ONLY or even BEST way to examine them.

GATTAC -> GATGGTACWhere were the 2 "G"s before I just typed them in. And don't say "on your keyboard".Inserts into the DNA are NOT bits that were floating around. They are errors of assembly. Claiming they were there before is like claiming a spelling mistake existed on the page before it "made it's way into the sentence."That's just silly "magic!" thinking.

No I absolutely agree with that point right as stated above Grey. Yes all information is information regardless of an entity that can understand it. But not all possibilities of information produce specific functions, and that is the point that I am trying to make. Only those possibilities that are designed to be read and interpreted can produce a specific and useful function. Unless you are trying to argue that "functionality is only in the eyes of the beholder." But then you are getting into that "scary" philosophy where people start asking if they really exist or are they just part of someone else's elaborate imagination.

It is my position that you can not argue that there is evidence of design unless you can tell the mechanism of design.For example:
If I present you the mathematical equation describing a series of interlocking rings - that's information.However, you can't tell me if that information is describing the rings in a pond after two droplets hit or that information is describing a pattern of circles I've drawn on a piece of paper.The droplets in the pond are not in any way "designed". They just happened. The circles on the pieces of paper are entirely "designed", they were put there by me with tools for a specific purpose.So we have the EXACT same information and the only thing different between the two scenarios is how that information came to be generated.People arguing FOR ID are claiming that it was a "designer", but when pressed for a mechanism it always falls back to "magic!".Well a "designer" who is using "magic!" is the Jewish Wizard the Christians are claiming Created everything.Trying to pretend that they are making an argument without invoking the Jewish Wizard is dishonest on their part. Right, because most people are pretty stupid. But, even the stupid recognize "You have to worship MY religion" is gonna be a problem.To take it to an extreme, it's the difference between "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing". "Oh, we're just washing away the bad people? Sounds lovely." Just because they don't think they are in the Creationist lobby doesn't mean they aren't.If they aren't standing up against ID, they are, in essence, helping to push Creationism into schools.If it makes "vaguely ID supports" uncomfortable when I point out that they are Christian Fundamentalists who hate the Constitution, then GOOD. It SHOULD make them uncomfortable.They are holding TWO DIFFERENT ideologies in their head at the exact same time and compartmentalizing. Allowing them to label the compartments whatever they want rather than forcing them to rationalize their dissidence is not going to solve this problem or move us forward as a society. The problem here is that the ID people are essentially the same people who run FoxNews - Christian Conservatives.They've demonstrated time and again that NO amount of evidence is sufficient for them to change their argument.Behe ADMITTED UNDER OATH that he was wrong yet continues to present the information as factual in speaking engagements even after Dover.Expecting the general (profoundly uneducated and generally disinterested) public to understand the facts when one side can literally say ANYTHING they want regardless of the evidence is completely naive.There is a reason Creationists win in open debates and we win in court. That's RULES OF EVIDENCE.

but you said that your 1-800 number WAS information whilst the other number wasn't - when the information was in the eye of the beholder (you)...