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Author
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Topic: Evidence to expect given a designer
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Jbr writes: No Doc. I'm going to say very clearly (again) no one has ever observed a case, through mutation or any other natural means, of added beneficially new never before existed information to the chromosomal DNA of a multi-celled organim. That is what is needed to demonstrate that it is possible to get from one major kind to another. For a fish to gain lungs, legs and finally lap tops, a whole lot of new information must be added to the DNA. So, the second option then.
Dr Adequate writes: Are you pretending that no-one's observed adaptive evolution in multi-celled organisms? Or are you planning to take refuge from this fact in vacuity of language and undefined terms? I thought it would be one or the other. Now, let us know if you can come up with an objective criterion for determining whether such an event has taken place, and I'll get back to you.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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No I just implied that even a child on its own plane operating within its limited and undeveloped level of knowledge and understanding could distinguish between something with characteristics of specificity and something just functioning under natural unguided processes and laws. And the things that you gave as examples of things without "characteristics of specificity" were, apparently, "naturally occurring things in the forest". But aren't you meant to be claiming that naturally occurring things do exhibit this vague, ill-defined property?
We do love that broad brush don't we? My statement about "the micro biologists who have cracked that code" was exactly as broad as yours, since we were talking about the same people. Mine was, of course, much more accurate.
Gee Doc. I don't know... maybe some sort of a controlled study where a group of multi-celled organisms where observed over several generations. The parent groups DNA being mapped out and over "X" amount of generations the decedents are observed to have added beneficially new never before existed information to the chromosomal DNA. I'm still waiting for the actual criterion. We need an operational definition. Whether through incompetence or a kind of low cunning, creationist maunderings about "information" are usually too vague to provide one.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Re: My one comment
To say that you can't differentiate between evolution being responsible and a designer, is logically problematic ... Also, not what anyone's said, because we can. There are mistakes that evolution must make but a designer wouldn't.
But we don't know deductively, that evolution has the power for such specific designs. Simulation of evolution, not to mention direct observation, shows that evolution can evolve things just as designers design things.
For example, the difference between the avian lung and our own might require a hernia. Unless you think that birds are descended from humans, this is irrelevant.
Even if there is a general picture, and induction of evidence favouring the ToE, this does not address specific designs. You can only speculate that evolution somehow did it, but when we look at a combustion engine we are not speculating that a designer could have somehow did it, we know designers did it. Which is one of the many ways in which an internal combustion engine differs from living things.
Again, the only real reason to reject the glaringly obvious facts is denial, in my opinion, given that two basic mechanisms would not be expected to produce high-quality design. Your expectations are irrelevant when put alongside the fact that variation and selection do produce high-quality "design".
There is no predictive power in claiming that evolution can produce brilliant design, unless we see it produce it in the future. Bollocks. I note, by the way, that you do not apply this reasoning to your invisible designer.
Designs are designed well given; - Ideas - Planning - An extraordinarily clever contingency for a specific problem - Predetermination Things that you'd mistake for designs are not-really-designed well given: - Reproduction - Variation - Selection
The picture from the fossil record can in no way give a satisfying answer given how fragmented and incomplete that record is. It seems that it is simply by faith that evolution is favoured over the glaringly obvious solution. No.
At the very and bare least, intellectually it must be conceded that these types of designs qualify as evidence of a designer, because logically, such designs are superior to human designs, and human designs, even though they are lesser designs, REQUIRE designers. That is not logical; it's not even coherent.
If atheists could admit this then perhaps they would frighten me a lot more than they do, because then I could know that they could be reasonable, but to pretend that nothing in existence supports a designer is not reasonable, given that even in an atheistic universe, chance would produce evidence that would favour a designer. Something equally compatible with two hypotheses does not favor one over the other, and if I wanted to frighten you, I'd creep up behind you and shout "BOO!", not degrade my intellect by repeating fatuous nonsense.
| This message is a reply to: | | | Message 80 by mike the wiz, posted 12-19-2011 4:41 PM | | mike the wiz has not replied |
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Perhaps vague to the intentionally obtuse, but yes that is correct. Its like when my seven year old turns on the computer and watches it boot up. He can see it do all kinds of things that it "naturally" was pre-programed to do. Even my seven year old can easily distinguish between those actions, as opposed to when someone is IMiing him on the net. The boot up and basic operation of the system running in the background is all intelligently designed to run a "naturally basic function within the system. But the instant messages however are clearly intelligently being generated from his aunt Val. At his age he may not understand the operating system and how intricately designed it is, but this will come as his plane of understanding and knowledge base develops. Likewise a biologist can go out to that same forest and pick up a tree frog, take it back to the lab and examine its DNA and see high levels of specificity. Therefore he is capable of doing what the child could not. And detect design even within the "operating system." When I used my child and the AR-15 analogy, I didn't expect for you to stretch my words beyond the breaking point of all congruity. I find it comical that you were waiting with bated breath for my arguments to hide behind vocabulary manipulation and yet you are the first out of that gate. Please do not lie to me about my own actions: this is both impolite and unconvincing. You wrote "even a child [...] could distinguish ... ", which in English usage implies "... so how much more would an intelligent adult make this distinction!" If you now wish us to understand that what you meant was something more along the lines of "only a child would distinguish ...", then I accept your explanation; nonetheless, it is neither "intentionally obtuse" nor "vocabulary manipulation" on my part to understand you as meaning what you said rather than the exact opposite.
I'll give you that. In the future I'll be more careful to say "MANY" micro biologists... That would be something of an overstatement, don't you think?
Look I'm not like you and trying to trip you up on your own words here. I just want any study that demonstrates how that increase of information from single celled life, to multi-celled, to fins, to lungs to legs, could possibly have came about. Loss of information can sometimes be beneficial to the organisms survival, but it doesn't explain how the increase happened to begin with. Nor do copies, nor copy errors etc. At some point mutations must occur that produce beneficially new never before existed information in the chromosomal DNA. How are you quantifying information?
DNA that almost ALL biologists agree is highly specified, and many biologists attribute to a designer. If you asked "almost ALL biologists" whether DNA is "highly specified" they'd stare at you blankly and ask what you mean. As to "many" attributing it to a designer, I await the source of your vague nonstatistic with interest.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Oh really? It might interest you to know that Crick and Watson (credited for first discovering DNA) also were the first to refer to the "specificity" of the code in DNA. But they didn't say it was "highly specified", nor, when they used the term "specificity" were they thinking of the vague ill-defined concept that plays such an important yet nebulous role in your maunderings about ID.
I have no "source" that says there are "X" amount of ID believing biologists compared to "X" amount of common decent believing biologists, if that's what you mean. But I can cite you several examples of highly credentialed biologists who attribute it to an intelligent source, if you want some of those. Unless "several" has become a synonym for "many" without anyone telling me about it, you may save your breath. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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I later learned that I needed to clarify that it is specific information that requires intelligence. It has nothing to do with odds, but rather information that has a very specified intent. So, in order to detect intelligent design, we need to detect specificity ... and in order to detect specificity, we need to detect intent. This might actually be true, since intent is a property of thinking entities. Now, how do we detect intent?
The ONLY evidence that could support common decent and exclude gene pool manipulation would be an example of observed added beneficially NEW never before existed information to the chromosomal DNA of any multi celled organism. That is what I have yet to ever see anyone present. We shall present it the moment you present an operational definition of it. Until then you might as well be saying that the only evidence you'll accept is flurble-wurble boo bing spong. Why you refuse to accept the actual evidence for evolution, the stuff that can be described in words that do possess meaning, is something of a mystery.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Please let us know how you wish to quantify information; thank you.
| Replies to this message: | | | Message 129 by JonF, posted 12-21-2011 11:46 AM | | Dr Adequate has replied |
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Message 131 of 373 (644893)
12-21-2011 12:35 PM
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Reply to: Message 129 by JonF
12-21-2011 11:46 AM
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I see this a lot, and it's one of my pet peeves. It's not actually necessary to be able to quantify information; rather it's necessary to be able to order information in an "a > b > c ..." order so we can objectively see if information is added, subtracted, or unchanged without necessarily knowing the amounts of information we're comparing. Of course we both know that neither a quantification or ordering will show up. Let Σ = {A,C,G,T}. Let Q 0 = {λ}. Define inductively Q n = {s in Σ * | Q n-1 < s & ~exists t in Σ * s.t. Q n-1 < t < s} Let q be a function from Σ * to N such that q(s) = n iff s is in Q n. Then q quantifies information so that q(a) < q(b) iff a < b. Hence if you can order DNA by information content, you can quantify it. The converse is, of course, obvious, since given a quantifier function q you can define < by a < b iff q(a) < q(b).
| This message is a reply to: | | | Message 129 by JonF, posted 12-21-2011 11:46 AM | | JonF has not replied |
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Both the dolphin communication, and the sequences of DNA bases fit within one of the two categories of what is defined as specificity. One is a specific (intended) pattern recognition in communication. The other is a specific arrangement that produces function. In DNA, specific function implies intent because specific function has only been observed originating by intelligence. A proposition which would be more easily disputed if you could mean something less vague by "specific".
The DNA code will first transcribe to the RNA code, that is still in the nitrogeneous bases language (if you will). Next that RNA code is translated into a protein code that is an entirely different language (if you will). This transaction utilizes ribosomes and two types of RNA. One type, mRNA, codes for the gene and gets copied off of the DNA, as the other type, tRNA matches a specific group of nucleotides with a specific amino acid. An anticodon (group of three nucleotides) codes for one amino acid which match up with specific three nucleotide sequences on the mRNA. The process involves many very precise matches of a highly specified manner. And all this "specific" stuff happening without an intelligent entity involved in any way. Just a lot of dumb chemicals doing their stuff. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Re: Evidence for a designer
Scientific observation A: Something has never been observed coming from nothing.
Scientific observation B: the universe "began." Semantic observation: the word "began" is not synonymous with "came from nothing".
Scientific observation D: When artifacts are studied basic facts about their origin can be conferred. Such as the observation that only things with an intended purpose, function, code, or pattern, are produced by intelligent sources. That would be untrue even if you'd written it the right way round.
Scientific observation E: The code found in the base protein pairs of the DNA of all living things is described by many micro biologists themselves as being highly specified. Though you cannot quote them, since microbiologists do not talk in your arcane jargon.
There are no observed cases of DNA forming by natural unguided processes, and there are no observed cases of added new never before existed information to the chromosomal DNA code of a multicelled organism, which is the only thing that could even imply that it is possible to form by natural unguided processes. If this meant something, it would probably be untrue; which would explain why despite repeated requests you have assiduously avoided attaching any meaning to it.
Scientific observation F: The more than 122 parameters of the Earth, such as size, position, angle, atmosphere, moon position, rotation speed, water content, and planetary orbital order, that make life possible here, are a clear display of highly specified life support systems. Nonsense. There are lots of solar systems, lots of planets, it's inevitable that we live on one of the ones on which life is possible.
Scientific observation G: Physical forces such as electromagnetic forces, nuclear intensity, strength of gravity, mass of material, temperature, excitation of nuclei, speed of light, centrifugal force of planetary movements, and rate of expansion are all fine tuned to the exact parameters need for life to exist. This is yet another life support system displaying a highly specified nature. Well, either that or physicists are right about physics and you're not.
Scientific observation H: The universe itself displays a highly specified nature as described by many astronomers and astrophysicists. Again, astrophysicists and astronomers do not use your jargon, because their aim is to convey ideas rather than to obscure them.
D + E + F + G + H = I
"I" being some sort of intelligence that was involved in the formation of the universe and life. ~D + ~E + ~F + ~G + ~H = ~I "~I" being the lack of intelligence that was involved in the formation of creationist apologetics.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Re: Evidence for a designer
Consider what happens if the horizon of the universe were ever as small as a Planck. Because space is quantized, nothing smaller than a Planck is possible to exist. That means that once you make the universe a zero point of energy (below a Planck length) there's no longer any "pixels" of space so to speak. Which would be why physicists don't think that there was an actual singularity, and suppose GR to be merely a very good approximation that breaks down at small scales.
Then there is something else to consider before taking refuge in the Casimir. A well established scientific law within the 1st Law of Thermodynamics (perhaps your familiar with it) the "Conservation of Energy Law" which states that energy in a closed system must be preserved. That means within a closed system no new energy or material can be added and none can be eliminated. It can be converted within that system but that is all. To atheist the universe is a closed system, so even the notion of new quantum "virtual" particles is a scientific impossibility. Instead of telling falsehoods to "atheists" (which Percy is not, IIRC) about what they think, you could always ask them. Of course, then you'd run the risk of coming into contact with accurate information.
I can actually quote several microbiologists who do use this term, including Crick and Watson (credited for discovering the structure of DNA). That would be Crick and Watson whom you actually quoted as saying something else, and who think that creationism is a load of crap?
I know the old "Granny" rebuttal when I see it. The notion that certain conditions had to be just right in order for Granny to meet Gramps and have Mom who then met Dad and had me. The idea is that Granny could have just as easily had children with any number of men and it just would not have resulted in my eventual birth, but rather someone elses. But this argument takes for granted that there are any number of possibilities that exist. In order to validate this argument Percy it becomes necessary to present at least one life form that exists which could not have come from these particular Earth parameters. Or to point out that there is a wide range of "parameters" on Earth which are hospitable to life.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Re: Evidence for a designer
Hey Doc, I have already responded a couple of times to your broad painting accusations that all the (insert professional title here) disagree with me. Perhaps you could respond with some sort of refutation, like finding a scientist who does use your jargon. Otherwise I stand by my claim that they don't.
Also I have nothing really to say to someone who just replies basically with, "Na uh!" Then perhaps you could respond to my posts instead.
I wish you nothing but good health, long life, and to be prosperous my friend. Well that's nice of you, but unfortunately your wishes don't seem to affect reality. You could contribute to my prosperity by sending me actual money ... no?
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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There are no new observed novel designs. Even if information was gained, they have yet to show an improvement to a fruit-fly. We see adaptations, but the same essential organisms. Look at HIV, and all bacteria, look at the speed they reproduce, it is not unreasonable to expect at least one of these organisms to have produce a new novel design that could be observed/counted as a mcro-evolution, or even a partial macro-evolution, given that 100 human years is.............how man bacteria years? Well, they have. Indeed, every adaptation is "a partial macro-evolution" if you wish that phrase to have any meaning whatsoever.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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DP. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 306 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: 07-20-2006
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Is? Lol. So this is the equivalent change of the general claim of evolution? You are saying a bacteria basically becoming a bacteria is the same logically, as the difference between a tree and a frog? What I am saying is that the difference between a small amount of change and a large amount of change is a quantitative difference. An analogy: we watch a snail for a quarter of an hour. You say that after watching such a rapidly-moving animal for such a long time, we should have seen it move a mile, "or at least a partial mile". I reply that we have seen it move a partial mile --- we have seen it move a yard, which is part of a mile.
This is why we need to see that small changes actually lead anywhere, ever ... "Lead anywhere"? Be more precise.
because a human becoming ahuman, a bacteria becoming a bacteria, logically, this is very, very weak "evidence". Which is why if you ask for evidence for "macroevolution", we usually refer you to molecular phylogeny, homology, embryology, the fossil record, etc; and this evidence is so compelling that creationists are forced to pretend that we refer them to microevolution instead.
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