The Origin of Novelty

Hi, Mindspawn. Obviously, we're not thinking on the same wavelengths here. Let me see if I can figure out why we're not seeing eye-to-eye on this.The way I understand it, the Designer designed a functioning biosphere by creating a whole bunch of organisms. The Designer had to make sure the biosphere was properly balanced, in order to maintain its stability over the long term. So, the Designer had to purpose-build organisms to fit all the different ecological niches.So, when I think of Intelligent Design, I imagine the Designer sitting down in a garage with an unlimited assortment of parts, and saying, "Now I need a baramin of apex predators. What traits would an apex predator need?"Then I see that, in one case, the Designer apparently needed to create a baramin of cursorial, terrestrial herbivores. So, the Designer took a bird's heart, a bird's brain, a bird's backbone, a bird's ear bones, a bird's legs, a bird's feathers, a bird's wings, a bird's beak, a bird's eggs, and a bird's lungs, and made an ostrich.In another case, the Designer apparently needed to create a baramin of nocturnal, flying insectivores. So, He took a mammal's heart, a mammal's brain, a mammal's backbone, a mammal's ear bones, a mammal's legs, a mammal's hair, a mammal's arms, a mammal's teeth, a mammal's placenta, and a mammal's lungs, and made a bat.This baffles me. I don't understand why the Designer would do this. If all those bird characteristics are specially-designed for flight performance, why didn't the Designer use any of them when purpose-building a flying baramin? And why did the Designer use all of them when purpose-building a non-flying baramin?To me, it's like the Designer needed to build a car, so He used an airplane's wings, ailerons, retractable landing gear, pressurized cabin, rudder, propeller, yoke and flight instruments to build it, even though He already had all the necessary car parts right there in His garage.From a design perspective, it's an extremely odd methodology. It confuses me that such a strange pattern would be so prevalent, when it makes so very little sense.Edited by Blue Jay, : Grammar edit

Hi, Mindspawn. You started out arguing that birds and bats were functionally distinct, designed to fill specific, different niches. But, now, you're arguing that they are functionally redundant, as a failsafe plan.These explanations make opposite predictions. Yet, you have said that both would be evidence of extreme cleverness on the part of the Designer. You've constructed your theory such that it cannot be falsified, even if it's actually wrong.You may not believe it, but I actually am fully willing to accept Intelligent Design. I'm under significant pressure from my family to do so, and it would make my life a hell of a lot easier if I could just give in and accept it.But, I can't accept an idea that's based entirely around an unfalsifiable framework of ad hoc rationalizations; so, I need to see that Intelligent Design is actually capable of making successful predictions, and I need to see evidence that its proponents are willing to reject it when its predictions are unsuccessful.----- I don't see the connection between needing a failsafe and needing to make a flying mammal. If oxygen in the atmosphere is the concern, then why not just make two bird baramins with different types of respiratory systems? All those other mammalian characteristics are just baggage.

Hi, Mindspawn. As a point of order, my reasoning in this thread has mostly been inductive: that is, I use specific examples of engineering to infer a general process of design. There's a very important difference between "is not contradicted by reality" and "cannot be contradicted by reality."Are you aware of the concept of falsifiability? Basically, falsifiability means that, if an idea is wrong, it can be shown to be wrong. Being falsifiable is a good thing, because you know that, when you test it, it's possible to get a positive or negative result. That means, when you get a positive, you can be confident that it's a genuine positive.Your idea, on the other hand, is not falsifiable. So, you're effectively flipping a double-headed coin, and patting yourself on the back when you make it land on heads. This is a wonderful construct for protecting your cherished beliefs from criticism, but surely you can see that it's an inappropriate and dishonest way to determine whether an idea is accurate.Science works by constantly replacing our current ideas with newer, updated ideas. But, you can only replace an old idea if you can show that it isn't good enough to explain the evidence anymore. Since your coin can only land on heads, we don't ever know whether or not your coin-flipping technique actually works. You need a coin that could potentially land on tails: that way, landing on heads would actually mean something.For evolution, the coin actually has heads and tails. In the bats and birds example, the hypothesis based on evolution is that birds and bats evolved flight independently. This hypothesis predicts that bats' flight apparatus is derived from mammalian features, and that birds' flight apparatus is derived from avian/dinosaurian features. If some bats had flow-through lungs or feathers, or some birds had wing membranes or a diaphragm (i.e., if the coin landed on tails), I would be forced to reject my evolution hypothesis. Therefore, when the coin does not land on tails, I know that it's not just because I flipped a rigged coin: it's because the coin legitimately landed on the side I predicted it would land on.Can you do this with intelligent design? Can you show me that the coin you're using actually could conceivably land on tails? If not, then what possible meaning could all the heads you're flipping have?

Hi, Mindspawn. If a feature has an "unknown origin," all it means is that there is no information available about its origin. I can't evaluate hypotheses based on information that I don't have access to, so you're right: a feature of "unknown origin" would have absolutely no effect on which hypothesis I accept.But, "unknown origins" and "inexplicable origins" aren't the same thing. If I were to find organisms with features of inexplicable origin, like a bat with avian lungs or a bird with a mammalian placenta, I would be very willing to entertain the notion that bats are not entirely a product of evolution. I would even freely admit that Intelligent Design is a possible explanation for these things.But, in the absence of this kind of evidence, I have no justification for incorporating Intelligent Design into my worldview. I will happily incorporate Intelligent Design into my worldview if the hypothesis can ever be shown to have any explanatory power. But, every prediction that it might make is not necessarily expected, so I can't test it, and it has no explanatory power.----- I ignored it because I didn't know what to do with it. Mutation rates are a bit far from the topic. I'm also not particularly clear on what predictions our respective hypotheses might make about mutation rates, anyway.Perhaps you could start a new thread about it: I don't think I'm the best candidate to discuss mutation rates, but I am willing to give it a try.

Hi, Mindspawn. Taq didn't argue that there have to be mixes across every grouping: that was your addition. So, this is a strawman. All we want is some examples of mixes.If you want to find evidence in support of a hypothesis, you look in places where that evidence seems most likely to occur. To me, bats seemed like an obvious case in which the Designer might mix parts. So, if I were an Intelligent Design proponent looking to confirm a prediction of my hypothesis, this would be one of the first places I would look. If I failed to observe mixing-and-matching in a case where it seems like mixing-and-matching would be an obvious design choice, I might lose a little faith in my hypothesis.----- Evolution is about diversification, not about advancement. So, "some races are less evolved" is another strawman that you should avoid trying to argue against in the future.

Hi, Mindspawn. This is rather unfair of you. You asked if I would reject evolution if I observed a certain type of evidence that another model explains better than evolution does. I said, "Yes, I would." Your response here appears to be, "No, you wouldn't." Well, the evidence is against you on this one too.Upthread, I made a big deal about how I was unsatisfied with RM/NS as an explanation for certain steps in the evolution of vertebrate and mollusc eyes. I would be most happy to accept an alternative explanation, if one could be found, because it seems a bit too fortuitous to be a random mutation, in my mind. Maybe I just don't understand all the relevant variables yet, but, as it currently sits, I am eager to find some other mechanism that can explain how a "dimple" appeared on top of an eyespot. But, I don't have that, so I fall back on the best hypothesis I have (which I don't like).I would also like to point out that evolutionary biologists have a history of assimilating non-"orthodox" ideas into our worldviews when they prove to be better than our orthodox ideas. For example, some novel features in the diversity of life are better explained by horizontal gene transfer than by random mutations. Nowadays, most evolutionists agree that "random mutation" is a poor explanation for many features, such as carotenoid pigments in spider mites and in aphids.In addition, the biology community has reached consensus on the idea that mitochondria and chloroplasts emerged through endosymbiosis, rather than by random mutation. This is particularly telling, because this idea is usually credited to Lynn Margulis, who is widely regarded as something of a kook and "fringe scientist" with a history of controversial ideas (e.g., the Gaia hypothesis, the idea that HIV doesn't cause AIDS, and the idea that all novelty in evolution is due to symbiosis and "gene sharing").So, the record seems to show that the evolutionary biology community is more than willing to accept and incorporate ideas from outside of our strict RM/NS framework, even if they come from people we regard as nutjobs. But, like everybody else whose ideas evolutionists eventually accepted, it's incumbent on you, the creationist, the demonstrate that we should accept yours.

I actually do know those people: characters, all of them.But, unfortunately, I wasn't involved in that research, and don't know anything about it, except that they were doing it.Sorry.

Hi, Mindspawn. I mentioned blue egg shells in chickens upthread. This trait is caused by a single allele, which differs from wild-type alleles at two base-pairs.The blue-shell phenotype has only ever been found in one population of chickens, bred in Chile. All chickens that lay blue eggs are descended from that population of chickens.Blue egg shells have never been observed in other populations of chickens, or in the wild ancestor of chickens. Given that the blue color is a dominant phenotype, it is highly unlikely that this allele has been hiding out, unobserved, in populations of European, African and Asian chickens for thousands of years.I feel that the best explanation for this novel phenotype is two point mutations (only one of them may be relevant, but I don't know that). What logical alternative explanation is there that fits all the evidence I mentioned above?Edited by Blue Jay, : blue eyes have, in fact, been observed in some populations of organisms.