Summations Only

When and if that ever occurs, two things will happen:
(1) science will be able to measure the amount of such information, and
(2) those measurements will show that information increases or decreases or stays the same during different instances of evolution.And then the Creationists will be out of another argument they think refutes evolution.See Irreducible Complexity, Information Loss and Barry Hall's experiments for additional information ...

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2. Information Loss

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Another argument common to creationism and IDology is that mutations only result in the loss of "information", and that without a mechanism to gain "information" new systems, functions or features cannot evolve.

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Let's review the logic of this argument:

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• (P1) mutations cannot cause an increase in "information."
• (P2) an increase in "information" is necessary for new mechanisms or functions to evolve.
• (C1) Therefore new mechanisms or functions cannot evolve.

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Leaving aside the fact that "information" is not defined in any way to measure whether or not there is an increase or a decrease in any evolved changes in species over time, we can still show that the concept is falsified if we can show that ONE such mechanism or function has evolved that would require such an increase. In other words, if we can show that either (P1) or (P2) must be invalid then we have shown that the conclusion is invalid.

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Now let's look at Barry Hall's experiments again in light of this concept:

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An existing "irreducibly complex" system is intentionally disrupted and ceases to function.

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According to the equation of new information with the evolution of new functions or mechanisms by precept (2), the intentional loss of a function or mechanism must then also involve the loss of AT LEAST SOME information for that function or mechanism:

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In 1982, Barry Hall of the University of Rochester began a series of experiments in which he deleted the bacterial gene for the enzyme beta-galactosidase. The loss of this gene makes it impossible for the bacteria to metabolize the sugar lactose.

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Thus the deletion of the beta-galactosidase gene MUST have involved the loss of AT LEAST SOME information for the function or mechanism of that gene.

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Next what we see is that a DIFFERENT "IC" system evolves to replace the original -- the original "IC" system is not repaired or recovered, but a new and different "IC" system evolved.

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Ergo new "information" MUST have evolved that was not in the original organism, the "information" for that organism MUST have been increased. Again, this is the principle of falsification used by science - it invalidates either precept (P1) or precept (P2), and therefore invalidates ALL conclusions based on their combination.

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We started with a system with some quantity of "information" that -- according to precept (2) -- must have been lost to render it dysfunctional, and then a replacement system evolved.

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Either "information" was added (invalidates precept (P1)) OR added "information" was not necessary for the evolution of a feature, function or system (invalidates precept (P2)).

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Thus either precept (P1) OR precept (P2) is invalidated, falsified, refuted and ALL conclusions based on their combination are invalidate. Q.E.D.

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Enjoy

Perhaps. Let's accept that to be true. So what if that did happen. The creationist claim is that information cannot be increased. There are already logical arguments that the claim is total BS anyway. I will present one.If a mutation for state A to state B decreases information, then by definition a mutation from state B to state A increases information. I have yet to see a creationist explain why one of those two should be impossible. The idea that increases in information are impossible is just assertion based on a gross misunderstanding of the 2nd law of thermodynamics.You have a long way to go to make your argument work.

Creationists just can't seem to grasp the simple concept that they need positive evidence that God did create something. This isn't about us trying to disprove creationism. This is about creationists needing to put forth evidence for their position. This is called the "burden of proof". If ID/creationism can not explain the facts, then ID/creationism is not accepted. Since ID/creationism can not explain the twin nested hierarchies, then ID/creationism is not accepted. Evolution DOES explain the twin nested hierarchy which is why scientists accept evolution over ID/creationism.

This is what we call psychological projection. Notice how you have to attack the messenger instead of dealing with the message.

You have yet to show that evolution requires an increase in genetic information.For example, compare the human and chimp genomes. Can you show us how those genomes differ in information content? Probably not, right?

They have already done that. At the same time, they have also shown that information can evolve.

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Evolution of biological information

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Thomas D. Schneider

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Nucleic Acids Res (2000) 28 (14): 2794-2799.

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How do genetic systems gain information by evolutionary processes? Answering this question precisely requires a robust, quantitative measure of information. Fortunately, 50 years ago Claude Shannon defined information as a decrease in the uncertainty of a receiver. For molecular systems, uncertainty is closely related to entropy and hence has clear connections to the Second Law of Thermodynamics. These aspects of information theory have allowed the development of a straightforward and practical method of measuring information in genetic control systems. Here this method is used to observe information gain in the binding sites for an artificial ‘protein’ in a computer simulation of evolution. The simulation begins with zero information and, as in naturally occurring genetic systems, the information measured in the fully evolved binding sites is close to that needed to locate the sites in the genome. The transition is rapid, demonstrating that information gain can occur by punctuated equilibrium.
Evolution of biological information | Nucleic Acids Research | Oxford Academic

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I didn't say it is an atheist site.
Evolution is an atheist invention, so any non-religious site dedicated to evolution is likely to be dominated by atheists ... just as evolutionary biology is dominated by atheists.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.

No, it's no strange at all for Catholics to differ on points of science. And what Church leaders think about any point of science is irrelevant to the faith. If a Pope supports evolution, other Catholics are not obliged to share his opinion. And a Catholic can believe that the Sun revolves around the earth, for example, if he wants to. Getting science wrong is not considered a sin. The bottom line is, a Catholic can believe anything as long as it doesn't compromise the doctrines, teachings and dogmas of the Church.The Bible is not a book of science and the Catholic Church is not a science club. I can't think of any science that a Catholic is obliged to believe. In fact, the dogmas that a Catholic must believe are decidedly un-scientific ... the Resurrection, Transubstantiation, the Virgin Birth, the Trinity, etc, etc.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.

Huh? I'm saying anyone who accepts evolution is wrong - theists included. BioLogos and Talk Origins are both wrong.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.Edited by Dredge, : No reason given.

In Message 483: You replied to him in Message 487: So not only are you calling that site "atheist", but "Satanic" to boot!Why is it so impossible to expect even the slightest bit of honesty from creationists? And just where did you get that "Evolution is an atheist invention" from? Show us your reasoning behind that false statement.Of course, I know that it comes straight from "creation science's" "Two Model Approach" (TMA) and its "evolution model", which is a gross misrepresentation of evolution and far, far worse.The TMA falsely splits origins into "two and only two mutually exclusive models: the creation model and the evolution model". There's the "creation model" and everything that's not part of that gets dumped into their "atheist evolution model". While creationists will only speak of their "creation model" in the vaguest of terms to the public, their private presentations identify as being nothing more than strict young-earth creationism. Therefore, most of what got dumped into the "atheist" "evolution model" turns out to be the vast majority of theist creation accounts; as Dr. Henry Morris himself told me, the "evolution model" contains "most of the world's religions, ancient and modern." And many of those religions in the "atheistic" "evolution model" are either Judaic, Christian, or Islamic.So apparently you think that most Jews, Christians, and Muslims are not only atheists, but also Satanists.Evolution is part of science, just as much as Universal Gravitation. Is gravity also an atheist invention? Do you believe that science is atheistic or even Satanic?Also, talkorigins is not dedicated to evolution, but rather to examination and discussion of creationist claims. Since so many creationist claims (such as yours) are based on misunderstanding and/or misrepresenting evolution and other sciences, then of course some of the articles would need to explain what evolution actually is and what the evidence actually is.Have you ever read their feedbacks? People writing to them with questions or damning them to eternal hell. Read through some of those. A number of those responses were written by Christians.But you still need to support your assertion that "evolution is an atheist invention."A side question would be why you seem to hate atheists so much. More groundless prejudice?

Yes, that is true. They are things that are part of the supernatural and the supernatural is outside of the realm of science, hence they are decided un-scientific.So what's your point?Science can only deal with the natural universe, which we can observe and measure and against which we can test hypotheses and build theories to explain how it works. We cannot observe the supernatural, nor can we measure it, nor can we test against it any hypotheses we might conjure up to try to explain it. We cannot even determine whether it even exists! Clearly, the supernatural is out of the reach of science and any attempt to use supernaturalistic hypotheses in science would be completely useless.Now, to express this simply, there are different kinds of questions which we can identify roughly with interrogatives. There are the "how" questions, questions of how the natural universe works. Science is extremely good at answering that kind of question, whereas religion has been very poor at it. But then there are the more interesting questions of "why" or even "who" which science is extremely poor at, but which philosophy and theology are much better suited for.The problems for philosophy and theology is the difficulty in testing their conclusion. Science is so good at answering the "how do things work" questions because you have something you can test ideas against. Not so for philosophy and theology (especially theology). They both use logic, most often rigorous and intricate logic, but they both must start with some axioms, "facts" what they take to be givens (such as that particular theology's particular set of religious dogma). Axioms are never proven, but rather assumed to be true. The problem with logic is that it can only test the validity of the logical argument. If an argument is valid and you feed it true premises (the axioms), then the conclusion is true. But if you feed it false premises, then you have no idea whether the conclusion is true or not (most likely not).Of course, any logical construct in science suffers from the same problem, but the difference is that science can test its conclusion whereas philosophy and theology cannot. I've tried to use ship's navigation pre-GPS as an analogy. You start from a known location. You use dead reckoning to predict where you should now be by taking your speed and heading and time elapsed and predicting what your current position should be. Keep in mind that the ship's superstructure acts as a sail to the wind and ocean currents are also working on the hull. So periodically you get a fix: you step outside, observe the sun and stars and planets (depending on time of day) and calculate your actual position from direct observation. Then the next leg of dead reckoning proceeds from that fix.The difference between science and philosophy/theology is that while science can get an actual fix, philosophy/theology cannot, so the latter can just keep wandering farther and farther off course.I have a quote from Carl Sagan that also describes this situation:

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The Physicist and the Metaphysicist

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In the 1920s, there was a dinner at which the physicist Robert W. Wood was asked to respond to a toast. This was a time when people stood up, made a toast, and then selected someone to respond. Nobody knew what toast they'd be asked to reply to, so it was a challenge for the quick-witted. In this case the toast was: "To physics and metaphysics." Now by metaphysics was meant something like philosophy -- truths that you could get to just by thinking about them. Wood took a second, glanced about him, and answered along these lines: The physicist has an idea, he said. The more he thinks it through, the more sense it makes to him. He goes to the scientific literature, and the more he reads, the more promising the idea seems. Thus prepared, he devises an experiment to test the idea. The experiment is painstaking. Many possibilities are eliminated or taken into account; the accuracy of the measurement is refined. At the end of all this work, the experiment is completed and ... the idea is shown to be worthless. The physicist then discards the idea, frees his mind (as I was saying a moment ago) from the clutter of error, and moves on to something else.

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The difference between physics and metaphysics, Wood concluded, is that the metaphysicist has no laboratory.

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(reportedly from an essay by Carl Sagan, http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/saganws.htm)

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Now, we have a movement, Intelligent Design (courtesy of the Discovery Institute), whose stated goal is to change science so that it must include supernaturalistic explanations. Science could not possibly exist under those conditions, as should be plain to you by now."goddidit" cannot not possibly answer any scientific question, any "how does this work" question.

So you believe all that nonsense but reject science? What kind of lunacy is that?Transubstantiation - the belief that bread and wine are changed into flesh and blood; not figuratively but quite literally, by a chap in a funny hat lifting it above his head.Really?

That sure sounds like an admission that you reject evolution because of your religious beliefs and not because of any scientific reasons.

How can you say they are wrong when you don't even understand the most basic science that undergirds the theory of evolution?

Then why mention atheists at all? Why not just argue against evolution from a scientific point of view?Practically every Christian who knows anything about evolution accepts it. Why don't you try to figure out why YOU'RE wrong?