Evidence of design .... ?

Message 1 of 52 (30683) 01-30-2003 8:15 AM

Peter Borger seems to be hooked on:

1) Genetic redundancies.

These are genes which, if knocked out, do not affect the
viability of the organism (i.e. it is not fatal to not have
them).

His claim seems to be something like, that if there is no difference
in rate of change in such genes compared to necessary genes
then NS selection cannot be happening and so design must be the
solution.

I would suggest that::
i) Genes which can be modified or de-activated without killing
the organism would be necessary for evolution to work.
ii) Selection, and so rates of change is not about the gene
and whether it makes an organism viable, but about its fitness
to the environment in which it finds itself.
iii) If other genes on the same chromosome are selected for
that will have an impact on change rates for all genes in that
chromosome.
My conclusion::
Genetic redundancies do not provide sufficient or necessary evidence
of design.

2) Non-random mutations

PB suggests that mutations are not random, and so there is only
the illusion of common descent within the different genomes
studied by bioogists.

I say that the non-randomness that PB relates is not non-random
in the sense of the when and why a mutation becomes fixed in
a population, but might indicate the presence of a repair
mechanism at work which could mitigate the negative effects of
mutations should they occur.

In any case if the end result 'looks like common descent', then
common descent is an equally likely explanation as any other,
and so PB has effectively restated the argument that::

common design is indistinguishable from common descent.

My concusion::
It is not sufficient evidence of design.

Are there other design evidences that anyone would care to put
forward?

Complexity doesn't count, because it has no relation to design.
A hammer is designed, but hardly complex.

IC has also been put forward -- there are other threads on that,
but it basically comes down to an inability to believe that
certain biological features could have developed over time.

I guess what I am after is a reference list of design evidences
so that we can start a more focussed discussion on the subject.

Message 2 of 52 (30686) 01-30-2003 8:54 AM

Reply to: Message 1 by Peter 01-30-2003 8:15 AM

Rebuttle:
"Behe's colossal mistake is that, in rejecting these possibilities, he concludes that no Darwinian solution remains. But one does. It is this: An irreducibly complex system can be built gradually by adding parts that, while initially just advantageous, become-because of later changes-essential. The logic is very simple. Some part (A) initially does some job (and not very well, perhaps). Another part (B) later gets added because it helps A. This new part isn't essential, it merely improves things. But later on, A (or something else) may change in such a way that B now becomes indispensable. This process continues as further parts get folded into the system. And at the end of the day, many parts may all be required." - H. Allen Orr

Message 6 of 52 (43965) 06-24-2003 3:51 PM

Reply to: Message 1 by Peter 01-30-2003 8:15 AM

If you would find a dna-kit lying around among the fossils then that would certainly also constitute circumstantial evidence of design.

regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

Message 7 of 52 (43967) 06-24-2003 3:58 PM

Reply to: Message 6 by Syamsu 06-24-2003 3:51 PM

Oh? Why is that? Because light exists? For the same reason, we can be sure that a mass-sensitive organ will eventually exist, able to detect objects by the gravity the generate. Or even senses that we can't conceive? Like, oh, say "Smision"?

I don't see that eyes are any more certain than any other conceivable organ.

Message 10 of 52 (43977) 06-24-2003 5:17 PM

Reply to: Message 8 by NosyNed 06-24-2003 4:38 PM

I was referring to a more remote kind of sense - where I could walk into a room and know the masses of everything in it, the same way I percieve the colors of the objects.

The inner-ear doesn't have the same kind of noise-reduction our other senses exhibit, so it's not really a useful sense for determining spacial relationships and stuff. All it detects is the Earth.

Message 11 of 52 (43978) 06-24-2003 5:31 PM

Reply to: Message 9 by Wounded King 06-24-2003 5:11 PM

------------------
"Do not proffer sympathy to the mentally ill. It is a bottomless pit."
-William S. Burroughs

Message 12 of 52 (44113) 06-25-2003 8:17 AM

Reply to: Message 6 by Syamsu 06-24-2003 3:51 PM

Certain physical properties of the universe exist,
and it is likely that adaptations that take advantage
of them will develop.

It is by no means certain, however ... and certainly does
not suggest that they were designed into the universe.

Message 15 of 52 (44291) 06-26-2003 6:18 AM

quote:

---

It can be reasonably asserted that it was a relative certainty from the start of the universe that there would be organisms with eyes at some future point.

---

rest of post snipped for brevity.

I don't regard this as a serious problem, approaching it as I do from an information science perspective.

Lets take the claim that, at some point, it is reasonable to expect the developement of the eye. I accept this - seeing as we can identify ambient light, it is indeed reasonable to expect that organisms would evolve, sooner or later, to take advantage of this ambient phenomenon. This IMO is uncontroversial.

Why can this argument not be extended to the brain? I believe it can - in fact there is a certain coincidence here becuase both the brain and the eye are SIGNALS PROCESSING devices. Data and information have their own dynamics; for one thing, you can only derive as much benefit from incoming data as you have capacity to process. Any more data has to overflow and be lost.

So I would suggest, Syamsu, that in acknowledging the developement of the eye as arising from physical phenomenon of which the organism can advatange, you have also explained the development of the brain. The brain exists to add value to the signals processed by the eye (and other sensory organs) and thus render them into fiteness-beneficial behaviours and responses.

Intelligence at this level is not useful to everyone, of course. We are at the point that signals processing requires fully one third of our energy budget, if I recall correctly. And that is why we rule the planet and have inflicted the most profound changes on it of any organism since cyanobacteria.