Silly Design Institute: Let's discuss BOTH sides of the Design Controversy...

Good question. However, my approach (to give credit where credit is due: Mike Gene developed this approach) is that once we have established that a given system displays properties of rational design, then this is one factor out of several that increases the confidence in our hunch that teleology was involved in the origin of this system. Simply because a biotic system displays properties of rational design doesn't mean it was designed. But if you couple this with other factors, then it's a clue in favor of the telic hypothesis.

Spiffy.

Now all you have to do is tell us what those criteria are.

Well, actually, I did. But let me elaborate on this. The efficiency of the energy conversion of the flagellum is very close to 100% - and, of course, efficiency is a hallmark of rational design. Further, structurally speaking, it is rationally designed. The flagellum-specific ATP synthase fits neatly into the FliF pore - it could easily have been otherwise; e.g., it could have been that one or more F1 subunits partially clogged up the FliF pore. But this is not the case. I could go on about how the structure of the flagellum displays properties of rational design, but the above should suffice.

Not hardly.

For starters, show your math to support your conclusion that the energy conversion is "very close to 100%." Second, lose the weasel words.

Further, structurally speaking, it is rationally designed.

This isn't evidence. This is a conclusion.

The flagellum-specific ATP synthase fits neatly into the FliF pore - it could easily have been otherwise; e.g., it could have been that one or more F1 subunits partially clogged up the FliF pore. But this is not the case.

And how is this inconsistent with or different from what we see in nature? A living creature has functioning parts. This is exactly what we would expect to see in nature. Most of the parts of most living organisms function. The ones that don't tend to get selected against.

So far, no evidence.

Well, I'm not part of the ID movement

Ahh. So you distance yourself from the official movement. Does that mean you've written your own papers, documented your own findings? So far all you've done is give us your say so and not provided one iota of work.

In response to your assumption that ID and common descent are incompatible, I described the ID hypothesis of front-loading

You don't have a hypothesis unless you can show some peer reviews. Until then all you have is an idea that sounds an awful lot like the already established panspermia just wrapped up in ID clothes.

It is an extension of Crick and Orgel's directed panspermia hypothesis.

In what way? In that you are asserting a designer? or in that you are calling it something else entirely and wrapping it up in ID clothes to make it palatable to the ID crowd?

An idea need not be peer-reviewed in the scientific literature in order to have merit as an idea that deserves discussion.

If your name was Feynman or Dawkins, I'd buy it. However, you're some yahoo on a message board blathering on about ID so forgive me if I need more than your sayso.

my query as to who are arguing that the genetic code is predisposed to disease

1: retroviruses.
2: Sickle cell

Well, here is where this guy got all his shit from: The Design Matrix!!!

I believe the literary technique given Paul and written in all his epistles for the revelation of the mystery of Christ is in regards to the days of Creation in the first oracles of Genesis 1 and the days of Creation from the sixth chapter of Revelation.

That Apolgetics and the Internet lab work sure is a beast isn't it? How many more posts and responses do you need? Will my response help?

Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

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Now all you have to do is tell us what those criteria are.

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Discontinuity, analogy, rationality, and foresight.

Discontinuity, analogy, rationality, and foresight.

Ooookay.

Now, define what each of those terms mean and give objective criteria for distinguishing between when each of those features is found naturally as opposed to as a result of design.

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Not hardly. For starters, show your math to support your conclusion that the energy conversion is "very close to 100%." Second, lose the weasel words.

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See "The turn of the screw: the bacterial flagellar motor," DeRosier (see Table 1).

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And how is this inconsistent with or different from what we see in nature? A living creature has functioning parts. This is exactly what we would expect to see in nature. Most of the parts of most living organisms function. The ones that don't tend to get selected against.

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My statement was not merely that the flagellum has functioning parts, but rather that the arrangement of the parts is optimal for flagellar function. If the ATP synthase had F1 subunits that clogged up the FliF pore, this would be evidence that the flagellum does not have properties of rational design. But it does: the ATP synthase fits neatly into the FliF pore - which adds to the efficiency of the flagellum, and again, efficiency is a hall mark of rational design. From a structural point of view, there is nothing about the flagellum that is sub-optimal. It displays properties of rational design.

See "The turn of the screw: the bacterial flagellar motor," DeRosier (see Table 1).

At this forum, you are expected to present your evidence here, not send us off into the wilderness looking for it.

My statement was not merely that the flagellum has functioning parts, but rather that the arrangement of the parts is optimal for flagellar function

Optimal by what standards? How is this measured? What other possible arrangements have you examined to see if they are better or worse?

If the ATP synthase had F1 subunits that clogged up the FliF pore, this would be evidence that the flagellum does not have properties of rational design. But it does: the ATP synthase fits neatly into the FliF pore - which adds to the efficiency of the flagellum, and again, efficiency is a hall mark of rational design.

Ah, more weasel words. How do we distinguish parts that "fit neatly" from parts that simply "fit adequately."

From a structural point of view, there is nothing about the flagellum that is sub-optimal. It displays properties of rational design.

Again, this isn't evidence. This is you saying so. You've neglected to explain to us how you tell the difference between rational design and something found in nature that appears to be rationally designed that we know isn't. I'm not looking for one or two specific examples with ad hoc rationalizations. I'm talking about a set of criteria that we can use for any given organism to determine whether and to what extent it is designed.

{Added by Edit}

I had a couple of minutes to kill before bed, so I googled that DeRosier paper. Table 1 included this entry:

Efficiency: unknown but could be (circa)100% vs. (circa)50%

Hmmmmmmm......

I'm no molecular biologist or anything, and I might well be misreading this, but to my untrained eye, it seems to say that Efficiency is unknown.

Unknown isn't particularly compelling as evidence goes.

Edited by subbie, : As noted

My statement was not merely that the flagellum has functioning parts, but rather that the arrangement of the parts is optimal for flagellar function. If the ATP synthase had F1 subunits that clogged up the FliF pore, this would be evidence that the flagellum does not have properties of rational design. But it does: the ATP synthase fits neatly into the FliF pore - which adds to the efficiency of the flagellum, and again, efficiency is a hall mark of rational design. From a structural point of view, there is nothing about the flagellum that is sub-optimal. It displays properties of rational design.

So because the flagellum is the way it is, and not some way that wouldn't work, it's "rationally designed"? Like saying homosapiens are "rationally designed" to walk bipedally because if we only had one leg, we wouldn't be bipedal and therefor couldn't walk?

It's funny to see how many different ways you guys can say "irreducible complexity" without ever substantially defining the criteria for it, hoping that using a different word for it will suffice.

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Optimal by what standards? How is this measured? What other possible arrangements have you examined to see if they are better or worse?

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Optimal by engineering standards. Efficiency is one hallmark of rational design, as is flexibility. Of all the possible ways to build a biological machine that functions as a motility organelle, the vast majority wouldn't be optimal - they'd be hodge-podge. The ATP synthase could have F1 subunits, clogging up the pore. Or the stoichiometry of the various components could be significantly different, resulting in a totally inefficient flagellar motor. Or the junction proteins could bind very loosely such that FliC monomers often escape from the hook complex.

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Ah, more weasel words. How do we distinguish parts that "fit neatly" from parts that simply "fit adequately."

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What precisely do you mean by "fit adequately"?

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Again, this isn't evidence. This is you saying so. You've neglected to explain to us how you tell the difference between rational design and something found in nature that appears to be rationally designed that we know isn't.

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That's not the point of our current discussion, I'm afraid. I'm providing evidence that the flagellum displays properties of rational design; I am not attempting to provide evidence that the flagellum is indeed designed.

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I'm no molecular biologist or anything, and I might well be misreading this, but to my untrained eye, it seems to say that Efficiency is unknown.

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See: "Low Flagellar Motor Torque and High Swimming Efficiency of Caulobacter crescentus Swarmer Cells":

"The energy conversion efficiency of E. coli is also very high, at 80% or more."

Admittedly, the flagella of different bacteria species have varying levels of energy conversion efficiency. Nonetheless, the E. coli flagellum is highly efficient, which is a hallmark of rational design.

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You don't have a hypothesis unless you can show some peer reviews. Until then all you have is an idea that sounds an awful lot like the already established panspermia just wrapped up in ID clothes.

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No scholar of the philosophy of science has stated that an idea must be peer-reviewed in order to fit the definition of a scientific hypothesis. It seems to me that that's an idea you made up. Can you cite a single scholarly source that states an idea must be peer-reviewed in order to be a scientific hypothesis? I'll be waiting for that citation.

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In what way? In that you are asserting a designer? or in that you are calling it something else entirely and wrapping it up in ID clothes to make it palatable to the ID crowd?

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Crick and Orgel asserted an unknown intelligence in their directed panspermia hypothesis. They posited that some intelligent civilization purposefully seeded the earth with life forms. The front-loading hypothesis goes a step further and states that these life forms contained the necessary genomic information to shape future evolution.

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1: retroviruses.

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That retroviruses cause disease is not evidence that the genetic code is predisposed to pathological conditions. It is evidence that viruses cause disease - but it is not, in any way, evidence that the genetic code is somehow sub-optimal or predisposed to disease.

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2: Sickle cell

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Again, this is not evidence that the genetic code is predisposed to disease or that it is sub-optimal. It is evidence that mutations can cause diseases. There is no way to get around the problem of mutation causing diseases. No matter how you designed the genetic code, some mutations would still cause diseases because some proteins function in a context where any significant deviation from their sequence identity would result in a loss of their tertiary structure. This, of course, would cause disease if the protein plays a crucial role in tissues. The take-home message here: genetic diseases would exist even with the most optimal genetic codes.

This seems to me to be arguing that because Australia fits so neatly into it's coastline the shape was intelligently designed. (Apologies to whoever on here used that before, I would give you credit, but I can't find the post.)

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This seems to me to be arguing that because Australia fits so neatly into it's coastline the shape was intelligently designed.

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Not at all. The analogy is hardly relevant in the first place because Australia's shape has no function. That's an aside however. The arrangement of flagellar proteins produces an optimal system that displays properties of rational design: efficiency, for example. This answers hooah's question as to how the flagellum displays properties of rational design.

The analogy is hardly relevant in the first place because Australia's shape has no function

Tell that to the surfers who'd have a much longer walk to the beach The analogy is that the function of the Australian coastline is to fit Australia into the Australia shaped location it's in now. Yes that is absurd, but it gives a flavour ofwhat you're arguing.

Edited by Trixie, : Formatting