Genetic Programming as evidence against ID

Until you get a nibble you can live vicariously by starting at Message 142 of the Give your one best shot - against evolution thread. In it I provide and describe a very simple C++ model of evolution just to falsify the notion that information theory renders evolution impossible.--Percy

What does this have to do with genetic programming?--Percy

It is beside the point that an intelligence designed the computer and the program. GP merely models the way evolution works.Creating a computer model takes intelligence, but that doesn't mean that the thing being modelled was designed. We create computer models of many things, like the weather and planetary orbits, and these things were not designed, either.In other words, you're confusing the intelligence necessary to create the model with the thing itself.--Percy

Hi Sonnikke,Sorry, but you are the one who is confused. I was right on the money.And now it's your turn. And, of course, this will get us nowhere.Which is why rule 4 of the Forum Guidelines says Assertions should be supported with either explanations and/or evidence for why the assertion is true. Bare assertions are strongly discouraged. You only addressed my conclusion, not the argumentation that preceded it. Why don't you try again?--Percy

Hi Sonnikke,Others have already replied to most of your message, so I'll just address what's left. Well, I wasn't aware I was saying anything controversial. Your position is unlike that of other IDers. Creationist supporters of ID argue that it is the complexity of the microbiological processes comprising life that require an intelligent designer. You're the first IDer I've encountered to argue that orbital mechanics and the weather also require an intelligent designer. Are you sure you're not confusing YEC and ID positions? Just like Paul, you're confusing creation of the model with the object or system being modelled. Sure, it takes intelligence to create a model and then write a program based on that model. But that has no bearing on whether that being modelled was designed. If I create a traffic analysis program then I'm modelling cars and highways, and these were definitely designed by intelligence (I guess that's arguable in Boston). But I can also create a snowflake modelling program, and snowflakes are not designed. You see, I can create models of things that are designed, and I can create models of things that are not designed. So the fact that I create a model of something is not in any way an indicator of whether that being modelled was designed.--Percy

Yeah, I can see I'm not going to win any awards for clarity with that one. Oversimplification goes awry once more. Let me try again.We can create a model of the snowflake creation process and realize that model in a computer program. Then we can run the program to generate snowflakes (probably really just computer drawings of snowflakes). The program isn't *designing* snowflakes, but is simply a model of physical processes such as the crystalization of water under certain atmospheric conditions. If the model is fairly accurate then the snowflakes generated will be indistinguishable from actual snowflakes. But the snowflakes aren't designed, they are only the logical outcome of physical processes as modelled in the computer program.Or we can create a computer model of a river. It can include all the relevant factors, such as original configuration of the river in three dimensions, composition of the ground at all points along and beneath the river, and so forth. When the computer model is run it will show how the river changes over time, becoming wider, narrower, deeper, shallower, and moving around on the terrain. When we're done running the model the river will have a new configuration, but that new configuration was not designed. The changed river is merely the logical outcome of the action of physical processes realized in the computer model.--Percy