The Limits of Evolution

[WookieeB]

1) Firstly, define "information" used in this context, before we go any further.

2) Bull shit. If we were to assume that the universe was designed specifically to sustain life, then we would be forced to admit that whomever designed it is a twit who had no idea what he was doing. If there's a god or something that matches the description but we're trying to look smart so we call it something with a few big words instead, then it did not design this universe, the one we live in, with the primary purpose of supporting life. .....

3) What does that have to do with design or intelligence? As far as I can figure, it's irrelevant either way, so please explain that.

1) Information - wiki info is sufficient

Shannon information (Shannon information) is a start, though that is only considering the complexity (probability) part of information.

Specified relates to function, meaning.

For DNA this is demonstrated by the specific pattern of nucleotides that code for translation to amino acids that form proteins, and also for controls on how the process is executed.

2) First, your response is a theological argument. What the motivations, intentions, or skill of the designer is irrelevant. But I would point out that any supposed good or bad design, whether of malevolent or benevolent intent, is still design.

Secondly, who said that the universe had to be designed specifically for life, or that was its only purpose? This is a strawman.

MY statement is relating to the apparent fine tuning of universal constants (electromagnetic force, weak and strong nuclear forces) coupled with parameters of our solar system and earths place in it. Tweak many of these settings just a little, and life as we know it becomes impossible.

3) The “Cambrian explosion” refers to the geologically sudden appearance of many new animal body plans about 530 million years ago. At this time, at least half, and perhaps as many as 7/8's phyla of forty total, made their first appearance on earth within a narrow five- to ten-million-year window of geologic time. As a negative argument, such rapid appearance goes against the standard version of Darwin's theory. As a positive argument it applies to appearance of complex and specified information in a biological sense, that only makes sense with a designer.

You can hide the injection of God into this "science" however you want, but the fact of the matter is that any intelligent agent capable of doing these things is a defacto god. Call it whatever you like, but it can do things that make it qualify for the title "god".

Further, you now need to support that such an agent, whether we apply the label "god" or not, actually exists such that it could cause such things.

It is irrelevant who the designer is, whether is it the Christian God, Islam's Allah, Ometecuhtli/Omecihuatl, the flying spaghetti monster, some aliens or Bill Gates. ID doesnt propose to explain that. It does though propose that A designer exists based upon observable evidence. Sure, that designer probably would need to exhibit an impressive level of knowledge, power and skill. But who it specifically is? ID doesn't care. Answering that question is left to other disciplines.

To illustrate - SETI looks for radio signals from space for other intelligent life. If they received a signal that met their criteria, they would not need to know spit about the life form that sent the signal to recognize that the signal was designed and represented at least some amout of intelligence.

Suppose the aliens (the ones sending the signals of course :P) visit Earth in a million years after man has killed himself off in some biological disaster, and they dig up a well preserved iPhone. They wouldnt have to know who Steve Jobs, Tim Cook, or Steve Wozniak were to believe the device was designed.

I can take my 6 year old daughter to Mt Rushmore. She wouldn't be able to recognize the Presidents displayed there, or even have any clue who Gutzon Borglum is. But she could easily recognize that the forms she sees on that mountain were designed, someone had to have made it.

Site one example of a credible ID proponent so that I can.

Nice semantic dodge. I meant "credible" as to proponents of ID. So instead, use any well known or published ID proponent. If you need help finding material, try Michael Behe, Stephen Meyer, William Dembski, Ann Gauger, Douglas Axe to start. By they way, you were still the one with the initial charge of....

Even though it's entire strategy is to attempt to prove evolution false (poorly), and then say "See, it's actually not explained, therefore some sort of mysterious, intelligent agent must have done it!"

I'm just asking for you to provide that example.

 

[WookieeB]

Ken Miller (biologist at Brown University);

Ahhhh! Ken Miller. I had a feeling you might try to pull him out. That is precisely why I stated in my request..."whatever example you show will not be correctly refuting IC as it is properly defined"

And Ken Miller doesn't disappoint. Go back and read the Wiki definition of IC. I'm not a big fan of Wiki explanations, but it will suffice -

"A single system which is composed of several interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, and where the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning." - Behe

"A system performing a given basic function is irreducibly complex if it includes a set of well-matched, mutually interacting, non arbitrarily individuated parts such that each part in the set is indispensable to maintaining the system's basic, and therefore original, function. The set of these indispensable parts is known as the irreducible core of the system." - Dembski

I thought it was interesting that the very last part of the Wiki definitions it states: "This definition ignores the utility of individual components in unrelated systems"

Now Ken Miller. "The argument is that evolution cant produce them, because the individual "parts" have no function of their own. that is what irreducible complexity means."

"If IC is right, then the parts of these machines should be absolutely useless."

Now compare the two sets of definitions. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME. According to Behe (who coined the phrase), IC is saying that if you take away one of the parts, then the 'thing" will not function. You need all the interacting parts as a whole for the "thing" to function. Whether or not one of the individual parts can have a function outside of the 'thing' is irrelevant.

Ken Miller is defining IC as saying that the individual parts must be useless outside of the "thing" they are a part of. His definition is not accurate, it is a straw man.

So now lets look at his individual part - the Type-III Secretory System.

The idea is that the T3SS was co-opted by the flagellum because it is homologous to a subset component of the flagellum, a portion of the substructure in the basal body. There is some empirical basis in the homology between the two systems: but that should not surprise us, because both the TTSS and the “homologue” subset in the flagellum accomplish a similar function: they pump proteins through a membrane.

But that is somewhat like saying that an airplane and a cart are similar because both have wheels. It is true, but an airplane is not a cart. and the flagellum is not a TTSS. And the sub-machine which pumps proteins in the basal body of the flagellum is similar to, but not the same as the TTSS.

A lot of the proteins in the flagellum have no explanation on the basis of homologies to existing bacterial machines, or of partial selectable function. Most importantly, TTSS arguments notwithstanding: the overall function of the flagellum cannot be accomplished by any simpler subset. This has been demonstrated by knockout experiments for the genes coding for the flagellum. That means that the flagellum is irreducibly complex.

The T3SS does not account for how the fundamental function of the flagellum--its propulsion system--evolved. The unresolved challenge that the irreducible complexity of the flagellum continues to pose for Darwinian evolution is summarized by William Dembski:

"At best the T[3]SS represents one possible step in the indirect Darwinian evolution of the bacterial flagellum. But that still wouldn't constitute a solution to the evolution of the bacterial flagellum. What's needed is a complete evolutionary path and not merely a possible oasis along the way. To claim otherwise is like saying we can travel by foot from Los Angeles to Tokyo because we've discovered the Hawaiian Islands. Evolutionary biology needs to do better than that."

Dembski's critique is appropriate because it recognizes that Miller wrongly characterizes IC as focusing on the non-functionality of sub-parts. Behe properly tests irreducible complexity by assessing the plausibility of the entire functional system to assemble in a step-wise fashion, even if sub-parts can have functions outside of the final system. The "leap" required by going from one functional sub-part to the entire functional system is indicative of the degree of irreducible complexity in a system.

Miller misconstrued the proper way of testing irreducible complexity, and his argument amounts to this: if my laptop's power cord could also be used to power my toaster, then my laptop is no longer irreducibly complex. Because a laptop requires a number of parts necessary for function, this is preposterous. So is Dr. Miller's straw method of testing irreducible complexity.

Lastly, some biologists argue that phylogenetic data implies the T3SS could not have been a precursor to the flagellum. The TTSS could easily be explained as a derivation from a subset of the flagellum, retaining the pump function with loss of the higher level functions. And anyway, the TTSS itself is irreducibly complex.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

You can hide the injection of God into this "science" however you want, but the fact of the matter is that any intelligent agent capable of doing these things is a defacto god. Call it whatever you like, but it can do things that make it qualify for the title "god".

This thread has evolved to the point of going over my head(mutated wings?) but I just wanted to say that this is a nasty combination of strawman and equivocation.

I'm fine with debate, but I just hope this thread doesn't( or hasn't) become just another pretext for one's support against/for religion.

Evolution is already a controversial subject that doesn't need the intolerance of either side clouding the objectivity of information and the state of current scientific theory. The same things could be observed in the other evolution thread that was recently necro'd(Agent Intellect seemed to be knowledgeable about the subject but I doubt his links are within my comprehension).

 

[SpaceYeti]

This is quickly turning into one of those wall-of-text debates, which are no longer entertaining. I have no desire to continue, but I will for the sake of understanding. However, I lack the patience to reply to everything said, so I'm going to reply to the bigger points. For the record, my heart is not in this because it's obvious to me that nothing I say will convince you of anything, as you've fully accepted the "but this thing that meets the definition of a god could be any god, even ones we haven't thought of" red herring I think I'll address later.

1)For DNA this is demonstrated by the specific pattern of nucleotides that code for translation to amino acids that form proteins, and also for controls on how the process is executed.

I'll just grant the "information" argument for the shit of it. How is this indicative of an intelligence behind it's design?

2) First, your response is a theological argument. What the motivations, intentions, or skill of the designer is irrelevant. But I would point out that any supposed good or bad design, whether of malevolent or benevolent intent, is still design.

Sure, but something that doesn't actually appear to be designed because it has no apparent purpose... well, that. The universe has no apparent purpose or design. This is all religious rhetoric, which the ID movement is trying to hide from being obvious in order to appear like legitimate science... and has succeeded in fooling you.

Secondly, who said that the universe had to be designed specifically for life, or that was its only purpose? This is a strawman.

A designed thing is designed for a purpose. Because the universe doesn't appear to have a purpose, it doesn't appear to have a design. Life is one of the things theologians and ID proponents like to claim the universe is designed for, but it's patently not designed for that.

MY statement is relating to the apparent fine tuning of universal constants (electromagnetic force, weak and strong nuclear forces) coupled with parameters of our solar system and earths place in it. Tweak many of these settings just a little, and life as we know it becomes impossible.

You mean to say that if we change the parameters which brought something about, the thing brought about through them would be different?! I'm shocked! No, really, you just basically said "If things were different, they'd be different!"

Uh doy. Even if we assume it's possible for these parameters to be different, the fact that we got what we got is irrelevant, because if the universe were to exist, it would exist with parameters. Every single hand you get dealt in poker is unlikely, but every time you get dealt a hand, you still wind up with one.

3) The “Cambrian explosion” refers to the geologically sudden appearance of many new animal body plans about 530 million years ago. At this time, at least half, and perhaps as many as 7/8's phyla of forty total, made their first appearance on earth within a narrow five- to ten-million-year window of geologic time. As a negative argument, such rapid appearance goes against the standard version of Darwin's theory.

Firstly, it actually doesn't. Secondly, Darwin hasn't had a hand in the theory of evolution in over a century. Things have been discovered he probably didn't even imagine, such as DNA. He presumed the heaviest evidence of his theory would be fossils, but we could throw every fossil we have into the sun and erase all the data we had on them, and run off of genetic data alone.

As a positive argument it applies to appearance of complex and specified information in a biological sense, that only makes sense with a designer.

No it doesn't. It makes sense with the theory of evolution, and with that theory, there's no need to inject a designer such that parsimony has been maintained.

It is irrelevant who the designer is, whether is it the Christian God, Islam's Allah, Ometecuhtli/Omecihuatl, the flying spaghetti monster, some aliens or Bill Gates.

I agree with you. The problem isn't who it proposes as the intelligent designer, or that the designer fits the definition of a god, but that the injection of a designer is entirely unnecessary, especially considering that nothing IDers like to claim appears designed actually does appear designed, except maybe superficially. ID cats don't get it, and I don't expect to convince you, but that's the case.

Suppose the aliens (the ones sending the signals of course :P) visit Earth in a million years after man has killed himself off in some biological disaster, and they dig up a well preserved iPhone. They wouldnt have to know who Steve Jobs, Tim Cook, or Steve Wozniak were to believe the device was designed.

It's curious how these aliens determine that the phone has a designer, but not the planet they found it on. Why do IDers always use examples of designed things which we know are designed, instead of saying "Well, everything's designed, so we have zero basis of understanding what an undesigned thing would look like such that we can compare design to non-design."?

Nice semantic dodge. I meant "credible" as to proponents of ID. So instead, use any well known or published ID proponent. If you need help finding material, try Michael Behe, Stephen Meyer, William Dembski, Ann Gauger, Douglas Axe to start. By they way, you were still the one with the initial charge of....

It was actually much more of a joke than a dodge, but I suppose it did both things. So, "credible as to proponents of ID"... so, people that are believed by the people they fooled into believing them? I'm sorry, but no ID proponent has ever written a peer reviewed paper on Intelligent design which was submitted to a credible scientific journal. The only explanations are that they know their paper won't get accepted due to lacking merit, it was rejected due to lacking merit, or there's a conspiracy to advocate evolution and shoot down any competitor instead of allowing them a fair shot. Which is more plausible? Do you believe in such a conspiracy?

I'm just asking for you to provide that example.

Irreducible Complexity is them doing that! The entire point is to find a thing evolution cannot explain and claim that, instead of then not knowing how it happened, it could only have happened through an intelligent agent acting to bring it about. By the way, that isn't actually an explanation of how it got there. Even if an intelligent agent did cause it, we still have no idea how. Thus, intelligent design is one big non-answer.

Ahhhh! Ken Miller. I had a feeling you might try to pull him out. That is precisely why I stated in my request..."whatever example you show will not be correctly refuting IC as it is properly defined"... blah blah blah.

If IC does not exclude a thing from evolving out of things which do not do the same job, then IC is not a critique of evolution and says nothing about design (or anything, really). Also, it counters the actual use of the term as used by Behe and Dempski within context at the Dover trial.

This is just another attempted win by technicality, the same way ID goes on and on about how the intelligent designer isn't necessarily any particular god. Good for it. These are all arguments by technicality, none of which stop ID from being bad science.

 

[SpaceYeti]

Evolution is already a controversial subject that doesn't need the intolerance of either side clouding the objectivity of information and the state of current scientific theory.

"Doesn't need the intolerance of either side clouding..."

What does that even mean?! Why should bad science be tolerated? You think an astrologist popping into a cosmological debate between peers in the field should be given a serious listen to? Creationism and ID is bad science, pure and simple. The fact that it's hidden behind a bunch of intelligent words and technicality of definitions doesn't change the fact. It's never produced a single peer reviewed papr in any of the scientific journals. Why is ignoring it or calling it bad science or not allowing it to be taught in the science classroom being "intolerant"?

 

[Duxwing]

This thread has evolved to the point of going over my head(mutated wings?) but I just wanted to say that this is a nasty combination of strawman and equivocation.

I'm fine with debate, but I just hope this thread doesn't( or hasn't) become just another pretext for one's support against/for religion.

Evolution is already a controversial subject that doesn't need the intolerance of either side clouding the objectivity of information and the state of current scientific theory. The same things could be observed in the other evolution thread that was recently necro'd(Agent Intellect seemed to be knowledgeable about the subject but I doubt his links are within my comprehension).

Controversial? Not within the scientific community. The "controversy" results from extremely religious people attempting to refute it with as many illogical arguments as exist fundamentalists. And furthermore, the debate present in this "controversy" is really the Freudian freak show of zealots having their cherished beliefs figuratively dashed against the rocks of science, for the ego will protect itself from pain, even the pain of knowing the truth.

-Duxwing

 

[The Introvert]

Wasn't the OP about evolution?

How did we get to religion...

The two are not correlated in any objective way.

 

[The Introvert]

3) The “Cambrian explosion” refers to the geologically sudden appearance of many new animal body plans about 530 million years ago. At this time, at least half, and perhaps as many as 7/8's phyla of forty total, made their first appearance on earth within a narrow five- to ten-million-year window of geologic time. As a negative argument, such rapid appearance goes against the standard version of Darwin's theory. As a positive argument it applies to appearance of complex and specified information in a biological sense, that only makes sense with a designer.

I actually laughed out loud with this.

Completely incompetent. You have no place in a discussion of evolution. Carry on, now

 

[SpaceYeti]

Wasn't the OP about evolution?

How did we get to religion...

The two are not correlated in any objective way.

The OP was about the "limits" of evolution... which I'm not really sure what that would cover. I can think of these silly ID and Creationist arguments, which are actually not limits on the theory, or even a proper criticism having anything to do with the theory, or we're talking about something the theory of evolution doesn't cover, but maybe is related, like abiogenesis, or geology, or something. If the latter, why call it "limits of evolution" instead of the actual subject? It'd be like talking about the "limits of gravity" or the "limits of germ theory". What the hell would we discuss if that were the subject? Anything besides bacterial or viral infections?

 

[The Introvert]

The OP was about the "limits" of evolution... which I'm not really sure what that would cover. I can think of these silly ID and Creationist arguments, which are actually not limits on the theory, or even a proper criticism having anything to do with the theory, or we're talking about something the theory of evolution doesn't cover, but maybe is related, like abiogenesis, or geology, or something. If the latter, why call it "limits of evolution" instead of the actual subject? It'd be like talking about the "limits of gravity" or the "limits of germ theory". What the hell would we discuss if that were the subject? Anything besides bacterial or viral infections?

But his question was specific.

He asked how evolution could explain the questions he had: anything other than an evolutionary answer would be off-topic; when you start arguing about religion, it's de-railing the thread.

Not saying you're the one de-railing, BTW.

 

[SpaceYeti]

Sure, but that question was also already answered by several people... so should the thread just die now? I'm thinking yes, if the OP is done.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

"Doesn't need the intolerance of either side clouding..."

What does that even mean?! Why should bad science be tolerated? You think an astrologist popping into a cosmological debate between peers in the field should be given a serious listen to? Creationism and ID is bad science, pure and simple. The fact that it's hidden behind a bunch of intelligent words and technicality of definitions doesn't change the fact. It's never produced a single peer reviewed papr in any of the scientific journals. Why is ignoring it or calling it bad science or not allowing it to be taught in the science classroom being "intolerant"?

It means there are people who are not biologists who wish to learn more about evolution and the history of life, but have to filter through the empty polemics that distorts the information.

Whether it be the religious agenda of theists, or the dismissive arrogance by adherents of evolution theory.

 

[WookieeB]

It means there are people who are not biologists who wish to learn more about evolution and the history of life, but have to filter through the empty polemics that distorts the information.

Whether it be the religious agenda of theists, or the dismissive arrogance by adherents of evolution theory.

True! You see this on both sides.

Interesting video for your OP

http://youtu.be/V_XN8s-zXx4

 

[SpaceYeti]

It means there are people who are not biologists who wish to learn more about evolution and the history of life, but have to filter through the empty polemics that distorts the information.

Whether it be the religious agenda of theists, or the dismissive arrogance by adherents of evolution theory.

Why should false ideas not be dismissed? It may appear to be arrogance, sure, but after decades of the same stupid arguments under different titles, what do you expect? If someone's sincerely curious and unbiased, they'll figure it out and ask questions relevant to the actual science. Most people don't have time to teach rudimentary biology to anyone who supports ID or Creationism, and those people wouldn't listen anyway. The only reason I argue at all any more is to save the fence sitters from getting fooled by the propaganda.

 

[Duxwing]

Why should false ideas not be dismissed? It may appear to be arrogance, sure, but after decades of the same stupid arguments under different titles, what do you expect? If someone's sincerely curious and unbiased, they'll figure it out and ask questions relevant to the actual science. Most people don't have time to teach rudimentary biology to anyone who supports ID or Creationism, and those people wouldn't listen anyway. The only reason I argue at all any more is to save the fence sitters from getting fooled by the propaganda.

*salutes* A noble cause indeed.

-Duxwing

 

[WookieeB]

I'll just grant the "information" argument for the shit of it. How is this indicative of an intelligence behind it's design?

For someone that is so confident of their position, you certainly do not seem to understand even the basics of the ID argument. At first I thought you were just bluffing in order to set me up for some point you wanted to make, but now I'm not so sure.

Design: a specification of an object, manifested by an agent, intended to accomplish goals, in a particular environment, using a set of primitive components, satisfying a set of requirements, subject to constraints.

A design inference is not triggered by any phenomenon that we cannot yet explain. Rather, it is triggered when two conditions are met. First, the event must be exceedingly improbable. Second, it must conform to a meaningful or independently given pattern.

Inferring design is something that people do everyday, intuitively.

Having a design implies a designer. I suppose applying the adjective "intelligent" may be somewhat subjective, but the idea is that anything that is designed has a mind behind it. I doubt that anyone that looks into the workings of DNA as being designed would not apply that adjective to it.

The universe has no apparent purpose or design. This is all religious rhetoric, which the ID movement is trying to hide from being obvious in order to appear like legitimate science... and has succeeded in fooling you.

A designed thing is designed for a purpose. Because the universe doesn't appear to have a purpose, it doesn't appear to have a design. Life is one of the things theologians and ID proponents like to claim the universe is designed for, but it's patently not designed for that.

Again, a charge of ID tactics that I would say is false. Name your example.

Besides, nobody is saying that the UNIVERSE was designed solely for life, or even trying to state what, if any, the purpose of the whole UNIVERSE is.

But there are aspects of the universe, not the entire universe itself, show signs of fine-tuning and design. Physical and chemical laws being some of those aspects, like the mass of Protons, force of gravity, electromagnetism, weak nuclear force, strong nuclear force. The laws governing these things are set, and set to such a fine degree that even tweaking them to a very minute degree would not allow the universe as we have it now to exist.

For instance, increase the mass of a proton by 0.2% and there would be no protons, they would decay quickly. No protons, no universe as we know it. Electromagnetic force is roughly 10^40 times greater than gravity. Increase that by factor of 10 and stars wouldnt exist. Decrease it by a factor of 10 and stars would burn, but they would burn out very quickly.

There are a host of other factors about the earths environment, not physical laws per se, but factors nonetheless that make life impossible, even the supposed evolutionary OOL stories, impossible.

Uh doy. Even if we assume it's possible for these parameters to be different, the fact that we got what we got is irrelevant, because if the universe were to exist, it would exist with parameters. Every single hand you get dealt in poker is unlikely, but every time you get dealt a hand, you still wind up with one.

I'm not saying that things would be different if things were different. I'm also not saying that there need be no parameters, of course there has to be parameters.

If it was just based on probability, I would agree that the argument was a "x of the gaps" type. But to use your analogy, what if I said that life depends on you walking into Caesar's Palace, the Bellagio, and Circus Circus in Vegas, all an hour apart and on the hour, sit down at the 5th poker table you see, and play one hand only and get a Royal Flush each time. (I dont know the exact probability of this, but it is probably stupid-crazy high) And then you proceeded to do exactly that! You could say that though it was improbable, it is possible. I would agree, but would also say the what you accomplished was planned, was by design! Try and figure out why.

 

[WookieeB]

Why should false ideas not be dismissed? It may appear to be arrogance, sure, but after decades of the same stupid arguments under different titles, what do you expect? If someone's sincerely curious and unbiased, they'll figure it out and ask questions relevant to the actual science. Most people don't have time to teach rudimentary biology to anyone who supports ID or Creationism, and those people wouldn't listen anyway. The only reason I argue at all any more is to save the fence sitters from getting fooled by the propaganda.

Except all you ever say is that is it "false ideas" and "stupid arguments" and "propaganda" without giving satisfactory reasons. You speak of "rationality" and "relevant to the actual science" like they are characters just offstage, but we dont see them ever perform.

'The gentleman doth protests too much, methinks'

 

[WookieeB]

The problem isn't who it proposes as the intelligent designer, or that the designer fits the definition of a god, but that the injection of a designer is entirely unnecessary, especially considering that nothing IDers like to claim appears designed actually does appear designed, except maybe superficially. ID cats don't get it, and I don't expect to convince you, but that's the case.

Haha, really? Ever hear of Richard Dawkins? "Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose” - (Blind Watchmaker)

There is a probably a new paper coming out every week on new discoveries about DNA and other functions in the cell that either directly use the term "design", or use synonymous terms and phrases that imply an obvious appearance of design, even despite most of those authors very likely believing in evolution. Why do you think the analogous terms of design artifacts are used so often? Because the design inference is easily understood by most persons and those terms best describe what is being observed.

Darwin hasn't had a hand in the theory of evolution in over a century.

Oh please! Your equivocating over a term, and one that isn't unusual. Every time you refer to natural selection action on mutation you are invoking Darwin. Neo-Darwinism is a well known phrase and is synonymous with the Modern Synthesis of evolution.

It's curious how these aliens determine that the phone has a designer, but not the planet they found it on. Why do IDers always use examples of designed things which we know are designed,

What the hell does the planet have to do with my example? "IDers" use examples of things that are designed....because they were designed. That kinda is the point.

...instead of saying "Well, everything's designed, so we have zero basis of understanding what an undesigned thing would look like such that we can compare design to non-design."?

No ID advocate has ever said that or anything even remotely close to it. What is that statement even suppose to mean?

The point of design detection is to be able to tell the difference between designed things and non-designed things. As far as our discussion is concerned, it would apply to artifacts that are a result of a purposeful arrangement of parts and artifacts that are a result of purely natural causes. ID obviously acknowledges that both types of things exist.

I'm sorry, but no ID proponent has ever written a peer reviewed paper on Intelligent design which was submitted to a credible scientific journal. The only explanations are that they know their paper won't get accepted due to lacking merit, it was rejected due to lacking merit, or there's a conspiracy to advocate evolution and shoot down any competitor instead of allowing them a fair shot. Which is more plausible? Do you believe in such a conspiracy?

You are really out of touch.

http://www.discovery.org/a/2640

Irreducible Complexity is them doing that! The entire point is to find a thing evolution cannot explain and claim that, instead of then not knowing how it happened, it could only have happened through an intelligent agent acting to bring it about

Your desperation is showing through. And your lack of understanding what IC is. Please, go back and reread the definitions I posted, or on the Wiki page, it matters not which. In fact, if you really knew the development of the idea you would realize that Behe acknowledged that exaptation/co-option might be a method to come up with 'parts', but you still have a big problem explaining the bringing them together into coordination. Regardless, your accusation has no basis in fact.

By the way, that isn't actually an explanation of how it got there. Even if an intelligent agent did cause it, we still have no idea how. Thus, intelligent design is one big non-answer.

By your same standards, neither is evolution an explanation of how it got there.

ID doesn't propose to explain how it happened, but it does encourage more research to find out. If scientists some day are able to develop and build a cell from scratch, ID advocates will rejoice, cause it would be proving their point even more.

If IC does not exclude a thing from evolving out of things which do not do the same job, then IC is not a critique of evolution and says nothing about design (or anything, really). Also, it counters the actual use of the term as used by Behe and Dempski within context at the Dover trial.

God, you are thick. Again, GO AND READ THE DEFINITION OF IC! It's not really that hard to understand. As nearly incomprehensible your statement is, IC is saying that a system that is composed of several interacting parts CANNOT evolve from parts that do not do the same job.... ... ? ... Frankly, I dont think that even evolution is saying that can be done. :P

For the Flagellum, the part that is analogous the the T3SS is not a T3SS. And even if it was the same, the T3SS on its own is not a flagellum, nor does it function anything like a flagellum.

I'm not sure what your point is in bringing up Dover, but the definition I have referred to was what was used there by Behe.

This is just another attempted win by technicality, the same way ID goes on and on about how the intelligent designer isn't necessarily any particular god. Good for it. These are all arguments by technicality, none of which stop ID from being bad science.

Bad science....because you say so. OK, that's enough for me!

Your argument reminds me of the Black Knight in Monty Python's - The Quest for the Holy Grail.

http://youtu.be/dhRUe-gz690

 

[WookieeB]

I actually laughed out loud with this.

Completely incompetent. You have no place in a discussion of evolution.

May I ask why?

 

[SpaceYeti]

Having a design implies a designer. I suppose applying the adjective "intelligent" may be somewhat subjective, but the idea is that anything that is designed has a mind behind it. I doubt that anyone that looks into the workings of DNA as being designed would not apply that adjective to it.

Sure. If you assume DNA is actually designed, then of course you would consider there to be a designer.

But there are aspects of the universe, not the entire universe itself, show signs of fine-tuning and design. Physical and chemical laws being some of those aspects, like the mass of Protons, force of gravity, electromagnetism, weak nuclear force, strong nuclear force. The laws governing these things are set, and set to such a fine degree that even tweaking them to a very minute degree would not allow the universe as we have it now to exist.

Why are we assuming that their being different is even a possibility, let alone at all likely? Have we observed other universes with differing rules? Even if they could be different, they're not. That's not an indication of design. It's an indication of nothing. We have no reason to presume any of those things are the way they are for any purpose. Saying they look designed is a hollow claim.

There are a host of other factors about the earths environment, not physical laws per se, but factors nonetheless that make life impossible, even the supposed evolutionary OOL stories, impossible.

The scientific theory of evolution says nothing about the origin of life. That's a different theory entirely; Abiogenesis. Either way, my above point remains.

I'm not saying that things would be different if things were different. I'm also not saying that there need be no parameters, of course there has to be parameters.

Okay, fine, you're saying that things would have probably been different, therefore how things are probably didn't come through pure coincidence. Which is a fallacious idea, because unlikely events happen all the time. A thing being unlikely is not a good reason to presume it was made to be through an intelligent agent. Even if it's beneficial to us.

If it was just based on probability, I would agree that the argument was a "x of the gaps" type. But to use your analogy, what if I said that life depends on you walking into Caesar's Palace, the Bellagio, and Circus Circus in Vegas, all an hour apart and on the hour, sit down at the 5th poker table you see, and play one hand only and get a Royal Flush each time. (I dont know the exact probability of this, but it is probably stupid-crazy high) And then you proceeded to do exactly that! You could say that though it was improbable, it is possible. I would agree, but would also say the what you accomplished was planned, was by design! Try and figure out why.

Um... that's an entirely probabilistic example. The only thing that makes it not exclusively probabilistic is that you said it would happen beforehand, but that obviously didn't happen with life.

Except all you ever say is that is it "false ideas" and "stupid arguments" and "propaganda" without giving satisfactory reasons. You speak of "rationality" and "relevant to the actual science" like they are characters just offstage, but we dont see them ever perform.

I'm not a biologist. Anything I could answer for you, biology-wise, you could learn with a google search or looking through some peer reviewed articles. I call them the things you cite me saying because the entirety of their content is unsubstantiated, and they have the burden of proof. Claiming DNA or the universe, or anything, looks designed is nothing but a claim. Prove that it is designed. A subjective interpretation is not fact.

Haha, really? Ever hear of Richard Dawkins? "Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose” - (Blind Watchmaker)

Have you read that book? I would appreciate it if you do. Yes, he says that things in biology appear to be designed, for specific functions. He also says that it, in fact, is. By evolution, not a thinking entity of any form (The Blind Watchman). Good work quote mining, though. Taking things people say out of context, in a manner which supports your ideas, is a very clever tactic.

There is a probably a new paper coming out every week on new discoveries about DNA and other functions in the cell that either directly use the term "design", or use synonymous terms and phrases that imply an obvious appearance of design, even despite most of those authors very likely believing in evolution. Why do you think the analogous terms of design artifacts are used so often? Because the design inference is easily understood by most persons and those terms best describe what is being observed.

Do they mean the term literally, or in the figurative "evolution" way that biologists do?

You are really out of touch.

http://www.discovery.org/a/2640

Oh boy. Well, I guess you showed me there!

Oh, wait, no you didn't; http://www.skeptical-science.com/religion/intelligent-design-examined-peer-review/

Don't trust the discovery institute, dude. It has an agenda, not critical thought.

Your desperation is showing through. And your lack of understanding what IC is. Please, go back and reread the definitions I posted, or on the Wiki page, it matters not which. In fact, if you really knew the development of the idea you would realize that Behe acknowledged that exaptation/co-option might be a method to come up with 'parts', but you still have a big problem explaining the bringing them together into coordination. Regardless, your accusation has no basis in fact.

My statement stands, and it's not my job to explain anything. I don't know how those parts came together, exactly. They obviously did, though. I don't take my lack of information and say "Intelligent Designer did it!". That's an Intelligent Designer of the Gaps fallacy. Oh, and it still doesn't explain anything even if it is the case.

You may find this interesting, though; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_flagella

By your same standards, neither is evolution an explanation of how it got there.

Except it is. It's not my fault you don't understand evolution. I mean, hey, you keep saying I don't understand ID, maybe you simply don't understand ID or evolution. I would suggest looking into the subject, as I simply don't have the patience (and probably not the knowledge) to explain it here.

God, you are thick. Again, GO AND READ THE DEFINITION OF IC! It's not really that hard to understand. As nearly incomprehensible your statement is, IC is saying that a system that is composed of several interacting parts CANNOT evolve from parts that do not do the same job.... ... ? ... Frankly, I dont think that even evolution is saying that can be done. :P

It totally is. Evolution says that parts can evolve from parts that do different things. On a large scale, that generally takes a long time. On a small scale, it can happen to very small parts fairly quickly suddenly, even, especially on the chemical level.

For the Flagellum, the part that is analogous the the T3SS is not a T3SS. And even if it was the same, the T3SS on its own is not a flagellum, nor does it function anything like a flagellum.

So what?

I'm not sure what your point is in bringing up Dover, but the definition I have referred to was what was used there by Behe.

And Behe was metaphorically eviscerated there. Seriously, read the judge's ruling and/or the transcripts. They're informative and entertaining.

Ruling; http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/kitzmiller_342.pdf
Transcripts; http://www.aclupa.org/legal/legaldocket/intelligentdesigncase/dovertrialtranscripts.htm

Bad science....because you say so. OK, that's enough for me!

No, because that's what actual scientists say about it, or why they ignore it. It brings no original research to the table and ignores the peer research aspect of modern science. It's bad science the same way flat-earthers use bad science to prove the Earth is flat, the same way fake-moon-landing-ers use bad science to prove the moon landings were faked, the same way 9/11 conspiracy theorists use bad science to prove the 9/11 attacks were an inside job, etc. None of those guys have any actual peer reviewed material, either.

See what I mean about boring walls of text?

 

[The Introvert]

May I ask why?

It exemplifies your total ignorance on the subject of evolution.

You're trying to combine hearsay with scientific fact - when you cross that line, there is no point in continuing the argument.

 

[WookieeB]

It exemplifies your total ignorance on the subject of evolution.

You're trying to combine hearsay with scientific fact - when you cross that line, there is no point in continuing the argument.

Please elucidate. I have an idea what you are meaning, but I don't want to put words in your mouth.

Otherwise all you have said is begging the question.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

The organisms here had forelimbs, and the differences in genetic material they possess (ultimately from mutations) equate to many different possible outcomes for the heritable trait: forelimb. IE, the trait for a longer or shorter forelimb is heritable. Let's just say that these organisms reproduce, and lo and behold, their offspring are born with a mutation that causes the skin between their digits to become webbed. These offspring then reproduce, and some of their offspring have this heritable trait.

Over time, the trait is selected for by the environment via natural selection; lets just say that organisms with webbed digits are better at catching prey, or something. Over a long enough time, the trait 'webbed digits' becomes fixed in the population. Now lets say another mutation occurs; this time, the offspring have digits that are slightly more separated. Over time, natural selection selects for these individuals, and the average space between digits grows and grows, etc. etc.

This was probably a convoluted and confusing mess. I apologize. The main point here is that evolution occurs like this: mutation arises in population. (like yeti said above, mutations are not necessarily good or bad - many times they are neutral). This mutation, for some reason or another (using an evolutionary mechanism, or just by pure chance [more unlikely]) is fixed in the population. Over time, more and more mutations occur, the gene pool for said population gets larger and more diverse, and speciation occurs via evolutionary mechanism.

The coupling of evolutionary mechanisms and mutations is what we call evolution.


I'm pretty sure the above answers these questions. If not, let me know.

What I don't understand about this is that the biological system is made up of:

A planned genetic body
Planned genetic functions
Accidental genetic mutations in the plans/expression.


Changes in the biological system are either due to outside influence, or internal mutation. Barring outside influence, what exactly does it take for numerous mutations and constant breeding to result in a permanent, physical addition to the body plan that also is able to continually develop(through even more numerous mutations and breeding) into having a biological function?


It's the unpredictable, chaotic quality that confuses me the most; not so much that complexity in evolution seems impossible but that these changes are not something that were deliberate...they're just random products of nature that somehow gained evolutionary momentum to the point of being something visible and purposeful.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

The evolution of the eye has been a subject of significant study, as a distinctive example of a homologous organ present in a wide variety of taxa. Certain components of the eye, such as the visual pigments, appear to have a common ancestry: that is, they evolved once, before the animals radiated. However, complex, image-forming eyes evolved some 50 to 100 times[1] – using many of the same proteins and genetic toolkits in their construction.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_the_eye

There are "phylogenetic" trees that show relationships between species. So are there "phylogenetic" trees for the development of specific body characteristics and functions?

For example, if eyes in general can be traced back to a common ancestor, then it should be possible to trace the development of the current human eye.

 

[The Introvert]

What I don't understand about this is that the biological system is made up of:

A planned genetic body
Planned genetic functions
Accidental genetic mutations in the plans/expression.

What don't you get about it? I would be more than happy to attempt to explain

Changes in the biological system are either due to outside influence, or internal mutation. Barring outside influence, what exactly does it take for numerous mutations and constant breeding to result in a permanent, physical addition to the body plan that also is able to continually develop(through even more numerous mutations and breeding) into having a biological function?

As collections of cells working together (organisms) get larger and larger, inevitably there will be more and more mistakes being made, simply due to probability. Sometimes, the mistakes end up being beneficial, and through natural selection and probability, if an allele, trait, mutation, what have you increases the fitness (or simply, if an organism has better genes) of an organism, then the probability of that organism surviving and contributing to the next population is greater (assuming that the mutation is heritable). With every increase in complexity, there is that much more that can mess up (and with each of those mess-ups, complexity is again increased). Interesting to think that life as we know it only exists because the mechanisms that control life are flawed.

It's the unpredictable, chaotic quality that confuses me the most; not so much that complexity in evolution seems impossible but that these changes are not something that were deliberate...they're just random products of nature that somehow gained evolutionary momentum to the point of being something visible and purposeful.

I think worth noting is that big changes in evolution (AKA growing an arm or something) take inconceivably long to occur. We can see evolution occur over several generations, yes, but to consider the existence of say a single celled Archean bacteria and follow the chain of events to today, it's conceptually impossible (at least to me). It just covers too much time - too many changes, too much information.

That's the harshest criticism on evolution - that the largest changes cannot actually be perceived by humans. You must take it on scientific evidence (seeing micro-evolution, fossil records, DNA, phylogenetics) and see that it applies in the long run to understand how large changes can become fixed in a certain species. For instance, you can look at breeds of dogs - we know that all dogs came from one common ancestor - a wolf. But of course, we were not around when that wolf was domesticated, but we know that all of the vastly different dogs that came of that wolf are still related. All dogs can still interbreed - it's been estimated that dogs appeared around 33,000 years ago, and they are still genetically similar enough to breed with one another and produce viable offspring. The scope of time that one must look through to understand the evolutionary history of life is incredibly vast, and I'll be the first one to admit that I cannot actually comprehend the amount of change that occurred in such an expansive amount of time.

 

[The Introvert]

Please elucidate. I have an idea what you are meaning, but I don't want to put words in your mouth.

Otherwise all you have said is begging the question.

You said:

3) The “Cambrian explosion” refers to the geologically sudden appearance of many new animal body plans about 530 million years ago. At this time, at least half, and perhaps as many as 7/8's phyla of forty total, made their first appearance on earth within a narrow five- to ten-million-year window of geologic time. As a negative argument, such rapid appearance goes against the standard version of Darwin's theory.

And what is in bold is a combination of hearsay with scientific fact.

It's bogus. Wrong. Made-up. It has zero scientific weight. You're just saying it, proclaiming its truth with no evidence.

Unless of course I misunderstand what you mean by negative argument. Perhaps you are saying that the argument in bold is actually an argument from ignorance (negative evidence) and is thus invalid?

 

[joal0503]

i found this to be interesting

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_intelligent_design

to me the bigger picture is clear. there is a human agenda. always been there. it changed clothes, but its still the same person underneath it all.



http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/28/opinion/28dennett.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

First, imagine how easy it would be for a determined band of naysayers to shake the world's confidence in quantum physics - how weird it is! - or Einsteinian relativity. In spite of a century of instruction and popularization by physicists, few people ever really get their heads around the concepts involved. Most people eventually cobble together a justification for accepting the assurances of the experts: "Well, they pretty much agree with one another, and they claim that it is their understanding of these strange topics that allows them to harness atomic energy, and to make transistors and lasers, which certainly do work..."

...

With evolution, however, it is different. The fundamental scientific idea of evolution by natural selection is not just mind-boggling; natural selection, by executing God's traditional task of designing and creating all creatures great and small, also seems to deny one of the best reasons we have for believing in God. So there is plenty of motivation for resisting the assurances of the biologists. Nobody is immune to wishful thinking. It takes scientific discipline to protect ourselves from our own credulity, but we've also found ingenious ways to fool ourselves and others. Some of the methods used to exploit these urges are easy to analyze; others take a little more unpacking.

A creationist pamphlet sent to me some years ago had an amusing page in it, purporting to be part of a simple questionnaire:

Test Two

Do you know of any building that didn't have a builder? [YES] [NO]

Do you know of any painting that didn't have a painter? [YES] [NO]

Do you know of any car that didn't have a maker? [YES] [NO]

If you answered YES for any of the above, give details:

Take that, you Darwinians! The presumed embarrassment of the test-taker when faced with this task perfectly expresses the incredulity many people feel when they confront Darwin's great idea. It seems obvious, doesn't it, that there couldn't be any designs without designers, any such creations without a creator.

Well, yes - until you look at what contemporary biology has demonstrated beyond all reasonable doubt: that natural selection - the process in which reproducing entities must compete for finite resources and thereby engage in a tournament of blind trial and error from which improvements automatically emerge - has the power to generate breathtakingly ingenious designs.

Take the development of the eye, which has been one of the favorite challenges of creationists. How on earth, they ask, could that engineering marvel be produced by a series of small, unplanned steps? Only an intelligent designer could have created such a brilliant arrangement of a shape-shifting lens, an aperture-adjusting iris, a light-sensitive image surface of exquisite sensitivity, all housed in a sphere that can shift its aim in a hundredth of a second and send megabytes of information to the visual cortex every second for years on end.

But as we learn more and more about the history of the genes involved, and how they work - all the way back to their predecessor genes in the sightless bacteria from which multicelled animals evolved more than a half-billion years ago - we can begin to tell the story of how photosensitive spots gradually turned into light-sensitive craters that could detect the rough direction from which light came, and then gradually acquired their lenses, improving their information-gathering capacities all the while.

We can't yet say what all the details of this process were, but real eyes representative of all the intermediate stages can be found, dotted around the animal kingdom, and we have detailed computer models to demonstrate that the creative process works just as the theory says.

article in its entirety, just click the link

 

[SpaceYeti]

i found this to be interesting

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_intelligent_design

to me the bigger picture is clear. there is a human agenda. always been there. it changed clothes, but its still the same person underneath it all.

What I find most interesting about this specific change is that it happened one month after it became illegal to teach Creationism in schools.

 

[joal0503]

What I find most interesting about this specific change is that it happened one month after it became illegal to teach Creationism in schools.

language... a powerful tool of understanding... as well as deceiving.

 

[redbaron]

Haha, really? Ever hear of Richard Dawkins? "Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose”

Are you serious?

This statement is not an inference that there is likely a designer. It's a subtle insult to proponents of ID/Creation theories, that their misunderstanding of biology and either inability or unwillingness to understand complicated concepts is what leads to the injection of a designer in the first place.

It's also the reason ID theories pop up and so many people fall for them. Biology isn't a household topic, people don't possess the knowledge or method required to assess and break down certain arguments when they're presented.

Funny that this lack of ability and/or drive to understand certain complicated concepts is what would lead you to misinterpret the quote in the first place.

If you link to one peer-reviewed work on ID for me to analyse, I'm happy to refute it on its own merits.

 

[SpaceYeti]

He already linked that Discovery Institute peer reviewed page. I don't think that'll satisfy you, though, since the stuff that actually is peer reviewed articles aren't about ID.

 

[joal0503]

Are you serious?

This statement is not an inference that there is likely a designer. It's a subtle insult to proponents of ID/Creation theories, that their misunderstanding of biology and either inability or unwillingness to understand complicated concepts is what leads to the injection of a designer in the first place.

It's also the reason ID theories pop up and so many people fall for them. Biology isn't a household topic, people don't possess the knowledge or method required to assess and break down certain arguments when they're presented.

Funny that this lack of ability and/or drive to understand certain complicated concepts is what would lead you to misinterpret the quote in the first place.

If you link to one peer-reviewed work on ID for me to analyse, I'm happy to refute it on its own merits.

to be fair, i think that person already posted the sole article...but it was published by the discovery institute, as spaceyeti has pointed out

http://www.discovery.org/a/2640


theres a list of papers there ^

:cambrian explosion: logic:

uhn also explores the question of human/ape common ancestry, citing Jonathan Wells's book The Myth of Junk DNA and arguing:

DNA homology between ape and man has been reported to be 96% when considering only the current protein-mapping sequences, which represent only 2% of the total genome. However, the actual similarity of the DNA is approximately 70% to 75% when considering the full genome, including the previously presumed "junk DNA," which has now been demonstrated to code for supporting elements in transcription or expression. The 25% difference represents almost 35 million single nucleotide changes and 5 million insertions or deletions.
In Dr. Kuhn's view, this poses a problem for Darwinian evolution because the "[t]he ape to human species change would require an incredibly rapid rate of mutation leading to formation of new DNA, thousands of new proteins, and untold cellular, neural, digestive, and immune-related changes in DNA, which would code for the thousands of new functioning proteins."

Kuhn also observes that a challenge to neo-Darwinism comes from the Cambrian explosion:

Thousands of specimens were available at the time of Darwin. Millions of specimens have been classified and studied in the past 50 years. It is remarkable to note that each of these shows a virtual explosion of nearly all phyla (35/40) of the animal kingdom over a relatively short period during the Cambrian era 525 to 530 million years ago. Since that time, there has been occasional species extinction, but only rare new phyla have been convincingly identified. The seminal paper from paleoanthropologists J. Valentine and D. H. Erwin notes that the absence of transitional species for any of the Cambrian phyla limits the neo-Darwinian explanation for evolution.

The ONLY aspect of this argument I can sort of relate to...is the feeling that evolution is not at a level of understanding for it to be officially 'taught' in the general education curriculum. It sort of like making theoretical particle physics a mandatory class for 10th graders; pointless. Theres simply too much up for debate, not known, and it could possibly lead to a backlash somewhere down the road.


edit: lol, spaceyetis right...its next to impossible to find a legitimate peer reviewed scientific journal article...they got some good tricks up in thur fo sho.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

OP

Spoiler

As I understand it (and please correct & enlighten me where I am wrong), evolutionary theory holds that various organisms of different species compete for survival, the organisms and species with the most advantageous attribute(s) are the ones that have the chance to pass on their unique and beneficial features. Over time this results in a family of organisms with the same hereditary traits.


This explains why certain species exist today, while others have gone extinct. However it doesn't explain how genetic mutations become "fully developed" through successful breeding. Of course the animal that could fly was able to escape its captors and go on to breed, but how did its wings develop? How did a simple genetic defect of the limb progress into fully functional defects on both respective limbs to the point of allowing flight? How was the defect passed on in the first place when there is death, or the uncertainty of gene expression?



Evolution seems to only cover retrograde movement(what was it previously?), it doesn't seem to be able to answer the question of forward development (how did it become this? ). What can?



Again, if I've got this all wrong, please elucidate.

Erm... Not really. Evolution really only dictates that life responds to external stimuli in a manner that better ensures its continued existence (note that other life forms also fall under the "external stimuli" umbrella. One competes with peers, avoids predators, consumes prey, etc). The "how" is complex and often counterintuitive, and is covered well by A.I. here: http://www.intpforum.com/showthread.php?t=6599

It's less about whoever has the best attributes surviving to pass them on and more about not having traits that are unfavorable under the current set of circumstances. Evolution makes no attempt to predict the future nor does it really attempt to recreate the past, though the latter is used to provide supportive evidence. There's also no such thing as "fully developed," as evolution is a constant and unguided process. The whole mess is in constant flux.

That is what I am interested in; these many, virtually insignificant mutations and their role in the eventual appearance of biological attributes that serve an interactive purpose in reality.

Features that are under heavy selective pressure, such as long legs used to sustain high rates of speed to flee from predators, tend to evolve in a manner so as to become more refined; while features with less pressure like the feathers used by birds of paradise to attract a mate, tend to be more flexible. These are what tend to give rise to new and novel structures because they're open to wider variation; more relaxed.

This isn't to say a relaxed structure can't provide the foundation for the development of an eventual keystone structure. The most common explanation for the development of flight in birds (which is entirely different from the development of flight in bats or insects) is that feathers developed first as a means of insulation as extensions of scales, then as a means of display, and then as a means of locomotion. Who knows what they might develop into next? (Personally I'd like to see the development of a specialized patch of feather projectiles. Porcupine birds ftw).

It doesn't happen the same way with biological evolution which is more chaotic and irregular; one thing doesn't actually evolve into another, but dies itself and passes along genes through reproduction. This makes it hard to see how these genes with subtle mutations come to actually make a physically perceptible difference, and not only that but actively aid the organism, especially in an environment that's subject to change(if evolution takes thousands or even millions of years, that environment is going to change).

Change can be rather stealthy and "invisible." If a genetic code is like a book, how easy would it be to pick out one random letter out of place, or even entire paragraphs? There are millions of forms of a single book that could easily "make it past the cut." The accumulation of mutations is akin to trying to produce a best seller by changing one random letter at a time, like using brute force to crack a password. Most of the time a lot of the "words" are gibberish, but every once in a while the letters form literary gold.

IMHO evolution is really best understood in terms of systems (big surprise, eh?), specifically as complex adaptive systems.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irreducible_complexity

Most people that believe in evolution cannot adequately address the problem of irreducible complexity. A large portion of these people will also not admit that this is the case.

Complexity is ironically what bolsters evolution as an axiom of systems.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organization
@EyeSeeCold ^This might be what you're after, which ties directly into Chaos Theory.

Natural selection does not occur at an individual level.

According to the arbitrary and conventional boundaries of biology no, but from a systems perspective it actually does. The regulation of cancer by P53 is a prime example.

I thought I had a pretty good post... :/


*sigh*

We can't ALL be winners.

Spoiler

*duck*

Scientists don't do that: they start with data and extrapolate theory. They don't start with a vision and then try to justify it, as the scientists "pursuing" a theistic explanation did.

That's not entirely accurate. There's a constant back and forth between deductive and inductive reasoning, especially when one considers that all boundaries are arbitrary (the social sciences are the happy quagmire that demonstrates this). Frequently scientists start with a possibility, submit a grant application, collect data, and then draw conclusions and refine their understanding. The larger the question, the more induction tends to be used.

3) The “Cambrian explosion” refers to the geologically sudden appearance of many new animal body plans about 530 million years ago. At this time, at least half, and perhaps as many as 7/8's phyla of forty total, made their first appearance on earth within a narrow five- to ten-million-year window of geologic time. As a negative argument, such rapid appearance goes against the standard version of Darwin's theory. As a positive argument it applies to appearance of complex and specified information in a biological sense, that only makes sense with a designer.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punctuated_equilibrium
And you'd probably be interested in the self-organization link above as well.

The only reason I argue at all any more is to save the fence sitters from getting fooled by the propaganda.

Dood... The fence is where it's at.

What I don't understand about this is that the biological system is made up of:


A planned genetic body
Planned genetic functions
Accidental genetic mutations in the plans/expression.


Changes in the biological system are either due to outside influence, or internal mutation. Rephrased as "Changes in a car are either due to wrecks, or not changing the oil," does it still make sense? Both actually share the same underlying physics; both are actually following the same rules but produce different manifestations of disability. They're really the same thing. Barring outside influence, what exactly does it take for numerous mutations and constant breeding to result in a permanent, physical addition to the body plan that also is able to continually develop(through even more numerous mutations and breeding) into having a biological function?

"Planning" is a boundary, akin to the physical laws governing any system. Genetics are constructs of larger, wider-reaching processes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructal_theory

There are "phylogenetic" trees that show relationships between species. So are there "phylogenetic" trees for the development of specific body characteristics and functions?


For example, if eyes in general can be traced back to a common ancestor, then it should be possible to trace the development of the current human eye.

Yes!

i found this to be interesting

I think this is more a function of rhetoric (<-Socratic definition) as opposed to some sort of underhanded PR campaign, i.e. the proponents of one idea are yielding to a better idea. This isn't to say that all of a given idea's proponents actually know wtf they're talking about...

 

[joal0503]

I think this is more a function of rhetoric (<-Socratic definition) as opposed to some sort of underhanded PR campaign, i.e. the proponents of one idea are yielding to a better idea. This isn't to say that all of a given idea's proponents actually know wtf they're talking about...

but how is intelligent design'a better idea than creationism? they are the same thing. the language has been updated, ideas refined, sure..but the core is still there. and the timing of this paradigm change didnt come with a scientific discovery...it coincided with the findings that "creationism" and related materials were unconstitutional to teach in schools i.e. law and politics dictated the action, to me that is exactly what an underhanded PR campaign is all about. besides the change from creationism to id, isnt the first time the language had been manipulated. creationism (up to late 70's) ---> creationism science ---> ID. politics forced campaigning...

Hendren v. Campbell (1977) addresses the issue:

"We may note that with each new decision of the courts religious proponents have attempted to modify or tailor their approach to active lobbying in state legislatures and agencies. Softening positions and amending language, these groups have, time and again, forced the courts to reassert and redefine the prohibitions of the First Amendment. Despite new and continued attempts by such groups, however, the courts are bound to determine, if possible, the purpose of the approach."


(god my head is soooo foggy right now)

 

[WookieeB]

http://www.discovery.org/a/2640
Oh boy. Well, I guess you showed me there!

Oh, wait, no you didn't; http://www.skeptical-science.com/rel...d-peer-review/

Don't trust the discovery institute, dude. It has an agenda, not critical thought
...
He already linked that Discovery Institute peer reviewed page. I don't think that'll satisfy you, though, since the stuff that actually is peer reviewed articles aren't about ID.

This makes me wonder if you even read what is linked in these discussions, either by others or even yourself.

Your contention was that there were no peer-reviewed articles. Not on whether most people agree with them, or even if the peer-reviewers agree with them, or anything to the effect of who accepts what idea. Just published peer-reviewed articles supportive of ID.

The link I gave has over 50 articles, listing whom, where, and a brief synopsis.

The link you gave is a citation bluff. The guy somehow whittles it down to 12 articles (and not even the latest ones) because they apparently were not peer-enough to him, and then even among those 12 is admitting that they were peer-reviewed. Of course, he and others disagrees with them (no duh), and that seems to be his point. So it really comes down to his opinion that the articles are either not REALLY peer-reviewed, or they don't specifically say ID in them.

p.s. - It was revealing to notice that the first comments in that article pretty much disputed at least one of the contentions he had on one of the listed articles. Even though it doesn't seem that the author of the comment supports the ID articles, even he could see the bias.

 

[SpaceYeti]

The real problem is, this entire time, they've been trying to skip right over the scientific process, the one evolution had to go through, to get injected as though it's as mature or more of an idea in the scientific realm. It's simply not. If you want your idea taken seriously, prove it's merit in the scientific gauntlet and it will either be shown to lack merit, or it will be automatically included in textbooks after it has passed the test.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

but how is intelligent design'a better idea than creationism? they are the same thing. the language has been updated, ideas refined, sure..but the core is still there. and the timing of this paradigm change didnt come with a scientific discovery...it coincided with the findings that "creationism" and related materials were unconstitutional to teach in schools i.e. law and politics dictated the action, to me that is exactly what an underhanded PR campaign is all about. besides the change from creationism to id, isnt the first time the language had been manipulated. creationism (up to late 70's) ---> creationism science ---> ID. politics forced campaigning...

Nope.

"Is Intelligent Design the same thing as Creationism?

No. Intelligent Design adherents believe only that the complexity of the natural world could not have occurred by chance. Some intelligent entity must have created the complexity, they reason, but that "designer" could in theory be anything or anyone."

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4648170

The timing of the paradigm change coincided with a change in federal policy and a "national conversation" on the issue. Socratic rhetoric in it's truest form. One idea replaced another. Where is the creationist Adam riding a triceratops steed now!?!?! That's right

What if the "designer" of the system is the system itself? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organization

 

[WookieeB]

Are you serious?

This statement is not an inference that there is likely a designer. It's a subtle insult to proponents of ID/Creation theories, that their misunderstanding of biology and either inability or unwillingness to understand complicated concepts is what leads to the injection of a designer in the first place.

Have you read that book? I would appreciate it if you do. Yes, he says that things in biology appear to be designed, for specific functions. He also says that it, in fact, is. By evolution, not a thinking entity of any form (The Blind Watchman). Good work quote mining, though. Taking things people say out of context, in a manner which supports your ideas, is a very clever tactic.

I am tempted to call strawman, but I wont necessarily because you may have missed the particular item of argument. Nevertheless, my statement is being mis-characterized.

SpaceYeti originally said -

The problem isn't who it proposes as the intelligent designer, or that the designer fits the definition of a god, but that the injection of a designer is entirely unnecessary, especially considering that nothing IDers like to claim appears designed actually does appear designed, except maybe superficially. ID cats don't get it, and I don't expect to convince you, but that's the case.

The idea I was commenting on was that 'nothing appears designed'. I was just pointing out Dawkins statement to the contrary. I know Dawkins doesn't believe in design. His whole book was basically pointing that out. But what he believes was not the issue of my post. It was merely to point out that a lot of biological things do 'appear' designed, whether or not the persons stating that believe that is actually the case or not. The the mere idea of design is not foreign.

 

[SpaceYeti]

Nope.

"Is Intelligent Design the same thing as Creationism?

No. Intelligent Design adherents believe only that the complexity of the natural world could not have occurred by chance. Some intelligent entity must have created the complexity, they reason, but that "designer" could in theory be anything or anyone."

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4648170

The timing of the paradigm change coincided with a change in federal policy and a "national conversation" on the issue. Socratic rhetoric in it's truest form. One idea replaced another. Where is the creationist Adam riding a triceratops steed now!?!?! That's right

What if the "designer" of the system is the system itself? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organization

A superficial change.

Creationism; It's so complicated that God must have done it.
ID; It's so complicated that Intelligent Designer did it.

Same idea, different label.

 

[joal0503]

This makes me wonder if you even read what is linked in these discussions, either by others or even yourself.

Your contention was that there were no peer-reviewed articles. Not on whether most people agree with them, or even if the peer-reviewers agree with them, or anything to the effect of who accepts what idea. Just published peer-reviewed articles supportive of ID.

The link I gave has over 50 articles, listing whom, where, and a brief synopsis.

The link you gave is a citation bluff. The guy somehow whittles it down to 12 articles (and not even the latest ones) because they apparently were not peer-enough to him, and then even among those 12 is admitting that they were peer-reviewed. Of course, he and others disagrees with them (no duh), and that seems to be his point. So it really comes down to his opinion that the articles are either not REALLY peer-reviewed, or they don't specifically say ID in them.

p.s. - It was revealing to notice that the first comments in that article pretty much disputed at least one of the contentions he had on one of the listed articles. Even though it doesn't seem that the author of the comment supports the ID articles, even he could see the bias.

my interpretation of the link you provided...

they asked for peer reviewed scientific journal materials in support of intelligent design right?

From Discovery:

We provide below an annotated bibliography of technical publications of various kinds that support, develop or apply the theory of intelligent design. The articles are grouped according to the type of publication.

Scientific Publications Supportive of Intelligent Design Published in Peer-Reviewed Scientific Journals, Conference Proceedings, or Academic Anthologies

This means, that they can throw around the "peer reviewed" phrase as much as they like (which they do in the opening explanation) and only provide maybe 1 or 2 of the actual "peer reviewed scientific journals". It seems like a marketing gimmick/trap right off the bat. And surprise surprise!!

Instead of being academic and simply GIVING us the full articles, what is there instead?

Lets just look at the first article mentioned (the theme is universal in all of the selected material)

Joseph A. Kuhn, “Dissecting Darwinism,” Baylor University Medical Center Proceedings, Vol. 25(1): 41-47 (2012).

PEER REVIEWED? YES. RELEVANT AS SUPPORT FOR ID? NO. They pick and choose, ignore most of the content, and then extrapolate how its 'scientific evidence'
for ID. So what theyve cleverly done, is given us a peer reviewed article, that has nothing to do with what they claim. If you actually READ that article...

Hence, the purpose of this paper is to review the arguments that have been leveled against the concept of evolution as proposed by Charles Darwin and John Hunter, surgeon and biologist extraordinaire.

closes with

In this dissection of Darwinism, we have cut into the weaknesses of the fossil evidence for human evolution, the failure of the fossil data to demonstrate substantial transition species, and the awareness of the sudden formation of most species in a short window of time, with no signifi cant subsequent variation. More importantly, this physician-perspective article emphasizes the extreme impossibility of the natural formation or self-formation of billions of nucleotides in a specifi c sequence, allowing for the coding of RNA and proteins in a complex cell with thousands of interrelated and irreducibly complex functions. Th e article also
enlightens the reader regarding the confl icts and diffi culty of using natural selection and mutation to explain the simultaneous or sequential changes in cellular DNA, involving entirely new strands of DNA and thousands of new proteins, which are necessary for the formation of new species.

hell i even TRIED to be a devils advocate, and searched the article for "design" and "intelligent design"...how many results landed in the bulk of the article? 0.


Bottomline to me: addressing the fallacies and holes in Darwin's theory =/= evidence for intelligent design. Because the truth is, YES OF COURSE, we have an abundance of new material, insight, and research Darwin could never have dreamed of. But I fail to see how this equates to proof of intelligent design.

and at the very bottom of the page...

Articles Supportive of Intelligent Design Published in Peer-Reviewed Philosophy Journals, or Peer-Reviewed Philosophy Books Supportive of Intelligent Design

Michael C. Rea, World without Design : The Ontological Consequences of Naturalism (Oxford University Press, 2004).

William Lane Craig, “Design and the Anthropic Fine-Tuning of the Universe,” in God and Design: The Teleological Argument and Modern Science, pp. 155-177. (Neil Manson ed., London: Routledge, 2003).

Michael Behe, “Reply to my Critic: A Response to Reviews of Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution,” Biology and Philosophy, Vol. 16, 685–709, (2001).

In this article published in the mainstream journal Biology and Philosophy, Michael Behe defends his views supporting intelligent design as stated Darwin’s Black Box.

Del Ratzsch, Nature, Design, and Science: The Status of Design in Natural Science (State University of New York Press, 2001).

William Lane Craig, “The Anthropic Principle,” in The History of Science and Religion in the Western Tradition: An Encyclopedia, pp. 366-368 (Gary B. Ferngren, general ed., Garland Publishing, 2000).

Michael Behe, “Self-Organization and Irreducibly Complex Systems: A Reply to Shanks and Joplin,” Philosophy of Biology, Vol. 67(1):155-162 (March, 2000).

Michael Behe defends his arguments for irreducible complexity against the criticisms of various Darwinian scientists.

William Lane Craig, “Barrow and Tipler on the Anthropic Principle vs. Divine Design,” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Vol. 38: 389-395 (1988).

William Lane Craig, “God, Creation, and Mr. Davies,” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Vol. 37: 168-175 (1986).

NOW THIS MAKES SENSE!!!

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

A superficial change. You got me. 10,000 years ago, the "designer" created the universe astride a triceratops while eating a maple bacon donut.

Creationism; It's so complicated that God must have done it.
ID; It's so complicated that Intelligent Designer did it.

Same idea, different label.

What if the "designer" of the system is the system itself? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organization

 

[joal0503]

you enjoy wiki articles? I DO TOO!

"Two offshoots of creationism—creation science and intelligent design—are pseudoscience"

So i guess, you are technically right? Not the same thing. would you accept,

"ID is just the bastard child of creationism" ?

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

you enjoy wiki articles? I DO TOO!

"Two offshoots of creationism—creation science and intelligent design—are pseudoscience"

So i guess, you are technically right? Not the same thing. would you accept,

"ID is just the bastard child of creationism" ?

How about what's discussed in the articles as opposed to the fact that both are hosted on Wikipedia?

 

[joal0503]

How about what's discussed in the articles as opposed to the fact that both are hosted on Wikipedia?

i edited, now ill just post it here...

im much more open to an idea like self organization than ID, they are different...ID is explicit about a definite creator/designer...where SO seems a bit more open...

process where some form of global order or coordination arises out of the local interactions between the components of an initially disordered system. This process is spontaneous: it is not directed or controlled by any agent or subsystem inside or outside of the system; however, the laws followed by the process and its initial conditions may have been chosen or caused by an agent.

in fact reading the article now, is sort of turning me on...

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

i edited, now ill just post it here...

im much more open to an idea like self organization than ID, they are different...ID is explicit about a definite creator/designer...where SO seems a bit more open...

Now it's my turn to claim they're one in the same.

in fact reading the article now, is sort of turning me on...

 

[joal0503]

on the surface i am failing to see the connection...but if you could dumb it down for me, id appreciate it

 

[redbaron]

The idea I was commenting on was that 'nothing appears designed'. I was just pointing out Dawkins statement to the contrary.

Firstly, thank you for admitting that you were quote-mining Dawkins by removing his point from its intended context entirely. At least we can agree on that. However me responding to this by clarifying the intended context of the comment that you removed it from, is not a Straw Man.

However you are again, misunderstanding.

The comment that biology is complex and thus appears designed is aimed directly at people like you. People who won't see the point that, yes it appears designed - when you don't understand the concepts.

This is really what is being implied. When the complexity is understood, it is no longer apparent that there is a likely designer. It's an amusing irony of the statement that those who see the complexity won't find it insulting because they're knowledgeable, yet neither will those who misunderstand it, because they're ignorant.

In any case, even if you did manage to disprove SpaceYeti's point about nothing appearing designed, that's really all you'd be doing - disproving SpaceYeti's opinions. It really wouldn't have any bearing on the hundreds (thousands?) of peer-reviewed articles ciontaining supporting evidence for evolution.

Considering the ridiculous amount of peer-reviewed information available for any proponent of ID to refute, if you really did want to make a point you could just set about debunking one of those instead.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

on the surface i am failing to see the connection...but if you could dumb it down for me, id appreciate it

Spoiler

 

[joal0503]

Spoiler

See this makes sense. Nature acts as the agent of design? To me this is good stuff...could i say its the explanation of ' intelligent design ', but detaching itself from the traditional religious dogma? sort of like a dirty pagan outlook on things?

i really have no clue.

 

[SpaceYeti]

This makes me wonder if you even read what is linked in these discussions, either by others or even yourself.

Your contention was that there were no peer-reviewed articles. Not on whether most people agree with them, or even if the peer-reviewers agree with them, or anything to the effect of who accepts what idea. Just published peer-reviewed articles supportive of ID.

The link I gave has over 50 articles, listing whom, where, and a brief synopsis.

The link you gave is a citation bluff. The guy somehow whittles it down to 12 articles (and not even the latest ones) because they apparently were not peer-enough to him, and then even among those 12 is admitting that they were peer-reviewed. Of course, he and others disagrees with them (no duh), and that seems to be his point. So it really comes down to his opinion that the articles are either not REALLY peer-reviewed, or they don't specifically say ID in them.

p.s. - It was revealing to notice that the first comments in that article pretty much disputed at least one of the contentions he had on one of the listed articles. Even though it doesn't seem that the author of the comment supports the ID articles, even he could see the bias.

Explain to me why someone needs to waste their time proving that every single one of those references are not a peer-reviewed article on Intelligent Design when some of them are not. The page claims all of them are peer reviewed, why should I trust them that any of them are when all the ones I looked into are not? Or, rather, none of them are PR article about ID published in a respected journal, anyway.

If you were looking through a sword collector's collection of swords, and he makes the claim that all of his swords are "battle-ready", yet you examine twelve in a row and they're all decorative pieces, then do you trust him that the rest are? When you point out that none of those twelve swords are battle ready, he says "You didn't look at all of them!" instead of pointing out specifically which ones are, do you trust him? The burden of prrof is his. It's not your job to prove him wrong, it's his job to prove himself right.

Basically, take from that list the ones that are;
1) Peer-reviewed scientific articles published in a respected journal.
2) About intelligent design

Show those ones to me, not the ones which are not that. When you do that, I'll look at them, but pointing me at a haystack and saying there's some needles in it, well, I don't give a shit. Show me the needles. Put up or shut up. Burden of proof is on the one making the claim.