Category: Complex Specified Information
How can we measure specified complexity?
| August 10, 2017 | Posted by News under Complex Specified Information, Intelligent Design, Irreducible Complexity |
A friend asked about this common intelligent design concept. Specified complexity, also called complex specified information (CSI): Life shows evidence of complex, aperiodic, and specified information in its key functional macromolecules, and the only other example we know of such function-specifying complex information are artifacts designed by intelligent agents. A chance origin of life would exceed […]
Design Disquisitions: Design & the Problem of Intelligibility
| June 16, 2017 | Posted by Joshua G under Back to Basics of ID, Complex Specified Information, Design inference, ID, Intelligent Design, Philosophy, Science |
Many critics of intelligent design argue that not only is ID false (or at least unscientific), but that it is basically meaningless. Such lines of criticism come from philosophers such as Sahotra Sarkar and Elliott Sober. They argue that the general concepts that are assumed in ID discussions like ‘design’ and ‘intelligence’ are too primitive and […]
Confusing Probability: The “Every-Sequence-Is-Equally-Improbable” Argument
| June 4, 2017 | Posted by Eric Anderson under Complex Specified Information, Design inference, Information, Intelligent Design, Mathematics, Probability |
Note to Readers: The past few days on this thread there has been tremendous activity and much discussion about the concept of probability. I had intended to post this OP months ago, but found it still in my drafts folder yesterday mostly, but not quite fully, complete. In the interest of highlighting a couple of the issues […]
FFT: Antikythera, Paley, Crick, Axe, the “first computer” claim and the design inference on sign
| May 31, 2017 | Posted by kairosfocus under Back to Basics of ID, Darwinist rhetorical tactics, Design inference, Functionally Specified Complex Information & Organization, Selective Hyperskepticism |
The Antikythera mechanism is a fascinating object (thanks, EA . . . ), one that is often called the “first” [Analogue] Computer. It was recovered from a Roman shipwreck (likely c. 50 – 80 BC) near the island of that name, and the origin of the mechanism has been a challenge ever since a key observation […]
Design Disquisitions: Peter S. Williams on Intelligent Design
| May 22, 2017 | Posted by Joshua G under Audio, Biology, Complex Specified Information, Darwinism, Design inference, Evolution, Food for thought, ID, Irreducible Complexity, Naturalism, Origin Of Life, Philosophy, Podcasts, Science |
In the latest post at Design Disquisitions I focus on the excellent work on ID by British philosopher Peter S. Williams. He has published several papers, and has many high quality articles and media presentations on the subject. His work was instrumental in initiating my change of mind from theistic neo-Darwinism to design. Highly recommended stuff! Peter […]
Design Disquisitions: A Dialogue Between Peter S. Williams & Denis Alexander
| April 23, 2017 | Posted by Joshua G under Biology, Christian Darwinism, Complex Specified Information, Darwinism, Design inference, Food for thought, ID, Intelligent Design, Irreducible Complexity, Philosophy |
Selensky, Shallit, & Koza vs artificial life simulations
It’s always a pleasure to host Dr Selensky’s thoughtful contributions. Here, he tackles the subject of artificial life simulations and the implications of modelling environments, assumptions, algorithms etc: ____________________________ On Modelling Spontaneous Emergence of Programs and Their Evolutionary Self-Improvement Evgeny Selensky Some time ago, I left a comment on Jeffrey Shallit’s blog. We exchanged a […]
FFT: TJG ponders the design inference- objecting mindset
. . . through a case in point: >>tjguyApril 12, 2017 at 2:28 am rvb8 @2 Thank god (heh:), the obvious has been consigned to the rubbish bin of understanding, and we now prefer evidence, experimentation, and the unobvious, to the vacuous, empty, ‘obvious’. What is the problem with this way of thinking? He just […]
Programming by Accident – The Darwinian Paradigm
| April 5, 2017 | Posted by Eric Anderson under Complex Specified Information, Darwinism, Engineering, Evolutionary biology, Information |
The last couple of days I have spent too much time trying to rescue a hard drive. This drive was intended for a Windows 10 system, but it would not appear anywhere in utilities. BIOS could recognize it was plugged in, but that was it. Nothing in Explorer, nothing in Disk Management, not even in […]
GP on the Origin of Body Plans [OoBP] challenge
. . . here (at 194) in his amazing engineering thread as he responds to Dionisio: >>Dionisio: Thank you for summarizing that interesting discussion. I will summarize it even more. 1) Nobody knows how morphogenesis is controlled and guided. 2) Moran is no exception to that. 3) “Experts” are no exception to that. 4) However, […]
RVB8 and the refusal to mark the difference between description and invention
| March 3, 2017 | Posted by kairosfocus under Back to Basics of ID, Darwinist rhetorical tactics, Functionally Specified Complex Information & Organization, Selective Hyperskepticism |
. . . (of the concept, functionally specific, complex organisation and associated information, FSCO/I) Sometimes, a longstanding objector here at UD — such as RVB8 — inadvertently reveals just how weak the objections to the design inference are by persistently clinging to long since cogently answered objections. This phenomenon of ideology triumphing over evident reality […]
UD Guest Post: Dr Eugen S on the second law of thermodynamics (plus . . . ) vs. “evolution”
Our Physicist and Computer Scientist from Russia — and each element of that balance is very relevant — is back, with more. MOAR, in fact. This time, he tackles the “terror-fitted depths” of thermodynamics and biosemiotics. (NB: Those needing a backgrounder may find an old UD post here and a more recent one here, helpful.) […]
A Tutorial on Specified Complexity
| December 2, 2016 | Posted by johnnyb under Complex Specified Information, ID Foundations, Intelligent Design, Video |
I’ve found that a lot of people who are interested in Intelligent Design are nonetheless unaware of the mathematics behind it. Therefore, I decided to do some videos teaching the basic ideas.
BTB: Points to ponder as we look at Crick’s understanding of DNA as text, since March 19, 1953
A few days back, I headlined a clip from Crick’s letter to his son Michael, March 19, 1953: The main text is accessible here (with page scans). Sans diagrams: >>My Dear Michael, Jim Watson and I have probably made a most important discovery. We have built a model for the structure of des-oxy-ribose-nucleic-acid (read it […]
Fixing a Confusion
| November 30, 2016 | Posted by johnnyb under Complex Specified Information, Darwinism, ID Foundations, Intelligent Design |
I have often noticed something of a confusion on one of the major points of the Intelligent Design movement – whether or not the design inference is primarily based on the failure of Darwinism and/or mechanism.
The e-YES Joke shows the power of manipulative framing in rhetoric, media and persuasion
This weekend, someone shared the e-YES joke now making the rounds with me, and I found it on YouTube: embedded by Embedded VideoYouTube Direkt It seems to be just a prank at first, but on a second look, it shows us how framing distorts perceptions and is potentially quite manipulative. As we consider the various […]
BTB, Q: Where does the FSCO/I concept come from? (Is it reasonable/ credible?)
A: One of the old sayings of WW II era bomber pilots was that flak gets heaviest over a sensitive target. So, when something as intuitively obvious and easily demonstrated as configuration-based, functionally specific complex organisation and/or associated (explicit or implicit) information — FSCO/I — becomes a focus for objections, that is an implicit sign […]
BTB, Q: Why all of this fuss about specific functionality and FSCO/I, when we already have CSI?
A: Of course, this was long since answered in Dembski’s No Free Lunch, but many (especially those who draw their understanding of ID from what ruthlessly manipulative objectors have to say) will not be familiar with what he has long since said on record. So, let’s clip and highlight, as foundational: >>p. 148:“The great myth […]
BTB, Bob O’H vs the trillion-member observational base of FSCO/I and the design inference on reliable sign
It seems we need more back to basis by us deplorable lightweight ID-iots, again. Here, Bob O’H refuses to take the trillion member case observational base that functionally specific complex organisation and/or associated information [FSCO/I for short] is a reliable sign of intelligently directed configuration as key causal factor. Accordingly, in the answering ID is […]
BTB, RVB8 vs deplorably “lazy” ID-iots who “deny science” and insist on trying to “detect a designer”
UD News’ Walking dead thread offers an opportunity to address some common talking points and/or assumptions of many objectors to design. In this case, I replied to some key claims by RVB8, at 21 in the thread: [KF, 21:] >>I see your intended sting in the tail at 18 above: Actual experiments to detect a […]
