Could newly hatched pterosaurs fly?

Seversky, since your straw-man version of god apparently does not like country and western, perhaps your imagination, OOPS I meant he, might like this song instead? (the song is even, somewhat strangely, related to the fact that the fossil record itself gives witness to God)

RATTLE! | Official Lyric Video | Elevation Worship https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrAdbH28gIg John 1:4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.

bornagain77

Seversky, so your straw-man version of god, that you have constructed in your own imagination, and who apparently does not like country and western music, would never allow extinctions?

Psalm 104: 27-30 All creatures look to you to give them their food at the proper time. When you give it to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are satisfied with good things. When you hide your face, they are terrified; when you take away their breath, they die and return to the dust. When you send your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground.

bornagain77

Bornagain77/73

Blake Shelton – God’s Country (Live from The Soundstage Sessions) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onFl2ILiYkY

Blake Shelton? Well, I suppose it makes sense for that part of the country and western community that pictures God as someone like Uncle Jesse from The Dukes of Hazzard The fossil record paints a picture of a whole lot of extinctions, which is hard to square with an omniscient, omnipotent deity. Describing it as incompetent is putting it mildly. Seversky

As the fossil record itself testifies, the whole world, and its entire history, is "God's Country"!

Blake Shelton - God’s Country (Live from The Soundstage Sessions) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onFl2ILiYkY

bornagain77

In regards to the fossil record, JVL tries to get around the very embarrassing fact that the fossil record has only gotten worse for Darwinists since Darwin's day, and that the fossil recored is, basically, completely upside-down from what Darwin predicted,,, ,,, As James W. Valentine stated, ” It’s as if the phyla were created first and they were modified into classes and we see that the number of classes peak later than the number of phyla and the number of orders peak later than that. So it’s kind of a top down succession, you start with this basic body plans, the phyla, and you diversify them into classes, the major sub-divisions of the phyla, and these into orders and so on. So the fossil record is kind of backwards from what you would expect from in that sense from what you would expect from Darwin’s ideas.”

“Darwin had a lot of trouble with the fossil record because if you look at the record of phyla in the rocks as fossils why when they first appear we already see them all. The phyla are fully formed. It’s as if the phyla were created first and they were modified into classes and we see that the number of classes peak later than the number of phyla and the number of orders peak later than that. So it’s kind of a top down succession, you start with this basic body plans, the phyla, and you diversify them into classes, the major sub-divisions of the phyla, and these into orders and so on. So the fossil record is kind of backwards from what you would expect from in that sense from what you would expect from Darwin’s ideas.” James W. Valentine – as quoted from “On the Origin of Phyla: Interviews with James W. Valentine” – (as stated at 1:16:36 mark of video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtdFJXfvlm8 Jerry Coyne’s Chapter on the Fossil Record Fails to Show “Why Evolution is True” – Jonathan M. – December 4, 2012 Excerpt: Erwin et al. (1987), in their study of marine invertebrates, similarly conclude that, “The fossil record suggests that the major pulse of diversification of phyla occurs before that of classes, classes before that of orders, orders before that of families. The higher taxa do not seem to have diverged through an accumulation of lower taxa.” http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/12/jerry_coynes_c067021.html Erwin and Valentine’s The Cambrian Explosion Affirms Major Points in Darwin’s Doubt: The Cambrian Enigma Is “Unresolved” – June 26, 2013 Excerpt: “In other words, the morphological distances — gaps — between body plans of crown phyla were present when body fossils first appeared during the explosion and have been with us ever since. The morphological disparity is so great between most phyla that the homologous reference points or landmarks required for quantitative studies of morphology are absent.” Erwin and Valentine (p. 340) http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/06/erwin_valentine_cambrian_explosion073671.html

JVL tried to get around that very embarrassing 'upside-down' falsification of Darwin's theory by claiming that the fossil record is severely incomplete. But we now know, via the 'collector's curve', that the fossil record is far more complete than Darwinists have long tried to claim. As paleontologist Gunter Bechly explains in the following video, because of the ‘collector’s curve’ we now know for a fact that the fossil record is far more ‘complete’ in its representation of fossils than Darwinists pretend.

How complete is the current fossil record and what does that tell us about the theory of evolution? Gunter Bechly – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCam4z1Ic9w&index=9&t=1s&list=PLtAP1KN7ahiZ80ClsWz-IAmP_fWHpqWar

And as the following paper states, “we find that completeness (of the fossil record) is rather high for many animal groups.”

Absolute measures of the completeness of the fossil record. – Foote M1, Sepkoski JJ Jr. – 1999 Excerpt: These measurements are nonetheless highly correlated, with outliers quite explicable, and we find that completeness (of the fossil record) is rather high for many animal groups. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11536900

With the ‘collector’s curve’, we find that the more fossils that we collect, then the more they fall into preexisting groups, and the less they ‘surprise’ us. Thus strongly suggesting that we have a fairly complete picture of the overall fossil record, since the discovery of outliers is now few and far between Moreover, we also now know, since sponge embryos were preserved in the pre-Cambrian, that conditions were far more favorable for fossils to form than Darwinists had presupposed within their 'missing fossils' hypothesis.

Dr. Stephen Meyer: Darwin's Dilemma - The Significance of Sponge Embryos - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPs8E7y0ySs Deepening Darwin’s Dilemma – Jonathan Wells – Sept. 2009 Excerpt: “The truth is that (finding) “exceptionally preserved microbes” from the late Precambrian actually deepen Darwin’s dilemma, because they suggest that if there had been ancestors to the Cambrian phyla they would have been preserved.” http://www.discovery.org/a/12471

Thus, JVL's appeal to 'missing fossils', (to try to 'explain away' the very embarrassing fact that the fossil record is, basically, completely upside-down from what Darwin's theory predicts), is found to fall apart under scrutiny.

1 Thessalonians 5:21 but test all things. Hold fast to what is good.

bornagain77

Of supplemental note as to the primacy of the randomness postulate within Darwinian thinking,,, “CHANCE ALONE,” the Nobel Prize-winning chemist Jacques Monod once wrote, “is at the source of every innovation, of all creation in the biosphere. Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, is at the very root of the stupendous edifice of creation.”

“It necessarily follows that chance alone is at the source of every innovation, and of all creation in the biosphere. Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, at the very root of the stupendous edifice of evolution: this central concept of modern biology is no longer one among many other possible or even conceivable hypotheses. It is today the sole conceivable hypothesis, the only one that squares with observed and tested fact. And nothing warrants the supposition – or the hope – that on this score our position is ever likely to be revised. There is no scientific concept, in any of the sciences, more destructive of anthropocentrism than this one.” Jacques Monod, Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of Modern Biology

Since mutations to DNA are now known, in the vast majority of instance, to not be truly random, i.e. "absolutely free but blind", in the sense that Jacques Monod claimed,, Darwinists will often respond to this (very) inconvenient falsification of their theory by claiming that mutations are only held to be random with regard to fitness, i.e. to the needs of the individual, (as if that claim gets them out of the severe jam they have with this core falsification to their theory), but even their claim that mutations are only held to be random with regard to fitness, i.e. to the needs of the individual, is now known to be a false claim in and of itself.

(False) Prediction of Darwinism – Mutations are not adaptive – Cornelius Hunter In the twentieth century, the theory of evolution predicted that mutations are not adaptive or directed. In other words, mutations were believed to be random with respect to the needs of the individual. As Julian Huxley put it, “Mutation merely provides the raw material of evolution; it is a random affair, and takes place in all directions. … in all cases they are random in relation to evolution. Their effects are not related to the needs of the organisms.” (Huxley, 36) Or as Jacques Monod explained: “chance alone is at the source of every innovation, of all creation in the biosphere. Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, at the very root of the stupendous edifice of evolution: this central concept of modern biology is no longer one among other possible or even conceivable hypotheses. It is today the sole conceivable hypothesis, the only one that squares with observed and tested fact. And nothing warrants the supposition—or the hope—that on this score our position is likely ever to be revised.” (Monod, 112) Ronald Fisher wrote that mutations are “random with respect to the organism’s need” (Orr). This fundamental prediction persisted for decades as a recent paper explained: “mutation is assumed to create heritable variation that is random and undirected.” (Chen, Lowenfeld and Cullis) But that assumption is now known to be false. The first problem is that the mutation rate is adaptive. For instance, when a population of bacteria is subjected to harsh conditions it tends to increase its mutation rate. It is as though a signal has been sent saying, “It is time to adapt.” Also, a small fraction of the population increases its mutation rates even higher yet. These hypermutators ensure that an even greater variety of adaptive change is explored. (Foster) Experiments have also discovered that duplicated DNA segments may be subject to higher mutation rates. Since the segment is a duplicate it is less important to preserve and, like a test bed, appears to be used to experiment with new designs. (Wright) The second problem is that organisms use strategies to direct the mutations according to the threat. Adaptive mutations have been extensively studied in bacteria. Experiments typically alter the bacteria food supply or apply some other environmental stress causing mutations that target the specific environmental stress. (Burkala, et. al.; Moxon, et. al; Wright) Adaptive mutations have also been observed in yeast (Fidalgo, et. al.; David, et. al.) and flax plants. (Johnson, Moss and Cullis) One experiment found repeatable mutations in flax in response to fertilizer levels. (Chen, Schneeberger and Cullis) Another exposed the flax to four different growth conditions and found that environmental stress can induce mutations that result in “sizeable, rapid, adaptive evolutionary responses.” (Chen, Lowenfeld and Cullis) In response to this failed prediction some evolutionists now are saying that evolution somehow created the mechanisms that cause mutations to be adaptive. https://sites.google.com/site/darwinspredictions/mutations-are-not-adaptive

bornagain77

JVL, in regards to Random vs. directed mutations, perhaps you should, in the interest of intellectual integrity, have addressed my strongest pieces of evidence, (Shapiro and JohnnyB) instead of trying to find a work-a-around for Darwin's theory from my weakest piece of evidence, i.e. from the Edge article? In fact, since you are into mathematics, I suggest you try JohnnyB's video,

A Tour Of Directed Mutations – November 23, 2021 – johnnyb – video https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/a-tour-of-directed-mutations/

Moreover, in regards to the Darwinian presupposition of randomness in general, there is now known to be far less randomness, specifically far less 'random thermodynamic jostling', in cells and proteins than was first presupposed by Darwinists. In the following 1998 article, Bruce Alberts, who was a two time president of the National Academy of Sciences, stated that “We have always underestimated cells.”,,, “But at least we are no longer as naïve as we were when I was a graduate student in the 1960s.”,,, “instead of a cell dominated by randomly colliding individual protein molecules, we now know that nearly every major process in a cell is carried out by assemblies of 10 or more protein molecules.”

“We have always underestimated cells. Undoubtedly we still do today. But at least we are no longer as naïve as we were when I was a graduate student in the 1960s. Then, most of us viewed cells as containing a giant set of second-order reactions: molecules A and B were thought to diffuse freely, randomly colliding with each other to produce molecule AB — and likewise for the many other molecules that interact with each other inside a cell. This seemed reasonable because, as we had learned from studying physical chemistry, motions at the scale of molecules are incredibly rapid. Consider an enzyme, for example. If its substrate molecule is present at a concentration of 0.5mM,which is only one substrate molecule for every 105 water molecules, the enzyme’s active site will randomly collide with about 500,000 molecules of substrate per second. And a typical globular protein will be spinning to and fro, turning about various axes at rates corresponding to a million rotations per second. But, as it turns out, we can walk and we can talk because the chemistry that makes life possible is much more elaborate and sophisticated than anything we students had ever considered. Proteins make up most of the dry mass of a cell. But instead of a cell dominated by randomly colliding individual protein molecules, we now know that nearly every major process in a cell is carried out by assemblies of 10 or more protein molecules. And, as it carries out its biological functions, each of these protein assemblies interacts with several other large complexes of proteins. Indeed, the entire cell can be viewed as a factory that contains an elaborate network of interlocking assembly lines, each of which is composed of a set of large protein machines.” – Bruce Alberts, “The Cell as a Collection of Protein Machines: Preparing the Next Generation of Molecular Biologists,” Cell, 92 (February 6, 1998): 291-294) https://brucealberts.ucsf.edu/publications/BAPub157.pdf Editor-in-Chief of Science (2009-2013). Dr Alberts served two six-year terms as the president of the National Academy of Sciences

And even though Dr. Alberts wrote that article 24 years ago in 1998, Darwinists, because of the ‘randomness’ presupposition held within their reductive materialistic framework, are still very much reluctant to let go of their belief that the cell is “dominated by randomly colliding individual protein molecules”. To clearly illustrate this 'reluctance' on the part of Darwinists, I first have to back up to 2006. In 2006 Harvard University, via a production company called “BioVisions”, made a video entitled The Inner Life of the Cell

The Inner Life of the Cell http://www.xvivo.net/animation/the-inner-life-of-the-cell/

The 2006 video by Harvard BioVisions was one of the first videos on the web that animated some of the amazing molecular machines that are now being found in cells. As you can see, the overwhelming impression of the intelligent design of the cell literally leaps out of the video at you. And in 2013, apparently trying to undo the damage that was done to Darwinian thinking by their original 2006 video, Harvard BioVisions then made a subsequent video entitled 'Inner Life of the Cell: Protein Packing'.

Inner Life of a Cell | Protein Packing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHeTQLNFTgU

As you can see, Harvard Biovisions, in their 2013 video, tried to make the inner workings of the cell look as random, chaotic, haphazard, as "Darwinian" as possible so as to try to dispel any impression of intelligent design in the cell that they had inadvertently created in their first video. In fact, in 2014, the New York Times itself ran an article on the 2013 Harvard Biovisions 'Protein Packing' video. In that article Carl Zimmer stated that ' “In the 2006 version, we can’t help seeing intention in the smooth movements of the molecules” but of the 2013 video he said that the molecules of the cell 'flail blindly in the crowd.” And that “Our cells work almost in spite of themselves.'

Watch Proteins Do the Jitterbug - Carl Zimmer - APRIL 10, 2014 Excerpt: In the 2006 version, we can’t help seeing intention in the smooth movements of the molecules; it’s as if they’re trying to get from one place to another. In reality, however, the parts of our cells don’t operate with the precise movements of the springs and gears of a clock. They flail blindly in the crowd. Our cells work almost in spite of themselves. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/10/science/watch-proteins-do-the-jitterbug.html

Thus, even though Bruce Alberts himself. all the way back in 1998, had largely dispelled the myth that the cell was “dominated by randomly colliding individual protein molecules”, none-the-less, Darwinists as late as 2014, motivated primarily by their bias against Intelligent Design, were still widely disseminating the false claim that the cell was “dominated by randomly colliding individual protein molecules”. Yet, regardless of their overt bias against anyone ‘inadvertently’ seeing Intelligent Design in the cell, the fact of the matter is that we now have several lines of evidence firmly establishing the fact that the cell is not nearly as random and haphazard in its makeup as Darwinists have erroneously presupposed, For the sake of brevity I will list only one piece of evidence at this time. The following article on human vision states that, “Research,, has shown that humans can detect the presence of a single photon, the smallest measurable unit of light”.,,, “it is remarkable: a photon, the smallest physical entity with quantum properties of which light consists, is interacting with a biological system consisting of billions of cells, all in a warm and wet environment,”,, and the researched added, “The response that the photon generates survives all the way to the level of our awareness despite the ubiquitous background noise. Any man-made detector would need to be cooled and isolated from noise to behave the same way.”,,, “What we want to know next is how does a biological system achieve such sensitivity? How does it achieve this in the presence of noise?”

Study suggests humans can detect even the smallest units of light – July 21, 2016 Excerpt: Research,, has shown that humans can detect the presence of a single photon, the smallest measurable unit of light. Previous studies had established that human subjects acclimated to the dark were capable only of reporting flashes of five to seven photons.,,, it is remarkable: a photon, the smallest physical entity with quantum properties of which light consists, is interacting with a biological system consisting of billions of cells, all in a warm and wet environment,” says Vaziri. “The response that the photon generates survives all the way to the level of our awareness despite the ubiquitous background noise. Any man-made detector would need to be cooled and isolated from noise to behave the same way.”,,, The gathered data from more than 30,000 trials demonstrated that humans can indeed detect a single photon incident on their eye with a probability significantly above chance. “What we want to know next is how does a biological system achieve such sensitivity? How does it achieve this in the presence of noise?” http://phys.org/news/2016-07-humans-smallest.html

If a cell were really dominated by randomly colliding individual protein molecules, as Darwinists had originally, and erroneously, presupposed within their materialistic framework, detecting a single photon should be, by all rights, impossible for humans. Moreover, as the preceding article strongly hints at, the only way it is possible for humans to detect a single photon is if life, cells, proteins, etc.., are, in fact, based on quantum principles instead of being based on classical principles as is wrongly held within the materialistic framework of Darwinian evolution. As Jim Al-Khalili explains in the following video, since Biologists have, by and large, neglected to even take quantum mechanics into consideration, and are still, basically, operating under a classical framework, Darwinian Biologists are, for all intents and purposes, not even on the correct theoretical foundation in order to properly understand biology in the first place.

Jim Al-Khalili, at the 2:30 minute mark of the following video states, ",, Physicists and Chemists have had a long time to try and get use to it (Quantum Mechanics). Biologists, on the other hand have got off lightly in my view. They are very happy with their balls and sticks models of molecules. The balls are the atoms. The sticks are the bonds between the atoms. And when they can't build them physically in the lab nowadays they have very powerful computers that will simulate a huge molecule.,, It doesn't really require much in the way of quantum mechanics in the way to explain it." At the 6:52 minute mark of the video, Jim Al-Khalili goes on to state: “To paraphrase, (Erwin Schrödinger in his book “What Is Life”), he says at the molecular level living organisms have a certain order. A structure to them that’s very different from the random thermodynamic jostling of atoms and molecules in inanimate matter of the same complexity. In fact, living matter seems to behave in its order and its structure just like inanimate cooled down to near absolute zero. Where quantum effects play a very important role. There is something special about the structure, about the order, inside a living cell. So Schrodinger speculated that maybe quantum mechanics plays a role in life”. Jim Al-Khalili – Quantum biology – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOzCkeTPR3Q

To badly paraphrase Shakespeare's Hamlet, "There are more things in organisms, cells, proteins, etc..,, JVL, than are dreamt of in your materialistic Darwinian philosophy" Supplemental note:

Darwinian Materialism vs. Quantum Biology – Part II - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSig2CsjKbg

Verse:

Mark 8:37 Is anything worth more than your soul?

bornagain77

Bornagain77: So, if I am reading you correctly, you are honestly admitting that Charles Darwin did not get the fossil record right, but instead hold that the fossil record is somehow compatible with current ‘thinking of evolution’? Perhaps you are thinking that Gould’s punctuated equilibrium model somehow explains the fossil record? Let me make an attempt to reply to this as well . . . I think Charles Darwin hoped that the fossil record would be more complete than it is. But the fact that is it spotty is not surprising: If I considered your own history based on the available photographic evidence there would be some large gaps. It's the same with the fossil record and that's to be expected considering the specific set of circumstances that must happen for a dead life form to fossilise. I agree with Dr Dawkins: consider whether or not unguided evolution is true without considering the fossils at all. I agree with him that there is still compelling evidence that the hypothesis is true. Also, looking at what fossils we do have . . . they do not contradict the unguided hypothesis. And, I will agree, they do not contradict the guided hypothesis although I think that conclusion is much more tenuous considering the times when change was clearly slow and incremental. Perhaps we should just set them aside and look at other threads of evidence? I don't have a problem with there being times of rapid and undocumented (unfossilised) change, something like punctuated equilibrium. But the way Dr Gould proposed the idea did not entail any kind of guidance or intervention. JVL

Bornagain77: You have presented a huge amount of commentary and I am finding it a bit daunting even thinking about replying to it all at once. I'll just respond to one source that seemed a bit more sensible: https://www.edge.org/response-detail/25264

While we can't say mutations are random, we can say there is a large chaotic component, just as there is in the throw of a loaded dice. But loaded dice should not be confused with randomness because over the long run—which is the time frame of evolution—the weighted bias will have noticeable consequences. So to be clear: the evidence shows that chance plays a primary role in mutations, and there would be no natural selection without chance. But it is not random chance. It is loaded chance, with multiple constraints, multi-point biases, numerous clustering effects, and skewed distributions.

I don't think that source says what you think it says. But I do find the use of mathematical terms a bit inconsistent in these discussions. If I have the time and the inclination I'll see if I can find a better discussion of how mutations can be 'random' with respect to fitness and yet still more likely to occur at some loci. JVL

Of related interest, and as is intuitively obvious from the 'top down' fossil record itself, the way in which Intelligent Designers implement design into things is drastically different from the unguided 'bottom up' method envisioned by Darwin. Namely, Intelligent Designers implement design into things from the 'top down' rather than from the bottom up.

How Does The World Work: Top-Down or Bottom-Up? - September 29, 2013 Excerpt: To get an handle on how top-down causation works, Ellis focuses on what's in front of all us so much of the time: the computer. Computers are structured systems. They are built as a hierarchy of layers, extending from the wires in the transistors all the way up to the fully assembled machine, gleaming metal case and all. Because of this layering, what happens at the uppermost levels — like you hitting the escape key — flows downward. This action determines the behavior of the lowest levels — like the flow of electrons through the wires — in ways that simply could not be predicted by just knowing the laws of electrons. As Ellis puts it: “Structured systems such as a computer constrain lower level interactions, and thereby paradoxically create new possibilities of complex behavior.” Ellis likes to emphasize how the hierarchy of structure — from fully assembled machine through logic gates, down to transistors — changes everything for the lowly electrons. In particular, it "breaks the symmetry" of their possible behavior since their movements in the computer hardware are very different from what would occur if they were just floating around in a plasma blob in space. But the hardware, of course, is just one piece of the puzzle. This is where things get interesting. As Ellis explains: “Hardware is only causally effective because of the software which animates it: by itself hardware can do nothing. Both hardware and software are hierarchically structured with the higher level logic driving the lower level events.” In other words, it's software at the top level of structure that determines how the electrons at the bottom level flow. Hitting escape while running Word moves the electrons in the wires in different ways than hitting escape does when running Photoshop. This is causation flowing from top to bottom. For Ellis, anything producing causes is real in the most basic sense of the word. Thus the software, which is not physical like the electrons, is just as real as those electrons. As Ellis puts it: “Hence, although they are the ultimate in algorithmic causation as characterized so precisely by Turing, digital computers embody and demonstrate the causal efficacy of non-physical entities. The physics allows this; it does not control what takes place. Computers exemplify the emergence of new kinds of causation out of the underlying physics, not implied by physics but rather by the logic of higher-level possibilities. ... A combination of bottom-up causation and contextual affects (top-down influences) enables their complex functioning.” The consequences of this perspective for our view of the mind are straightforward and radical: “The mind is not a physical entity, but it certainly is causally effective: proof is the existence of the computer on which you are reading this text. It could not exist if it had not been designed and manufactured according to someone's plans, thereby proving the causal efficacy of thoughts, which like computer programs and data are not physical entities.” http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2013/09/29/225359504/how-does-the-world-work-top-down-or-bottom-up Recognising Top-Down Causation - George Ellis Excerpt: Causation: The nature of causation is highly contested territory, and I will take a pragmatic view: Definition 1: Causal Effect If making a change in a quantity X results in a reliable demonstrable change in a quantity Y in a given context, then X has a causal effect on Y. Example: I press the key labelled “A” on my computer keyboard; the letter “A” appears on my computer screen.,,, Definition 2: Existence If Y is a physical entity made up of ordinary matter, and X is some kind of entity that has a demonstrable causal effect on Y as per Definition 1, then we must acknowledge that X also exists (even if it is not made up of such matter). This is clearly a sensible and testable criterion; in the example above, it leads to the conclusion that both the data and the relevant software exist. If we do not adopt this definition, we will have instances of uncaused changes in the world; I presume we wish to avoid that situation.,,, ,,,However there are many topics that one cannot understand by assuming this one-way flow of causation. The flourishing subject of social neuroscience makes clear how social influences act down on individual brain structure[2]; studies in physiology demonstrate that downward causation is necessary in understanding the heart, where this form of causation can be represented as the influences of initial and boundary conditions on the solutions of the differential equations used to represent the lower level processes[3]; epigenetic studies demonstrate that biological development is crucially shaped by the environment[4] What about physics? In this essay I will make the case that top-down causation is also prevalent in physics, even though this is not often recognised as such. This does not occur by violating physical laws; on the contrary, it occurs through the laws of physics, by setting constraints on lower level interactions. Excerpt: page 5: A: Both the program and the data are non-physical entities, indeed so is all software. A program is not a physical thing you can point to, but by Definition 2 it certainly exists. You can point to a CD or flashdrive where it is stored, but that is not the thing in itself: it is a medium in which it is stored. The program itself is an abstract entity, shaped by abstract logic. Is the software “nothing but” its realisation through a specific set of stored electronic states in the computer memory banks? No it is not because it is the precise pattern in those states that matters: a higher level relation that is not apparent at the scale of the electrons themselves. It’s a relational thing (and if you get the relations between the symbols wrong, so you have a syntax error, it will all come to a grinding halt). This abstract nature of software is realised in the concept of virtual machines, which occur at every level in the computer hierarchy except the bottom one [17]. But this tower of virtual machines causes physical effects in the real world, for example when a computer controls a robot in an assembly line to create physical artefacts. Excerpt page 7: The assumption that causation is bottom up only is wrong in biology, in computers, and even in many cases in physics, for example state vector preparation, where top-down constraints allow non-unitary behaviour at the lower levels. It may well play a key role in the quantum measurement problem (the dual of state vector preparation) [5]. One can bear in mind here that wherever equivalence classes of entities play a key role, such as in Crutchfield’s computational mechanics [29], this is an indication that top-down causation is at play.,,, Life and the brain: living systems are highly structured modular hierarchical systems, and there are many similarities to the digital computer case, even though they are not digital computers. The lower level interactions are constrained by network connections, thereby creating possibilities of truly complex behaviour. Top-down causation is prevalent at all levels in the brain: for example it is crucial to vision [24,25] as well as the relation of the individual brain to society [2]. The hardware (the brain) can do nothing without the excitations that animate it: indeed this is the difference between life and death. The mind is not a physical entity, but it certainly is causally effective: proof is the existence of the computer on which you are reading this text. It could not exist if it had not been designed and manufactured according to someone’s plans, thereby proving the causal efficacy of thoughts, which like computer programs and data are not physical entities. https://arxiv.org/pdf/1212.2275.pdf

bornagain77

"So he didn’t get everything exactly right. So what? He’s not the sum total of thinking on evolution as anyone familiar with the field knows." So, if I am reading you correctly, you are honestly admitting that Charles Darwin did not get the fossil record right, but instead hold that the fossil record is somehow compatible with current 'thinking of evolution'? Perhaps you are thinking that Gould's punctuated equilibrium model somehow explains the fossil record? Well, despite the desperate attempt of Gould and others to 'explain away' the 'un-Darwinian' nature of the fossil record with punctuated equilibrium, the fact of the matter is that the fossil record is so un-Darwinian, (in that it is, basically speaking, completely upside down from what Darwin predicted), that even Gould's punctuated equilibrium model fails to 'explain away' why the fossil record is as discordant with Darwin's theory as it is found to be. Specifically, we now know that the fossil record is far worse for Darwin's theory than what even Darwin himself honestly admitted to,

"Consequently, if the theory be true, it is indisputable that, before the lowest Silurian or Cambrian stratum was deposited long periods elapsed, as long as, or probably far longer than, the whole interval from the Cambrian age to the present day; and that during these vast periods the world swarmed with living creatures… To the question why we do not find rich fossiliferous deposits belonging to these assumed earliest periods, I can give no satisfactory answer… The case at present must remain inexplicable; and may be truly urged as a valid argument against the views here entertained." - Charles Darwin - Chapter IX, “On the Imperfection of the Geological Record,” On the Origin of Species, - fifth edition (1869), pp. 378-381.

Specifically, we now know that even more phyla abruptly appeared in the Cambrian explosion than were known about in Darwin's day. As Stephen Meyer noted in the following recent video at the 8:00 minute mark, "The Cambrian Explosion,, has become more explosive"

'The Cambrian Explosion,, has become more explosive" - Stephen Meyer Takes On Darwin's Tree - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXKAMR94-rc

And what makes the Cambrian explosion so explosive, and so 'un-Darwinian, for Darwin's theory is the fact that it is phyla, (which are among the very highest taxonomic categories), that are found to be 'explosively' appearing in the Cambrian explosion without any plausible precursors.

Jerry Coyne's Chapter on the Fossil Record Fails to Show "Why Evolution is True" - Jonathan M. - December 4, 2012 Excerpt: Taxonomists classify organisms into categories: species are the very lowest taxonomic category. Species are classified into different genera. Genera are classified into different families. Families are classified into different orders. Orders are classified into different classes. And classes are classified into different phyla. Phyla are among the very highest taxonomic categories (only kingdom and domain are higher), and correspond to the high level of morphological disparity that exists between different animal body plans. Phyla include such groupings as chordates, arthropods, mollusks, and echinoderms. Darwin's theory would predict a cone of diversity whereby the major body-plan differences (morphological disparity) would only appear in the fossil record following numerous lower-level speciation events. What is interesting about the fossil record is that it shows the appearance of the higher taxonomic categories first (virtually all of the major skeletonized phyla appear in the Cambrian, with no obvious fossil transitional precursors, within a relatively small span of geological time). As Roger Lewin (1988) explains in Science, "Several possible patterns exist for the establishment of higher taxa, the two most obvious of which are the bottom-up and the top-down approaches. In the first, evolutionary novelties emerge, bit by bit. The Cambrian explosion appears to conform to the second pattern, the top-down effect." Erwin et al. (1987), in their study of marine invertebrates, similarly conclude that, "The fossil record suggests that the major pulse of diversification of phyla occurs before that of classes, classes before that of orders, orders before that of families. The higher taxa do not seem to have diverged through an accumulation of lower taxa." Indeed, the existence of numerous small and soft-bodied animals in the Precambrian strata undermines one of the most popular responses that these missing transitions can be accounted for by them being too small and too-soft bodied to be preserved. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/12/jerry_coynes_c067021.html

The sudden appearance of Phyla is simply completely upside-down from what Darwin's theory, or even Gould's punctuated equilibrium models, predicts for the fossil record. As James Valentine explained, "The record of the first appearance of living phyla, classes, and orders can best be described in Wright's (1) term as 'from the top down'."

The Ham-Nye Creation Debate: A Huge Missed Opportunity - Casey Luskin - February 4, 2014 Excerpt: "The record of the first appearance of living phyla, classes, and orders can best be described in Wright's (1) term as 'from the top down'." (James W. Valentine, "Late Precambrian bilaterians: Grades and clades," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 91: 6751-6757 (July 1994).) http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/02/the_ham-nye_deb081911.html

And as Chen Junyuan, one of the world's leading researchers on the Cambria explosion, observed, "Darwin's tree is a reverse cone shape"

Chinese microscopic fossil find challenges Darwin's theory - 11 November, 2014 Excerpt: One of the world's leading researchers on the Cambria explosion is Chen Junyuan from the Nanjing Institute of Palaeontology and he said that his fossil discoveries in China show that "Darwin's tree is a reverse cone shape". A senior research fellow at Chengjiang Fauna [fossil site], said, "I do not believe the animals developed gradually from the bottom up, I think they suddenly appeared". As a medical professional and former atheist, I ignorantly believed that Darwin's evolutionary theory was a scientific fact. The fact is, Darwinism has never been more than an unproven theory,,, http://www.scmp.com/comment/letters/article/1636922/chinese-microscopic-fossil-find-challenges-darwins-theory

Moreover, it is not only the Cambrian explosion where the fossil record is, basically, completely upside-down from what Darwin's theory predicts. The following study which "looked at nearly one hundred fossil groups" that appeared subsequent to Cambrian explosion, found that "This pattern, known as 'early high disparity', turns the traditional V-shaped cone model of evolution on its head."

Scientific study turns understanding about evolution on its head - July 30, 2013 Excerpt: evolutionary biologists,,, looked at nearly one hundred fossil groups to test the notion that it takes groups of animals many millions of years to reach their maximum diversity of form. Contrary to popular belief, not all animal groups continued to evolve fundamentally new morphologies through time. The majority actually achieved their greatest diversity of form (disparity) relatively early in their histories. ,,,Dr Matthew Wills said: "This pattern, known as 'early high disparity', turns the traditional V-shaped cone model of evolution on its head. What is equally surprising in our findings is that groups of animals are likely to show early-high disparity regardless of when they originated over the last half a billion years. This isn't a phenomenon particularly associated with the first radiation of animals (in the Cambrian Explosion), or periods in the immediate wake of mass extinctions.",,, Author Martin Hughes, continued: "Our work implies that there must be constraints on the range of forms within animal groups, and that these limits are often hit relatively early on. Co-author Dr Sylvain Gerber, added: "A key question now is what prevents groups from generating fundamentally new forms later on in their evolution.,,, http://phys.org/news/2013-07-scientific-evolution.html

Thus, despite Gould's attempt to 'explain away' the fossil record with his punctuated equilibrium model, the fact of the matter is that the fossil record is so 'un-Darwinian', and so 'upside-down' from what Darwin predicted, that even Gould's 'punctuated' model is falsified by the 'top-down' nature of the fossil record. Supplemental notes:

Günter Bechly video: Fossil Discontinuities: A Refutation of Darwinism and Confirmation of Intelligent Design - 2018 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7w5QGqcnNs The fossil record is dominated by abrupt appearances of new body plans and new groups of organisms. This conflicts with the gradualistic prediction of Darwinian Evolution. Here 18 explosive origins in the history of life are described, demonstrating that the famous Cambrian Explosion is far from being the exception to the rule. Also the fossil record establishes only very brief windows of time for the origin of complex new features, which creates an ubiquitous waiting time problem for the origin and fixation of the required coordinated mutations. This refutes the viability of the Neo-Darwinian evolutionary process as the single conceivable naturalistic or mechanistic explanation for biological origins, and thus confirms Intelligent Design as the only reasonable alternative. Gunter Bechly Explains What The Fossil Evidence Really Says - video (2021) 16:49 minute mark - Dr. Bechly quotes many leading Darwinian paleontologists who also agree that the fossil record is severely discordant with Darwin's theory. https://youtu.be/V15sjy7gtVM?t=1009

bornagain77

Perhaps, time permitting, I will address the rest of JVL's false counter-claims tomorrow. bornagain77

"You can’t even say it correctly! Yes, most mutations are detrimental or neutral but that has nothing to do with the rate of mutations." You are correct JVL, for clarity I should have instead said, "the ratio of detrimental to beneficial mutations is overwhelmingly detrimental,,, " But regardless of my poor word choice, and despite you trying to hand wave this finding off as being no big deal for Darwinism, this finding is still simply devastating to Darwin's theory. First off, to clear up any Darwinian misconceptions, there are strong theoretical reasons for believing that there are very few, if any, truly 'neutral' mutations as Darwinists believe.

“Moreover, there is strong theoretical reasons for believing there is no truly neutral nucleotide positions. By its very existence, a nucleotide position takes up space, affects spacing between other sites, and affects such things as regional nucleotide composition, DNA folding, and nucleosome building. If a nucleotide carries absolutely no (useful) information, it is, by definition, slightly deleterious, as it slows cell replication and wastes energy.,, Therefore, there is no way to change any given site without some biological effect, no matter how subtle.” – John Sanford – Genetic Entropy and The Mystery of The Genome – pg. 21 – Inventor of the ‘Gene Gun’ (among many other accomplishments)

Secondly, 'It is almost universally acknowledged that beneficial mutations are rare compared to deleterious mutations'

Multiple Overlapping Genetic Codes Profoundly Reduce the Probability of Beneficial Mutation George Montañez 1, Robert J. Marks II 2, Jorge Fernandez 3 and John C. Sanford 4 - May 2013 Excerpt: It is almost universally acknowledged that beneficial mutations are rare compared to deleterious mutations [1–10].,, It appears that beneficial mutations may be too rare to actually allow the accurate measurement of how rare they are [11]. 1. Kibota T, Lynch M (1996) Estimate of the genomic mutation rate deleterious to overall fitness in E. coli . Nature 381:694–696. 2. Charlesworth B, Charlesworth D (1998) Some evolutionary consequences of deleterious mutations. Genetica 103: 3–19. 3. Elena S, et al (1998) Distribution of fitness effects caused by random insertion mutations in Escherichia coli. Genetica 102/103: 349–358. 4. Gerrish P, Lenski R N (1998) The fate of competing beneficial mutations in an asexual population. Genetica 102/103:127–144. 5. Crow J (2000) The origins, patterns, and implications of human spontaneous mutation. Nature Reviews 1:40–47. 6. Bataillon T (2000) Estimation of spontaneous genome-wide mutation rate parameters: whither beneficial mutations? Heredity 84:497–501. 7. Imhof M, Schlotterer C (2001) Fitness effects of advantageous mutations in evolving Escherichia coli populations. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 98:1113–1117. 8. Orr H (2003) The distribution of fitness effects among beneficial mutations. Genetics 163: 1519–1526. 9. Keightley P, Lynch M (2003) Toward a realistic model of mutations affecting fitness. Evolution 57:683–685. 10. Barrett R, et al (2006) The distribution of beneficial mutation effects under strong selection. Genetics 174:2071–2079. 11. Bataillon T (2000) Estimation of spontaneous genome-wide mutation rate parameters: whither beneficial mutations? Heredity 84:497–501. http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/pdf/10.1142/9789814508728_0006

Moreover, as if that was not bad enough, it is also interesting to note that virtually all, (if not all), of the mutations that Darwinists have classified as being beneficial are only beneficial in a very narrow sense of increasing reproduction and/or fitness, but, in reality, that these supposedly beneficial mutations gain their beneficial effect by breaking something at the molecular level, (i.e. by losing biological information). As Dr. Michael Behe notes, it is now found that “even the great majority of helpful mutations degrade the genome to a greater or lesser extent.,,”

“The First Rule of Adaptive Evolution”: Break or blunt any functional coded element whose loss would yield a net fitness gain – Michael Behe – December 2010 Excerpt: In its most recent issue The Quarterly Review of Biology has published a review by myself of laboratory evolution experiments of microbes going back four decades.,,, The gist of the paper is that so far the overwhelming number of adaptive (that is, helpful) mutations seen in laboratory evolution experiments are either loss or modification of function. Of course we had already known that the great majority of mutations that have a visible effect on an organism are deleterious. Now, surprisingly, it seems that even the great majority of helpful mutations degrade the genome to a greater or lesser extent.,, I dub it “The First Rule of Adaptive Evolution”: Break or blunt any functional coded element whose loss would yield a net fitness gain. http://behe.uncommondescent.com/2010/12/the-first-rule-of-adaptive-evolution/

On top of that, it is now found that supposedly ‘beneficial mutations’ will, when combined together, be antagonistic towards each other, and will not be beneficial towards each other.

Epistasis between Beneficial Mutations – July 2011 Excerpt: We found that epistatic interactions between beneficial mutations were all antagonistic—the effects of the double mutations were less than the sums of the effects of their component single mutations. We found a number of cases of decompensatory interactions, an extreme form of antagonistic epistasis in which the second mutation is actually deleterious in the presence of the first. In the vast majority of cases, recombination uniting two beneficial mutations into the same genome would not be favored by selection, as the recombinant could not outcompete its constituent single mutations. https://uncommondescent.com/epigenetics/darwins-beneficial-mutations-do-not-benefit-each-other/ The diminishing returns of beneficial mutations – July 2011 Excerpt: Evolution thus has three strikes against it: most mutations are not beneficial, practically all mutations destroy specified complexity, and, now, even ‘beneficial’ mutations work against each other. While mutations may be of limited benefit to a single organism in a limited context (e.g., sickle cell anemia can protect against malaria even though the sickle cell trait is harmful), mutations seem to be no benefit whatsoever for microbes-to-man evolution, whether individually or together. http://creation.com/antagonistic-epistasis

Thirdly, the Darwinian belief that “natural selection", via purifying selection, will tend to filter out these vast majority of detrimental mutations leaving only the (very) rare beneficial mutations is also now shown to be a false claim.

Can Purifying Natural Selection Preserve Biological Information? - May 2013 - Paul Gibson, John R. Baumgardner, Wesley H. Brewer, John C. Sanford In conclusion, numerical simulation shows that realistic levels of biological noise result in a high selection threshold. This results in the ongoing accumulation of low-impact deleterious mutations, with deleterious mutation count per individual increasing linearly over time. Even in very long experiments (more than 100,000 generations), slightly deleterious alleles accumulate steadily, causing eventual extinction. These findings provide independent validation of previous analytical and simulation studies [2–13]. Previous concerns about the problem of accumulation of nearly neutral mutations are strongly supported by our analysis. Indeed, when numerical simulations incorporate realistic levels of biological noise, our analyses indicate that the problem is much more severe than has been acknowledged, and that the large majority of deleterious mutations become invisible to the selection process.,,, http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/pdf/10.1142/9789814508728_0010    Using Numerical Simulation to Better Understand Fixation Rates, and Establishment of a New Principle - "Haldane's Ratchet" - Christopher L. Rupe and John C. Sanford - 2013 Excerpt: Our empirically-determined rates of beneficial fixation are in general agreement with the fixation rate estimates derived by Haldane and ReMine using their mathematical analyses. We have therefore independently demonstrated that the findings of Haldane and ReMine are for the most part correct, and that the fundamental evolutionary problem historically known as "Haldane's Dilemma" is very real.?Previous analyses have focused exclusively on beneficial mutations. When deleterious mutations were included in our simulations, using a realistic ratio of beneficial to deleterious mutation rate, deleterious fixations vastly outnumbered beneficial fixations. Because of this, the net effect of mutation fixation should clearly create a ratchet-type mechanism which should cause continuous loss of information and decline in the size of the functional genome. We name this phenomenon "Haldane's Ratchet". http://media.wix.com/ugd/a704d4_47bcf08eda0e4926a44a8ac9cbfa9c20.pdf Responding to supposed refutations of genetic entropy from the ‘experts’ by Paul Price, Robert Carter and John Sanford – 1 December 2020 Excerpt: 1 Mutations & Equilibrium Claim: As the load of deleterious mutations grows over time, the pool of possible beneficial mutations also grows with it. This eventually leads to an equilibrium, preventing fitness decline beyond a certain point.,,,, Comments from Dr Sanford: This argument is: 1) merely dismissive, 2) categorically wrong, and 3) without a rational or data-driven basis. Obviously, rapidly accumulating deleterious mutations do not lead to more and more beneficial mutations. Rather, the much more abundant deleterious mutations effectively overwhelm and negate the fitness effects of the extremely rare beneficial mutations. The ratio of bad to good mutations is, minimally, 1000:1. With or without selection, bad mutations will always accumulate much more rapidly that beneficial mutations. We have done thousands of numerical simulations showing this. Even given the most generous parameter settings, the near-neutral bad mutations consistently accumulate about 1000 times faster than the beneficial mutations. https://creation.com/genetic-entropy-defense

Moreover, when realistic rates of detrimental to beneficial mutations are taken into consideration, then it falsifies Fisher's supposed mathematical proof that fitness must always increase:

Defending the validity and significance of the new theorem “Fundamental Theorem of Natural Selection With Mutations, Part I: Fisher’s Impact – Bill Basener and John Sanford – February 15, 2018 Excerpt: While Fisher’s Theorem is mathematically correct, his Corollary is false. The simple logical fallacy is that Fisher stated that mutations could effectively be treated as not impacting fitness, while it is now known that the vast majority of mutations are deleterious, providing a downward pressure on fitness. Our model and our correction of Fisher’s theorem (The Fundamental Theorem of Natural Selection with Mutations), take into account the tension between the upward force of selection with the downward force of mutations.,,, Our paper shows that Fisher’s corollary is clearly false, and that he misunderstood the implications of his own theorem. He incorrectly believed that his theorem was a mathematical proof that showed that natural selection plus mutation will necessarily and always increase fitness. He also believed his theorem was on a par with a natural law (such as entropic dissipation and the second law of thermodynamics). Because Fisher did not understand the actual fitness distribution of new mutations, his belief in the application of his “fundamental theorem of natural selection” was fundamentally and profoundly wrong – having little correspondence to biological reality. Therefore, we have reformulated Fisher’s model and have corrected his errors, thereby have established a new theorem that better describes biological reality, and allows for the specification of those key variables that will determine whether fitness will increase or decrease. http://theskepticalzone.com/wp/defending-the-validity-and-significance-of-the-new-theorem-fundamental-theorem-of-natural-selection-with-mutations-part-i-fishers-impact/ Geneticist Corrects Fisher’s Theorem, but the Correction Turns Natural Selection Upside Down – December 22, 2017 | David F. Coppedge A new paper corrects errors in Fisher’s Theorem, a mathematical “proof” of Darwinism. Rather than supporting evolution, the corrected theorem inverts it. Excerpt: The authors of the new paper describe the fundamental problems with Fisher’s theorem. They then use Fisher’s first principles, and reformulate and correct the theorem. They have named the corrected theorem The Fundamental Theorem of Natural Selection with Mutations. The correction of the theorem is not a trivial change – it literally flips the theorem on its head. The resulting conclusions are clearly in direct opposition to what Fisher had originally intended to prove.,,, The authors of the new paper realized that one of Fisher’s pivotal assumptions was clearly false, and in fact was falsified many decades ago. In his informal corollary, Fisher essentially assumed that new mutations arose with a nearly normal distribution – with an equal proportion of good and bad mutations (so mutations would have a net fitness effect of zero). We now know that the vast majority of mutations in the functional genome are harmful, and that beneficial mutations are vanishingly rare. The simple fact that Fisher’s premise was wrong, falsifies Fisher’s corollary. Without Fisher’s corollary – Fisher’s Theorem proves only that selection improves a population’s fitness until selection exhausts the initial genetic variation, at which point selective progress ceases. Apart from his corollary, Fisher’s Theorem only shows that within an initial population with variant genetic alleles, there is limited selective progress followed by terminal stasis.,,, The authors observe that the more realistic the parameters, the more likely fitness decline becomes. - per crev.info

So in conclusion, and again, the fact that the ratio of detrimental to beneficial mutations is found to be overwhelmingly detrimental is simply devastating to Darwin's theory.

1 Thessalonians 5:21 but test all things. Hold fast to what is good.

bornagain77

And as the following article states, “Most of the molecules taking part actively in biochemical processes are tuned exactly to the transition point and are critical conductors,” and “the possibility of finding even one (biomolecule) that is in the quantum critical state by accident is mind-bogglingly small and, to all intents and purposes, impossible.,, of the order of 10^-50 of possible small biomolecules and even less for proteins,”,,,

Quantum criticality in a wide range of important biomolecules – Mar. 6, 2015 Excerpt: “Most of the molecules taking part actively in biochemical processes are tuned exactly to the transition point and are critical conductors,” they say. That’s a discovery that is as important as it is unexpected. “These findings suggest an entirely new and universal mechanism of conductance in biology very different from the one used in electrical circuits.” The permutations of possible energy levels of biomolecules is huge so the possibility of finding even one (biomolecule) that is in the quantum critical state by accident is mind-bogglingly small and, to all intents and purposes, impossible.,, of the order of 10^-50 of possible small biomolecules and even less for proteins,”,,, “what exactly is the advantage that criticality confers?” https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/the-origin-of-life-and-the-hidden-role-of-quantum-criticality-ca4707924552

And as this follow up article stated, “There is no obvious evolutionary reason why a protein should evolve toward a quantum-critical state, and there is no chance at all that the state could occur randomly.,,,”

Quantum Critical Proteins – Stuart Lindsay – Professor of Physics and Chemistry at Arizona State University – 2018 Excerpt: The difficulty with this proposal lies in its improbability. Only an infinitesimal density of random states exists near the critical point.,, Gábor Vattay et al. recently examined a number of proteins and conducting and insulating polymers.14 The distribution for the insulators and conductors were as expected, but the functional proteins all fell on the quantum-critical distribution. Such a result cannot be a consequence of chance.,,, WHAT OF quantum criticality? Vattay et al. carried out electronic structure calculations for the very large protein used in our work. They found that the distribution of energy-level spacings fell on exactly the quantum-critical distribution, implying that this protein is also quantum critical. There is no obvious evolutionary reason why a protein should evolve toward a quantum-critical state, and there is no chance at all that the state could occur randomly.,,, http://inference-review.com/article/quantum-critical-proteins Gábor Vattay et al., “Quantum Criticality at the Origin of Life,” Journal of Physics: Conference Series 626 (2015); Gábor Vattay, Stuart Kauffman, and Samuli Niiranen, “Quantum Biology on the Edge of Quantum Chaos,” PLOS One 9, no. 3 (2014)

The absolutely devastating thing for Darwinian materialists in finding quantum information to be ubiquitous with biological life is that it takes a ‘non-local’, i.e. beyond space and time, cause in order to explain quantum correlations in the first place,. As the following paper entitled “Looking beyond space and time to cope with quantum theory” stated, “Our result gives weight to the idea that quantum correlations somehow arise from outside spacetime, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,”

Looking beyond space and time to cope with quantum theory – 29 October 2012 Excerpt: “Our result gives weight to the idea that quantum correlations somehow arise from outside spacetime, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,” http://www.quantumlah.org/highlight/121029_hidden_influences.php

Darwinists, with their reductive materialistic framework, and especially with the falsification of ‘hidden variables’, simply have no beyond space and time cause that they can appeal so as to be able to explain the ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, quantum coherence, quantum information, and/or entanglement that is now found to be ubiquitous within biology.

“hidden variables don’t exist. If you have proved them come back with PROOF and a Nobel Prize. John Bell theorized that maybe the particles can signal faster than the speed of light. This is what he advocated in his interview in “The Ghost in the Atom.” But the violation of Leggett’s inequality in 2007 takes away that possibility and rules out all non-local hidden variables. Observation instantly defines what properties a particle has and if you assume they had properties before we measured them, then you need evidence, because right now there is none which is why realism is dead, and materialism dies with it. How does the particle know what we are going to pick so it can conform to that?” per Jimfit https://uncommondescent.com/philosophy/quantum-physicist-david-bohm-on-why-there-cannot-be-a-theory-of-everything/#comment-662358

Christians, on the other hand, readily do have a beyond space and time cause that they can appeal to so as to explain ‘non-local’ quantum entanglement.

Colossians 1:17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Moreover, it is also important to realize that quantum information is conserved. As the following article states, In the classical world, information can be copied and deleted at will. In the quantum world, however, the conservation of quantum information means that information cannot be created nor destroyed.

Quantum no-hiding theorem experimentally confirmed for first time – 2011 Excerpt: In the classical world, information can be copied and deleted at will. In the quantum world, however, the conservation of quantum information means that information cannot be created nor destroyed. This concept stems from two fundamental theorems of quantum mechanics: the no-cloning theorem and the no-deleting theorem. A third and related theorem, called the no-hiding theorem, addresses information loss in the quantum world. According to the no-hiding theorem, if information is missing from one system (which may happen when the system interacts with the environment), then the information is simply residing somewhere else in the Universe; in other words, the missing information cannot be hidden in the correlations between a system and its environment. http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-03-quantum-no-hiding-theorem-experimentally.html

The implication of finding ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, and ‘conserved’, cannot be created nor destroyed, quantum information in molecular biology on such a massive scale, in every important biomolecule in our bodies, is fairly, and pleasantly, obvious. That pleasant implication, of course, being the fact that we now have very strong empirical evidence suggesting that we do indeed have an eternal soul that is capable of living beyond the death of our material bodies. As Stuart Hameroff states in the following article, “the quantum information,,, isn’t destroyed. It can’t be destroyed.,,, it’s possible that this quantum information can exist outside the body. Perhaps indefinitely as a soul.”

Leading Scientists Say Consciousness Cannot Die It Goes Back To The Universe – Oct. 19, 2017 – Spiritual Excerpt: “Let’s say the heart stops beating. The blood stops flowing. The microtubules lose their quantum state. But the quantum information, which is in the microtubules, isn’t destroyed. It can’t be destroyed. It just distributes and dissipates to the universe at large. If a patient is resuscitated, revived, this quantum information can go back into the microtubules and the patient says, “I had a near death experience. I saw a white light. I saw a tunnel. I saw my dead relatives.,,” Now if they’re not revived and the patient dies, then it’s possible that this quantum information can exist outside the body. Perhaps indefinitely as a soul.” – Stuart Hameroff – Quantum Entangled Consciousness – Life After Death – video (5:00 minute mark) (of note, this video is no longer available for public viewing) https://radaronline.com/exclusives/2012/10/life-after-death-soul-science-morgan-freeman/

Personally, I consider these recent findings from quantum biology to rival all other scientific discoveries over the past century. Surpassing even the discovery of a beginning of the universe, via Big Bang cosmology, in terms of theological, even personal, significance. As Jesus once asked his disciples along with a crowd of followers, “Is anything worth more than your soul?”

Mark 8:37 Is anything worth more than your soul?

Of supplemental note, long before DNA and quantum information were even known about, Christians were on record 'predicting' that life has a ‘beyond space and time’ author,

Acts 3:15 You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this. John 1:1-4 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.

bornagain77

And just how much information is coming into a developing embryo ‘from the outside’, by some ‘non-material’ method? Well, when working from a thermodynamic perspective, it is found that the ‘positional information’ that is inherent in a ‘simple’ bacterium is on the order of 10^12 bits,

Biophysics – Information theory. Relation between information and entropy: – Setlow-Pollard, Ed. Addison Wesley Excerpt: Linschitz gave the figure 9.3 x 10^12 cal/deg or 9.3 x 10^12 x 4.2 joules/deg for the entropy of a bacterial cell. Using the relation H = S/(k In 2), we find that the information content is 4 x 10^12 bits. Morowitz’ deduction from the work of Bayne-Jones and Rhees gives the lower value of 5.6 x 10^11 bits, which is still in the neighborhood of 10^12 bits. Thus two quite different approaches give rather concordant figures. https://docs.google.com/document/d/18hO1bteXTPOqQtd2H12PI5wFFoTjwg8uBAU5N0nEQIE/edit

,,, Which is the equivalent of about 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. ‘In comparison,,, the largest libraries in the world,, have about 10 million volumes or 10^12 bits.”

“a one-celled bacterium, e. coli, is estimated to contain the equivalent of 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. Expressed in information in science jargon, this would be the same as 10^12 bits of information. In comparison, the total writings from classical Greek Civilization is only 10^9 bits, and the largest libraries in the world – The British Museum, Oxford Bodleian Library, New York Public Library, Harvard Widenier Library, and the Moscow Lenin Library – have about 10 million volumes or 10^12 bits.” – R. C. Wysong – The Creation-evolution Controversy ‘The information content of a simple cell has been estimated as around 10^12 bits, comparable to about a hundred million pages of the Encyclopedia Britannica.” – Carl Sagan, “Life” in Encyclopedia Britannica: Macropaedia (1974 ed.), pp. 893-894

Thus since bacterial cells are about 10 times smaller than most plant and animal cells.

Size Comparisons of Bacteria, Amoeba, Animal & Plant Cells Excerpt: Bacterial cells are very small – about 10 times smaller than most plant and animal cells. https://education.seattlepi.com/size-comparisons-bacteria-amoeba-animal-plant-cells-4966.html

And since there are conservatively estimated to be around 30 trillion cells within the average human body,

Revised Estimates for the Number of Human and Bacteria Cells in the Body – 2016 Abstract: Reported values in the literature on the number of cells in the body differ by orders of magnitude and are very seldom supported by any measurements or calculations. Here, we integrate the most up-to-date information on the number of human and bacterial cells in the body. We estimate the total number of bacteria in the 70 kg “reference man” to be 3.8·10^13. For human cells, we identify the dominant role of the hematopoietic lineage to the total count (?90%) and revise past estimates to 3.0·10^13 human cells. Our analysis also updates the widely-cited 10:1 ratio, showing that the number of bacteria in the body is actually of the same order as the number of human cells, and their total mass is about 0.2 kg. https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002533

Then that gives us a rough ballpark estimate of around 300 trillion times 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. Or about 300 trillion times the information content contained within the books of all the largest libraries in the world. Needless to say, that is a astonishingly massive amount of information that is somehow coming into the developing embryo of a single human body, “from the outside by some ‘non-material’ method’. As the following video states that “There are 10^28 atoms in the human body.,, The amount of data contained in the whole human,, is 3.02 x 10^32 gigabytes of information. Using a high bandwidth transfer, that data would take about 4.5 x 10^18 years to teleport 1 time. That is 350,000 times the age of the universe.”

“There are 10^28 atoms in the human body.,, The amount of data contained in the whole human,, is 3.02 x 10^32 gigabytes of information. Using a high bandwidth transfer that data would take about 4.5 x 10^18 years to teleport 1 time. That is 350,000 times the age of the universe.” Will (Quantum) Teleportation Ever Be Possible? – video – 2013 https://youtu.be/yfePpMTbFYY?t=76

Verse:

Psalm 139:13-14 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

Moreover, we don’t have to rely solely on our mathematics to tell us that a massive amount of information must somehow be coming into a developing human embryo, (‘from the outside by some ‘non-material’ method’), during embryological development. Advances in quantum biology have now proven, contrary to what was though to be possible just a few short years ago, that quantum entanglement and/or quantum information, is ubiquitous within molecular biology. First off, in the following site entitled “Quantum Information Science”, a site where Charles Bennett, (of quantum teleportation and reversible computation fame), himself is on the steering committee,

Quantum Information Science Steering Committee C. H. Bennett IBM D. P. DiVincenzo IBM N. Gershenfeld MIT H. M. Gibbs University of Arizona H. J. Kimble Caltech J. Preskill Caltech U. V. Vazirani UC/Berkeley D. J. Wineland NIST C. Yao Princeton University https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2000/nsf00101/nsf00101.htm

On that site, they have this following illustration showing classical information, (such as the classical information that is encoded on DNA, proteins, RNA, etc..) to be a subset of quantum information

Classical Information is a subset of Quantum information – illustration https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2000/nsf00101/images/figure1.gif below that illustration they have this caption, “Figure 1: The well-established theory of classical information and computation is actually a subset of a much larger topic, the emerging theory of quantum information and computation.”

And again, this quantum information, of which classical information is now known to be a subset, is now found to be ubiquitous within molecular biology. As Dr Rieper remarks in the following video, ‘practically the whole DNA molecule can be viewed as quantum information with classical information embedded within it’

“What happens is this classical information (of DNA) is embedded, sandwiched, into the quantum information (of DNA). And most likely this classical information is never accessed because it is inside all the quantum information. You can only access the quantum information or the electron clouds and the protons. So mathematically you can describe that as a quantum/classical state.” Elisabeth Rieper – Classical and Quantum Information in DNA – video (Longitudinal Quantum Information resides along the entire length of DNA discussed at the 19:30 minute mark; at 24:00 minute mark Dr Rieper remarks that practically the whole DNA molecule can be viewed as quantum information with classical information embedded within it) https://youtu.be/2nqHOnVTxJE?t=1176

bornagain77

And it is fairly easy to empirically demonstrate that biological form cannot be reduced to DNA, (nor be reduced to any other material particulars that Darwinists may try to invoke). In the following, fairly astonishing, experiment, a bacterium, ‘after shattering of its 3.2 Mb genome into 20–30 kb pieces,,, miraculously reassembles its genome such that only 3 hr later fully reconstituted nonrearranged chromosomes are present, and the cells carry on, alive as normal.,,,’

Extreme Genome Repair – 2009 Excerpt: If its naming had followed, rather than preceded, molecular analyses of its DNA, the extremophile bacterium Deinococcus radiodurans might have been called Lazarus. After shattering of its 3.2 Mb genome into 20–30 kb pieces by desiccation or a high dose of ionizing radiation, D. radiodurans miraculously reassembles its genome such that only 3 hr later fully reconstituted nonrearranged chromosomes are present, and the cells carry on, alive as normal.,,, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3319128/

And this ‘miraculous’ ability of D. radiodurans to reassemble its shattered genome is not just some freak of nature, but this ‘miraculous’ ability is now shown to be an inherent, and common, feature of e-coli.

In the lab, scientists coax E. coli to resist radiation damage – March 17, 2014 Excerpt: ,,, John R. Battista, a professor of biological sciences at Louisiana State University, showed that E. coli could evolve to resist ionizing radiation by exposing cultures of the bacterium to the highly radioactive isotope cobalt-60. “We blasted the cultures until 99 percent of the bacteria were dead. Then we’d grow up the survivors and blast them again. We did that twenty times,” explains Cox. The result were E. coli capable of enduring as much as four orders of magnitude more ionizing radiation, making them similar to Deinococcus radiodurans, a desert-dwelling bacterium found in the 1950s to be remarkably resistant to radiation. That bacterium is capable of surviving more than one thousand times the radiation dose that would kill a human. http://www.news.wisc.edu/22641

As well, in the following study, “researchers implanted human embryonic neuronal cells into a mouse embryo”.,,, Yet, “the human neurons, despite having human DNA, had a mouse morphology”. If DNA really ruled morphology, (as Darwinists have presupposed), we would have expected a human morphology.

If DNA really rules (morphology), why did THIS happen? – April 2014 Excerpt: Researchers implanted human embryonic neuronal cells into a mouse embryo. Mouse and human neurons have distinct morphologies (shapes). Because the human neurons feature human DNA, they should be easy to identify. Which raises a question: Would the human neurons implanted in developing mouse brain have a mouse or a human morphology? Well, the answer is, the human neurons had a mouse morphology. They could be distinguished from the mouse ones only by their human genetic markers. If DNA really ruled, we would expect a human morphology. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/if-dna-really-rules-why-did-this-happen/

Along that same line is this interesting tidbit from a UD blogger

“Last year I had a fair chunk of my nose removed in skin cancer surgery (Mohs). The surgeon took flesh from a nearby area to fill in the large hole he’d made. The pictures of it were scary. But in the healing process the replanted cells somehow ‘knew’ how to take a different shape appropriate for the new location so that the nose now looks remarkably natural. The doctor said he could take only half the credit because the cells somehow know how to change form for a different location (though they presumably still follow the same DNA code) . — I’m getting the feeling that we’ve been nearly as reductionist in the 20-21st century as Darwin and his peers were when they viewed cells as little blobs of jelly.” leodp – UD blogger

Moreover, the following article notes that “it is hard not to be impressed how a repeatable form reliably emerges despite considerable variation in both genes and environment.’

Criticality in morphogenesis – September 17, 2013 Excerpt: In many regards, a brief time-lapse video can teach more about embryonic development than any amount of reading. It is hard not to be impressed how a repeatable form reliably emerges despite considerable variation in both genes and environment. While it had been hoped that concepts borrowed from statistical mechanics or the ideas of self-organized criticality could help to create some kind of physics-based theory of development, much of what has been done lies only at the level of metaphor. In a paper just released to ArXiv, William Bialek and his colleagues from Princeton University, have taken their search for the signature of criticality in a more specific direction. They looked at a particular set of transcription factors in Drosophila embryos which control spatiotemporal development. By analyzing fluctuations in the expression levels of these so-called gap genes, they found evidence for critical (fine) tuning in this particular network. http://phys.org/news/2013-09-criticality-morphogenesis.html

To further drive to point home that the basic form of any particular organism is not reducible to DNA or any of the other material particulars of an organism, in the following article it is noted that, Richard Lewontin once described how you can excise the developing limb bud from an amphibian embryo, shake the cells loose from each other, allow them to reaggregate into a random lump, and then replace the lump in the embryo. A normal leg develops. Somehow the form of the limb as a whole is the ruling factor, redefining the parts according to the larger pattern.

What Do Organisms Mean? Stephen L. Talbott – Winter 2011 Excerpt: Harvard biologist Richard Lewontin once described how you can excise the developing limb bud from an amphibian embryo, shake the cells loose from each other, allow them to reaggregate into a random lump, and then replace the lump in the embryo. A normal leg develops. Somehow the form of the limb as a whole is the ruling factor, redefining the parts according to the larger pattern. Lewontin went on to remark: “Unlike a machine whose totality is created by the juxtaposition of bits and pieces with different functions and properties, the bits and pieces of a developing organism seem to come into existence as a consequence of their spatial position at critical moments in the embryo’s development. Such an object is less like a machine than it is like a language whose elements… take unique meaning from their context.[3]”,,, http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/what-do-organisms-mean

As the preceding experiments, and many more experiments like these, have made clear, ‘biological form’ simply cannot be reduced to mutations to DNA, nor can biological form be reduced to any other material particulars, (i..e. proteins, carbohydrates, etc.. etc..), that Darwinists may try to invoke. And this failure of the reductive materialistic framework of Darwinists to explain biological form, (and the failure of reductive materialists to explain any other type of ‘form’ in the universe for that matter), occurs at a much lower level than DNA itself. Specifically, in the following article entitled ‘Quantum physics problem proved unsolvable: Gödel and Turing enter quantum physics’, which studied the derivation of macroscopic properties from a complete microscopic description, the researchers remark that even a perfect and complete description of the microscopic properties of a material is not enough to predict its macroscopic behaviour.,,, The researchers further commented that their findings challenge the reductionists’ point of view, as the insurmountable difficulty lies precisely in the derivation of macroscopic properties from a microscopic description.”

Quantum physics problem proved unsolvable: Gödel and Turing enter quantum physics – December 9, 2015 Excerpt: A mathematical problem underlying fundamental questions in particle and quantum physics is provably unsolvable,,, It is the first major problem in physics for which such a fundamental limitation could be proven. The findings are important because they show that even a perfect and complete description of the microscopic properties of a material is not enough to predict its macroscopic behaviour.,,, “We knew about the possibility of problems that are undecidable in principle since the works of Turing and Gödel in the 1930s,” added Co-author Professor Michael Wolf from Technical University of Munich. “So far, however, this only concerned the very abstract corners of theoretical computer science and mathematical logic. No one had seriously contemplated this as a possibility right in the heart of theoretical physics before. But our results change this picture. From a more philosophical perspective, they also challenge the reductionists’ point of view, as the insurmountable difficulty lies precisely in the derivation of macroscopic properties from a microscopic description.” http://phys.org/news/2015-12-quantum-physics-problem-unsolvable-godel.html

Moreover Jonathan Wells, in the following video, after demonstrating that the Central Dogma of molecular biology, (which states (in effect) that DNA, makes RNA, makes protein, makes us), is incorrect at every step,

Design Beyond DNA: A Conversation with Dr. Jonathan Wells – video (41:00 minute mark) – January 2017 https://youtu.be/ASAaANVBoiE?t=2484

,,, after demonstrating that the Central Dogma of molecular biology is incorrect at every step, Dr. Wells, (who specializes in embryology by the way), then, using a branch of mathematics called category theory, demonstrates that, during embryological development, and as cells ‘transdifferentiate’, information must somehow be added to the developing embryo, ‘from the outside’, by some ‘non-material’ method. bornagain77

"then please tell us what is responsible for changes in morphology?" Well first off, when Darwinists first formulated the modern synthesis, they excluded biological form from the conceptual framework of the Modern Synthesis as being quote-unquote ‘irrelevant’ and thus "At present, the problem of biological form remains unsolved."

On the problem of biological form – Marta Linde-Medina (2020) Excerpt: Embryonic development, which inspired the first theories of biological form, was eventually excluded from the conceptual framework of the Modern Synthesis, (neo-Darwinism) as irrelevant.,,, At present, the problem of biological form remains unsolved. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12064-020-00317-3

Yet, in spite of the fact that Darwinists themselves excluded biological form from the conceptual framework of the Modern Synthesis as being quote-unquote ‘irrelevant’, by and large Darwinists still assume, (apparently with no justification whatsoever), that changes to DNA have the potential to eventually change the basic biological form and/or body plan of any given species into a brand new body plan of a brand new species. Yet, (directly contrary to what Darwinists have assumed without any empirical, nor theoretical, warrant), biological form is found to be irreducible to mutations to DNA, nor is biological form reducible to any other material particulars, (i.e. proteins, carbohydrates, etc..), in biology that Darwinists may wish to invoke. As Dr. Jonathan Wells explained, “Studies using saturation mutagenesis in the embryos of fruit flies, roundworms, zebrafish and mice also provide evidence against the idea that DNA specifies the basic form of an organism. Biologists can mutate (and indeed have mutated) a fruit fly embryo in every possible way, and they have invariably observed only three possible outcomes: a normal fruit fly, a defective fruit fly, or a dead fruit fly.”

Jonathan Wells: Far from being all-powerful, DNA does not wholly determine biological form – March 31, 2014 Excerpt: Studies using saturation mutagenesis in the embryos of fruit flies, roundworms, zebrafish and mice also provide evidence against the idea that DNA specifies the basic form of an organism. Biologists can mutate (and indeed have mutated) a fruit fly embryo in every possible way, and they have invariably observed only three possible outcomes: a normal fruit fly, a defective fruit fly, or a dead fruit fly. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/jonathan-wells-far-from-being-all-powerful-dna-does-not-wholly-determine-biological-form/ Response to John Wise – October 2010 Excerpt: But there are solid empirical grounds for arguing that changes in DNA alone cannot produce new organs or body plans. A technique called “saturation mutagenesis”1,2 has been used to produce every possible developmental mutation in fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster),3,4,5 roundworms (Caenorhabditis elegans),6,7 and zebrafish (Danio rerio),8,9,10 and the same technique is now being applied to mice (Mus musculus).11,12. None of the evidence from these and numerous other studies of developmental mutations supports the neo-Darwinian dogma that DNA mutations can lead to new organs or body plans–,,, (As Jonathan Wells states),,, We can modify the DNA of a fruit fly embryo in any way we want, and there are only three possible outcomes: A normal fruit fly; A defective fruit fly; or A dead fruit fly. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2010/10/response_to_john_wise038811.html

And as Dr. Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig points out, “even after inducing literally billions of induced mutations and (further) chromosome rearrangements”,,, “the law of recurrent variation is endlessly corroborated”…

Peer-Reviewed Research Paper on Plant Biology Favorably Cites Intelligent Design and Challenges Darwinian Evolution – Casey Luskin December 29, 2010 Excerpt: Many of these researchers also raise the question (among others), why — even after inducing literally billions of induced mutations and (further) chromosome rearrangements — all the important mutation breeding programs have come to an end in the Western World instead of eliciting a revolution in plant breeding, either by successive rounds of selective “micromutations” (cumulative selection in the sense of the modern synthesis), or by “larger mutations” … and why the law of recurrent variation is endlessly corroborated by the almost infinite repetition of the spectra of mutant phenotypes in each and any new extensive mutagenesis experiment instead of regularly producing a range of new systematic species… (Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig, “Mutagenesis in Physalis pubescens L. ssp. floridana: Some Further Research on Dollo’s Law and the Law of Recurrent Variation,” Floriculture and Ornamental Biotechnology Vol. 4 (Special Issue 1): 1-21 (December 2010).) https://evolutionnews.org/2010/12/peer-reviewed_research_paper_o/ Dr. Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig, (retired) Senior Scientist (Biology), Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research, Emeritus, Cologne, Germany.

The ‘blueprint’ for the biological form of any given species simply does not reside in DNA as Darwinists had falsely presupposed. As Michael Denton remarks in the following article,’”to date the form of no individual cell has been shown to be specified in detail in a genomic blueprint.”

The Types: A Persistent Structuralist Challenge to Darwinian Pan-Selectionism – Michael J. Denton – 2013 Excerpt: Cell form ,,,Karsenti comments that despite the attraction of the (genetic) blueprint model there are no “simple linear chains of causal events that link genes to phenotypes” [77: p. 255]. And wherever there is no simple linear causal chain linking genes with phenotypes,,,—at any level in the organic hierarchy, from cells to body plans—the resulting form is bound to be to a degree epigenetic and emergent, and cannot be inferred from even the most exhaustive analysis of the genes.,,, To this author’s knowledge, to date the form of no individual cell has been shown to be specified in detail in a genomic blueprint. As mentioned above, between genes and mature cell form there is a complex hierarchy of self-organization and emergent phenomena, rendering cell form profoundly epigenetic. http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2013.3/BIO-C.2013.3

And as Paul Davies stated, “DNA is not a blueprint for an organism,,,, Rather, DNA is a (mostly) passive repository for transcription of stored data into RNA,”

(Paul) Davies And Walker On Origin Of Life: Life As Information – March 7, 2020 Excerpt: However, the genome is only a small part of the story. DNA is not a blueprint for an organism:1 no information is actively processed by DNA alone [17]. Rather, DNA is a (mostly) passive repository for transcription of stored data into RNA, some (but by no means all) of which goes on to be translated into proteins. The biologically relevant information stored in DNA therefore has very little to do with its specific chemical nature (beyond the fact that it is a digital linear polymer). https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/davies-and-walker-on-origin-of-life-life-as-information/

And as Antony Jose stated, “DNA cannot be seen as the ‘blueprint’ for life,”,,, “It is at best an overlapping and potentially scrambled list of ingredients that is used differently by different cells at different times.”,,,

DNA may not be life’s instruction book—just a jumbled list of ingredients – Kimbra Cutlip, University of Maryland – APRIL 22, 2020 Excerpt: The common view of heredity is that all information passed down from one generation to the next is stored in an organism’s DNA. But Antony Jose, associate professor of cell biology and molecular genetics at the University of Maryland, disagrees. In two new papers, Jose argues that DNA is just the ingredient list, not the set of instructions used to build and maintain a living organism.,,, ,,, “DNA cannot be seen as the ‘blueprint’ for life,” Jose said. “It is at best an overlapping and potentially scrambled list of ingredients that is used differently by different cells at different times.” ,,, In addition, scientists are unable to determine the complex shape of an organ such as an eye, or that a creature will have eyes at all, by reading the creature’s DNA. These fundamental aspects of anatomy are dictated by something outside of the DNA. https://phys.org/news/2020-04-dna-life-bookjust-jumbled-ingredients.html

bornagain77

"Yes, other types of selection have been found along with genetic drift. But ‘grossly inadequate’? Really?" Yes really! ‘Grossly inadequate’!

More from Ann Gauger on why humans didn’t happen the way Darwin said – July 2012 Excerpt: Each of these new features probably required multiple mutations. Getting a feature that requires six neutral mutations is the limit of what bacteria can produce. For primates (e.g., monkeys, apes and humans) the limit is much more severe. Because of much smaller effective population sizes (an estimated ten thousand for humans instead of a billion for bacteria) and longer generation times (fifteen to twenty years per generation for humans vs. a thousand generations per year for bacteria), it would take a very long time for even a single beneficial mutation to appear and become fixed in a human population. You don’t have to take my word for it. In 2007, Durrett and Schmidt estimated in the journal Genetics that for a single mutation to occur in a nucleotide-binding site and be fixed in a primate lineage would require a waiting time of six million years. The same authors later estimated it would take 216 million years for the binding site to acquire two mutations, if the first mutation was neutral in its effect. Facing Facts But six million years is the entire time allotted for the transition from our last common ancestor with chimps to us according to the standard evolutionary timescale. Two hundred and sixteen million years takes us back to the Triassic, when the very first mammals appeared. One or two mutations simply aren’t sufficient to produce the necessary changes,, in the time available. At most, a new binding site might affect the regulation of one or two genes. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/more-from-ann-gauger-on-why-humans-didnt-happen-the-way-darwin-said/ The waiting time problem in a model hominin population – 2015 Sep 17 John Sanford, Wesley Brewer, Franzine Smith, and John Baumgardner Excerpt: The program Mendel’s Accountant realistically simulates the mutation/selection process,,, Given optimal settings, what is the longest nucleotide string that can arise within a reasonable waiting time within a hominin population of 10,000? Arguably, the waiting time for the fixation of a “string-of-one” is by itself problematic (Table 2). Waiting a minimum of 1.5 million years (realistically, much longer), for a single point mutation is not timely adaptation in the face of any type of pressing evolutionary challenge. This is especially problematic when we consider that it is estimated that it only took six million years for the chimp and human genomes to diverge by over 5 % [1]. This represents at least 75 million nucleotide changes in the human lineage, many of which must encode new information. While fixing one point mutation is problematic, our simulations show that the fixation of two co-dependent mutations is extremely problematic – requiring at least 84 million years (Table 2). This is ten-fold longer than the estimated time required for ape-to-man evolution. In this light, we suggest that a string of two specific mutations is a reasonable upper limit, in terms of the longest string length that is likely to evolve within a hominin population (at least in a way that is either timely or meaningful). Certainly the creation and fixation of a string of three (requiring at least 380 million years) would be extremely untimely (and trivial in effect), in terms of the evolution of modern man. It is widely thought that a larger population size can eliminate the waiting time problem. If that were true, then the waiting time problem would only be meaningful within small populations. While our simulations show that larger populations do help reduce waiting time, we see that the benefit of larger population size produces rapidly diminishing returns (Table 4 and Fig. 4). When we increase the hominin population from 10,000 to 1 million (our current upper limit for these types of experiments), the waiting time for creating a string of five is only reduced from two billion to 482 million years. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4573302/

Of course, being science, you can always challenge these mathematical models from population genetics with actual empirical evidence. The trouble is that you have no actual empirical evidence with which to challenge these models,

Waiting Longer for Two Mutations - Michael J. Behe Excerpt: Citing malaria literature sources (White 2004) I had noted that the de novo appearance of chloroquine resistance in Plasmodium falciparum was an event of probability of 1 in 10^20. I then wrote that 'for humans to achieve a mutation like this by chance, we would have to wait 100 million times 10 million years' (1 quadrillion years)(Behe 2007) (because that is the extrapolated time that it would take to produce 10^20 humans). Durrett and Schmidt (2008, p. 1507) retort that my number ‘is 5 million times larger than the calculation we have just given’ using their model (which nonetheless "using their model" gives a prohibitively long waiting time of 216 million years). Their criticism compares apples to oranges. My figure of 10^20 is an empirical statistic from the literature; it is not, as their calculation is, a theoretical estimate from a population genetics model. Generally, when the results of a simple model disagree with observational data, it is an indication that the model is inadequate.,,, The difficulty with models such as Durrett and Schmidt’s is that their biological relevance is often uncertain, and unknown factors that are quite important to cellular evolution may be unintentionally left out of the model. That is why experimental or observational data on the evolution of microbes such as P. falciparum are invaluable,,, http://www.discovery.org/a/9461 “a pervasive problem in biology is the religious adherence to the idea that natural selection is solely responsible for every feature of biological diversity.,,,, Some have gone so far as to proclaim that virtually any nucleotide that is at least occasionally transcribed or bound to a protein must be maintained by selection (ENCODE Project Consortium 2012). Such arguments are inconsistent with substantial theory and empirical work suggesting that many aspects of gene and genome evolution are consequences of the limitations of natural selection (Kimura 1983; Lynch 2007)..” – MIchael Lynch https://biodesign.asu.edu/sites/default/files/new_centers/Introduction.pdf Genome-wide analysis of a long-term evolution experiment with Drosophila – 2010 Excerpt of concluding paragraph: “Despite decades of sustained selection in relatively small, sexually reproducing laboratory populations, selection did not lead to the fixation of newly arising unconditionally advantageous alleles. This is notable because in wild populations we expect the strength of natural selection to be less intense and the environment unlikely to remain constant for ~600 generations. Consequently, the probability of fixation in wild populations should be even lower than its likelihood in these experiments.” http://www.homepages.ed.ac.uk/aspiliop//2010_2011/Burke%20et%20al%202010.pdf

Since JVL mentioned genetic drift, here is a note on that also,

Neutral Model, genetic drift and the Third Way—a synopsis of the self-inflicted demise of the evolutionary paradigm by Jeffrey P. Tomkins and Jerry Bergman - 2017 Abstract "Because of grievous deficiencies in the standard neo-Darwinian Model of evolution, which is largely selection driven, scientists proposed an alternative postulate called the ‘Neutral Model’ in the late 1960s. The Neutral Model is also mutation driven, but selection is deemed to be an insignificant force of change. Instead, random genetic drift is alleged to be the main driver. Since its inception, the Neutral Model has come to be incorporated in many theoretical evolutionary scenarios at some level. However, due to numerous discoveries in genomics and genome function, the Neutral Model has also become deficient, prompting a new move in science called the ‘Extended Evolutionary Synthesis’ or ‘The Third Way’, which takes a position of blissful ignorance and offers nothing tangible to extend or support evolutionary theory. While Third Way proponents recognize the deficiency of all popular evolutionary models, they maintain that more research is needed to elucidate unknown evolutionary mechanisms and processes despite the fact that the progress of scientific discovery is revealing nothing but unimaginable complexity." https://creation.com/evolutionary-mechanisms

Of supplemental note, in their 'just so stories', natural selection functions far more in the realm of unrestrained imagination than it does in the real world of physical science,

Sociobiology: The Art of Story Telling – Stephen Jay Gould – 1978 – New Scientist Excerpt: Rudyard Kipling asked how the leopard got its spots, the rhino its wrinkled skin. He called his answers “Just So stories”. When evolutionists study individual adaptations, when they try to explain form and behaviour by reconstructing history and assessing current utility, they also tell just so stories – and the agent is natural selection. Virtuosity in invention replaces testability as the criterion for acceptance. https://books.google.com/books?id=tRj7EyRFVqYC&pg=PA530 Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection Has Left a Legacy of Confusion over Biological Adaptation Brian Miller - September 20, 2021 Excerpt: Evolutionary biologist Robert Reid stated: "Indeed the language of neo-Darwinism is so careless that the words ‘divine plan’ can be substituted for ‘selection pressure’ in any popular work in the biological literature without the slightest disruption in the logical flow of argument." Robert Reid, Biological Emergences: Evolution by Natural Experiment, PP. 37-38 (2009) To fully comprehend the critique, one simply needs to imagine attempting to craft an evolutionary barometer that measures the selection pressure driving one organism to transform into something different (e.g., fish into an amphibian). The fact that no such instrument could be constructed highlights the fictitious nature of such mystical forces. https://evolutionnews.org/2021/09/darwins-theory-of-natural-selection-has-left-a-legacy-of-confusion-over-biological-adaptation/ “Natural selection functions in the realm of philosophy, not science.” Page 81 “Evolutionists, of course, believe that they are appealing to science, in contrast to the religionists’ reliance on faith. But the truth is that when they utter their two-word incantation, ‘natural selection,’ they are not being remotely scientific. Nor are they expected to provide any details.” Page 123 - Tom Bethell - Darwin’s House of Cards: A Journalist’s Odyssey Through the Darwin Debates

bornagain77

"Darwin knew nothing of mutations or genomics. And, guess what, the vast majority of mutations are NOT directed. That’s you misrepresenting some article you read, again." Really??? The only one doing the 'misrepresenting' is you and other Darwinists who refuse to accept evidence that falsifies your theory.

Revisiting the Central Dogma in the 21st Century – James A. Shapiro – 2009 Excerpt (Page 12): Underlying the central dogma and conventional views of genome evolution was the idea that the genome is a stable structure that changes rarely and accidentally by chemical fluctuations (106) or replication errors. This view has had to change with the realization that maintenance of genome stability is an active cellular function and the discovery of numerous dedicated biochemical systems for restructuring DNA molecules.(107–110) Genetic change is almost always the result of cellular action on the genome. These natural processes are analogous to human genetic engineering,,, (Page 14) Genome change arises as a consequence of natural genetic engineering, not from accidents. Replication errors and DNA damage are subject to cell surveillance and correction. When DNA damage correction does produce novel genetic structures, natural genetic engineering functions, such as mutator polymerases and nonhomologous end-joining complexes, are involved. Realizing that DNA change is a biochemical process means that it is subject to regulation like other cellular activities. Thus, we expect to see genome change occurring in response to different stimuli (Table 1) and operating nonrandomly throughout the genome, guided by various types of intermolecular contacts (Table 1 of Ref. 112). http://shapiro.bsd.uchicago.edu/Shapiro2009.AnnNYAcadSciMS.RevisitingCentral%20Dogma.pdf A Tour Of Directed Mutations – November 23, 2021 – johnnyb - video https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/a-tour-of-directed-mutations/ WHAT SCIENTIFIC IDEA IS READY FOR RETIREMENT? Fully Random Mutations – Kevin Kelly – 2014 Excerpt: What is commonly called “random mutation” does not in fact occur in a mathematically random pattern. The process of genetic mutation is extremely complex, with multiple pathways, involving more than one system. Current research suggests most spontaneous mutations occur as errors in the repair process for damaged DNA. Neither the damage nor the errors in repair have been shown to be random in where they occur, how they occur, or when they occur. Rather, the idea that mutations are random is simply a widely held assumption by non-specialists and even many teachers of biology. There is no direct evidence for it. On the contrary, there’s much evidence that genetic mutation vary in patterns. For instance it is pretty much accepted that mutation rates increase or decrease as stress on the cells increases or decreases. These variable rates of mutation include mutations induced by stress from an organism’s predators and competition, and as well as increased mutations brought on by environmental and epigenetic factors. Mutations have also been shown to have a higher chance of occurring near a place in DNA where mutations have already occurred, creating mutation hotspot clusters—a non-random pattern. http://edge.org/response-detail/25264 “It is difficult (if not impossible) to find a genome change operator that is truly random in its action within the DNA of the cell where it works. All careful studies of mutagenesis find statistically significant non-random patterns” James Shapiro – Evolution: A View From The 21st Century – (Page 82) How life changes itself: the Read-Write (RW) genome. – 2013 Excerpt: Research dating back to the 1930s has shown that genetic change is the result of cell-mediated processes, not simply accidents or damage to the DNA. This cell-active view of genome change applies to all scales of DNA sequence variation, from point mutations to large-scale genome rearrangements and whole genome duplications (WGDs). This conceptual change to active cell inscriptions controlling RW genome functions has profound implications for all areas of the life sciences. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23876611

bornagain77

Bornagain77: Darwin’s theory holds mutations to the genome to be random Darwin knew nothing of mutations or genomics. And, guess what, the vast majority of mutations are NOT directed. That's you misrepresenting some article you read, again. Natural Selection, especially for multicellular organisms, is found to grossly inadequate as the ‘designer substitute. Yes, other types of selection have been found along with genetic drift. But 'grossly inadequate'? Really? Yet, biological form is found to be irreducible to mutations to DNA, nor is biological form reducible to any other material particulars in biology one may wish to invoke. Oh right . . . then please tell us what is responsible for changes in morphology? The mutation rate to DNA is overwhelmingly detrimental. Detrimental to such a point that it is seriously questioned whether there are any truly beneficial, information building, mutations whatsoever. You can't even say it correctly! Yes, most mutations are detrimental or neutral but that has nothing to do with the rate of mutations. Charles Darwin himself held that the gradual unfolding of life would (someday) be self-evident in the fossil record. So he didn't get everything exactly right. So what? He's not the sum total of thinking on evolution as anyone familiar with the field knows. Darwin’s theory, due to the randomness postulate, holds that patterns will not repeat themselves in supposedly widely divergent species. Yet thousands of instances of what is ironically called ‘convergent evolution’, on both the morphological and genetic level, falsifies the Darwinian belief that patterns will not repeat themselves in widely divergent species. Darwin knew nothing of random mutations. And evolution is based on random mutations coupled with cumulative selection which tends to mold morphologies to be well adapted to environmental conditions which means it's not surprising if different genetic lines come to similar solutions. Yet as Doug Axe pointed out, “Basically every gene and every new protein fold, there is nothing of significance that we can show that can be had in that gradualistic way. It’s all a mirage. None of it happens that way.” But a vast majority of biologists disagree with Dr Axe. All your objections have been dealt with before. And you know that. And you know that you are in a very, very small minority of science literate people who think the way you do. Given that you yourself are not a trained biologist who has done and published peer-reviewed research in the field . . . it seems reasonable that some folks might disagree with you. And you still haven't discussed whether or not peer selection is a 'primary' mechanism for evolution. Why is that? JVL

"Darwin suggested ways his thesis could be falsified" No kidding?

1. Darwin’s theory holds mutations to the genome to be random. The vast majority of mutations to the genome are not random but are now found to be ‘directed’. 2. Darwin’s theory holds that Natural Selection is the ‘designer substitute’ that produces the ‘appearance’ and/or illusion of design. Natural Selection, especially for multicellular organisms, is found to grossly inadequate as the ‘designer substitute. 3. Darwin’s theory holds that mutations to DNA will eventually change the basic biological form of any given species into a new form of a brand new species. Yet, biological form is found to be irreducible to mutations to DNA, nor is biological form reducible to any other material particulars in biology one may wish to invoke. 4. Darwin’s theory holds there to be an extremely beneficial and flexible mutation rate for DNA which was ultimately responsible for all the diversity and complexity of life we see on earth. The mutation rate to DNA is overwhelmingly detrimental. Detrimental to such a point that it is seriously questioned whether there are any truly beneficial, information building, mutations whatsoever. 5. Charles Darwin himself held that the gradual unfolding of life would (someday) be self-evident in the fossil record. Yet, from the Cambrian Explosion onward, the fossil record is consistently characterized by the sudden appearance of a group/kind in the fossil record(disparity), then rapid diversity within the group/kind, and then long term stability and even deterioration of variety within the overall group/kind, and within the specific species of the kind, over long periods of time. Of the few dozen or so fossils claimed as transitional, not one is uncontested as a true example of transition between major animal forms out of millions of collected fossils. Moreover, Fossils are found in the “wrong place” all the time (either too early, or too late). 6. Darwin’s theory, due to the randomness postulate, holds that patterns will not repeat themselves in supposedly widely divergent species. Yet thousands of instances of what is ironically called ‘convergent evolution’, on both the morphological and genetic level, falsifies the Darwinian belief that patterns will not repeat themselves in widely divergent species. 7. Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” Yet as Doug Axe pointed out, “Basically every gene and every new protein fold, there is nothing of significance that we can show that can be had in that gradualistic way. It’s all a mirage. None of it happens that way.” 8. Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be proved that any part of the structure of any one species had been formed for the exclusive good of another species, it would annihilate my theory, for such could not have been produced through natural selection.” Yet as Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig pointed out, “in thousands of plant species often entirely new organs have been formed for the exclusive good of more than 132,930 other species, these ‘ugly facts’ have annihilated Darwin’s theory as well as modern versions of it.” 9. Charles Darwin himself stated that, ““The impossibility of conceiving that this grand and wondrous universe, with our conscious selves, arose through chance, seems to me the chief argument for the existence of God. Yet ‘our conscious selves’ are certainly not explainable by ‘chance’ (nor is consciousness explainable by any possible reductive materialistic explanation in general), i.e. ‘the hard problem of consciousness’. 10. Besides the mathematics of probability consistently showing that Darwinian evolution is impossible, the mathematics of population genetics itself has now shown Darwinian evolution to be impossible. Moreover, ‘immaterial’ mathematics itself, which undergirds all of science, engineering and technology, is held by most mathematicians to exist in some timeless, unchanging, immaterial, Platonic realm. Yet, the reductive materialism that Darwinian theory is based upon denies the existence of the immaterial realm that mathematics exists in. i.e. Darwinian evolution actually denies the objective reality of the one thing, i.e. mathematics, that it most needs in order to be considered scientific in the first place! 11. Donald Hoffman has, via population genetics, shown that if Darwin’s materialistic theory were true then all our observations of reality would be illusory. Yet the scientific method itself is based on reliable observation. Moreover, Quantum Mechanics itself has now shown that conscious observation must come before material reality, i.e. falsification of ‘realism’ proves that our conscious observations are reliable!. 12. The reductive materialism that undergirds Darwinian thought holds that immaterial information is merely ’emergent’ from a material basis. Yet immaterial Information, via experimental realization of the “Maxwell’s Demon” thought experiment, is now found to be its own distinctive physical entity that, although it can interact in a ‘top down’ manner with matter and energy, is separate from matter and energy. 13. Darwinists hold that Darwin’s theory is true. Yet ‘Truth’ itself is an abstract property of an immaterial mind that is irreducible to the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinian evolution. i.e. Assuming reductive materialism and/or Naturalism as the starting philosophical position of science actually precludes ‘the truth’ from ever being reached by science! 14. Darwinists, due to their underlying naturalistic philosophy, insist that teleology (i.e. goal directed purpose) does not exist. Yet it is impossible for Biologists to do biological research without constantly invoking words that directly imply teleology. i.e. The very words that Biologists themselves use when they are doing their research falsifies Darwinian evolution. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1I6fT6ATY700Bsx2-JSFqL6l-rzXpMcZcZKZfYRS45h4/edit

bornagain77

Bornagain77: Well golly gee whiz JVL, I did not ask if a vast majority of scientists think evolutionary science is science. I know that for crying out loud. I asked you what specific criteria demarcates Darwinism as a science.,,, As I already mention, it sure as hell ain’t Popper’s falsification criteria. Too funny. As everyone knows even Darwin suggested ways his thesis could be falsified. And that was over 150 years ago. Would you like to try for double or nothing? JVL

Well golly gee whiz JVL, I did not ask if a vast majority of scientists think evolutionary science is science. I know that for crying out loud. I asked you what specific criteria demarcates Darwinism as a science.,,, As I already mentioned, since Darwinists blatantly ignore empirical falsification, it sure as hell ain't Popper's falsification criteria.

“In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable; and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality.” – Karl Popper

As to your appeal to a 'consensus' of scientists, well, you might like to know, "Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled."

"I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had. Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus. There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period. In addition, let me remind you that the track record of the consensus is nothing to be proud of. Let’s review a few cases." - Michael Crichton - 2003 https://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Publications/PDF_Papers/Crichton2003.pdf

bornagain77

Dawkins, since his arguments are so bad for atheism, is apparently an unintentional Christian evangelist

Stephen Blume dedicates his book on design to Richard Dawkins

Dedication: This book is dedicated to Richard Dawkins, the world’s leading evo-illusionist. Dawkins has written many books on the subject of evolution. His most famous book, The Blind Watchmaker, has certainly taken the place of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species by Natural Selection as the Bible of evolution. He has done a great job of fooling his readers and fans into believing the most incredible fables. He has his own organization, The Richard Dawkins Foundation that will survive long after Dawkins is gone. His followers treat him with reverence, much like the pope is treated with great reverence by his followers.” — The DNA Delusion: The Evo-illusion of DNA by Dr. Stephen Blume

jerry

Bornagain77: Well golly gee whiz JVL, I know that the “trivial” question of whether or not Darwinian evolution can even be classified as a science in the first place may seem like a rather unimportant question for you right now, but, once again, perhaps you can see where others would hold that rather ‘unimportant question’ to be a intractable problem for Darwin’s theory? Sigh. You seem really intent on NOT addressing the question I brought up. Why is that? Don't you have any pre-selected quotes in your database to deal with it? Do you, yourself, not understand the controversy? But, just to be nice and give you something to respond to: clearly a vast majority of scientists think evolutionary science is science. And has been for a long time. So, no matter what quotes you mine, no matter how hard you try to suggest that evolutionary science is not science you are clearly in a very, very small minority. And considering that a lot of your 'supporting' quotes come from non-biologists I think it's fair to ask: why should anyone take you seriously? Perhaps you'd like to pick one particular argument in support of your case and we can discuss that. Based on you continuing to refuse to discuss my question. Which is typical. JVL

Well golly gee whiz JVL, I know that the "trivial" question of whether or not Darwinian evolution can even be classified as a science in the first place may seem like a rather unimportant question for you right now, but, once again, perhaps you can see where others would hold that rather 'unimportant question’ to be a intractable problem for Darwin’s theory? i.e. "there exists NO model successfully describing undirected Darwinian evolution. According to our current understanding, there never will be.,,,”

Top Ten Questions and Objections to ‘Introduction to Evolutionary Informatics’ – Robert J. Marks II – June 12, 2017 Excerpt: “There exists no model successfully describing undirected Darwinian evolution. Hard sciences are built on foundations of mathematics or definitive simulations. Examples include electromagnetics, Newtonian mechanics, geophysics, relativity, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, optics, and many areas in biology. Those hoping to establish Darwinian evolution as a hard science with a model have either failed or inadvertently cheated. These models contain guidance mechanisms to land the airplane squarely on the target runway despite stochastic wind gusts. Not only can the guiding assistance be specifically identified in each proposed evolution model, its contribution to the success can be measured, in bits, as active information.,,,”,,, “there exists no model successfully describing undirected Darwinian evolution. According to our current understanding, there never will be.,,,” https://evolutionnews.org/2017/06/top-ten-questions-and-objections-to-introduction-to-evolutionary-informatics/ Robert Jackson Marks II is an American electrical engineer. His contributions include the Zhao-Atlas-Marks (ZAM) time-frequency distribution in the field of signal processing,[1] the Cheung–Marks theorem[2] in Shannon sampling theory and the Papoulis-Marks-Cheung (PMC) approach in multidimensional sampling.[3] He was instrumental in the defining of the field of computational intelligence and co-edited the first book using computational intelligence in the title.[4][5] – per wikipedia

A bonus for you JVL, Dawkins, since his arguments are so bad for atheism, is apparently an unintentional Christian evangelist, :)

Why I converted from Atheism to Christianity (via Richard Dawkins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lxD2avzABs

bornagain77

Bornagain77: Well JVL, since you apparently think you know exactly what it is that makes evolution a science, (and (supposedly) ID not a science), I invite you, once again, to lay out the exact demarcation criteria by which Darwin can be described as being scientific. Oh dear, still avoiding the topic I was discussing (with someone else) and trying to get me involved in some other topic. Dr Wilson and a lot of other evolutionary theorists (including Dr Dawkins) had a strong disagreement over the effect of kin selection on development of altruistic behaviour. Jerry and Martin_r couldn't even get that far. You did a bit better. However . . . You seem to think that the disagreement was about 'the primary mechanism' of evolution. So, you think kin selection is the primary mechanism of evolution? Yes or no? From a modern sense or from a strict Darwinian sense? Do you think a disagreement over kin selection shows that evolutionary theory is bankrupt, not even a science? Notice I'm talking about the disagreement's effect NOT your already oft-stated views on evolutionary theory. If you could just stick to the topic that would be great. JVL

Well JVL, since you apparently think you know exactly what it is that makes evolution a science, (and (supposedly) ID not a science), I invite you, once again, to lay out the exact demarcation criteria by which Darwin can be described as being scientific.

“nobody to date has yet found a demarcation criterion according to which Darwin can be described as scientific”. – Imre Lakatos “Darwinism is not a testable scientific theory but a metaphysical research programme.” Karl Popper, Unended Quest (Glasgow: Fontana, Collins. 1976), p.151.

Popper's criteria of falsification, since Darwinists blatantly ignore empirical falsification, certainly ain't it.

"In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable; and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality." - Karl Popper 1. Darwin’s theory holds mutations to the genome to be random. The vast majority of mutations to the genome are not random but are now found to be ‘directed’. 2. Darwin’s theory holds that Natural Selection is the ‘designer substitute’ that produces the ‘appearance’ and/or illusion of design. Natural Selection, especially for multicellular organisms, is found to grossly inadequate as the ‘designer substitute. 3. Darwin’s theory holds that mutations to DNA will eventually change the basic biological form of any given species into a new form of a brand new species. Yet, biological form is found to be irreducible to mutations to DNA, nor is biological form reducible to any other material particulars in biology one may wish to invoke. 4. Darwin’s theory holds there to be an extremely beneficial and flexible mutation rate for DNA which was ultimately responsible for all the diversity and complexity of life we see on earth. The mutation rate to DNA is overwhelmingly detrimental. Detrimental to such a point that it is seriously questioned whether there are any truly beneficial, information building, mutations whatsoever. 5. Charles Darwin himself held that the gradual unfolding of life would (someday) be self-evident in the fossil record. Yet, from the Cambrian Explosion onward, the fossil record is consistently characterized by the sudden appearance of a group/kind in the fossil record(disparity), then rapid diversity within the group/kind, and then long term stability and even deterioration of variety within the overall group/kind, and within the specific species of the kind, over long periods of time. Of the few dozen or so fossils claimed as transitional, not one is uncontested as a true example of transition between major animal forms out of millions of collected fossils. Moreover, Fossils are found in the “wrong place” all the time (either too early, or too late). 6. Darwin’s theory, due to the randomness postulate, holds that patterns will not repeat themselves in supposedly widely divergent species. Yet thousands of instances of what is ironically called ‘convergent evolution’, on both the morphological and genetic level, falsifies the Darwinian belief that patterns will not repeat themselves in widely divergent species. 7. Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” Yet as Doug Axe pointed out, “Basically every gene and every new protein fold, there is nothing of significance that we can show that can be had in that gradualistic way. It’s all a mirage. None of it happens that way.” 8. Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be proved that any part of the structure of any one species had been formed for the exclusive good of another species, it would annihilate my theory, for such could not have been produced through natural selection.” Yet as Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig pointed out, “in thousands of plant species often entirely new organs have been formed for the exclusive good of more than 132,930 other species, these ‘ugly facts’ have annihilated Darwin’s theory as well as modern versions of it.” 9. Charles Darwin himself stated that, ““The impossibility of conceiving that this grand and wondrous universe, with our conscious selves, arose through chance, seems to me the chief argument for the existence of God. Yet ‘our conscious selves’ are certainly not explainable by ‘chance’ (nor is consciousness explainable by any possible reductive materialistic explanation in general), i.e. ‘the hard problem of consciousness’. 10. Besides the mathematics of probability consistently showing that Darwinian evolution is impossible, the mathematics of population genetics itself has now shown Darwinian evolution to be impossible. Moreover, ‘immaterial’ mathematics itself, which undergirds all of science, engineering and technology, is held by most mathematicians to exist in some timeless, unchanging, immaterial, Platonic realm. Yet, the reductive materialism that Darwinian theory is based upon denies the existence of the immaterial realm that mathematics exists in. i.e. Darwinian evolution actually denies the objective reality of the one thing, i.e. mathematics, that it most needs in order to be considered scientific in the first place! 11. Donald Hoffman has, via population genetics, shown that if Darwin’s materialistic theory were true then all our observations of reality would be illusory. Yet the scientific method itself is based on reliable observation. Moreover, Quantum Mechanics itself has now shown that conscious observation must come before material reality, i.e. falsification of ‘realism’ proves that our conscious observations are reliable!. 12. The reductive materialism that undergirds Darwinian thought holds that immaterial information is merely ’emergent’ from a material basis. Yet immaterial Information, via experimental realization of the “Maxwell’s Demon” thought experiment, is now found to be its own distinctive physical entity that, although it can interact in a ‘top down’ manner with matter and energy, is separate from matter and energy. 13. Darwinists hold that Darwin’s theory is true. Yet ‘Truth’ itself is an abstract property of an immaterial mind that is irreducible to the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinian evolution. i.e. Assuming reductive materialism and/or Naturalism as the starting philosophical position of science actually precludes ‘the truth’ from ever being reached by science! 14. Darwinists, due to their underlying naturalistic philosophy, insist that teleology (i.e. goal directed purpose) does not exist. Yet it is impossible for Biologists to do biological research without constantly invoking words that directly imply teleology. i.e. The very words that Biologists themselves use when they are doing their research falsifies Darwinian evolution. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1I6fT6ATY700Bsx2-JSFqL6l-rzXpMcZcZKZfYRS45h4/edit

bornagain77

Bornagain77: E.O. Wilson, a Pioneer of Evolutionary Biology, Dies at 92 – Dec. 27, 2021 Martin_r already told us he died back in comment . . . #7? Something like that. Are you paying attention or just jumping in because one of your favourite evo supporters (c'est moi!) is involved? I'm flattered but most of your contributions are off topic. And all stuff we've heard over and over and over and over and over and over and over . . . Apparently JVL thinks that the ‘unguided’ part of evolution is what, in and of itself, makes evolution a science and ID not a science. Nope, wrong again. You should really read what people actually write instead of making assumptions and then going to your REALLY BIG database of arguing points and grabbing some highly selected quotes. JVL

Martin_r: you keep asking the same question over and over … That's right because I wanted to see if you really understood the disagreement you were parading about. Seems like you don't; you just noticed that two prominent evolutionary biologists were sniping at each other and you thought: yeah, they're morons and the whole thing is bogus. But that's not true and you'd know that if you understood the point of contention but you don't. I see that BA77 already answered it, but PLEASE, explain to me, how IS THIS QUESTION IMPORTANT ???? If you understood the nature of the disagreement then you'd know why it's important to find out which detractors actually get what's going on and which are just cheerleaders. PAGES of misunderstandings !!!! Please give an example of one of those misunderstanding and compare and contrast Dr Dawkins and Dr Wilson's positions on it. If you can. leading Darwinists themselves can’t even agree on the primary mechanism of evolution You think that what they are disagreeing about is the primary mechanism of evolution? And what is that then? JVL