Jonathan McLatchie vs. Keith Fox: Has ID stood the test of time?
| February 24, 2018 | Posted by News under Design inference, Evolution, Intelligent Design, Irreducible Complexity |
Saturday 24th February 2018 – 02:30 pm
Seems to be up now in EST. Audio:Premier Christian Radio:
A bacterial flagellum acts as the outboard motor on a bacteria. But is the complex arrangement of parts that enable it to do its job a result of design or evolution? Michael Behe first opened the debate on the ‘irreducible complexity’ of biochemical machines in his 1996 book Darwin’s Black Box.
Intelligent Design proponent Jonathan McLatchie and theistic evolutionist Keith Fox debate whether Behe’s theory has stood the test of time, the bacterial flagellum and whether ID is a science stopper or theologically helpful. More.
Comment: Given that most traditional science greats believed that they lived in a meaningful universe that showed evidence of design, the idea obviously isn’t a science stopper. By contrast, Darwin’s horrid doubt, that our brains are shaped for fitness, not for truth, will destroy science by enabling the post-modern war on measurement.
See also: Live webinar with Robert Marks, Baylor U, on artificial intelligence and human exceptionalism (with Jonathan McLatchie)
110 Responses to Jonathan McLatchie vs. Keith Fox: Has ID stood the test of time?
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Science stopper: Everything came from nothing instantly some time ago and made all that is or will be. Everything that didn’t happen here happened somewhere we’ll never be able to visit or even observe so there’s no reason why. Gravity did it.
Jonathan M. has now loaded last week Marks’s video up on Youtube:
Related notes
Of particular interest from the following article by Marks is this quote: “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.,,,”
ID’s designer is an inexplicable mind that exists in an inexplicable ream that works by inexplicable means and methods. ID is left with the same problem in that its designer now fits the criteria of needed to be designed, etc.
A designer that “just was” complete with the knowledge of which genes would result in just the right proteins that would results in just the right features, already present, doesn’t serve an explanatory purpose. This is because one could more efficiently state that organisms “just appeared” complete with the knowledge of which genes would result in just the right proteins that would results in just the right features, already present.
You’ve just pushed the problem up a level without improving it.
Making the initial conditions fundamental when they are intractable is a science stopper. Most of that isn’t relevant to what we really care about, which is to solve problems. What we want is to cause transformation to solve problems. That’s knowledge.
ID is NOT about the designer. Your whining, while amusing, is meaningless.
ET:
No hope with CR. He is one of the worst examples of stereotyped self-referential thought I have ever met.
(With respect, CR. At least you are exceptional, in a sense! 🙂 )
CR –inexplicable means and methods.–
How is that different than your claim?
FWIW, ID doesn’t address the designer but only what can be observed and measured.
Behe’s initial claim was that there was no conceivable way that an organelle like the bacterial flagellum could have come about through incremental processes such as Darwin proposed for evolution. Biologists were able to suggest conceivable ways in which it could have happened thus refuting Behe’s claim.
An omnipotent and omniscient ‘Designer’ is as much of a science-stopper as the equivalent God because it can explain anything. What point is there in looking any further if all questions can be satisfactorily answered by ‘God/Designer did it’?
LocalMinimum @ 1
More like a science-pauser. WDK – we don’t know – yet – is a perfectly good answer. Anyway, why would any one expect that we have the answer to life, the Universe and everything after just a few hundred years of looking? At least the knowledge we do have we dug up for ourselves because we seem to be getting sweet FA in the way of help from the Designer/God.
Sev:
No they did not. That you think they did means only that you suspend your skepticism when it is necessary to cling to your cherished metaphysical beliefs.
gpuccio
Indeed. The “who designed the designer” canard has been dispatched countless times in these pages. Yet he seems to be impervious to reason. A truly sad case.
@ET
Your pointing out ID is defined in such a way that makes it a bad explanation for the biosphere, doesn’t somehow result in it not being a bad explanation for the biosphere.
Specifically, what is the origin of the knowledge the supposed designer would have put in organisms? If it didn’t possess that knowledge then did it spontaneously appear when the organisms were created? Is it the case that the designer “just was” complete with that knowledge already present? This makes ID’s designer an authoritative source of knowledge, which is bad philosophy.
On the other hand, if the designer did posses that knowledge then it was well adapted for the purpose of designing organisms. It too meets the criteria for having to had been designed. How can being well adapted to serve a purpose (designing organisms) be an explanation for being well to serve a purpose?
Furthermore, ID’s designer is abstract and has no defined limitations. As such, it’s a bad explanation for the biosphere. Example? Why did organisms appear in the order of least to most complex? That’s just what the designer must have wanted.
Terraforming doesn’t explain this order because you’d have to assume the designer didn’t posses the knowledge of how to terraform a planet without starting with simpler organisms. According to you, ID isn’t about the designer, so that’s not an assumption you can made, either.
Apparently, ID doesn’t say anything about the designer, except when it does?
Who dispatched it? When?
See above.
Just as there are no non-physical examples of commuters, There are no non-physical examples of information.
When we bring information into fundamental physics by defining via which tasks must be possible, which tasks must be impossible and why. This includes which tasks must be possibly to copy information, which ID’s designer must have done if it put the information there.
Why is that important?
Because it means the designer must have possessed that very knowledge in physical form. At which point, it represents the very same problem you claim need to be explained with a designer, etc.
CR:
CR, you are an inveterate liar. If I thought you truly did not know the answer to that, I would respond to it. But you do.
There is a reason we call them “Frequently Raised but Weak Arguments.” See https://uncommondescent.com/faq/#desdesnr
And yet reality demonstrates that we do not have to knw who the intelligent designer was before determining it (intelligent design) exists. Reality says that we don’t even ask about the designing intelligence until after that determination is made.
How do we know the ancients were capable of producing Stonehenge? The existence of Stonehenge. The point being is we know about the intelligent designers’ capabilities by what they left behind.
And that is OK. Sometimes you have to make assumptions given your knowledge.
Sev states that:
And herein lies the tremendous difference between the pseudoscience of Darwinian evolution and the science of Intelligent Design.
Darwinists are wholly reliant on what they can imagine to be true, but are unable to ever experimentally prove to be true. Whereas ID advocates rely on what the can observe and experimentally prove to be true. Namely that only intelligent agents can create functional information and/or molecular machines.
As Behe stated: “Some evolutionary biologists–like Richard Dawkins–have fertile imaginations. Given a starting point, they almost always can spin a story to get to any biological structure you wish”
You don’t have to take Behe’s word for it. Gould, Mayr and Hughes all concede the reliance of Darwinists on ‘just so stories’,,
And indeed, Darwinists have ZERO evidence of molecular machines coming into existence by Darwinian processes:
And where Darwinists have zero evidence of molecular machines coming into existence by Darwinian processes, on the other hand, ID advocates do have evidence of Intelligent agents creating molecular machines:
What is especially interesting in Darwinists being wholly reliant on imagination instead of evidence is that science, via experimentation and falsification, is SUPPOSE to reliably separate what humans imagine to be true from what is actually true.
Yet, since Darwinists refuse to accept experimental falsification for their theory,,, such as the following experimental falsification,,
,,,, Darwinists have simply abandoned experimental science altogether, and have thus forsaken any right they might have had to call their theory ‘scientific’ in the first place, but have instead wound up with a pseudoscientific theory along the lines of tea-leaf reading.
Of supplemental note: Earlier I quoted Dr. Marks in which he stated:
That Darwinists have no mathematical model should not be all that surprising. Their simply is no ‘law of evolution’ within the known physical universe for Darwinists to build a realistic mathematical model upon:
As Ernst Mayr himself conceded, “In biology, as several other people have shown, and I totally agree with them, there are no natural laws in biology corresponding to the natural laws of the physical sciences.”
In the following article, Roger Highfield makes much the same observation as Ernst Mayr and states, ,,, Whatever the case, those universal truths—’laws’—that physicists and chemists all rely upon appear relatively absent from biology.
Professor Murray Eden of MIT, in a paper entitled “Inadequacies of Neo-Darwinian Evolution as a Scientific Theory” stated that “the randomness postulate is highly implausible and that an adequate scientific theory of evolution must await the discovery and elucidation of new natural laws—physical, physico-chemical, and biological.”
In fact, not only is there no ‘law of evolution’ within the known physical universe for Darwinists to build a realistic mathematical model upon, the second law of thermodynamics, entropy, a law with great mathematical explanatory power in science, almost directly contradicts the primary Darwinian claim that greater and greater levels of functional complexity can easily be had and/or ‘naturally selected’ for over long periods of time. Indeed, entropy’s main claim is that, over long periods of time, everything in the universe will decay into simpler and simpler states until what is termed thermodynamic equilibrium is finally reached.
As the following video and paper show, entropy is a far greater problem for Darwinists than they are ever willing to openly admit in public.
Thus in conclusion, Darwinists simply have no known scientific basis within the known physical universe to build a realistic scientific/mathematical model upon. And therefore Darwinian evolution, unless such a ‘law of evolution’ is ever discovered, will forever be reliant on ‘the gullibility of imagination’ in order to try to make their theory seem remotely plausible,
Seversky @ 8:
I’m willing to accept your WDK; as long as it’s a fair and proper WDK. The whole super-material structure/spontaneously generated intelligence is fine but super-material intelligence is just wrong schtick gets sillier with every tiresome iteration once you know the game.
CR @ 3:
Which would well describe all of the “theories” I alluded to…with the difference being they’re specifically intended to be science stoppers, i.e. as an actual limit to what can be.
God isn’t intractable as we acknowledge Them in being beyond our sphere of understanding, and thus in the realm of solutions to what we can’t understand.
Of course, the universe being created by a Being beyond our understanding would not stand in the way of our chasing everything we can actually comprehend, so God isn’t even a science pauser.
In fact, history would point to God as a science enabler. Well, perhaps Newton could’ve accomplished so much more if Neil deGrasse Tyson had a time machine to go back and straighten him out on the God stuff and teach him to properly pursue science.
ba77 @ 15 –
So where are the ID experiments showing that the bacterial flagellum (for example) was designed?
per statistician Bob O’Hara at 19:
And here the flagellum is shown to be subject to ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, quantum effects. Non-local quantum effects simply are not within the reductive materialism framework of neo-Darwinism to explain.
Besides the flagellum, ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, quantum entanglement is now found to be pervasive within life, (i.e. within DNA, Proteins and RNA molecules):
Do Darwinists have a ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, cause to appeal to so as to be able to explain quantum entanglement in biological systems?,, (or to explain entanglement anywhere else for that matter?), No, they don’t! In fact, quantum mechanics falsifies the entire reductive materialistic framework upon which Darwinian evolution is based.
Whereas, on the other hand, the Christian Theist has been postulating a ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, cause for life for a few thousand years now.
Bob O’H:
All SCIENTIFIC experiments support the claim that all bacterial flagella were designed. And there aren’t any scientific experiments which demonstrate any bacterial flagella can evolve by means of blind and mindless processes.
Seversky:
What pure trope. How does anyone know those biologists came up with a conceivable way? Just cuz they put it down on paper doesn’t make it a conceivable way. They have to actually test it and no one has ever done so
So we can understand it, duh. We want to understand it so we can properly maintain and repair it. That said no one from your position is doing anything beyond declaring it evolved.
ba77 @ 20 & 21 – I’m afraid it’s not clear from any of you comments which of those links describe the the ID experiments showing that the bacterial flagellum was designed. Can you be more explicit?
As Dr Behe wrote in DBB:
“Our ability to be confident of the design of the cilium or intracellular transport rests on the same principles to be confident of the design of anything: the ordering of separate components to achieve an identifiable function that depends sharply on the components.”
And all scientific experiments with all bacterial flagella demonstrate they all fit Dr Behe’s description. And there isn’t any evidence that evolution by blind and mindless processes can produce any of them.
Per Bob (and weave) O’Hara at 24:
Although the bacterial flagellum (as well as other molecular machines) greatly outclass, in terms of engineering parameters, any machine man has built on the macro level,,
,,, much less any machine man has built on the micro level (for which Nobel prizes were awarded),,,
And despite the fact that the flagellum has been shown, per Minnich, to be ‘by definition, Irreducibly Complex’
And despite the fact that “the physical principle of flagella motor does not belong to classical mechanics, but to quantum mechanics”
,,, in spite of all that, Bob (and weave) O’Hara still holds that he is personally unsure whether or not the flagellum was designed.
In his denial of the evidence at hand, I hold that Bob (and weave) O’Hara is either self-deluded or else he is telling an outright bald-face lie.
How can I be sure that Bob (and weave) O’Hara is either self-deluded or else he is telling an outright bald-face lie?
Well, Intelligent Design is the default assumption or life. Darwinism started out as, and still is, a negative argument against Design. The ‘Design hypothesis’ was overwhelmingly accepted as true during Darwin’s day. Yet Darwin supposedly did away with the default assumption of design with his ‘designer substitute’ of Natural Selection.
Yet, natural selection, as even Darwinists themselves now admit with their acceptance of ‘neutral theory’,,,
,,, natural selection is now shown to be grossly inadequate as the supposed ‘designer substitute’:
Thus, with the supposed ‘designer substitute’ of natural selection being cast to the wayside, (by Darwinists themselves no less), then the default assumption reverts back to Design, not to chance.
Even Dawkins himself admits that chance is absurd as an explanation for life:
But to drive the nail home for my claim that Bob (and weave) O’Hara is either self-deluded or else he is telling an outright bald-face lie, it is now found that, despite what they may say to the public, the default assumption of professional scientists is one of Design:
i.e. It is not that Atheists do not see purpose and/or Design in nature, it is that Atheists, for whatever severely misguided reason, live in denial of the purpose and/or Design that they themselves see in nature.
I hold the preceding studies to be confirming evidence for Romans1:19-20
Bob O’H @ 27: The way to overturn an epistemic impossibility is with a counter example, not appeals to the unknown.
ba77 – you’ve now put up 4 responses, and still haven’t answered my question – where’s the ID experiment that shows that the flagellum was intelligently designed. Does this mean that there is no such experiment?
All SCIENTIFIC experiments support the claim that all bacterial flagella were designed. And there aren’t any scientific experiments which demonstrate any bacterial flagella can evolve by means of blind and mindless processes.
@Barry
I’m a liar? You seem to have confused the existence of a entry about the question in a list and having actually dispatched it, as you claimed.
Specifically, that entry doesn’t address any of my criticisms in #11.
From the referenced entry….
The knowledge in organisms is the proximate cause. This is because the origin of the features of organisms is the origin of that knowledge. Saying a designer “had it” doesn’t explain that knowledge.
Again….
If that knowledge spontaneously appeared, then in what sense did the designer actually design the organisms? And if it “just was”, one can more efficiently state that it just appeared. Neither explain anything.
So, it’s only dispatched if one holds the narrow, philosophical view that knowledge comes from authoritative sources
When we bring information into fundamental physics, the process of copying information, which is what the designer would have done if that information was not spontaneously created, requires specific construction tasks to be possible. That includes information being present externally before the copy occurred. Just as there are no non-physical computers, there are no non-physical instantiations of information.
So, the designer, or some source of that information it had access to, would have the appearance of design. And, according to ID, it too would be identified as being designed, etc.
Furthermore, as I’ve pointed out, the medical community consists of intelligent agents. They take actions with the intent and purpose of treating and curing diseases like cancer. So, why cant they just intentionally and purposefully impose their conciseness and arrange the bits on a thumb drive so it contains the cure for cancer?
IOW, it seems to me that, if ID was true, we’d have the cure for cancer by now. But we don’t. So, what gives?
@Barry
More from the entry…
So, it’s been dispatched, by definition, if you happen to be a natural theist?
See the previous comment. And, causes need to be beings? This too is parochial.
IOW, it’s been dispatched, but only if you happen to hold specific philosophical views that overlap with theism?
@ET
That’s incredibly bad analogy. And, apparently, you don’t realize it.
Stonehenge is not constructed over and over again by the process of replication. The knowledge of how to build Stonehenge was in its designer(s), not Stonehenge. It’s like a car, which needs a factory with workers and robots that posses the knowledge of how to build them. That knowledge is external.
However, biological organisms do not roll of manufacturing lines of a factory. Nor do they spontaneously appear out of thin air. They are constructed by following a recipe of transformations to preform on raw materials. It’s a self-replicator.
The origin of those features is the origin of that knowledge. Our current, best, universal explanation for the growth of knowledge is that it grows via variation controlled by criticism. This includes the growth of knowledge in the workers and the robots in the factory.
@BA
Ok, so then why don’t we have a cure for cancer?
Doesn’t the medical community consist of intelligent agents? Doesn’t it take actions with the purpose and intent to cure cancer?
And when we do eventually have a cure for cancer, what will have been the delta between then and now?
What will have changed?
IOW, something in between then and now will have happened to make curing cancer possible. That missing piece seems to be a rather large hold in the theory of ID, in that it doesn’t add up.
So what? Biological reproduction is irreducibly complex. Stones are constructed over and over again.
Question-begging drivel.
By the way, our current best explanation for knowledge is intelligent agents
Bob (and weave) O’Hara, though he was provided several lines of evidence supporting the claim that the flagellum is indeed designed, still insists that he personally finds that there is no ‘experiment that shows that the flagellum was intelligently designed’.
To which I can only echo ET’s bolded comment:
As was further highlighted in post 27, the default assumption has always been that life was and is designed, and, as was also shown, the Atheist’s ‘knee jerk’ gut level reaction is itself that life and nature are designed. As Crick himself noted:
Frankly, a more clear example of ‘suppressing the truth in unrighteousness(Romans 1:18)’ would be hard to find.
And when looking at a cross section of DNA, it is easy to see why Crick had to “constantly keep in mind’ that what he saw was not designed
Basically, atheists constantly fight tooth and nail insisting that the default assumption should be one of random chance instead of design, and even though many leading atheists themselves readily admit that life ‘appears to be designed’ for a purpose.
,,, and although they have ZERO experimental evidence to support the claim that such ‘appearance of design’ can be had through mindless processes,,,
,,, and although such a appeal to chance is patently insane,
,,, despite all that, many internet atheists, such as Bob (and weave) O’Hara, are willing to toss their own sanity itself out the window if it means that they do not ever have to admit that life ‘appears’ to be designed for a purpose.
And indeed, with the inherent denial of free will, and ones very own personhood, a denial that goes with the atheist’s materialistic worldview, insanity is all that the atheist is really left with when all is said and done.
Basically, committed atheists would rather embrace insanity than God. And that is exactly what they will get in the end unless they come to their right minds:
And exactly as would be expected on the Christian view of reality, we find two very different eternities in reality.
Of humorous note: My unsolicited advice to Bob (and weave) O’Hara
“My unsolicited advice to Bob (and weave) O’Hara.”
You may think that this phrase is witty, but it is more indicative of childish immaturity. I have enjoyed many of your comments, but this one is beneath you. I will start scrolling past your comments if you persist in such childishness. You are better than this.
MB @ 38: I find your comment to be pompous and condescending. I might have to start scrolling past your comments like I do to most of the other comments posted by a/mat preachers on this site.
MB oh golly gee whiz, I guess my only ‘mature’ response can be to tell you to go soak your head,
https://goo.gl/images/EukYtE
It looks like Truth Will Set You Free has lost his touch with reality today… He first accused me of being a/mat and now Molson Bleu even though we both of us clearly indicated our belief in God more than on a hundred occasions…
Go figure… Molson Bleu? Any clues? 😉
BA @40
Or alternatively you can present MB with one of your related notes, such as the unshakable evidence of the Shrek of Turin… That should shut him up… The long-bearded, long-haired Jesus face imprinted on a piece of cloth plus the lamb writing next to it… This reminds me of the supposed paintings of Jesus I have seen all my life until one day my kids asked:How do we know that Jesus had long hair and beard? And it hit me… We don’t. It’s all an illusion… however persistent…
J-Mac at 41 and 42, funny that I’ve seen you attack Christianity on UD much more than I have seen you defend ID.
The confusion with TWSYF, if any, is of your own making.
It is clear that you have deep personal issues with Christianity, or more precisely the false beliefs you’ve believe about Christianity, that have severely clouded your judgment.
“MB oh golly gee whiz, I guess my only ‘mature’ response can be to tell you to go soak your head,”
I suggest that we behave as mature adults and this is your response? Bob O’H has a fair question of you and you parody his name in response.
Molson, you are not the moral police of UD, for you to pretend that you are is pompous to put it mildly.
So again, go soak your pompous head!
https://goo.gl/images/EukYtE
Moreover, Bob (and weave) O’Hara question was certainly not ‘fair’. For you to pretend he was anything other than disingenuous in his dismissal of the empirical evidence presented to him supporting the inference to design makes you part of the problem.
Feel free to fulfill your promise and scroll past my posts, I can guarantee you that my feelings will not be hurt.
“Molson, you are not the moral police of UD, for you to pretend that you are is pompous to put it mildly.
So again, go soak your pompous head!”
Fair enough. But I have one question for you. Do you have a problem with people when they use the parody of your name that I have seen before? The one that starts with Batsh**? If you do, it just seems strange that you don’t have a problem doing it to others.
Hmmm, I thought I smelled a rat. Perhaps you would like to elaborate a little more on that particularly odious character who has been banned quite a few times from UD, posting under various different pseudonyms until exposed each time?
And that is the nice stuff he has said about us. It gets worse, much worse!
Of course, I’m sure you have been spared for whatever reason???
“Hmmm, I thought I smelled a rat.”
Sorry, but I have never seen the site you refer to. But I will certainly check it out. I only mentioned the parody on your name after I looked at the site that KF had mentioned (after the bar closes) when he called it an animus site. When people make claims like this about other sites, I prefer to draw my own conclusions. That is the site where I saw this parody of your name used many times. But I still stand by my point. You are obviously offended by this parody, as I would be. Why you would chose to use a tactic against others that obviously offends you, is simply not something I would expect another Christian to resort to.
BA77@47. I took a very brief look at the site you linked above. All I can say is that whoever this person is has some serious issues. I have rarely seen such hatred paranoia and venom on any web site. I almost feel sorry for whoever wrote that nonsense.
Molson Bleu, for someone who regularly deems himself morally superior to others on UD, your moral judgement is not nearly as astute as you apparently think it is.
I, with no personal animosity towards Bob, poked fun at Bob (and weave) O’Hara’s debating style. He basically ‘bobs and weaves’ to avoid addressing arguments honestly and directly. It is a humorous, good-natured, poke at him and his disingenuous debating style. You, apparently failing to distinguish this moral nuance, accuse me of attacking him in a personal manner (as your referenced troll regularly attacked UD bloggers in a very personal and degrading manner). That simply is not true. While I don’t respect Bob’s debating style, I’ve never attacked him personally.
But to be clear, I was being fairly blunt, and personal, with you and your feigned moral superiority when I told you to go soak your pompous head.
But, in my ‘moral’ judgment, calling you ‘pompous’ is far better than what Jesus Himself called the religious hypocrites of his day who thought they were morally superior to everyone else.
as to:
“I have rarely seen such hatred paranoia and venom on any web site. I almost feel sorry for whoever wrote that nonsense.”
For once we agree.
J-mac @ 41: Tell me more about your theism. Any specific religion?
BA77 @ 50: “I, with no personal animosity towards Bob, poked fun at Bob (and weave) O’Hara’s debating style.”
That’s how I understood your comment. Levity is often good. The real offensive remarks on this site generally come from a/mats… and sometimes me.
ba77 @ 50 – I find the “Bob (and weave) O’Hara” moniker irksome, especially as you are also accusing me of being disingenuous. You also claim no animosity. If there’s no animosity then why not try treating people with respect? That might help to raise the tone of the discussion here.
I would honestly like to see some evident that ID researchers have done experiments to specifically test the hypothesis that some biological structure was designed. I hope you appreciate that this is not the same thing as asking if it could have evolved, or even providing arguments for why something had to have been designed (essentially I’m asking for one or several parts of that argument: the building blocks of it).
as to:
“I find the “Bob (and weave) O’Hara” moniker irksome.”
But alas, your feeling of being ‘irked’ by my comment on your disingenuous ‘bob and weave’ debating style, much like your belief that you really exist as a real person, is just an illusion foisted off on you by the particles of your brain. i.e. According to your Darwinian presuppositions, there is only a illusion of ‘you’ having an illusion of being ‘irked’ by some illusion of objective morality being tresspassed.
“You” really need to come to terms with just how insane your worldview is. But alas, for “you” to be able to come to terms with your insane worldview presupposes that there really is a “you” that really is in control of your thoughts. But alas, only particles are real, the rest is all just a dream within a dream for “you”. There is no remedy for your insanity within Darwinism.
Final note, as to your repeated false claim that I have provided no empirical evidence for ID, I stand by my posts in 20, 21, 26, 27 and 36, and particularly stand by my claim that you are either self-deluded or are telling a bald-face lie when you deny the design inference,,,, and furthermore, I am more than happy to let the readers decide for themselves who is being honest towards the evidence, and who is being disingenuous, even deceitful, towards the evidence.
Bob O’H:
And we would honestly like to see some evident that evolutionary researchers have done experiments to specifically test the hypothesis that some biological structure evolved by means of blind and mindless processes. But we all know that ain’t going to happen.
Everything about all bacterial flagella scream intelligent design. They meet Dr Behe’s criteria and no one has any idea how blind and mindless processes could have done it.
It looks like the researchers may not be so smart. If all cancerous cells use fermentation instead of respiration then it is clear what needs to be done- stop the fermentation process. Why hasn’t anyone done so?
ba77 – let’s talk about disingenuous.
But that’s not what I asked for, was it? I asked for something more specific. I’m aware that to build a case for a theory you need to pull in different sorts of evidence, and I was asking for one specific sort of evidence.
BTW, ba77, I do believe I exist. So please don’t tell me that I don’t. You don’t understand my worldview: all of your statements about my worldview in 54 are false (well, except possibly the one about it being insane, but if it is insane then it’s not for the reasons you state, as your reasons don’t match with my worldview).
Oh, and if you want to respond by telling me what I should believe based on my “Darwinian presuppositions”, stop and think about whether your assumptions about my presuppositions might be wrong – your comments in 54 suggest to me that they are flat out wrong, I’m afraid.
I stand by my posts, and also stand by my claim, for which I also provided empirical evidence, that you are being personally disingenuous in your denial of the evidence presented. i.e. Studies establish that the design inference is ‘knee jerk’ inference that is built into everyone, especially including atheists, and that atheists have to mentally suppress the design inference!
Moreover, it is extremely ironic that you want your personal subjective opinion as to whether something is designed or not to carry so much weight when your Darwinian worldview itself holds that your personal subjective opinion is merely an illusion. Why should I give two hoots what an ‘illusion’s opinion is? (as if illusions could have opinions in the first place!),,, If the particles of your brain happened to spontaneously arrange themselves in some other pattern, ‘the illusion of you’ would be of the illusory opinion that the evidence for design was overwhelming, and there is nothing that ‘you, as a illusory person,’ could do to change that opinion. As Mr Arrington said in his thread, for the Darwinian materialist, “the category “particles and the impersonal natural forces that move them” exhausts the possible causes for all phenomena”
52 @ Truth Will Set You Free
J-mac @ 41: Tell me more about your theism. Any specific religion?
Yeah, when your Cowardliness Will Set You Free…
ba77 @ 59 – No, I don’t believe I’m an illusion. I don’t think you are either. I’ll ask you again – please don’t mis-represent my views. Neither you or Barry understand what I think, and I think it’s arrogant (at best) for you to pretend otherwise.
@ 43 bornagain77
J-Mac at 41 and 42, funny that I’ve seen you attack Christianity on UD much more than I have seen you defend ID.
The confusion with TWSYF, if any, is of your own making.
It is clear that you have deep personal issues with Christianity, or more precisely the false beliefs you’ve believe about Christianity, that have severely clouded your judgment.
I have a problem with falsehood; people or religions trying to support their preconceived ideas at all cost…
If it is Christianity, ID or atheists, so be it…
Truth should be able do defend itself…If it can’t, God help it!
Who appointed you the judge of me?
Bob (and weave) O’Hara, since you constantly defend the Darwinian worldview, I will hold ‘the illusion of you’ to the precepts inherent in that worldview.
It is not my duty to assign Theistic precepts of personhood to someone defending the atheistic worldview. If you differ from atheists in some fundamental way, “YOU” have to make the point clear. You have not.
I think it disingenuous of you to suppose otherwise. But alas, it is yet more evidence for your disingenuous ‘bob and weave’ debate style ..
@61 Bob O’H
I’ll ask you again – please don’t mis-represent my views. Neither you or Barry understand what I think, and I think it’s arrogant (at best) for you to pretend otherwise.
It’s a “Christian” way of misrepresentation, so it can’t be that bad…After all, it is for a good cause: the glorification of the “Christian truth”, as they see it and not as it really is…
Can you argue with this “logic”?
ba77 – I don’t know any atheists who deny the existence of the self. We may not have a good explanation for consciousness, but we don’t deny it exists. I honestly don’t see that the “Darwinian worldview” (whatever that is) denies consciousness and identity.
J-Mac as to:
“people or religions trying to support their preconceived ideas at all cost…”
Like for instance, I don’t know, maybe someone citing evidence for Out of Body experiences as evidence against the validity of Near Death Experiences
Well Bob, I really don’t care what ‘the illusion of you’ denies.
I could cite many quotes from leading atheists establishing my position, but what is the point. You will just deny it anyway. Oh well, for the sake of readers, a few more from Einstein and Rosenberg:
To reiterate, I stand by my posts, and the evidence presented therein thus far, and am more than happy to let readers decide for themselves.
The last word is all yours. Might I suggest some, any, empirical evidence that sophisticated molecular machines can evolve into existence from mindless processes, instead of just your usual subjective opinion as to whether you personally think the inference to ID is warranted or not, especially since “you”, according to atheistic materialism, really don’t exist as a real person?
If you think people are an illusion, then you have bigger problems. I don’t think I’m an illusion. I don’t understand consciousness (although I suspect it’s an emergent property of our brains), but I don’t deny it.
J-mac @ 60: That’s exactly the response I expected, a/mat. Stop faking. Embrace your nihilism.
Bob
I would honestly like to see some evident that ID researchers have done experiments to specifically test the hypothesis that some biological structure was designed.
If you were going to design a test for the hypothesis how would you do it?
t7 – I don’t know. I think it would depend on a model for how the design was done. For example, front-loading might be testable as it assumes that there is code in the DNA that is not yet functional, so it might be possible to detect that, and even turn it on. For other models of ID, I’ve no idea: I suspect the “the Designer just zapped in a new function” could be un-testable, although there might be some information in phylogenies to test it.
Bob, you are playing a game of pure rhetoric. Experimental evidence demonstrated (decades ago) that the gene is a symbol system using a genuine reading-frame code; very nicely fulfilling a logical prediction about such systems. The evidence supporting ID has only multiplied since that point. Hello? You’ve been on this blog for years, Bob, always playing the deadpan game. Does it really never get old for you? Moreover, is the “no evidence” shtick (in any of its various forms) really the best you’ve got at this point in the year 2018?
Come to think of it, Bob, here again is the question I asked you a few months ago (which you ignored): At the point in earth history that the first ever aaRS was successfully constructed from genetic memory, how many of the other aaRS had to be in place?
Bob at 71.
Suppose someone were trying to determine whether your post at 71 was random letters generated by a computer or an actual message in English.
Now suppose someone concluded based on the fact that the text has meaning within a code that it was in fact the product of intelligent design.
Would the following be a valid objection: You are just saying Bob zapped that text right into the combox. That’s untestable; your conclusion is invalid.
You would think that objection is idiotic. And you would be right.
Bob,
James Randi has stopped his very wise and good paranormal challenge due to his age but consider this: Suppose someone beat it? Would that prove the paranormal or would that just mean someone managed to fool him?
Or consider this: Suppose we tested ID by setting up cameras in some vacant wasteland to record whether complex specified information could arise by chance and nature, and our cameras record a huge earthquake, followed by a huge windstorm followed by another earthquake, and when all is stable we see the rocks spelled out very clearly “Dembski is right you idiots”.
Well, under the ground rules of the experiment you have just disproved ID.
So, so much for the powers of natural science 🙂
What I would suggest though by way of a testable experiment is to find something of known design, a page of writing, or a paragraph, or even an average-length sentence, quantify for the characteristics of design, see if those quantifications hold for other objects of known design and then apply the quantifications to some biological entity.
That would be potentially falsifiable at a least two points — whether the quantifications are accurate and whether the biological entity has them.
Barry, great minds 🙂
Upright Biped @ 72 –
I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to explain that. Firstly, what do you mean by “a symbol system using a genuine reading-frame code”? And also, how does that relate to ID?
Barry @ 74 – I’m sorry, I don’t get your point. If you know how to test the “the Designer just zapped in a new function” theory (and I mean specifically test that theory, not another one), then I’d be fascinated to hear more.
t7 @ 75 –
Eh? How do you come to that conclusion?
Bob,
The claim is that nature and chance can’t create complex specified information and science prohibits a resort to “supernatural” explanations.
Observing in realtime the creation of complex specified information solely via acts of nature would — ostensibly — disprove ID.
“The claim”? What claim? That claim doesn’t say anything about anything being designed by intelligence. And finding CSI being generated wouldn’t disprove ID either – presumably a designer could make something that mimicked what could be produced by evolution.
“That claim doesn’t say anything about anything being designed by intelligence. ”
The claim we are discussing is the one that says biological entities don’t need to be designed by intelligence because chance and nature can create the specified complexity that they exhibit.
Bob, what are you saying should be the conclusion of the experiment concerning the cameras in the wasteland?
t7 @ 80 – sorry if there was any confusion, but that’s not the claim I was discussing. I specifically wanted to discuss the claim that some natural things were designed.
“Molson Bleu, for someone who regularly deems himself morally superior to others on UD, your moral judgement is not nearly as astute as you apparently think it is.”
I never claim to be morally superior to anyone. At my best, I may be. At my worst, I definitely am not. In short, just like everyone else.
However, when I see people commenting in a disingenuous or disrespectful manner, I do not hesitate to call it out as constructive criticisms. As I hope that others do when I step over the line, which I occasionally do. The fact that you took my comment so personally suggests that there was some merit to it.
In your case all I said was that parodying a person’s name to discredit their debate style (Bob and Weave O’Hara) is childish. If you think that me pointing this out to you is pompous, then KF is guilty of the same thing whenever he calls people out for using the term “Gish Gallop”. Something that I think he is right to do.
I meant it as a constructive criticism and I hoped that you would take it as such.
Bob
I specifically wanted to discuss the claim that some natural things were designed.
OK, by natural let’s restrict it to biological. Computer code, novels, movies, airplanes are also natural by my reasoning and obviously designed.
So my argument is using items of known design quantify, as rigorously as we can, the characteristics as to what makes them designed and then see if they apply to biological entities.
We needn’t pretend. You are aware that it was confirmed by experiment in 1961 that the genetic code is a reading frame code — read from a fixed point in three non-overlapping bases at a time.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
At the point in earth history that the first ever aaRS was successfully constructed from genetic memory, how many of the other aaRS had to be in place?
At best that gets you to say that something might be designed, but things that are not designed might also have the same characteristics.
Based on what evidence Bob? Show me a reading-frame code (where you know the provenance of the system) that arose by non-intelligent means.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
At the point in earth history that the first ever aaRS was successfully constructed from genetic memory, how many of the other aaRS had to be in place?
at 71 Bob (and weave) O’Hara states:
at 78 tribune7 rightly observes
at 79 Bob (and weave) O’Hara retorts:
Bob’s notions of how science works are a muddled mess. He appeals to something nobody has ever seen, namely the creation of Information by natural processes, to try to basically say, “Well, if we saw information being created by natural processes it wouldn’t strictly falsify ID because God could work through nature.”
Yet despite Bob’s belief that hypothetical situations in science should take precedence over known situations in science, science, regardless of what Bob wants to believe, works primarily by experimentation and falsification.
In fact, since Darwinian evolution has no strict falsification criteria as other sciences, including ID, have, Popper also stated this in regards to Darwinism: “not a testable scientific theory but a metaphysical research program.”
Whereas on the hand, to experimentally falsify the claims of ID (as well as to experimentally validate the claims of Darwinists at the same time), and earn oneself up to 5 million dollars to boot, all one needs to do is “Show an example of Information that doesn’t come from a mind. All you need is one.”
As mentioned previously in post 16, the reason why Darwinian evolution is more properly classified as a pseudoscience instead of a science is that Darwinian evolution has no mathematical model to test against. As Dr Robert Marks states ““there exists no model successfully describing undirected Darwinian evolution. According to our current understanding, there never will be.,,,”
As was also mentioned in post 16, the reason why nobody has ever been able to build a realistic mathematical model for Darwinian evolution is simply because there is no ‘law of evolution’ within the known physical universe for mathematicians and physicists to build a realistic mathematical model upon:
As Ernst Mayr himself conceded, “In biology, as several other people have shown, and I totally agree with them, there are no natural laws in biology corresponding to the natural laws of the physical sciences.”
In the following article, Roger Highfield makes much the same observation as Ernst Mayr and states, ,,, Whatever the case, those universal truths—’laws’—that physicists and chemists all rely upon appear relatively absent from biology.
Professor Murray Eden of MIT, in a paper entitled “Inadequacies of Neo-Darwinian Evolution as a Scientific Theory” stated that “the randomness postulate is highly implausible and that an adequate scientific theory of evolution must await the discovery and elucidation of new natural laws—physical, physico-chemical, and biological.”
In fact, not only is there no ‘law of evolution’ within the known physical universe for Darwinists to build a realistic mathematical model upon, the second law of thermodynamics, entropy, a law with great mathematical explanatory power in science, almost directly contradicts the primary Darwinian claim that greater and greater levels of functional complexity can easily be had and/or ‘naturally selected’ for over long periods of time. Indeed, entropy’s main claim is that, over long periods of time, everything in the universe will decay into simpler and simpler states until what is termed thermodynamic equilibrium is finally reached.
And whereas Darwinian evolution has no known law of nature to appeal to so as to establish itself as a proper, testable, science, Intelligent Design does not suffer from such a disconnect from physical reality. In other words, Intelligent Design can appeal directly to ‘the laws of conservation of information’ (Dembski, Marks, etc..) in order to establish itself as a proper, testable, and rigorous science.
And since Intelligent Design is mathematically based on the ‘law of conservation of information’, that makes Intelligent Design very much testable and potentially falsifiable, and thus makes Intelligent Design, unlike Darwinism, a rigorous science instead of a unfalsifiable pseudoscience.
Of supplemental note: although Darwinists have refused to accept falsification for their theory from mathematics and empirical evidence, and even though, as was shown, Darwinian evolution, since there is no ‘law of evolution’ within the universe, can have no rigid mathematical basis to test against, Darwinian evolution, regardless of that monumental failing, has, none-the-less, been thoroughly falsified by both mathematics and experimentation.
https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/early-complexity-a-case-study-of-evolutionary-theory/#comment-650322
Also of related interest:
Bob
At best that gets you to say that something might be designed, but things that are not designed might also have the same characteristics.
That designed objects have a distinct, quantifiable characteristic is something that should be held as axiomatic by lovers of science and reason. This means that if an object has this characteristic it should be recognized as designed whether the designer is known or not.
Whether X is that characteristic of course may be disputed and attempts may be made to falsify it.
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MB, you are warned. There will not be a second warning.
Tribune7@90. Very good point.
Molson, I explained my position and find it very apt since he has repeatedly ‘bobbed and weaved’ in his argumentation.
I am very well aware of what the ‘moral’ limits are on UD having seen numerous people banned for overly rude behavior over the past 10 years.
You, on the other hand think you can pull moral judgement on me. (as well as others on UD) To which I refer you to the sink in your bathroom where you can go soak your pompous head.
Feel free to fulfill your promise and scroll past my posts, since my posts seem to upset your delicate sensibilities so much.
I suggest turning off your radio and TV too since they might hurt your feelings much more than I apparently have done.
Deleted
Alright Molson, let’s take our grievance to Mr. Arrington and see what happens. 🙂
I will forward the discussion to him.
“Alright Molson, let’s take our grievance to Mr. Arrington and see what happens. ????
I will forward the discussion to him.”
All I have done is criticized you for using a parody of someone’s name in several of your responses to him. A parody that you think is perfectly acceptable. But the moment I use a well known parody of your name to make a point, you go running to the boss crying foul. Maybe you have the power to have anyone who disagrees with you banned from this site, but that doesn’t say much about this site.
Molson, I do not have ‘power’ to ban anyone from this site. What I do know is that I have not been overly rude to Bob.
What I have done, or tried to do, is to call attention to Bob (and weave’s) disingenuous debating style and then to directly demonstrate his disingenuous debating style for all to see.
For prime example is post 88 and 89, where I directly exposed his disingenuous debating style, or at least exposed his severely muddled view of how science works for all to see.
https://uncommondescent.com/evolution/jonathan-mclatchie-vs-keith-fox-has-id-stood-the-test-of-time/#comment-652370
It is not that I want to hurt Bob personally, far from it, it is that I want to expose Bob’s arguments for what they are. i.e. disingenuous, shallow, and dishonest. It is only in so far that Bob is personally attached to his disingenuous debating style that he would feel personally offended,,, which in my view is a very good thing, since that is the exact effect I’m looking to have on Bob!
My goal and ‘hope’, besides protecting UD readers from Bob’s dishonest argumentation and even from the sheer ‘insanity’ inherent in his atheistic worldview, is that Bob himself will come around from his insane worldview before it is too late (a concern which I also briefly mentioned in post 36).
https://uncommondescent.com/evolution/jonathan-mclatchie-vs-keith-fox-has-id-stood-the-test-of-time/#comment-652270
All these moral nuances associated with my use of the nickname ‘bob and weave’ have apparently completely escaped you Molson, and you have now taken it upon yourself to try to impose your personal morality on me by using a nickname that was specifically designed to be vulgar and personally offensive in its use, This is a fact that you yourself were shown. Indeed, you yourself readily admitted that the person behind creating the Bat sh**crazy77 nickname, was full of hate and venom:
http://theidiotsofintelligentdesign.blogspot.com/
Thus, As I said before, I find your attempted ‘moral policing’ of me (and of others on UD) to be pompous to put it mildly.
Thus in conclusion, since you have persisted in your ‘moral policing’, I have appealed to Mr. Arrington to adjudicate the matter. And I will stand by his decision.
I’d appreciate it, then, if you don’t resort to childish name calling.
Then perhaps you shouldn’t resort to childish debating tactics. Things don’t happen in a vacuum, Bob. Cause and effect are at play.
Hmmm, appears to be working,,,
“It is only in so far that Bob is personally attached to his disingenuous debating style that he would feel personally offended,,, which in my view is a very good thing, since that is the exact effect I’m looking to have on Bob!”
Bob’s offence to my calling attention to his ‘bob and weave’ debating style is yet another opportunity to expose just how insane his worldview actually is.
In atheistic materialism, agent causality is ruled out of bounds before any scientific investigation has even taken place. Atheists have tried to make this artificial rule the supposed ‘ground rule’ for all of science (see Judge Jones – Dover trial). Under this guise it is called “Methodological Naturalism”. Moreover, under this artificially imposed stricture on science, the entire concept of personhood, free will, and objective morality, some of which Bob himself admits are self evident truths, disappear and become illusions:
Yet despite the fact that Bob himself admits it is a self-evident truth that he is not an illusion, and thus basically admits that he is indeed a causal agent with free will, the fact of the matter is that his atheistic Darwinian worldview allows no such compromise.
Here are a few references to drive this point home:
Moreover, on top of this insanity that Bob is forced to endure from his own ‘chosen’ atheistic worldview, his atheistic worldview also insists that any meaning and morality that Bob may believe to be true, are themselves merely illusions.
Thus in conclusion of the insanity inherent in Bob’s atheism, the illusion called “Bob (and weave) O’Hara” is only having an illusion of being ‘irked’ by some illusion of objective morality being trespassed.
My obvious question is this, why in blue blazes should I give two hoots about offending the illusory morality of a non-existent illusion named “Bob”?
Oh please, ba77, don’t mis-represent my views:
1. No, I wouldn’t say that it is a self-evident truth that I am not an illusion: I’m not sure what would count as a ‘self-evident truth’ (as opposed to some knowledge that has been instilled in us from an early age)
2. I never mentioned free will: it’s one of those subjects that I steer clear of because discussion usually brings more heat than light
3. My own world view does allow for the possibility of free will, but ultimately I don’t know if we have it or not (I think we would have to understand much more about the universe and consciousness before any conclusions could be reached).
If you’re going to call my world view insane, it might help if you actually knew what my world view is. I don’t expect you to agree with it (and it’s OK with me if you don’t), but I would appreciate it if you didn’t mis-represent it.
Really? you think I’m a non-existent illusion? FWIW, I don’t think I’m an illusion, and I don’t thin you are either.
Ha Ha Ha,,, exhibit number one for Bob (and weave) O’Hara’s debating style, his entire response at 101.
MB @ 96: “… that doesn’t say much about this site.”
BA77 didn’t say or imply that he had any power to remove you. He only said that he would take the discussion thread to one of the site administrators and let the administrator decide. Do you understand the difference?
Also, the fact that you (and other a/mats) are allowed to continually make worn-out and predictable objections (usually with a sneer) shows that the administrators of this site are compassionate, kind, and exceedingly lenient.
“BA77 didn’t say or imply that he had any power to remove you. He only said that he would take the discussion thread to one of the site administrators and let the administrator decide. Do you understand the difference?”
Yes I do. I just thought it rather strange that he would feel it necessary to run to the administrator rather than address the issue himself. But no matter.
“Also, the fact that you (and other a/mats) are allowed to continually make worn-out and predictable objections (usually with a sneer) shows that the administrators of this site are compassionate, kind, and exceedingly lenient.”
I’m not an a/mat. I am a practicing Catholic.
Molson Bleu,
Armand Jacks, is that you?
Andrew
“Armand Jacks, is that you?”
Who’s Armand Jacks?
How long before you feel you can start performing? 🙂
“How long before you feel you can start performing? ????”
That one never gets old. 🙂
I always say practicing because I am not always very good at it. As demonstrated by my decision long ago to avail myself of birth control. But I do try to follow most of the other teachings. I wish I could say that I am always successful, but that would be a lie.
He’s a sockpuppet who trolls here under different names.
His style is similar to yours.
Andrew
“He’s a sockpuppet who trolls here under different names.
His style is similar to yours.”
Then he must be an intelligent likeable chap. 🙂