A Search Algorithm, And A Prize

_{Gil Dodgen

March 18, 2009

Intelligent Design}

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There has been some discussion at UD about computational search algorithms, which is one of my specialties.

Just for fun, I’ve included some C source code here (as a .txt file), which is part of a research project. I’ll send a free set of my classical piano albums to the first person who runs the code and publishes the program output in the comments below, along with a correct guess as to what the ultimate purpose of the search algorithm is.

Please provide the following information: CPU clock speed and compiler used.

EIL members are not eligible.

Comments

(the above post was in the wrong thread.)JT_{March 29, 2009
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I've said before that to me, intelligence has to do with behavioral complexity, and also the degree of perceptual discrimination and acuity. So that if you have a program that does almost the same thing regardless of input (for example possibly because the program can only "see" the first n-bits of any input, then it is relatavely unintelligent. Or if you have a program that sees a much larger percentage of its input and furthermore the output it generates is highly variable, not trivially deducible from the input via any simple program for example, than that program is more intelligent. [also off-topic]JT_{March 29, 2009
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I think we can agree on many points in the terns of your last post. I would only add the following: 1) The design inference is not a logical demonstration, not a syllogism, and not a deductive argument. It is an empirical inference to the best explanation available, and as such all that we need is a rationale for the inference, logical explanatory consistency and sufficiency, and the lack of any better explanation (indeed, IMO, of any other explanation). 2) It is true that your syllogism in the second form is not true. But I have argued many times that the positive element in ID consists in our personal experience (subjective and objective) of the design process in humans, an experience which directly connects the design process to consciousness and intelligence and purpose, and not necessarily to just being humans. In that sense, any conscious intelligent being (if such will be shown to exists beyond humans) can qualify as a designer. Aliens are a good example of that reasoning (as even Dawkins has admitted). But obviously, non material entities could also qualify, for those who believe they exist. The fact is, it is being conscious and intelligently conscious, being able of representation, logical reasoning, inference, purpose, and so on, which apparently allows humans to be designers. So, the ID inference is a quite reasonable explanation of biological realities, which share with other designed things all the characteristics of the products of design. Humans could qualify as designers, but there are obvious reasons to believe that they were not around when those things started to happen. So, other conscious intelligent beings could qualify as designers of biological realities. The existence itself of biological information is a good prompt to ask ourselves if such designers exist, and what they could be. As we have said many times, the design inference in itself does not tell us much, if anything, about the nature of the designer and about the modalities of design implementation, but as I have debated many times, those points are certainly open to scientific inquiry. In the meantime, the design inference for biological information remains a reasonable and sound theory. The lack of any other credible non design theory can only give it further weight.gpuccio_{March 26, 2009
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Pendulum: OK, I accept the point about crystals in good faith. Anyway, crystals obviously don't qualify as FSCI because thay lack complexity and can be explained through necessity, as discussed many times. That is true of all forms of "self-organizing" structures, a la Prigogyne. And let's remember that in proteins it's not just the existence of the code which qualifies as FSCI (although it is in itself a rather stunning fact), but rather the information which is conveyed by the code: the thousands and thousands of different functional proteins, each of them in average of hundreds of aminoacids.gpuccio_{March 26, 2009
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Mappings, alphabets, and codes exist platonically, so physical systems technically cannot be a codes, although codes may be involved in how we model such systems. Any system with law-like behavior can be modeled using a mapping from cause to effect. Consider the rock in my yard -- there is a mapping between the number of atoms in the rock and the force felt by the ground underneath. And considering how many different options there are with regards to the number of atoms in a rock, the alphabet is enormous. Stepping back a little, the objective seems to be to define FSCI such that it's a property of some biological systems and some man-made artifacts, and nothing else. I think that the current status of the definition doesn't accomplish that, but it could do so with some more fleshing out. The argument would then presumably be: 1) All FSCI of known provenance is designed. 2) By induction, we conclude that all FSCI is designed. 3) Some biological structures have FSCI. 4) Therefore, those biological structures are designed. But that logic doesn't stand on its own. Consider another application of this logic: 1) All FSCI of known provenance is designed by humans. 2) By induction, we conclude that all FSCI is designed by humans. 3) Some biological structures have FSCI. 4) Therefore, those biological structures are designed by humans. This conclusion is clearly wrong. The fact that biology and artifacts have the common property of FSCI may be best explained by the ID hypothesis, or it may be better explained by a different hypothesis. I think it depends very much on how the definition of FSCI is fleshed out.R0b_{March 26, 2009
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Hi gpuccio, What I objected to in CJYman's post was that it seemed from his formatting that he was attributing all the Omega, probability vector stuff in the quoted definition to Perlwitz, et al. But the PBW paper doesn't say that. If that is a quote, it is a quote of someone else. I quite agree that for purposes of discussing the DNA-mRNA code, we can leave out discussions of introns etc. The point is that a mapping exists, and it is very simple. Crystal growth is just the very very simple map of a language onto itself. In cryptography, a substitution cipher is a mapping of the letters of a language onto themselves. The Ceasar cipher, or ROT13 are examples. A mapping from the language {Na, Cl} to the language {Na, Cl} for example, can grow salt crystals. A previous post wanted to dismiss the atomic structure of rocks out of hand. I was trying to point out some rocks, those that contain crystals, at least, do have an atomic structure dictated by a code.Pendulum_{March 25, 2009
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Pendulum: I am not a mathemathician, but I don't understand your objection. Here is the definition given: "Definition of a code: Given a source with probability space [Omega, A, p(A)] and a receiver with probability space [Omega, B, p(B)], then a unique mapping of the letters of alphabet A onto letters of alphabet B is called a code. Here p(A) is the probability vector of the elements of alphabet A and p (B) is the probability vector of the elements of alphabet B." It is very clear that DNA maps onto mRNA and, Through that, onto proteins. The two processes are different. Mapping ot mRNA is a mapping where each nucleotide in DNA maps to the complementary nucleotide in mRNA. That's certainly a mapping, but one whose only function is to "export" the information in DNA to the translation system. The single letters are not the same (the alphabet is complementary in mRNA), but the information is exactly the same. But the true mapping takes place in the translation system. Here, the units of A which map onto B are not the single nucleotides, but the codons. Each of the 64 codons maps unequivocally to one aminoacid, or to a stop signal. That's, IMO, is a code according to the above definition. PERLWITZ, BURKS, AND WATERMAN seem to agree, given that in their paper they write: "The genetic code is examined in a new and systematic fashion: we consider the code as mapping of one finite set (the 64 codons) to another (the 20 amino acids)." You can object that in reality it's the mRNA which physically maps onto the protein. That's true, but the information in mRNA is the same as the information in the gene (except for post-transcriptional modifications, which have an important role, but for simplicity we won't discuss them here). So, I can't understand your argument, and least of all the reference to crystals. What maps to what, in crystals?gpuccio_{March 25, 2009
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CJYman @ 119, I just downloaded and read the Perlwitz, Burks, and Waterman paper "Pattern Analysis of the Genetic Code" (1988). I can't find in it the definitions you've given for a code. They begin with a statement that the mapping from RNA triplets to amino acids and STOP is a code. tRNA is the physical instaniation of this code. By your definition, DNA is not a code. It might be 'language A' in the mapping to mRNA, and that very simple mapping is a code. I think that by your definition, the mapping of A to A would be a code just a bit simpler than the DNA to mRNA code, and that kind of code is used in rocks all the time for crystal growth.Pendulum_{March 25, 2009
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GP & CJY: Good work. If one denies our own intelligence we have no grounds for intelligent discussion. And if you are forcesd to reject the blatant fact that we form concepts out of experiences then seek to define to identify borders, then you don't understand how we learn or how definitions work. Tell me folks: how can you tell that a definition is failing? ANS: it does not accurately agree with examples and /or does not properly exclude counter-examples. So, examples -- empirics -- MUST come first, and serve to give flesh to definitions. So, now take the text in this post assuming it is beyond 143 ASCII characters: 1 --> Can you see that this has given us a quantity of functional information, based on stringing characters, words and the underlying ideas they express together in accord with certain rules for them working together? 2 --> That this 1,000 bit limit in the 143 7-bit characters constraint has given us a reasonable threshold of complexity for which we have excellent grounds to see that the observed universe acting as search engine could not reasonably come near to, per chance + necessity search resource exhaustion? 3 --> Do we not see that intelligences -- of which we are undeniably [on pain of absurdity] examples of -- routinely produce such? 4 --> Worse, for the code that makes this post work as a post? [Do we not see that we can measure it in working -- functional bits? That it exists in a context of irreducibly complex entities that must all work together in ways that are do co adapted that chance is maximally unlikely for this to work?] 5 --> Do we not see that DNA is similarly digital, algorithmically functional complex code, of measurable bit capacity . . . starting not at 1 k bit but 600++ k bits? 6 --> that is is a part of a similarly irreducibly complex nanotech, algorithmic, code based information processing entity in the heart of the cell? [Using codes that we have partly decoded too.] 7 --> That this is known to be reprogrammable [both by viruses and Venter et al as well as recombinant DNA technology!], i.e we have a nanotech, self-replicating COMPUTER in the heart of the cell? 8 --> that we know a source for computers, and we have excellent reason to see that chance + necessity on the gamut of our cosmos cannot reasonably be seen as capable of spontaneous generation of that irreducibly complex entity? 9 --> That such things are plainly -- beyond REASONABLE doubt -- the product of not only highly intelligent but highly sophisticated design, operating on a level that is way beyond our own current capacity? but, nah, that cannot be . . . it just may point in directions the friendly local magisterium does not want us to go:
It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. {Lewontin, NY Review of Books, 1997. Since made dogmatically “official” by the C21 magisterium — NAS, NSTA, NCSE, judge Jones, the new atheists, et al . . .]
It's high time to overthrow that magisterium and its chains of mental slavery! GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 24, 2009
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gpuccio: "the concept of recognizable apparent purpose by intelligent observers is not without merit, and can be an useful complement to more “objective” definitions." I agree completely; the main reason why I posted what I did is more so because I am amazed that some people just don't seem to get it yet. I am surprised that we still have to go over these basic fundamentals with some people who claim to have enough knowledge of ID that they can critique it. And of course, I do think that the subjective aspect can only really come into play in the scientific arena once a more objective definition is given. But, of course, there still is room for the subjective complement as you put it. We are subjective beings after all and everything we do has a subjective element in it -- we wouldn't know about the objective if we had no subjective experience (but that is another topic for a more philosophical discussion). ... and I too am amazed at the insights of Michael Polonyi.CJYman_{March 24, 2009
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CJY, thank you as well for the more rigorous definitions. The definition you've given regarding function is engineering based - which makes all the more sense (and clarity).Upright BiPed_{March 24, 2009
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CJYman: Thank you for your very beautiful post, wich gives unexpected and very rigorous support to my poor intuitive concepts, confirming that what is obvious is sometimes obvious for a reason. Your efforts to find an objective definition for function are really remarkable and, as far as I can judge, very satisfying. I humbly suggest, however, that the concept of recognizable apparent purpose by intelligent observers is not without merit, and can be an useful complement to more "objective" definitions. And finally, I am always in awe at quotations from Polanyi: thank you also for that.gpuccio_{March 24, 2009
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Iconofld, “By a materialist, presumably you mean someone who looks for natural causes for natural phenomena?” I would say that is partially correct, but doesn’t fully express materialism in the dress it wears today. I think IDist in general all look for material causes. I have never read a work by a design proponent that said “and then a supernatural force…” I don’t think such material exist, but it wouldn’t interest me to read it if it did. The distinction I make is someone who arbitrarily removes from knowledge one of the three observable causes in nature - about the things he cannot answer, and realistic, can barely fathom. I don’t think those who swear to empiricism, or those who know the most about the issue, should claim to have any more command over what they know than what they know. I think the history of mankind, even the recent history of mankind, supports that idea without question. This includes science, politics, law, and religion in equal measure. What I dislike most are persons who agree with that statement in one breath, then subvert it the next. There is little doubt it is the most common mistake man makes, and material science makes it with metronomic regularity. I agree with you that “non-natural” is sometimes as useless as “natural”, the question is what is. The evidence for ID is purely empirical and every reasonable person can acknowledge that. Philosophical questions of what design might mean are what they have always been. The reason I asked the question I did, is to set out that the material elements of the universe offer no explanation to the questions that men and women ask. Your answer, “The “property” you’re asking for is presumably, then, the ability to react in many different ways in many different environments” is therefore insufficient, nor do I believe you intended it to be comprehensive. We know why water boils off the sidewalk on a cold day, we know what happens to iron molecules that mix in different environments, and why undissolved proteins adhere to the surface tension of oxygen and hydrogen. We haven’t even the faintest clue why chemical elements would organize themselves into layers of highly-coordinated organizations operating off information and recording their existence in digital code. Any answers to the question of “why” are idle. I also find it interesting that if one could somehow start with the nose on their face and travel back through time, and through every chemical reaction that lead to its existence, he would have to stop at the information that distinguishes living tissue from inanimate material - and could go no further. That is where the material trail ends. So what we have are professional mathematicians arguing over trivialities blown up to be earth shattering differences, public campaigns devoted to ridiculing all those that don’t drink the Kool-Aid, research papers that say one thing yet describe another, and legal maneuvers sent in from the back room – and all the while, we haven’t a material clue. The only thing we know capable of what we see in molecular life is an act of volitional agency. Selection for fitness at the nucleic level. Period. Perhaps we could at least agree that (S)cience would be more intellectually honest if it returned to healthier sense of humility on such issues.Upright BiPed_{March 23, 2009
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gpuccio, well stated in #105 and #107. I would just like to add a couple things. ?Definition of a code: Given a source with probability space [Omega, A, p(A)] and a receiver with probability space [Omega, B, p(B)], then a unique mapping of the letters of alphabet A onto letters of alphabet B is called a code. Here p(A) is the probability vector of the elements of alphabet A and p (B) is the probability vector of the elements of alphabet B. (Perlwitz, Burks and Waterman, 1988). According to this definition, which is very simple, DNA is a code, whereas the atomic configuration in a stone is not a code. Function can be seen in a couple different ways and both are useful to ID. 1. Function can simply be referred to as the transfer of energy to perform work as a by-product of organized units (where that organization is not defined by mere regularity nor by the physical laws of the material used). Here are some quotes by George Gaylord Simpson and then Michael Polonyi referring to these concepts: "“In the face of the universal tendency for order to be lost, the complex organization of the living organism can be maintained only if work – involving the expenditure of energy – is performed to conserve the order. The organism is constantly adjusting, repairing, replacing, and this requires energy. But the preservation of the complex, improbable organization of the living creature needs more than energy for the work. It calls for information or instructions on how the energy should be expended to maintain the improbable organization. The idea of information necessary for the maintenance and, as we shall see, creation of living systems is of great utility in approaching the biological problems of reproduction.” George Gaylord Simpson and William S. Beck, Life: An Introduction to Biology, 2nd ed. (London: Routledge and Kegan, 1965), 145 “A shaping of boundaries may be said to go beyond a mere fixing of boundaries and establishes a ‘controlling principle.’ It achieves control of the boundaries by imprinting a significant pattern on the boundaries of the system. Or, to use information language, we may say that it puts the system under the control of a non-physical-chemical principle by a profoundly informative intervention.” --Michael Polanyi, “Life Transcending Physics and Chemistry,” Chemical & Engineering News (21 August 1967): 64. 2. Function can also be seen in the mathematical sense as a *specific input* providing *one output*. 3. Both of the above definitions of information provide all that is needed on order to refer to function. Of course, function by itself will not help us arrive at an inference to previous intelligence. How about coded information that provides function? Well, this brings us to functional specificity, since we are discussing an event which can be formulated as an independent pattern: event (function) --formulated as its--> pattern (code). Although, no one has yet provided evidence of functional codes forming absent previous intelligence, the ID hypothesis doesn't stop here. We need Functionally Specified Complexity. ...and of course, we all know that complexity is measured by measuring the probability of finding all specified patterns of same length as said specified pattern against all probabilistic resources (number of trials in space and time) available. ... and thus we have FSCI. As an aside it is interesting to note, as Hubert Yockey has in "Origin of life on earth and Shannon’s theory of communication," Computers and Chemistry 24 (2000) 105–123, that "The transmission of genetic messages from the DNA to the protein tape as conceived in molecular biology" follows the same system/pattern as "The transmission of information from source to destination as conceived in electrical engineering." ...interesting since that type of pattern is the result of intelligent engineering. Is there any reason we would expect un-intelligent processes to create such a system? Is there any reason to rule out intelligence as a creation of such a system? Evidence either way?CJYman_{March 23, 2009
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Sal: I have read your last post with great interest. Your arguments are deep and consistent, but they just demonstrate that our fundamental views of reality are very different. So, while admiring as usual your intelligence and creativity, I have to reject them as a whole. But obviously, I don't want to engage with you here in a confrontation of general world views. I would like only to briefly address the main points of divergence, just for your satisfaction, and then stay happy that we think differently. I "am" committed to empiricism. But my empiricism does include subjective experience. None of your arguments against that is convincing for me. The fact that you seem to forget is that "all" experience is subjective. The experience of the senses and of so called objective data is no exception. The experience of reason is no exception. In no way I can give priority of knowledge to a part of our experience (sensory experience of external objects, inductive reasoning, logic) against all the rest. The intuition of consciousness and of its qualities and activities has absolute priority in our experience, and so it should have in our wisdom (including science). Science, philosophy, art, psychology, religion, are all different facets of the same search for truth. Each gives its contribution, and all are connected. You reservations about the non objective nature of subjective experience bears no sense for me. I could just have the same reservations about the non objective nature of objective experience. To me, there is nothing more certain and more real than the existence of my "I", not even the existence of matter. The fact that inner experiences can be described in different ways does not make them in any way less real and objective: everything in the universe can be described in different ways, and words are in themselves elusive symbols. I am not arguing for subjectivism; on the contrary, I am arguing for the absolute objectivity of all that exists, and for the noble attempt which is the privilege of human cognition (not only of human reason) to search for some sense in such a contradictory context. Indeed, intelligence is in a way a secondary matter: consciousness is the primitive issue, and intelligence is one of its activities. Consciousness does not only perceive and cognize: it has needs, enjoys and suffers, loves and desires, imagines and creates, and as a result of all that it wills, and it wills freely. Consciousness creates and destroys, and has nothing to do with the imaginary determinism which misguided reason projects on everything, or with the empty constructions of some human philosophy which forgets its true purposes and the impellent needs of the perceiving I. Consciousness is not a loop of objective calculations, not an explosion of bits, or a display of parallel arithmetics. Purpose is not a category of reason, but a very intense experience of the soul. So, excuse me for this (very subjective) expression, but I cannot follow you on those territories. My personal cognitive world is probably different, and in my world those poor arguments about consciousness, intelligence and purpose remain simple and valid.gpuccio_{March 23, 2009
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Upright BiPed, Your question "Where did that come from?" would seem just a mirror image of the infinite loop argument ID opponents have been warned not to make. If I can't make it about the designer, I don't think you should be able to make it about new FSCI/FCSI.David Kellogg_{March 23, 2009
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Upright BiPed "The questions you raise end in the same spot every time. Could your brain exist, with all of your very own uniqueness, without the biological processes that made up its existence in the first place?" No, certainly not. "At one point in the history of this planet there were no brains, or anything else made of living tissue. Now there is." Quite right. "You are a materialist, I presume. Can you please specify what are the material properties of hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, iron, ect., that would cause those chemicals to become organized into coordinated structures that record their existence?" By a materialist, presumably you mean someone who looks for natural causes for natural phenomena? If so, yes, but it's no grand philosophy, just that I know of no evidence for such a thing as the "non-natural". You're not asking me the physics of what causes chemical reactions, presumably. You'll agree that chemicals react, and that that creates new chemical formations. There's no law of chemistry or physics that I know of that prevents chemicals forming into formations that self replicate, so I see no difference between that chemical phenomenon and any other that we see around us. The "property" you're asking for is presumably, then, the ability to react in many different ways in many different environments.iconofid_{March 23, 2009
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iconofid: "I’d see this as evidence of the natural emergence of new FSCI." Not me. But I could not discuss that kind of issues, even hypothetically, without going into deeply metaphysical subjects about highly mysterious questions, such as: how does the unique identity of each of us arise? And I try never to use the word "natural": it means nothing. My position is more or less that everything is natural, or everything is supernatural, as you prefer. So, while I bow to the unique treasure of your human identity, I keep my polite reservations about its possible emergence as a product of mere randomness and/or necessity.gpuccio_{March 23, 2009
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helium...I'm killing myself.Upright BiPed_{March 23, 2009
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"I’d see this as evidence of the natural emergence of new FSCI." ...and all it took was for some helium, carbon, nitrogen to form and record their existence so your brain could someday exist. Were did that come from? (shrugs)Upright BiPed_{March 23, 2009
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Upright Biped
You are a materialist, I presume.Can you please specify what are the material properties of hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, iron, ect., that would cause those chemicals to become organized into coordinated structures that record their existence?
Can you specify the non-material properties that would cause them to do so?George L Farquhar_{March 23, 2009
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gpuccio
No, you are wrong. We observe the function, but we are not sure if it is a real function (the product of a conscious purpose) or an apparent function (the product of chance and/or necessity which has assumed a pseudofunctional structure). That’s where complexity, and the design inference, are necessary.
Can you give me an example of this process?George L Farquhar_{March 23, 2009
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gpuccio says: "iconofid: You ask: “Does my brain contain new and unique FSCI or not, in your opinion?” I can’t speak for others, but my answer is definitely yes." I agree. I'd see this as evidence of the natural emergence of new FSCI.iconofid_{March 23, 2009
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iconofld, "Does my brain contain new and unique FSCI or not, in your opinion?" Your brain is not the issue. The idea that your very own thoughts creating unique pathways in your brain is not the issue either. The questions you raise end in the same spot every time. Could your brain exist, with all of your very own uniqueness, without the biological processes that made up its existence in the first place? With or without your uniquness, the brain systems themselves remain unaccounted for. At one point in the history of this planet there were no brains, or anything else made of living tissue. Now there is. You are a materialist, I presume. Can you please specify what are the material properties of hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, iron, ect., that would cause those chemicals to become organized into coordinated structures that record their existence?Upright BiPed_{March 23, 2009
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iconofid: You ask: "Does my brain contain new and unique FSCI or not, in your opinion?" I can't speak for others, but my answer is definitely yes.gpuccio_{March 23, 2009
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R0b: "See the example of the 104.27-pound rock in my previous post." See my answer in my previous post. "Obviousness is in the eye of the beholder. The history of science is replete with struggles against notions that are obvious to a lot a people, but wrong." And it is obviously (sic) infinitely more repleted with things which areobvious to almost all because they are true. To show that something obviously obvious is wrong is certainly possible, but it usually requires, rather than brute force, valid and detailed arguments, which frankly I can't see in your reasoning. "To me, it means intentional," Not exactly. I would rather say: fulfilling a task which appears related to some intention. The function is objectively observable, while the conclusion that it is the product of a conscious intention is the result of our design inference. So, in the blood clotting cascade, it is observable that each step is connected to the following one, and that the useful result is the final one (blood coagulation), but we have to decide if such a functional relation is really the product of design (conscious purpose) as it seems, or iof it can be explained as some random or necessity output. "but that would render an FSCI-based design inference nothing but question-begging" No, as I have explained. The function in FSCI is observable. How can you deny that the function in blood coagulation is observable? One thing is to observe a functional mechan ism, and another thing to asceratin how it came into being. Again, it's complexity which allows us to stay away from possible apparently functional structures whcih are simple enough to originate by chance. "And I would say that such recognition most certainly is subjective. Intelligent agents have all kinds of different ideas with regards to what phenomena are purposeful." I know of no biologist or medical doctor who doubts that the phenomenon of blood coagulation is purposeful and that it serves the function to avoid the certain death of every individual for even a minor wound. Again, hemophiliacs know that very well. Would you argue with them that coagulation function is a subjective concept? "What I don’t understand is what your objective distinction between function and non-function is." Coagulation factors are functional if they can bring to normal coagulation. Hemoglobin is functional if it can bind oxygen according to a very specific pattern. Transcription factors are functional if they can bind to DNA in very specific ways. If any of those proteins changes, even a little, so that it cannot do those things any more, that is non function. What is difficult to understand in that? "Gladly — such systems are trivial to make. That doesn’t mean that every program is useful." But the point was exactly that: to maje the program which does not work work. Ah, but you have used the word "useful"! Be careful... "So, to infer design via FSCI, you must determine that the object has function." I must determine that the object has observable function, IOW that it does something which appears to have a purpose. "To determine that it has function, you must show that it serves a conscious being’s purpose." No, you are wrong. We observe the function, but we are not sure if it is a real function (the product of a conscious purpose) or an apparent function (the product of chance and/or necessity which has assumed a pseudofunctional structure). That's where complexity, and the design inference, are necessary. "Doesn’t that smack of circularity?" No. Your wrong interpretation is circular, not my true argument. "Is that your opinion of what functional means, or is that part of an established definition?" It's my opinion of what functional means for a protein coding gene. I am very confident that most people in the world who know what a protein coding gene is would agree with me. "If so, can you tell me where it’s published?" Oh, again! Must I tell you where it's published that a protein coding gene is functional if it codes for its correct protein? Or where it's published that a car is functional if it moves? Or a radio if it receives radio programs and translates them into sounds? Shall I go on? "How can FSCI be defined objectively and still be a matter of opinion?" I don't want to spoil your ideals, but have you ever heard that people entertain different opinions even about the most objective issues? (and no, I was not thinking of darwinian evolution... ) :-) "Are coding genes nonfunctional before they’re decoded by intelligent humans?" I don't think I understand the question. Coding genes are functional if they carry functional information (the right sequence for a functional protein), and non functional otherwise. Intelligent humans certainly need to decode them to verify that. "Certainly not. But it’s hard to see FSCI as an objective concept when its handful of promoters don’t agree on what constitutes FSCI." Your concept of objectivity seems too connected to the vote of the majority for my taste. I am definitely a minority guy.gpuccio_{March 23, 2009
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Upright BiPed"iconofld, I see instead that you not only like to play word games, as conventionalist go, you’re lousy at it." I'm not playing word games. My question was serious. Does my brain contain new and unique FSCI or not, in your opinion? I haven't been playing word games elsewhere when I've asked people whether they think functional proviruses are designed, and whether they contain FSCI, or not. I won't ask questions that I wouldn't be prepared to answer myself if they were asked of me.iconofid_{March 23, 2009
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Wow! You get distracted one moment, and here you find a lot of work to do! R0b, I start with you (Sal, just wait a moment...) :-) "Not sure what that means. Can you point me to the general context definition that you’re referring to?" As I have said, the same exact definition I gave for FSCI applies not only to biological information, but to widespread human artifacts like linguistic outputs and computer programs. Isn't that a general enough context for our reasoning? "No, to show that FSCI is a reliable indicator of design, you can’t just offer a few examples of designed FSCI. You also have to show that FSCI is consistently absent from non-designed things." And it is! Can you show any non designed thing which exhibits FSCI, according to my definition? And please, don't come with the notion that we could always find one oin a remote future... The empirical evidence that FSCI is not present in non designed things is overwhelming. "The objectivity of ID measures could be demonstrated by showing that people independently come up with the same results when using those measures, but nobody on the ID side has tried to demonstrate that." Why do you say that? If you apply the context I have given, the measures will always be the same, except for when assumptions or approximations have to be made (which is perfectly natural in empirical science). The fact that others may fix the context differently does not mean anything. Measures are relative to a context, and can be done in different ways. I insist that my definition is objective and formally correct, and nobody has really shown why it would not be. All your objections, or Sal Gal's, have nothing to do with the substance of the definition. "Great! Where’s the data published?" Great! the appeal to authority again! My compliments... As far as I can say, each time someone here has asked whether some appropriate object (avccording to my definition) exhibited FSCI or not, I have always answered in detail. Please show me a digital sequence for which we cannot say if it exhibits FSCI (and again, don't appeal to the possible false negatives, which are absolutely expected). The fact is: millions of human artifacts and of biological code do exhibit FSCI, and no known non designed object does. Do you agree on that or not? And if not, please give examples. "To do so, you would have to flesh out what it means to be functional and what it means to be complex. Durston et al have tackled the latter, and their definition of complexity turns out to be based on probability. (Is yours also?)" Yes. "And that is exactly the problem with the current state of the FSCI concept." Absolutely not! Your examples are not correct. A stone is not a digital sequence conveying information. Its dicrete atoms cannot be read as digits conveying functional information. Is it so difficult to understand that in DNA each nucleotide is one of four letters of an alphabete, and that a sequence of aminoacids is written in that way, by means of ordered codons of three letters, and that sucj a sequence ios read for the DNA, via mRNA, by a sophisticated translation mechanisms, which knows exactly which aminoacid to choose according to the codon it reads, and that the resulting protein does things which nothing in the universe could spontaneously do? How can you seriously compare that to the random position of atoms in a stone? Again, and I hope for the last time: my definition requires a readable sequence of numbers, and that series of number must convey sone very specific, functional information, of the type we find in machines, in computer programs and proteins: the ability to accomplish a task which would be impossible without that specific information, and which has a well recognizble utility and purpose, so that without it a specific and desired result cannot be obtained. Now, if you and Sal Gal want to show how many strange concepts I have used in the last phrase (purpose, desired result), please be my guests, but I cannot follow you further on that line of reasoning. For me, all that is obvious and clear, and I agree with you on one thing, we could debate till the cows come home, but the reason for that is, for me, certanly different than for you. "But you seem to be saying that the digital requirement is your own restriction for the sake of discussion, and not part of the FSCI definition proper, so I’ll stop making a mountain out of a molehill." Thank you. It's beautiful to be understood, sometimes. And yes, I usually agree with kairosfocus, but we can also have different views on some detail. We do not plan positions in advance, and our affinity is completely spontaneous. As a rule, when I discuss I don't like to be tied to the positions of others, be it my best friend or my worst enemy. I just speak for myself, a bad habit I cannot get rid of. - continued -gpuccio_{March 23, 2009
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R0b CODE: "A code is data (meaning) sent from one entity, through a channel, to another entity to be interpreted as meaning." MEANING: "provides the information necessary to create function in proteins and processes within the organism." Since "any causal effects fits my definition" please provide one that was not designed.Upright BiPed_{March 23, 2009
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iconofld, I see instead that you not only like to play word games, as conventionalist go, you're lousy at it.Upright BiPed_{March 23, 2009
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