Appreciating Design and Designer – Vern Poythress

_{Denyse O'Leary

September 4, 2022

Intelligent Design, Mathematics}

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Philip Cunningham draws our attention to this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReATRww8jVc

Rev. Dr. Vern Poythress (PhD, Harvard; DTh, Stellenbosch) is distinguished professor of New Testament, biblical interpretation, and systematic theology at Westminster Theological Seminary. His books include Redeeming Science, Redeeming Mathematics, and Redeeming Philosophy, or Chance and the Sovereignty of God.

Of related note, he adds:

A Biblical View of Mathematics – Vern Poythress – Doctorate in theology, PhD in Mathematics (Harvard) Excerpt: 15. Implications of Gödel’s proofB. Metaphysical problems of anti-theistic mathematics: unity and plurality

Excerpt: Because of the above difficulties, anti-theistic philosophy of mathematics is condemned to oscillate, much as we have done in our argument, between the poles of a priori knowledge and a posteriori knowledge. Why? It will not acknowledge the true God, wise Creator of both the human mind with its mathematical intuition and the external world with its mathematical properties. In sections 22-23 we shall see how the Biblical view furnishes us with a real solution to the problem of “knowing” that 2 + 2 = 4 and knowing that S is true.

Comments

It’s probably an inaccurate interpretation to say “God also chose to hide how He did it.”
Why? We know that the proposed mechanisms for Evolution don’t explain how it happened. So if all the king’s horses and all the king’s men can’t find out how God did it, then is the statement “God hid how He did it” not accurate. At least for today. At the very least, He made it extremely difficult. Maybe when they find out how gestation works, there might be an inkling. Maybe this will be helpful for answering the Catholic question? Lamoureux Has a new book on it. https://christianscholars.com/evolutionary-creation-a-christian-approach-to-evolution/ And
Evolutionary Creation: A Christian Approach to Evolution Whether one prefers the term “theistic evolution” or “evolutionary creation,” the central claim of this position is that
as the Ordainer and Sustainer of the cosmos, the Creator did not intervene in origins nor does He act dramatically in [its] operations. Rather, “as a loving Father,” He reserves direct and dramatic interventions for personal relationships in order to admonish, call, and encourage us.
Lamoureux argues that evolutionary creationism, so defined, is consistent with a hermeneutically responsible interpretation of Christian Scripture. He employs what he terms the “Message-Incident Principle.” Put simply, this principle instructs us “to separate the Message of Faith from the incidental ancient science [in which it is transported], and not to conflate these together
https://christianscholars.com/evolutionary-creation-a-christian-approach-to-evolution/jerry_{September 9, 2022
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Link doesn't work for me, but it did if I took off the last part. I know that document, although it is too long to read for me right now, but Lamoureux is one of the TE's I've read before, and even talked to a bit about this. It's probably an inaccurate interpretation to say "God also chose to hide how He did it." But I do note that he wrote, "Evolutionary creation best describes the official position of the Roman Catholic Church, though it is often referred to in this tradition as 'theistic evolution.'", which is the point I've been making o relatd.Viola Lee_{September 9, 2022
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the points I’m making
Here is something from a Catholic priest on TE or as he puts it, evolutionary creationism. My eyes glazed over after a short while. But he thinks ID is present in the universe but naturalized evolution is the way God chose to implement it. There’s only one problem - God also chose to hide how He did it. Apparently God is allowed to tinker but only in certain ways. Unless all was in the original creation? http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/38692/619288/1254136181653/Evolutionary+Creation.pdf?token=DmKlOHJjZ1c5FtNP3QjjPEndoyE%3D A couple points First, the evolution of humans is the important thing with Catholics, less so the evolution of other species. Second, Catholic beliefs are all over the lot and a fair amount depends on the level of Catholic education. For example,
A majority of Catholics who went to a Catholic high school attends Mass at least once a month (53% compared to 40% of Catholics who did not attend a Catholic high school). Sixty-five percent of Catholics who went to a Catholic high school pray at least weekly compared to 58% of those who did not attend. Forty-eight percent of Catholic high school alumni believe in the Big Bang theory compared to 39% of those who did not attend. Sixty-three percent of Catholic high school alumni believe current science is compatible with the belief the God created the universe compared to 48% who did not attend. Sixty-five percent of Catholics who went to a Catholic high school believe in evolution compared to 53% who did not attend. Forty-two percent of Catholic high school alumni believe it is acceptable in the Catholic Church to believe humans evolved over time from other lifeforms compared to 24% who did not attend
Much more about Catholic school teacher beliefs at this site. https://cara.georgetown.edu/Publications/ScienceCatholicHS2018.pdfjerry_{September 9, 2022
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Fine. I can see that you don't understand the points I'm making.Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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VL at 50, I don't understand you. Others read our posts and I don't want to confuse anyone. I will no longer reply to you in this thread.relatd_{September 8, 2022
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Relatd, I understand the Catholic doctrines you have described, I think. I’m not asking you to help me understand them. I am describing a position that supports those positions. The issue that I would like you to address is the one mentioned by Jerry:
”Ramage [a TE] …feels uncomfortable with the implications of ID. Namely, God had to intervene thousands maybe millions of time in life. He seems to not want a God who has done this. This is the basis for a lot of theistic evolutionists objections to ID. They don’t want a tinkering God.”
You wrote, "Intelligent Design/Intervention is at work." Do you believe ID involves divine intervention? Do you believe a position of divine intervention is consistent with a Catholic doctrine of Providence as expressed in your quote? Or do you share Ramage’s concern that ID, implying a tinkering God, is not consistent with a Catholic understanding of God’s Providence.Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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Jerry at 48, Fer cryin' out loud. Where the heck did you get this? "They all accept natural Evolution because of the hype and peer pressure including the hierarchies." I don't and the Church doesn't. I recommend that you back up your statements as opposed to starting with "My guess..." Not helpful. Not helpful at all.relatd_{September 8, 2022
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do you see ID as involving divine intervention above and beyond the providential presence of God in all moments?
Ask ChuckDarwin about this. He has !6 years of Catholic education. However, he has already indicated he knows very little about anything. My guess if you asked 10 different church going Catholics, you would get 10 different answers. Most TEs are not Catholics but it’s unlikely they will be here. Somehow I got the impression that Catholics are not different from other Christians on this topic. They all accept natural Evolution because of the hype and peer pressure including the hierarchies.jerry_{September 8, 2022
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VL at 46, I don't know how else to explain this to you. The previous Church statement, which includes the words of Thomas Aquinas, sums it all up. "Fourth you write"? I didn't write that. A Catholic Cardinal did. I also quoted the Bible. I don't think I can help you in particular any further.relatd_{September 8, 2022
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Related, let me try to understand what you are saying, and to clarify some things. First, you write, “You also insist on TE.” No, I am not arguing that TE is true, much less insisting on it. I am just trying to describe it, and show that it is consistent with the Catholic theology you posted about. Second, you write, “Intelligent Design/Intervention is at work.” Are you saying that ID involves the intervention of God? Is that consistent with the TE perspective? This is actually the point Jerry bought up in the other thread, when he wrote,
Ramage [a TE] ...feels uncomfortable with the implications of ID. Namely, God had to intervene thousands maybe millions of time in life. He seems to not want a God who has done this. This is the basis for a lot of theistic evolutionists objections to ID. They don’t want a tinkering God.
When you say ID/Intervention, are you implying a “tinkering” as opposed to a providential God who is present in all causality without specific interventions? Third, you write, “And God works infallibly.” I’m not sure what this means. It seems to say God doesn’t make mistakes, but I don’t think that is what you mean. What do you mean when you say “God works infallibly”? Fourth you write, “The Church “proclaims that by the light of reason the human intellect can readily and clearly discern purpose and design in the natural world, including the world of living things.” Yes, this is a broad belief that design pervades the universe, from its most fundamental properties to all of its specific manifestations. A TE would agree whole-heartedly with this statement. However, what it doesn’t say is that some things seem to be specifically designed by interventionist divine acts. So, back to my second question: do you see ID as involving divine intervention above and beyond the providential presence of God in all moments?Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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Viola Lee at 44, You also insist on TE. Intelligent Design/Intervention is at work. And God works infallibly. If God is not real to you and others, His work is still apparent. The Church “proclaims that by the light of reason the human intellect can readily and clearly discern purpose and design in the natural world, including the world of living things.” "Christoph Cardinal Schönborn is archbishop of Vienna and general editor of the Catechism of the Catholic Church." Romans 1:20 "For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse."relatd_{September 8, 2022
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Relatd, you write, “You ask for an explanation of the supernatural God. But you insist that this explanation be given at a human – scientific – level. This cannot be done.” I don’t think I’ve been asking for, or insisting that, an “explanation be given at a human – scientific – level”. I’ve been agreeing with you: the ways in with God’s providence is manifested in the world can’t be explained at a human level. There are unexplainable paradoxes that can only be accepted by faith, but not explained analytically. The primary one I am focussing on is that what might appear to be contingent (or by chance) to us is not contingent to God. So our describing something as happening in part by chance does not mean that God wasn’t involved, even though it is our faith in God’s involvement that leads us to that conclusion, not an analytic understanding of how God does that. This is a TE perspective presented by the Catholic doctrine of Providence.Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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Viola Lee at 41, You ask for an explanation of the supernatural God. But you insist that this explanation be given at a human - scientific - level. This cannot be done. John 19:10 and 11 10 'So Pilate said to Him, “Do You refuse to speak to me? Do You not know that I have authority to release You and authority to crucify You?” 11Jesus answered, “You would have no authority over Me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed Me over to you is guilty of greater sin.” 12 Jesus tells Pilate that his authority was given to him by God. God knows the past, present and future. But He does not communicate the entire plan. From time to time, Jesus has sent His mother Mary to appear to people with messages from God. The plan of God in the present is for the world and individuals. Each of us is given a role. Each of us is given a chance to accept or reject Jesus. Jesus spoke of the future and about wars, but specific dates were not provided. In the end, it must be realized that an ancient evil is at work and we should understand it has been at work now and will continue into the future. At a certain time, when Bible prophecy is fulfilled, Jesus will come again. We are not yet in that time. Ephesians 6:12 "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places." Working at "the human level" will not reveal the mysteries any further,relatd_{September 8, 2022
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VL/37 This is very well put:
In this case, the proper response, in my opinion, is also a humble acceptance that the ultimate nature of the world is unknown, without needing to wrap that lack of knowledge in an invented metaphysic.
chuckdarwin_{September 8, 2022
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re 39, to Relatd: I haven’t been discussing my personal beliefs. I have been discussing the theology and philosophy of how things happen in the world as understood by a Christian (in this case, Catholic) theistic evolutionist, as brought up by Jerry in a remark on another thread in a discussion between a TE and theistic IDist. You write, “The Catholic Church has given a detailed account of Creation. The work of God. And Thomas Aquinas has given an explanation that God works infallibly in Creation. There is no mystery or paradox if these words are accepted.” Yes, there are mysteries and paradoxes. The Catholic position, I think, is to humbly accept that human understanding cannot understand them, but they are mysteries and paradoxes none the less. Believing that what the Bible, the Church, and Aquinas say is true is different than analytically, at the human level, explaining how those truths are manifested or instantiated. To us, they are paradoxes that no words can explain.Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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Every day in every life is full of such things. Most don't stand out as leading in a clearcut direction that might have gone otherwise. Also, we are never aware of things that almost happened, but didn't, and therefore don't know what life paths we barely missed. I might have had a life-changing interaction at the grocery store today if I had just gone five minutes earlier - how can we tell? :-)Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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VL at 37, Do you believe the Bible is the Word of God? If not, then a discussion is not possible. The Catholic Church has given a detailed account of Creation. The work of God. And Thomas Aquinas has given an explanation that God works infallibly in Creation. There is no mystery or paradox if these words are accepted. As stated by the Church: God creates from nothing. Jesus rose from the dead and was seen by many witnesses. I'm sure that modern scientists standing next to Him would not see the mechanism He used to change water to wine. Or understand how He could multiply a few loaves and fishes to feed a large number of people. Or raise Lazarus from the dead. As God, Jesus required no technology to do this.relatd_{September 8, 2022
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A great example of a contingent event is Queen Elizabeth. Her ascension to the throne depended on her uncle’s abdication. Without Wallis Simpson, would we have Elizabeth? We have been lucky to have such a magnificent queen.jerry_{September 8, 2022
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to CD at 33: Although I will describe the situation differently than you do, I basically agree with you. Let me explain. Any attempt to try to discuss the relationship between an omni-everything theistic deity will run into irreconcilable paradoxes/contradictions. A common religious solution to this is to assert that the ways of God surpass our understanding, and the proper response is a humble submission to the mysteries, and a faith in this God that is beyond analytic understanding. A non-religious response is to say, somewhat as you do, that the religious description is an invented abstract system, with various embellishments added to try to resolve the paradoxes, including the ultimate resolution that it is all just beyond the ability for our reason to understand. In this case, the proper response, in my opinion, is also a humble acceptance that the ultimate nature of the world is unknown, without needing to wrap that lack of knowledge in an invented metaphysic. But, to return to my main subject, the TE perspective described in the Catholic quote is a common, orthodox Christian view on God’s providence which states, and this is the key point, that what we see as contingency (or luck or chance) is still within the provenance of God’s providence, so things that happen by contingency are still as God wills, even though we do not and can not understand that mechanism by which divine causality impinges on the “creation causality” that we experience.Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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CD at 33, If you first disregard this, it would follow that you would disregard anything said in the Bible, by the Catholic Church and Thomas Aquinas. God is God. He's not a man. He created and His creation activity works infallibly. But again, if God is right out then so is the rest. Romans 9:20 "But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?”'relatd_{September 8, 2022
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Yes. I've been discussing the theology of the natural, physical world. Catholic and other Christian theologies also assert that God gave humans a soul, a special relationship with God, and free will, and thus people do in fact introduce an indeterminacy into the world. That is, free will agency essentially produces innumerable instances of uncaused causation. This, of course, introduces a whole other set of paradoxes..Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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If God is present in “every moment of causality” there are no contingent events…
Not true. There are other wills besides God. So while every event in our universe has a cause, other wills make some events contingent even though God is present in some way.jerry_{September 8, 2022
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VL/32 The various paradoxes that Catholic scholasticism claims to resolve, including the one that you present, always hinge on a concocted dichotomy between the "created order" and the "divine order":
[C]ontingency in the created order, experienced by us, "radically differ[s] in kind" from divine causality, and thus what looks like chance to us still manifests God’s providential plan.
Paradox solved! Never mind that we are never provided actual proof of this "divine order" beyond clever and complicated abstractions that distill down to "God's providential plan." And, because of our fallen nature, we lack the capacity to discern and understand that plan. Like the ant trying to look up at the ant-keeper. It is a perpetual mystery. How conveniently circular when all is said and done..........chuckdarwin_{September 8, 2022
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In the Providential God version of TE that I am trying to describe (and contrast with both deism and ID), from God's point of view what you say is true: what is chance and contingency to us is not so to God. All that happens is as God wills through his omnipresence in all moments. As quoted by Relatd:
But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation.
That is, contingency in the created order, experienced by us, “radically differ[s] in kind” from divine causality, and thus what looks like chance to us still manifests God’s providential plan.Viola Lee_{September 8, 2022
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If God is present in "every moment of causality" there are no contingent events....chuckdarwin_{September 8, 2022
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Deism is based on old clock-work Newtonian physics. However, quantum mechanics now shows us that each moment is not completely determined by the previous moment, so Deism of the traditional Newtonian sort isn't defensible. The TE idea that I offered in another post (and Relatd offered a supporting quote from Catholic doctrine) is that a Providential God is present in every moment, upholding with his will both the necessary structures and laws of the world and the contingent events within it, which would include quantum probabilities. Thus, God is present in every moment of causality, rather than the Deistic idea of being present in only the one moment of setting forth the initial conditions. See here.Viola Lee_{September 7, 2022
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Ba77, Interesting. I am glad to see the "front loading" argument laid to rest, and Deism laid to rest along with it.relatd_{September 7, 2022
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A few more notes that 'scientifically' challenge CD's philosophical belief in Deism
The Front-loading Fiction – Dr. Robert Sheldon – 2009 Excerpt: Historically, the argument for front-loading came from Laplacian determinism based on a Newtonian or mechanical universe–if one could control all the initial conditions, then the outcome was predetermined. First quantum mechanics, and then chaos-theory has basically destroyed it, since no amount of precision can control the outcome far in the future. (The exponential nature of the precision required to predetermine the outcome exceeds the information storage of the medium.),,, Even should God have infinite knowledge of the outcome of such a biological algorithm, the information regarding its outcome cannot be contained within the system itself. http://procrustes.blogtownhall.com/2009/07/01/the_front-loading_fiction.thtml How well can information be stored from the beginning to the end of time? – Jan. 13, 2015 Excerpt: Information can never be stored perfectly. Whether on a CD, a hard disk drive, or a piece of papyrus, technological imperfections create noise that limits the preservation of information over time. But even if you had a perfect storage medium with zero imperfections, there would still be fundamental limits placed on information storage due to the laws of physics that govern the evolution of the universe ever since the Big Bang.,,, To do this, they modelled information transmission over a “channel” that is essentially spacetime itself, described by the Robertson-Walker metric. Their model combines the theories of general relativity and quantum information by considering the quantum state of matter (specifically, spin-1/2 particles) as the universe expands. In this model, the evolution of the universe creates noise which, in the context of quantum communication, acts like an amplitude damping channel. The physicists’ main result is that, the faster the universe expands, the less well the information can be preserved.,,, So to answer the original question of how much information can be stored from the beginning to the end of time, the results suggest “not very much.” http://phys.org/news/2015-01-how-well-can-information-be.html Conservation of information, evolution, etc – Sept. 30, 2014 Excerpt: Kurt Gödel’s logical objection to Darwinian evolution: “The formation in geological time of the human body by the laws of physics (or any other laws of similar nature), starting from a random distribution of elementary particles and the field is as unlikely as the separation of the atmosphere into its components. The complexity of the living things has to be present within the material [from which they are derived] or in the laws [governing their formation].” Gödel – As quoted in H. Wang. “On `computabilism’ and physicalism: Some Problems.” in Nature’s Imagination, J. Cornwall, Ed, pp.161-189, Oxford University Press (1995). Gödel’s argument is that if evolution is unfolding from an initial state by mathematical laws of physics, it cannot generate any information not inherent from the start – and in his view, neither the primaeval environment nor the laws are information-rich enough.,,, More recently this led him (Dembski) to postulate a Law of Conservation of Information, or actually to consolidate the idea, first put forward by Nobel-prizewinner Peter Medawar in the 1980s. Medawar had shown, as others before him, that in mathematical and computational operations, no new information can be created, but new findings are always implicit in the original starting points – laws and axioms.,,, http://potiphar.jongarvey.co.uk/2014/09/30/conservation-of-information-evolution-etc/ Evolutionary Computing: The Invisible Hand of Intelligence – June 17, 2015 Excerpt: William Dembski and Robert Marks have shown that no evolutionary algorithm is superior to blind search — unless information is added from an intelligent cause,,, Any internally generated information is conserved or degraded by the law of Conservation of Information.,,, What Marks and Dembski (mathematically) prove is as scientifically valid and relevant as Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem in mathematics. You can’t prove a system of mathematics from within the system, and you can’t derive an information-rich pattern from within the pattern.,,, http://www.evolutionnews.org/2015/06/evolutionary_co_1096931.html
bornagain77_{September 7, 2022
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Moreover, as Gilbert Newton Lewis, (1875-1946, a preeminent chemist who discovered the covalent bond in 1916, and who had the distinction of re-naming light quanta "photons" by analogy with electrons), stated, "Gain in entropy always means loss of information, and nothing more."
"Gain in entropy always means loss of information, and nothing more." Gilbert Newton Lewis - ("The Symmetry of Time in Physics.", Science, Vol. 71, No. 1849 (Jun. 6, 1930), p.570) https://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/scientists/lewis/
As should be needless to say, the fact that, "Gain in entropy always means loss of information, and nothing more", is in direct contradiction to CD's claim that God 'front-loaded' all the information necessary for life at the creation of the universe. In fact, it was long suspected that there was a connection between entropy in physics and the entropy of information since, "The equations of information theory and the second law are the same",,
“Is there a real connection between entropy in physics and the entropy of information? ….The equations of information theory and the second law are the same, suggesting that the idea of entropy is something fundamental…” - Tom Siegfried, Dallas Morning News, 5/14/90, [Quotes Robert W. Lucky, Ex. Director of Research, AT&T, Bell Laboratories & John A. Wheeler, of Princeton & Univ. of TX, Austin]
And now this connection between entropy and information has been established. Specifically, it has now been empirically shown, via experimental realization of the Maxwell demon thought experiment, that a bit of information, (i.e. “a record of a choice” Perry Marshall per Erwin Schrodinger), has a quote-unquote ‘thermodynamic content’,
Maxwell’s demon demonstration turns information into energy – 2010 Excerpt: Scientists in Japan are the first to have succeeded in converting information into free energy in an experiment that verifies the “Maxwell demon” thought experiment devised in 1867.,, In Maxwell’s thought experiment a partition with a small trapdoor is placed in the box, and the trapdoor is guarded by the imaginary being who, without expending energy, selects which molecules go through to the other side.,,, Until now, demonstrating the conversion of information to energy has been elusive, but University of Tokyo physicist Masaki Sano and colleagues have succeeded in demonstrating it in a nano-scale experiment. In a paper published in Nature Physics they describe how they coaxed a Brownian particle to travel upwards on a “spiral-staircase-like” potential energy created by an electric field solely on the basis of information on its location.,, The results also verified the generalized Jarzynski equation, which was formulated in 1997 by statistical chemist Christopher Jarzynski of the University of Maryland. The equation defines the amount of energy that could theoretically be converted from a unit, (i.e. a bit), of information. https://phys.org/news/2010-11-maxwell-demon-energy.html
As Christopher Jarzynski, who was instrumental in formulating the ‘equation to define the amount of energy that could theoretically be converted from a unit, (i.e. a bit), of information’, stated, “This is a beautiful experimental demonstration that information has a thermodynamic content,”
Demonic device converts information to energy – 2010 Excerpt: “This is a beautiful experimental demonstration that information has a thermodynamic content,” says Christopher Jarzynski, a statistical chemist at the University of Maryland in College Park. In 1997, Jarzynski formulated an equation to define the amount of energy that could theoretically be converted from a unit of information2; the work by Sano and his team has now confirmed this equation. “This tells us something new about how the laws of thermodynamics work on the microscopic scale,” says Jarzynski. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=demonic-device-converts-inform
Moreover, the following 2017 article states, "James Clerk Maxwell (said), “The idea of dissipation of energy depends on the extent of our knowledge.”,,, quantum information theory,,, describes the spread of information through quantum systems.,,, Fifteen years ago, “we thought of entropy as a property of a thermodynamic system,” he said. “Now in (quantum) information theory, we wouldn’t say entropy is a property of a system, but a property of an observer who describes a system.”,,,
The Quantum Thermodynamics Revolution – May 2017 Excerpt: the 19th-century physicist James Clerk Maxwell put it, “The idea of dissipation of energy depends on the extent of our knowledge.” In recent years, a revolutionary understanding of thermodynamics has emerged that explains this subjectivity using quantum information theory — “a toddler among physical theories,” as del Rio and co-authors put it, that describes the spread of information through quantum systems. Just as thermodynamics initially grew out of trying to improve steam engines, today’s thermodynamicists are mulling over the workings of quantum machines. Shrinking technology — a single-ion engine and three-atom fridge were both experimentally realized for the first time within the past year — is forcing them to extend thermodynamics to the quantum realm, where notions like temperature and work lose their usual meanings, and the classical laws don’t necessarily apply. They’ve found new, quantum versions of the laws that scale up to the originals. Rewriting the theory from the bottom up has led experts to recast its basic concepts in terms of its subjective nature, and to unravel the deep and often surprising relationship between energy and information — the abstract 1s and 0s by which physical states are distinguished and knowledge is measured.,,, Renato Renner, a professor at ETH Zurich in Switzerland, described this as a radical shift in perspective. Fifteen years ago, “we thought of entropy as a property of a thermodynamic system,” he said. “Now in (quantum) information theory, we wouldn’t say entropy is a property of a system, but a property of an observer who describes a system.”,,, https://www.quantamagazine.org/quantum-thermodynamics-revolution/
In fact, the Maxwell demon thought experiment has also now been extended to build, i.e. 'intelligently design', a refrigerator that is powered, not by energy, but by, of all things, information.
New Scientist astounds: Information is physical – May 13, 2016 Excerpt: Recently came the most startling demonstration yet: a tiny machine powered purely by information, which chilled metal through the power of its knowledge. This seemingly magical device could put us on the road to new, more efficient nanoscale machines, a better understanding of the workings of life, and a more complete picture of perhaps our most fundamental theory of the physical world. https://uncommondescent.com/news/new-scientist-astounds-information-is-physical/
On top of that, and via ‘using only information about the particle’s position’, researchers have now built, i.e. intelligently designed, a quote unquote ‘information engine’, and have achieved “power comparable to molecular machinery in living cells, and speeds comparable to fast-swimming bacteria,”
World’s fastest information-fuelled engine designed by SFU researchers – May 11, 2021 Excerpt: The information engine designed by SFU researchers consists of a microscopic particle immersed in water and attached to a spring which, itself, is fixed to a movable stage. Researchers then observe the particle bouncing up and down due to thermal motion. “When we see an upward bounce, we move the stage up in response,” explains lead author and PhD student Tushar Saha. “When we see a downward bounce, we wait. This ends up lifting the entire system using only information about the particle’s position.” “Guided by this insight, we picked the particle mass and other engine properties to maximize how fast the engine extracts energy, outperforming previous designs and achieving power comparable to molecular machinery in living cells, and speeds comparable to fast-swimming bacteria,” says postdoctoral fellow Jannik Ehrich. https://www.sfu.ca/university-communications/issues-experts/2021/05/world-s-fastest-information-fuelled-engine-designed-by-sfu-resea.html
In short, in order to 'locally' violate the second law, it is necessary for an 'outside intelligence' to add information to a 'local' system. Gain in Entropy, by itself, and as Gilbert Newton Lewis noted, "means loss of information, and nothing more". In conclusion, CD's claim that God front loaded all the information necessary to "account for every contingency", (i.e. to account for the subsequent creation of life, and etc..), at the creation of the universe, is for him to directly contradict the second law of thermodynamics, which is widely regarded as the most fundamental law of physics, and which "explains every possible action in the universe" and which "means loss of information, and nothing more". And thus CD is guilty of exactly what he accused Dr. Meyer of being guilty of, i.e. "motivated reasoning at its worse". A "motivated reasoning" on his part which has no discernible empirical connection to physical reality, and which is, in fact, directly contradicted from what we now know to be true from the second law of thermodynamics. Simply put, CD is putting his a-priori philosophical commitment to Deism above any scientific considerations that are strongly pointing to Theism. Verses
Romans 8:20-21 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. “We have the sober scientific certainty that the heavens and earth shall ‘wax old as doth a garment’…. Dark indeed would be the prospects of the human race if unilluminated by that light which reveals ‘new heavens and a new earth.’” Sir William Thomson, Lord Kelvin (1824 – 1907) – pioneer in many different fields, particularly electromagnetism and thermodynamics. https://darwinthenandnow.com/scientific-revolution/william-thompson-kevin/ Psalm 102:25-27 Of old You laid the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands. They will perish, but You will endure; Yes, they will all grow old like a garment; Like a cloak You will change them, And they will be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will have no end.
Supplemental note:
March 2021 - The 'infinite' entropic divide between special relativity and general relativity (and Christ’s resurrection from the dead as the correct 'theory of everything) https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/fine-tuning-of-the-universe-the-strong-force-and-the-fine-structure-constant/#comment-726659
Verse:
Colossians 1:15-20 The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
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CD claims that
"His (Meyer's) explanation that deism is inadequate to deal with “later” infusions of information and thus periodic tinkering is necessary, again, is motivated reasoning at its worst. Any “god” capable of creating a universe is clearly powerful and clever enough to front-load his/her/its creation to account for every contingency ab initio."
Yet far from 'motivated reasoning at its worse', Meyer lists several scientific reasons why the Deist's front loaded scenario is an inadequate scientific explanation. And why Theism is to be preferred over Deism as an adequate scientific explanation. In the following review of Meyer's book, 'Return of the God Hypothesis', several scientific reasons are given as to why the Deist's front loaded scenario is an inadequate scientific explanation.
Book Review - Return of the God Hypothesis by Stephen Meyer Excerpt: Indeed, given the facts of molecular biology, the axioms of information theory, the laws of thermodynamics, the high-energy state of the early universe, the reality of unpredictable quantum fluctuations, and what we know about the time that elapsed between the origin of the universe and the first life on earth, explanations of the origin of life that deny the need for new information after the beginning of the universe clearly lack scientific plausibility. And since deism denies that God could have or would have acted to add any such necessary information after an original act of creation, deistic and other truly front-loaded design hypotheses cannot account for the origin of the first life. Since, on the other hand, theism does posit an intelligent agent who acts in a creative way (in addition to sustaining the laws of nature) after the beginning of the universe, theism provides a better explanation for the origin of the information necessary to produce the first cell as well as subsequent innovations in the history of life. Thus, of these two worldview hypotheses, theism provides a better overall explanation than deism of the three key facts about biological and cosmological origins under examination: (1) the material universe had a beginning; (2) the material universe has been finely tuned for life from the beginning; and (3) large discontinuous increases in functionally specified information have entered the biosphere since the beginning. Deism can explain the first two of those facts; theism can explain all three.,,, https://returnofthegodhypothesis.com/book/preview/
As to Quantum Mechanics, (and as I pointed out to CD previously, and as he characteristically ignored), the Kochen-Specker theorem, (as well as the falsification of ‘realism’ by Leggett’s inequality), undermines his 'front-loading' scenario in the most fundamental way possible in that “it would not even be possible to place the information into the universe’s past in an ad hoc way”, - November 2021 https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/christian-darwinists-must-now-backtrack-re-adam-and-eve/#comment-741479
The free will theorem of John H. Conway and Simon B. Kochen,,, Excerpt: Since the free will theorem applies to any arbitrary physical theory consistent with the axioms, it would not even be possible to place the information into the universe’s past in an ad hoc way. The argument proceeds from the Kochen-Specker theorem, which shows that the result of any individual measurement of spin was not fixed (pre-determined) independently of the choice of measurements. http://www.informationphilosopher.com/freedom/free_will_theorem.html
In fact, as far as Quantum Mechanics is concerned, "the world (as you experience it) might as well not have existed 10^-43 seconds ago!”
“Look, we all have fun ridiculing the creationists who think the world sprang into existence on October 23, 4004 BC at 9AM (presumably Babylonian time), with the fossils already in the ground, light from distant stars heading toward us, etc. But if we accept the usual picture of quantum mechanics, then in a certain sense the situation is far worse: the world (as you experience it) might as well not have existed 10^-43 seconds ago!”’ - Scott Aaronson - MIT - ‘Lecture 11: Decoherence and Hidden Variables (also see falsification of 'realism' via the violation of Leggett's inequality by Zeilinger and company)
As should be needless to say, if, as quantum mechanics holds, "the world (as you experience it) might as well not have existed 10^-43 seconds ago!", then that obviously presents a fairly substantial difficulty for CD's deistic belief that all the information necessary for life was 'front-loaded' into the universe at its initial creation of the universe approx. 13.7 billion years ago. Besides quantum mechanics, thermodynamics also presents a fairly substantial difficulty for CD's 'front-loading' belief. As to thermodynamics in particular. The second law is, by far, the most finely tuned of the initial conditions of the universe. As was noted in post 15:
“An explosion you think of as kind of a messy event. And this is the point about entropy. The explosion in which our universe began was not a messy event. And if you talk about how messy it could have been, this is what the Penrose calculation is all about essentially. It looks at the observed statistical entropy in our universe. The entropy per baryon. And he calculates that out and he arrives at a certain figure. And then he calculates using the Bekenstein-Hawking formula for Black-Hole entropy what the,,, (what sort of entropy could have been associated with,,, the singularity that would have constituted the beginning of the universe). So you’ve got the numerator, the observed entropy, and the denominator, how big it (the entropy) could have been. And that fraction turns out to be,, 1 over 10 to the 10 to the 123rd power. Let me just emphasize how big that denominator is so you can gain a real appreciation for how small that probability is. So there are 10^80th baryons in the universe. Protons and neutrons. No suppose we put a zero on every one of those. OK, how many zeros is that? That is 10^80th zeros. This number has 10^123rd zeros. OK, so you would need a hundred million, trillion, trillion, trillion, universes our size, with zero on every proton and neutron in all of those universes just to write out this number. That is how fine tuned the initial entropy of our universe is. And if there were a pre-Big Bang state and you had some bounces, then that fine tuning (for entropy) gets even finer as you go backwards if you can even imagine such a thing. ” Dr Bruce Gordon – Contemporary Physics and God Part 2 – video – 1:50 minute mark – video https://youtu.be/ff_sNyGNSko?t=110
Unsurprisingly, the second law of thermodynamics is also considered one of the, if not THE, most fundamental law of physics,
Shining Light on Dark Energy – October 21, 2012 Excerpt: It (Entropy) explains time; it explains every possible action in the universe;,, Even gravity, Vedral argued, can be expressed as a consequence of the law of entropy. ,,, The principles of thermodynamics are at their roots all to do with information theory. Information theory is simply an embodiment of how we interact with the universe —,,, http://crev.info/2012/10/shining-light-on-dark-energy/
In fact Arthur Eddington himself stated that, “The law that entropy always increases holds, I think, the supreme position among the laws of Nature.,,, if your theory is found to be against the Second Law of Thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it to collapse in deepest humiliation.”
“The law that entropy always increases holds, I think, the supreme position among the laws of Nature. If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell’s equations – then so much the worse for Maxwell’s equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation – well, these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your theory is found to be against the Second Law of Thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it to collapse in deepest humiliation.” – Arthur Eddington, New Pathways in Science - 1935
And indeed, Darwinian evolution is 'against' the second law. Dr. Brain Miller has done an excellent job of explaining exactly why entropy presents an ‘impossible’ barrier for Darwinian processes to overcome.
Physicist Brian Miller: Two Conundrums for Strictly Materialist Views of Biology – January 2020 Excerpt: Nothing in nature will ever simultaneously go to both low entropy and high energy at the same time. It’s a physical impossibility. Yet life had to do that. Life had to take simple chemicals and go to a state of high energy and of low entropy. That’s a physical impossibility. https://evolutionnews.org/2020/01/physicist-brian-miller-two-conundrums-for-strictly-materialist-views-of-biology/ “‘Professor Dave’ argues that the origin of life does not face thermodynamic hurdles. He states that natural systems often spontaneously increase in order, such as water freezing or soap molecules forming micelles (e.g., spheres or bilayers), He is making the very common mistake that he fails to recognize that the formation of the cell represents both a dramatic decrease in entropy and an equally dramatic increase in energy. In contrast, water freezing represents both a decrease in entropy but also a decrease in energy. More specifically, the process of freezing releases heat that increases the entropy of the surrounding environment by an amount greater than the entropy decrease of the water molecule forming the rigid structure. Likewise, soap molecules coalescing into micelles represents a net increase of entropy since the surrounding water molecules significantly increase in their number of degrees of freedom. No system without assistance ever moves both toward lower entropy and higher energy which is required for the formation of a cell.” – Brian Miller, Ph. D. – MIT – Episode 0/13: Reasons // A Course on Abiogenesis by Dr. James Tour https://youtu.be/71dqAFUb-v0?t=1434 Brian Miller – Thermodynamics, the Origin of Life, and Intelligent Design https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAXiHRPZz0s
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