Darwinists are Delegitimizing Science in the Name of Science

_{Gil Dodgen

October 25, 2011

Intelligent Design}

Share: Facebook; Twitter; LinkedIn; Flipboard; Print; Email

What Darwinists don’t recognize is that, in the name of promoting science, they are actually promoting skepticism about what can be trusted in the name of science.

Bears evolved into whales? No, that’s been rejected. “Scientists” suggest that whales might have evolved from a cat-like animal, or a hyena-like animal, or (fill in the blank).

“It is thought by some that…”

This is “science”?

Evolution is a fact, if evolution is defined as the observation that some living systems are not now as they once were. According to this definition I count myself as an evolutionist.

But Darwinists are unwilling to acknowledge their ignorance concerning how this all came about, and persist in presenting unsupported speculation in the name of science.

This is ultimately destructive of the scientific enterprise. When people read such things as “science has discovered…” or “scientific consensus assures us that…” or some such, people are likely to assume that they are being conned, even if this is not the case, because they have been burned by so many claims in the past that turned out to be transparently false or eventually invalidated by evidence.

Based upon what I’ve learned over my 60 years of existence — mathematics, chemistry, physics, music and language study, computer programming, AI research, and involvement in multiple engineering disciplines — I find this Darwinism stuff to be a desperate attempt to deny the obvious: design and purpose in the universe and human existence.

The irony is that Darwinists are doing much harm to that which they presume to promote — confidence in claims made in the name of science.

Comments

KF: Thank you for the very important clarification :)gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:39 PM
11
11
39
PM
PDT}

GinoB: a) Please explain the difference between abstract codes and, I suppose, "concrete codes" (?) b) Unwarranted and not pertinent. I was speaking of information in general. If you define information, it is very easy to apply that definition to biological information. No new definition is necessary. c) I have never said that information has "immaterial properties". But it is certainly an abstract concept, not definable in purely material terms (if we can give a meanign to "material", a word that I usually avoid to use). d) I said "The information in DNA is not digital". That was the denial. That DNA is not digital is obvious and trivial. It has however benn denied too, recently, by Elizabeth, and I have very explicitly stated on that occasion that molecules are not digital, and that normal molecules contain no digitally coded information, while DNA does. e) I have many times rigorously defined all those things.gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:29 PM
11
11
29
PM
PDT}

KF: Definitely deliberate gobbledygook :). But in the end they make more sense than many darwinist "arguments". (By the way, they were generated by randomly typing on my keyboard, after having conscientiously tried to get in the state of mind of a monkey) :) .gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:18 PM
11
11
18
PM
PDT}

GinoB: Well, just to explain why I say that you are just "looking for a fight": a) Have you read my many detailed posts about dFSCI? It seems not, from what you write. So, why are you jumping to the conclusion that it is a "made up, subjective metric"? b)You say: at best your claim “only intelligently designed things can have large amounts of dFSCI” is a hypothesis, not any sort of established truth. What you are expressing here is not the initial hypothesis, but the final inference. It is obvious that you don't know, or don't understand, the ID position. c) You say: To honestly test the hypothesis, you’re going to have to measure both known designed and known not-designed things. That's exactly what I explicitly do in my reasoning about dFSCI. I show that known designed objects, that is human artifacts, often exhibit dFSCI (very easy to demonstrate). And that no known not-designed object exhibits it (equally easy to demonstrate). From those empirical observations, and only from them, derives the concept that dFSCI is an empirical indicator of design. Then I use that indicator to formulate a design inference for biological information, that does exhibit dFSCI in great amounts. That is the correct epistemological sequence. d) You say: You can’t look at a whole class of unknown-origin objects (i.e biological life) and then conclude that they’re all designed based on the very thing you’re trying to test. Obviously. I have never done that. That kind of statement only demonstrates that you have never read my posts on the subject. or never understood them So, either you are cognitively superficial and arrogant, or you are just looking for a fight. QED.gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:14 PM
11
11
14
PM
PDT}

gpuccio
So, I believe they stick to some bizarre denials: a) DNA is not a code
Of course it's a code, meaning that it's a process where the inputs are mapped to the outputs. It's just not an abstract code. IDers love to play bait-and-switch equivocation games with the different definitions of code.
b) Information cannot be defined
No IDer has ever defined 'biological information' in any sort of rigorous or meaningful way.
c) Information does not exist
Of course information exists. It just doesn't have the immaterial properties you guys like to fantasize about.
d) The information in DNA is not digital
DNA is not digital.
e) Functional information is a sprtiehsgao f) dFSCI is a cbdkspfvorunm
Both 'functional information' and 'dFSCI' (and all the rest of the alphabet buzzterms you guys come up with) have never been rigorously defined. But that's OK. The scientific community knows keeping things fuzzy and vague is part of the IDer squid-ink escape strategy. If you never commit to definitions you can't be pinned down.GinoB_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:04 PM
11
11
04
PM
PDT}

GP: are those Italian terms, or deliberate gobbledygook?kairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:02 PM
11
11
02
PM
PDT}

F/N: Above, Dr Bot raises the issue of Analogue info. A discussion of digital info is without loss of generality, as analogue info may be converted to digital, and by so doing, the tolerance range can be assessed -- indeed this is an island of function issue. Working with digital info is without loss of generality, WLOG. Take a car part for say an engine. It has certain specific requisites as to shape, materials, size etc. As we know from the modern world of digital drawings [cf. discussion here on in IOSE], such can be reduced to a mesh of nodes and arcs, in some structured order. To do so, in effect there is a structured chain of yes/no decisions, of some length. Such a chain is of course a measure of info in bits. The island of function issue emerges from seeing that his structure has a tolerance range [T], within which various actual configs [E] will be adequately acceptable. All of these sit in the wider space of all possibilities for something of that degree of complexity [W], where of course for a particular context, by far, most of W will be non-functional. A vinyl record is a good example in point, as is a bar of cams used to control an automaton. Both of these are analogue programs, and can WLOG be converted to equivalent digital ones. Modern info theory was developed in a largely analogue comms world, but reduced info to bits using a probability metric I = - log p. In effect, the easiest way to see how that works is to carry out a notional or actual analogue to digital conversion process, with some degree of tolerance for the acceptable function. Discussion in digital terms is WLOG. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
11:00 PM
11
11
00
PM
PDT}

gpuccio
I think I will not answer you any more. There is no hope, when the attitude is to serach only senseless fight.
No one's looking for a fight. I'm just pointing out the big problems with your arguments, ones that you obviously have no answers for. Let's assume for a second that that your made up, subjective 'dFSCI' metric has some validity. You still have the issue that at best your claim "only intelligently designed things can have large amounts of dFSCI" is a hypothesis, not any sort of established truth. To honestly test the hypothesis, you're going to have to measure both known designed and known not-designed things. You can't look at a whole class of unknown-origin objects (i.e biological life) and then conclude that they're all designed based on the very thing you're trying to test. It's called "affirming the consequence", and it's horribly bad reasoning. There's a reason the scientific community doesn't take such fatally flawed arguments seriously. Hint - it's not because of an evil conspiracy to EXPEL you.GinoB_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
10:44 PM
10
10
44
PM
PDT}

material.infantacy: Of course it is digital. The fuss is easy to understand. At some point our darwinist interlocutors, or at least some of them, seem to become more or less aware that some of the things ID says are worrying. Maybe only in their subconscious. And, obviously, thay have no good arguments to answer those things. Not their fault. There are not good arguments. So, I believe they stick to some bizarre denials: a) DNA is not a code b) Information cannot be defined c) Information does not exist d) The information in DNA is not digital e) Functional information is a sprtiehsgao f) dFSCI is a cbdkspfvorunm And so on...gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
09:54 PM
9
09
54
PM
PDT}

GinoB: I think I will not answer you any more. There is no hope, when the attitude is to serach only senseless fight. Please review your epistemology, and think about the difference between a logic deduction and an empirical inference. And, if you want, look for the many occasions where I have detailed, supported and motivated all those assertions here. Again, have a good time (sincerely :) ).gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
09:43 PM
9
09
43
PM
PDT}

gpuccio
Because dFSCI is found empirically only in designed things. Because biological information has tons of dFSCI. Because you cannot explain that dFSCI in biological information in any other way, and the design inference remains the best explanation, indeed the only one we have at present.
Sorry, but your first statement is a completely unsupported assertion. Indeed, your whole argument is so logically flawed it would put a philosophy freshman to shame. "Salmon are found empirically only in fresh water" The Pacific ocean has tons of salmon Therefore the Pacific ocean must be fresh water" ID "logic" at its finest.GinoB_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
09:10 PM
9
09
10
PM
PDT}

Dear Liz: Could you give an example of an unsupported speculation that a Darwinist has presented in the name of science? I'm bewildered. I presented exactly what you have requested in my opening comments. Darwinism is essentially nothing but unsupported speculation in the name of science (except for such trivialities as antibiotic resistance in bacteria). By Darwinian speculation I'm referring to -- although this also refers to Darwinian speculation concerning ancestor-descendant relationships in the fossil record, which are impossible to establish -- the proposed creative power of random errors filtered by natural selection. If this thesis is true, every feature of every living thing that has ever existed must be explicable by this mechanism. Darwinists propose that there "must have been" a gradual slope on the backside of Mount Improbable, which explains how an inherently degenerative process (random errors) can produce the exact opposite. What we observe in biology is a highly sophisticated error-detection-and-repair algorithm, with associated machinery, that compensates for the destructive effects of random errors. If this is not evidence of design, nothing is. As always Liz, I must express my appreciation for your contributions here. You are a fine person (anyone who appreciates classical music can't be all bad!), even though you are wrong. :-)GilDodgen_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
08:44 PM
8
08
44
PM
PDT}

Dr Bot, Pardon, but you are dancin' wrong but strong. That DNA strands are string data structures using four-state elements, physically implemented using informational polymers -- even as electronic circuts use refined grains of sand with artfully introduced impurities, should be plain. This is instantiation, not analogy; save to those who so desperately need an out that they want to pretend that by describing a digital system as "discrete" instead, they can then suggest that it's all an analogy and analogies are not deductive proofs. First, the matter is plainly instantiation, and second, analogy is the foundation stone of inductive argument, which is the only class of argument that gives us empirical knowledge. No, I am not playing at giving misleading impressions, I am going off what I have studied, used and taught for over 30 years: digital systems are discrete state systems, by definition, and discrete state systems are digital systems by definition. Discrete meaning that between neighbouring states there are no defined intermediate states. The example I usually have given is that one may not climb a ladder by standing between the rungs. BTW, when I have taught basic atomics, I have pointed out that there are no inter-atoms, i.e being a particular element is a discrete state system too. Nature has a digital side to it. So, please note that I have taken pains to highlight how the matter is not merely being discrete state, but functionally specific complex information, having worked out the simplified Chi metric expression: Chi_500 = I*S - 500, bits beyond the solar system threshold, where I is an info metric rooted in the old I = - log p expression, directly or indirectly, and S is a dummy variable for specificity. 501 coins tossed at random will not be in a specified state so S = 0, and by overwhelming odds will be near to a 50-50 distribution: Chi_500 = - 500. But if the coins are instead found to encode the ASCII code for a statement in English, S = 1, I = 501 bits, Chi_500 = 1. One will be well warranted to conclude the best explanation is the coins were set in that array by intelligence. DNA is full of FSCI and we are well warranted -- despite all sorts of objections like the above -- to infer to design. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
06:02 PM
6
06
02
PM
PDT}

So the measurable amount of difference in information between a live human and a dead human is about 21 grams?paragwinn_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
03:52 PM
3
03
52
PM
PDT}

Could you give an example of an unsupported speculation that a Darwinist has presented in the name of science? You mean like the birds from dinos propaganda? [url]http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090609092055.htm[/url]Blue_Savannah_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
03:39 PM
3
03
39
PM
PDT}

Base 2: 0, 1 Base 4: 0, 1, 2, 3 Base 4: A, T, C, G 2^6 = 64 4^3 = 64 2^6 = 4^3 = (2^2)^3 = 2^(2*3) = 2^6 A = 0 = 00 T = 1 = 01 C = 2 = 10 G = 3 = 11 " " = 0 a = 1 b = 2 c = 3 d = 4 e = 5 f = 6 g = 7 h = 8 i = 9 j = 10 k = 11 l = 12 m = 13 n = 14 o = 15 p = 16 q = 17 r = 18 s = 19 t = 20 u = 21 v = 22 w = 23 x = 24 y = 25 z = 26 decimal: "digitally encoded" decimal: "4 9 7 9 20 1 12 12 25 0 5 14 3 15 4 5 4" binary: "100 1001 111 1001 10100 1 1100 1100 11001 0 101 1110 11 1111 100 101 100" quaternary: "10 21 13 21 110 1 30 30 121 0 11 32 3 33 10 11 10" quaternary: "TA CT TG CT TTA T GA GA TCT A TT GC G GG TA TT TA" It seems reasonably digital, as well as base 4. I don't understand the fuss.material.infantacy_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:46 PM
2
02
46
PM
PDT}

BTW Dr Bot, pardon a basic reminder: digital MEANS discrete — as opposed to continuous
Yes, it does. So why can't the d in dFSCI refer to discrete? Probably because to the lay reader discrete does not imply design in the way digital does! If digital just means discrete then any molecular structure is digital because it is discrete. It is about arguments from analogy KF.DrBot_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:45 PM
2
02
45
PM
PDT}

Onlookers, for a 101, cf here.kairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:44 PM
2
02
44
PM
PDT}

BTW Dr Bot, pardon a basic reminder: digital MEANS discrete -- as opposed to continuous -- state. That's lesson 1 in digital technology. (I used to teach that one by contrasting rungs on a ladder with climbing a rope. That too is why I pointed out various bases for digital systems above, 12 hrs and 60 minutes on a clock, etc. And the physical substrates used to store or manipulate the info are secondary to its significance as discrete state info. Binary digits do not lose their informational significance by being stored or processed as transistor ckt voltage levels or magnetisation states or tones or phases or amplitudes moving along a phone line etc. And in von Neumann's kinematic replicator, short rods of different length were to be used as digital storage units.)kairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:39 PM
2
02
39
PM
PDT}

Kindly tell us the term we use to describe a discrete as opposed to continuous state system.
DiscreteDrBot_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:36 PM
2
02
36
PM
PDT}

Dr Liddle: We have a string structure, wherein the positions along the string take states commonly symbolised by G/C/A/T (or for RNA, U). There is no defined state between any pair of these possibilities. Discrete state, in a string data structure, and known to hold coded prescriptive information. If your side is reduced to pleading "analogy" or to deny the definition of digital, then that is quite telling. And, kindly recall, the inference to design -- as has been pointed out over and over -- is not on complexity, but complexity with specificity, in this case by specific code based function. In a fairly direct comparison, let us suppose we were to impose a six state code on the system of dice, with the letters of he alphabet represented therein. If we saw a couple of hundred dice in a string, reading in no particular order the sequence would be best explained on randomness. But if we saw another in which the letters were spelling our an intelligible message in English -- note the specification here -- the best explanation would be intelligence. For very obvious reasons. In the cell, we have 4-state strings, with the elements arranged to carry out highly specific functions based on algorithmic step by step sequences, e.g. protein sequencing. Why should we refuse to accept the best explanation for the latter as design? GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:25 PM
2
02
25
PM
PDT}

Dr Bot: Kindly tell us the term we use to describe a discrete as opposed to continuous state system. Instantiation is not analogy. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:17 PM
2
02
17
PM
PDT}

Elizabeth: You ask why???? I was just restating the fundamental consclusion of ID theory. Do you want me to explain it all again from scratch? Because dFSCI is found empirically only in designed things. Because biological information has tons of dFSCI. Because you cannot explain that dFSCI in biological information in any other way, and the design inference remains the best explanation, indeed the only one we have at present. Because the only other model explicitly proposed, neodarwinism, completely fails to explain what it pretends to explain.gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:08 PM
2
02
08
PM
PDT}

Elizabeth: But what in the world are you saying now? Sure, it’s a polynucleotide with four possible base pairs, bu that doesn’t make it “digital”. But it's not the DNA molecule that is digital. It's the information encoded in the gene! Codons: three nucleotides encode for one aminoacid. A base four code, redundant, and including stop codons. That is digital. How can you misunderstand that simple concept? What has that to do with molecules being "digital"? Molecules are not symbolic information. They do not bear the coded information for the structure of other molecules. The DNA code is a code. All biologists seem to understand that. Is it so difficult to agree on such elementary issues?gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:05 PM
2
02
05
PM
PDT}

Any encoding of functional information, if the information is complex enough, is an indicator of design.
Why?Elizabeth Liddle_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:03 PM
2
02
03
PM
PDT}

DrBot: Any encoding of functional information, if the information is complex enough, is an indicator of design. It does not matter if the information is digital or analogic, discrete or continuous. In my diuscussions about dFSCI I have always specified that I choose a specific subset of FSCI, the digital (d), only because: a) The computations and models are easier b) The biologic information we are debating, that in my case is protein gene information, is certainly digital, and coded in a base four code. Therefore, there is no loss of generality in the discussion.gpuccio_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
02:01 PM
2
02
01
PM
PDT}

Exactly. As I keep saying, there's not much that's digital about DNA. Sure, it's a polynucleotide with four possible base pairs, bu that doesn't make it "digital". And even if it did, it wouldn't make it designed. All molecules are "digital" in that they are, as you say, made of discrete entities, atoms, or monomers, or ions.Elizabeth Liddle_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
01:05 PM
1
01
05
PM
PDT}

A raft of what?Elizabeth Liddle_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
01:03 PM
1
01
03
PM
PDT}

It is also plainly digitally coded. (Binary digital is just the most headlined, we commonly count with decimal digital notation, we tell time with duodecimal and sexagesimal digital systems, hexadecimal digital systems are often used in machine language work with controllers or computers, etc etc. Even our alphanumeric symbol system used for computer based type is a digital system. So is music notation.)
Why is this anything more than an argument by analogy? What other system could be used to encode heritable information at this scale that could not be regarded as discrete - that is the proper word you should be using - DNA is a discrete encoding, not a continuous one. If a continuous encoding was present would that count against ID, or would the argument by analogy just switch to magnetic tape and vinyl?DrBot_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
12:53 PM
12
12
53
PM
PDT}

GB: Pardon, but this is simply a strident way of saying, I don't like the facts in evidence. Let's review a few key points relative to my description, based on the past 60 or so years of molecular biology: 1 --> DNA is at the heart of cell based life. 2 --> DNA uses a 4-state, discrete state, string data structure with various specific codes. 3 --> The codes for making proteins in particular have in them: START (and put in Meth), elongate with type-x AA, elongate . . . , STOP codons. 4 --> This is functionally specific, prescriptive information. 5 --> It is also plainly digitally coded. (Binary digital is just the most headlined, we commonly count with decimal digital notation, we tell time with duodecimal and sexagesimal digital systems, hexadecimal digital systems are often used in machine language work with controllers or computers, etc etc. Even our alphanumeric symbol system used for computer based type is a digital system. So is music notation.) So, the attempt at dismissal backfires. I DESCRIBED the facts. Now, let's ask the proverbial astute onlooker why you are so patently uncomfortable with the information age facts that sit in the heart of the living cell. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 26, 2011
October
10
Oct
26
26
2011
12:30 PM
12
12
30
PM
PDT}

Prev 1 2 3 4 5 Next

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Leave a Reply