Evolution or Intelligent design: On which side is the evidence?

Martin_r @22, Thanks for the link. This is a fascinating possibility. Unfortunately, the article is paywalled, but I appreciate the approach that the author takes to interpreting parts of cellular communication from the perspective that it's not just "junk," but may have a purpose. -Q Querius

Seversky@

…. but, yes, the origins of the laws, complexity, information we observe does demand explanation and we don’t have one.

You do not accept ‘intelligence’ as an explanation for complex specified functional organization/information. Why not?

God is not an explanation of how, it is a speculation concerning a “who”.

I agree. As an aside, ID does not identify the source of intelligent design WRT biology. ID modestly offers ‘intelligent design’ as an explanation for the kind of information we encounter in biology. That’s all. What is the problem with that?

If you are so certain that it couldn’t have came about through natural means, that implies you have an explanation of how it came about through non-natural means. What would that be?

Intelligent design. ‘By who or what?’, you might ask, but that question is only appropriate after the design inference. Right? Origenes

#26 Seversky: " that implies you have an explanation of how it came about through non-natural means. What would that be? " An agency with super intelligence and power, that we commonly call God. See here: https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2419-where-did-glucose-come-from-in-a-prebiotic-world#6109 Otangelo

Otangelo/20

” I went to someone who is a competent authority for his opinion on your claims.” Right. It’s said that people believe anything when the source is a scientist making claims.

Which is an odd claim given how resistant people are to scientific explanations concerning evolution or vaccines, for example. It's almost as if they will only accept science where they think it supports their religious beliefs such as in creationism.

The fact that someone has credentials does not make that person automatically right.

I agree but it makes them more likely to be right than someone who has not put all that time and effort into studying and conducting research in that field.

Neither he nor anyone else knows how the production of glucose, life essential, emerged on the prebiotic earth by natural means.

If that's the case then you have no better idea than Moran which means you are in no position to argue that it couldn't have come about through natural means. Absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence.

If you think I am wrong, ask Larry Moran to come here and provide his explanations. He was inapt/unable then, five years ago, and I predict he is so as well today.

If you are so certain that it couldn't have came about through natural means, that implies you have an explanation of how it came about through non-natural means. What would that be? Seversky

When somebody is right but has no love then he is wrong. (a Saint) whistler

Origenes/17

As per usual PM1’s argument misses the mark by a wide margin. While it is true that organisms as wholes are very different from machines (in a way that is extremely unhelpful to your position), it is also most certainly the case that aspects of organisms show strong similarities with machines. The complex functional specified organization/information that we observe in e.g. DNA must be explained (and your position cannot) irrespective of the high likelihood that a complete explanation of an organism involves much more.

FSCO/I is an unproven metric but, yes, the origins of the laws, complexity, information we observe does demand explanation and we don't have one. God is not an explanation of how, it is a speculation concerning a "who". And while analogies can be informative their evidentiary weight can only be determined by weighing both the similarities and differences if we are to avoid confirmation bias. Seversky

Martin amazing. Thanks for sharing. Otangelo

Otangelo talking about Signaling ... this is my favorite one:

Do cells use passwords in cell-state transitions? Is cell signaling sometimes encrypted? Organisms must maintain proper regulation including defense and healing. Life-threatening problems may be caused by pathogens or by a multicellular organism’s own cells through cancer or autoimmune disorders. Life evolved solutions to these problems that can be conceptualized through the lens of information security, which is a well-developed field in computer science. Here I argue that taking an information security view of cells is not merely semantics, but useful to explain features of signaling, regulation, and defense. An information security perspective also offers a conduit for cross-fertilization of advanced ideas from computer science and the potential for biology to inform computer science. First, I consider whether cells use passwords, i.e., initiation sequences that are required for subsequent signals to have effects, by analyzing the concept of pioneer transcription factors in chromatin regulation and cellular reprogramming. Second, I consider whether cells may encrypt signal transduction cascades. Encryption could benefit cells by making it more difficult for pathogens or oncogenes to hijack cell networks. By using numerous molecules, cells may gain a security advantage in particular against viruses, whose genome sizes are typically under selection pressure. I provide a simple conceptual argument for how cells may perform encryption through posttranslational modifications, complex formation, and chromatin accessibility. I invoke information theory to provide a criterion of an entropy spike to assess whether a signaling cascade has encryption-like features. I discuss how the frequently invoked concept of context dependency may oversimplify more advanced features of cell signaling networks, such as encryption. Therefore, by considering that biochemical networks may be even more complex than commonly realized we may be better able to understand defenses against pathogens and pathologies. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31175621/

martin_r

#16 Seversky " the machines we design are also very different from biological organisms so we should be very cautious about how much they can inform us and how much they can mislead us." The factory maker argument https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2245-abiogenesis-the-factory-maker-argument The Factory maker argument ( Paley's watchmaker 2.0) 1. We have empirical experience and background knowledge that intelligent agents can and do create information storage mechanisms ( hardware), codes and languages, and instructional assembly information ( data) using a codified language ( software) information transmission systems ( post-delivery services, worldwide web) translation software, transistors, complex machines, automated robotic production lines, integrated circuit boards, energy turbines, and factories. Intelligence can conceptualize and create and design these things from scratch, select the building materials, create data that directs the making and joining of physical parts together in the right way, ( blueprints to create robots) and fine-tune them, to achieve a functional outcome. 2. We have no theoretical, conceptual, practical, or hypothesized and scientifically tested experimental evidence that unguided, nonintelligent, random causes and mechanisms can create and fabricate these things stochastically, or be instantiated by physical necessity and constraints. 3. All the mentioned things in premise 1 exist analogously to man-made artifacts in nature, not only in an analogous manner but literally so. Cells are in a literal sense chemical factories, driven by molecular machines (proteins), directed by data stored in the genome ( the nucleotide sequence), epigenetic data systems, and driven by energy (ATP). 4. Therefore, it is rational, logical, and plausible, to infer and prefer the conclusion that an intelligent agent with foresight created biological embodied life, rather than random events. Otangelo

#15 Seversky " I went to someone who is a competent authority for his opinion on your claims." Right. It's said that people believe anything when the source is a scientist making claims. That's the best way to self-delusion and deception. The fact that someone has credentials does not make that person automatically right. In fact, what you copy/pasted, was indeed pseudo-scientific superficial blabbering from Moran. Neither he nor anyone else knows how the production of glucose, life essential, emerged on the prebiotic earth by natural means. If you think I am wrong, ask Larry Moran to come here and provide his explanations. He was inapt/unable then, five years ago, and I predict he is so as well today. Otangelo

Martin #13 Good grief !! The essential signaling pathways for animal development 1 https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2351-the-essential-signaling-pathways-for-animal-development How Signaling in biology points to design https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2745-how-signaling-in-biology-points-to-design Signaling between organs and tissues: Interdependence points to design https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t3065-signaling-between-organs-and-tissues-interdependence-points-to-design Cell Communication and signaling, evidence of design http://reasonandscience.heavenforum.org/t2181-cell-communication-and-signaling-evidence-of-design The Hippo signaling pathway in organ size control, tissue regeneration and stem cell self-renewal 1 https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2350-the-hippo-signaling-pathway-in-organ-size-control-tissue-regeneration-and-stem-cell-self-renewal How intracellular Calcium signaling, gradient, and its role as a universal intracellular regulator points to design https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2448-howintracellular-calcium-signaling-gradient-and-its-role-as-a-universal-intracellular-regulator-points-to-design Cell signaling & the origin of life https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t3235-cell-signaling-the-origin-of-life Otangelo

Seversky

as PM1 has pointed out, the machines we design are also very different from biological organisms

do you even read my posts ? Show me where I was mentioning machines .... So once again: Signaling everywhere… Regulation/Coordination/Control everywhere … Proofreading and checkpoints everywhere … Engineering ... everywhere .... And I have to repeat the following as well, especially for you Seversky, because you are a textbook example... G.K. Chesterton:

Darwinism is ‘An attack upon thought itself’

martin_r

Seversky

No one is denying that there are useful analogies between biology and engineering but, as PM1 has pointed out, the machines we design are also very different from biological organisms so we should be very cautious about how much they can inform us and how much they can mislead us.

As per usual PM1's argument misses the mark by a wide margin. While it is true that organisms as wholes are very different from machines (in a way that is extremely unhelpful to your position), it is also most certainly the case that aspects of organisms show strong similarities with machines. The complex functional specified organization/information that we observe in e.g. DNA must be explained (and your position cannot) irrespective of the high likelihood that a complete explanation of an organism involves much more. Origenes

Martin_r/13

How does it matter who Otangelo is, or what his education is. Otangelo is quoting mainstream research.

And Larry Moran has conducted and published mainstream research. He doesn't just quotemine it to support his creationist beliefs.

And then, people like you or Chuckdarwin will attacking me (or Otangelo), when I say that biology is all about engineering.

No one is denying that there are useful analogies between biology and engineering but, as PM1 has pointed out, the machines we design are also very different from biological organisms so we should be very cautious about how much they can inform us and how much they can mislead us. Seversky

Otangelo/8

Or would you like to confess, that you have no idea on the matter, but just saw someone in the cheap attempt to discredit me, and thought you should try the same, by parroting others say?

I was not parroting, I was quoting directly from what was published on Larry Moran's blog. I'm happy to confess I have no expertise in that field. That's I why I went to someone who is a competent authority for his opinion on your claims. Larry Moran has spent his working life in that field, has published papers in scientific journals and written textbooks. Have you done the same? Seversky

Jerry/6

Seversky mocks Otangelo by using someone who cannot justify his own beliefs.

I wasn't aware that quoting from a competent authority in that field who disputes Otangelo's claims constitutes mockery.

How appropriate from Seversky who only mocks and cannot justify his beliefs

Which of my beliefs am I unable to justify?

Otangelo does indeed throw hundreds if not thousands of arguments against the wall hoping that some will resonate.

Yes, it's an online version of the Gish Gallop. We see similar from BA77 and kf. Seversky

Seversky

A search for “Otangelo Grasso”, however, found the following amongst a lot of other references: Trying to educate a creationist (Otangelo Grasso) Otangelo Grasso is a creationist who’s convinced he can learn to understand biochemistry by reading what’s on the internet and copy-pasting it into his website.

How does it matter who Otangelo is, or what his education is. Otangelo is quoting mainstream research. Seversky, look at this list for example: (from wikipedia)

In cell biology, there are a multitude of signalling pathways. Cell signalling is part of the molecular biology system that controls and coordinates the actions of cells. Akt/PKB signalling pathway AMPK signalling pathway cAMP-dependent pathway Eph/ephrin signalling pathway Hedgehog signalling pathway Hippo signalling pathway Insulin signal transduction pathway JAK-STAT signalling pathway MAPK/ERK signalling pathway mTOR signalling pathway Nodal signalling pathway Notch signalling pathway PI3K/AKT/mTOR signalling pathway TGF beta signalling pathway TLR signalling pathway VEGF signalling pathway Wnt signalling pathway

Signaling everywhere... Regulation/Coordination/Control everywhere ... Proofreading and checkpoints everywhere ... (of course, otherwise there won't be any life) And then, people like you or Chuckdarwin will attacking me (or Otangelo), when I say that biology is all about engineering. G.K. Chesterton:

Darwinism is ‘An attack upon thought itself'

martin_r

Related, uh yeah. A creepy one... for instance. Otangelo

Otangelo at 7, So you're a Necromancer? relatd

CD at 5, You definitely could be wrong. My least favorite phrase used by the 'cool kids.' relatd

@5

, I could be wrong, but I don’t think we have any “actual quotes” from Socrates…….

That is correct. So far as we know, Socrates never wrote anything. Everything we know about him comes from the surviving Socratic dialogues -- the famous ones from Plato, a less well-known dialogue called Symposium by Xenophon, and a fragment of text from someone named Isocrates. Regardless, there's little doubt that Socrates/Plato endorsed what we today would call "intelligent design". Plato endorses it many times in his dialogues against the more or less quasi-mechanistic cosmogonies of Anaxagoras and Empedocles. He doesn't mention Leucippus or Democritus, though David Sedley (Creationism and Its Critics in Antiquity) conjectures that Socrates was aware of at least Leucippus and saw his views as a threat to social order. Sedley also suggests that the first people to really formalize the argument from design -- the argument from order to a designing intelligence -- were the Stoics, who were concerned to push back against Epicureanism. Not being a classicist or expert in ancient philosophy, I don't know what criticisms Sedley received or whether his book was highly regarded. But it made an impression on me at the time. PyrrhoManiac1

Seversky can you point out, why I was wrong, and Larry Moran was right on Glycolysis, and gluconeogenesis? Here is the link: https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2419-where-did-glucose-come-from-in-a-prebiotic-world#5145 Or would you like to confess, that you have no idea on the matter, but just saw someone in the cheap attempt to discredit me, and thought you should try the same, by parroting others say? Otangelo

Chuckdarwin Socrates has resurrected, learned English, and is using it now in my videos to educate atheistic ignoramuses why chance is not a compelling thing to explain our existence.... :=P Otangelo

Seversky mocks Otangelo by using someone who cannot justify his own beliefs. How appropriate from Seversky who only mocks and cannot justify his beliefs. Otangelo does indeed throw hundreds if not thousands of arguments against the wall hoping that some will resonate. That one or two do not have actual proof for support of Otangelo’s basic premise are also proof that his detractors do not have even a minimal case. It’s like going through a thousand word essay and finding a typo and then exclaiming “I gotcha” to prove the essay wrong.

I don’t think we have any “actual quotes” from Socrates…….

We do have Plato though. Did Plato cite Socrates on design? I don’t know. If he did, to paraphrase it into American English would be a fair approach. ChuckDarwin proves ID once again. Thank you Chuck!

Selection from Plato’s Dialogue Philebus Socrates: …let us begin then, Protarchus, by asking a question. Protarchus: What question? Socrates: Whether all this which they call the universe is left to the guidance of unreason and chance medley, or, on the contrary, as our fathers have declared, ordered and governed by a marvellous intelligence and wisdom. Protarchus: Wide asunder are the two assertions, illustrious Socrates, for that which you were just now saying to me appears to be blasphemy; but the other assertion, that mind orders all things, is worthy of the aspect of the world, and of the sun, and of the moon, and of the stars and of the whole circle of the heavens; and never will I say or think otherwise. Socrates: Shall we then agree with them of old time in maintaining this doctrine-not merely reasserting the notions of others, without risk to ourselves,-but shall we share in the danger, and take our part of the reproach which will await us, when an ingenious individual declares that all is disorder? Protarchus: That would certainly be my wish. Socrates: Then now please to consider the next stage of the argument. Protarchus: Let me hear. Socrates: We see that the elements which enter into the nature of the bodies of all animals, fire, water, air, and, as the storm-tossed sailor cries, “land” [i.e., earth], reappear in the constitution of the world. Protarchus: The proverb may be applied to us; for truly the storm gathers over us, and we are at our wit’s end. Socrates: There is something to be remarked about each of these elements. Protarchus: What is it? Socrates: Only a small fraction of any one of them exists in us, and that of a mean sort, and not in any way pure, or having any power worthy of its nature. One instance will prove this of all of them; there is fire within us, and in the universe. Protarchus: True. Socrates: And is not our fire small and weak and mean? But the fire in the universe is wonderful in quantity and beauty, and in every power that fire has. Protarchus: Most true. Socrates: And is the fire in the universe nourished and generated and ruled by the fire in us, or is the fire in you and me, and in other animals, dependent on the universal fire? Protarchus: That is a question which does not deserve an answer. Socrates: Right; and you would say the same, if I am not mistaken, of the earth which is in animals and the earth which is in the universe, and you would give a similar reply about all the other elements? Protarchus: Why, how could any man who gave any other be deemed in his senses? Socrates: I do not think that he could-but now go on to the next step. When we saw those elements of which we have been speaking gathered up in one, did we not call them a body? Protarchus: We did. Socrates: And the same may be said of the cosmos, which for the same reason may be considered to be a body, because made up of the same elements. Protarchus: Very true. Socrates: But is our body nourished wholly by this body, or is this body nourished by our body, thence deriving and having the qualities of which we were just now speaking? Protarchus: That again, Socrates, is a question which does not deserve to be asked. Socrates: Well, tell me, is this question worth asking? Protarchus: What question? Socrates: May our body be said to have a soul? Protarchus: Clearly. Socrates: And whence comes that soul, my dear Protarchus, unless the body of the universe, which contains elements like those in our bodies but in every way fairer, had also a soul? Can there be another source? Protarchus: Clearly, Socrates, that is the only source. Socrates: Why, yes, Protarchus; for surely we cannot imagine that of the four classes, the finite, the infinite, the composition of the two, and the cause, the fourth, which enters into all things, giving to our bodies souls, and the art of self-management, and of healing disease, and operating in other ways to heal and organize, having too all the attributes of wisdom;-we cannot, I say, imagine that whereas the self-same elements exist, both in the entire heaven and in great provinces of the heaven, only fairer and purer, this last should not also in that higher sphere have designed the noblest and fairest things? Protarchus: Such a supposition is quite unreasonable. Socrates: Then if this be denied, should we not be wise in adopting the other view and maintaining that there is in the universe a mighty infinite and an adequate limit, of which we have often spoken, as well as a presiding cause of no mean power, which orders and arranges years and seasons and months, and may be justly called wisdom and mind? Protarchus: Most justly. Socrates: And wisdom and mind cannot exist without soul? Protarchus: Certainly not.

Did the previous or something similar take place? Plato thought so. Just not in Midwestern English. jerry

I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that Socrates didn’t speak American English with a Midwest accent. And again, I could be wrong, but I don’t think we have any “actual quotes” from Socrates……. chuckdarwin

A search for "Otangelo Grasso", however, found the following amongst a lot of other references:

Trying to educate a creationist (Otangelo Grasso) Otangelo Grasso is a creationist who's convinced he can learn to understand biochemistry by reading what's on the internet and copy-pasting it into his website. He then takes that limited knowledge and concludes that evolution is impossible. He often poses "gotcha" questions based on his flawed understanding. His behavior isn't very different from most other creationists who suffer from Dunning-Kruger Disease but he happens to be someone who I thought could be educated. I was wrong. Over the years I've tried to correct a number of errors he's made so we could have an intelligent discussion about evolution. You can't have such a discussion if one side ignores facts and refuses to learn. Here's an example of a previous attempt: Fun and games with Otangelo Grasso about photosynthesis. Here's a post from yesterday showing that I wasted my time: Otangelo Grasso on photosynthesi. One of my latest failed attempts concerns glycolysis. Otangelo Grasso claims that glycolysis is necessary to make ATP. He then points out that ATP is necessary to make the enzymes of the glycolytic pathway so evolution is impossible. Sandwalk readers will recognize it's difficult to know where to begin because there are so many flaws in this argument. Nevertheless, I decided, once again, to give it a try. I started by pointing out there are bacteria that do not have the standard glycolytic pathway and that gluconeogenesis (synthesis of glucose) undoubtedly evolved before glycolysis. The discussion about gluconeogenesis and glycolysis is a classic case of his ridiculous behavior. I tried patiently to show him where he was going wrong but he refused to read and understand. Instead, he posted a number of articles on his website and Facebook and challenged me to answer his questions. Here's one on the origin of glucose: Where did Glucose come from in a prebiotic world?. What this shows is that Otangelo didn't listen to a thing I said about basic biochemistry and how scientists understand the origin of life.

Seversky

Besides Unpierre, the texts are actual quotes from the respective persons. Louis Unpierre is a face swap morph between Einstein and Louis Pasteur. Une Pierre is french and means Einstein ( German: One stone). The texts spoken by Unepierre are entirely mine. No chatbot was used in the video. At all. So, basically, Unepierre is my avatar. Otangelo

A Google search turned up zero results for anyone named "Unepierre". What are you talking about? PyrrhoManiac1

People here fall for silly tricks and try to argue against them. Recently a phony commenter introduced chatGPT arguments here and everyone rushed to counteract them as if they were real. But this commenter could not answer very simple questions if the answers were self generated. The above video and arguments are cleverly done. Was chatGPT used to create the arguments? They range from very complicated and hard to follow to simple and straightforward. jerry