Have quantum physics’ problems been disgracefully swept under the carpet?

Brother Brian, Singularities such as the absence of gravity attested to by the markings of the body delineated on the Holy Shroud of Turin, ensuing from the incredibly bright flash of UV radiation, virtually by definition, would hardly be susceptible to mathematical analysis, although the intensity of the radiation necessary for it to be caused was calculated. Moreover, the scientists discovered a wealth of 3-dimensional, digital information relating to the markings left by the body, that is never been found on any other picture. Pedantry will get you nowhere sensible on a subject such as this. It's like asking whether any ash-trays were damaged after an airliner crashed. Axel

After rreading so much material here pointing out the birth and development of empirical science under the aegis of Christian culture, I was absolutely intrigued to realise that the exploitation, at least of such mysteries of QM as have currently been established with impeccable precision mirrors the methodology, the paradigm, of the Roman Catholic theologians' acceptance of the Christian mysteries as plain, ineluctable realities, and then having recourse to them, as springboards and staging posts on the path to further discoveries by pursuing orthodox logic. It was, in fact, what prompted me to view successful QM in that light. On the other hamd, the A/Mats, at least when addressing the public, always seem to speak of QM dismissively as being hopelessly crazy and mysterious - effectively challenging the reality of their own favoured, much more manageable (until the branch they're sitting on snaps off) reductionist, mechanistic Lego paradigm of pre-QM classical physics. Remember, paradoxes are not ostensibly oxymoronic, repugnant to logic, counter-rational ..... they're just 'counter-intuitive'..... just a 'gut feeling' from time to time that waves and particles gotta be one or the other..... cain't be both at the same time, d-yer see ?. Axel

Bob- You are afraid. You are afraid of trying to support your anti-ID position. And you are afraid of science. Focus on your lame position. And if you ever come up with the science to support it, you will be the first. ET

ba77 @ 82 -

As to a ‘mathematical proof’ that God must be the author of the equations that describe the universe and therefore must ultimately be central to any ‘theory of everything’ we devise, I reference Godel’s incompleteness theorem: As for a falsification criteria, I reference conservation of information theorems.

I'm afraid a a proof that leaves out a lot of detail - you need to more than reference something, you need to use it to demonstrate the theorem you are trying to prove. Can you fill in the gaps for those of us unable to see the leap from Gödel to God? Bob O'H

For ba: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implicate_and_explicate_order hazel

You gave plenty of mathematical evidence of the historicity of Christ's death and resurrection in this YouTube video-clip of yours, BA77, Godel's Incompleteness theorem, notwithstanding. BB wants you to deposit the sun, the moon and the stars in his lap, but he'll have to 'make do' with the known universe qua the Shroud of Turin : https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=F-TL4QOCiis Axel

Brother Brian, As to a 'mathematical proof' that God must be the author of the equations that describe the universe and therefore must ultimately be central to any 'theory of everything' we devise, I reference Godel's incompleteness theorem: As for a falsification criteria, I reference conservation of information theorems. To falsify my claim all you must do is violate conservation of information theorems and thereby prove that Godel's incompleteness theorem for mathematics is false and thereby prove that God is not the 'miracle' behind the applicability of mathematics to the physical universe (Einstein; Wigner). In short, you must demonstrate that that which is not intelligent can do what only intelligence can do. There you go, a mathematical proof and falsification criteria backing up my claim that God must be behind any coherent theory of everything that we may put forth. What mathematical proof and falsification criteria can Darwinism offer in comparison so as to put itself on equal scientific footing? In fact, to prove Darwinism plausible, you must meet the very same falsification threshold that I just laid out for you trying to prove that God is not the author behind the mathematical equations that describe the universe. i.e. You must violate conservation of information theorems. There you go BB, you can kill two birds with one stone. I will not hold my breath waiting for you to do so. bornagain77

Earth to Brother Brian- Stop worrying about what other people say and focus on your position, which still has nothing for support beyond deceitful humans. ET

BA77

I hold that until a scientific theory has some sort of rigid mathematical basis to experimentally test against, (such as we currently have with our present understanding of atoms), then the theory is ‘not so good’ as a scientific theory to begin with.

BA77

Moreover, the correct solution to the ‘theory of everything’, as I have referenced for you twice now, is found in Christ’s resurrection from the dead:

So, as a logical extension of these two statements I asked:

Can you provide the mathematic proof of this?

Perhaps I should have worded it differently. Something like, "Can you provide me with the rigid mathematical basis to experimentally test your "theory of everything" (i.e., Christ's resurrection) against. Brother Brian

Brother Brian:

However, I do rememember you saying something about evolution not being a valid theory because it doesn’t have a robust mathematical model supporting it (which, of course it does).

Evolution is not a valid theory because it posits untestable claims. And no, it does NOT have a robust mathematical model supporting it. You are lying. ET

As to:

I do remember you saying something about evolution not being a valid theory because it doesn’t have a robust mathematical model supporting it (which, of course it does).

Really??? And apparently it is beneath you to reference this robust mathematical model for Darwin's theory???

Top Ten Questions and Objections to ‘Introduction to Evolutionary Informatics’ – Robert J. Marks II – June 12, 2017 Excerpt: “There exists no model successfully describing undirected Darwinian evolution. Hard sciences are built on foundations of mathematics or definitive simulations. Examples include electromagnetics, Newtonian mechanics, geophysics, relativity, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, optics, and many areas in biology. Those hoping to establish Darwinian evolution as a hard science with a model have either failed or inadvertently cheated. These models contain guidance mechanisms to land the airplane squarely on the target runway despite stochastic wind gusts. Not only can the guiding assistance be specifically identified in each proposed evolution model, its contribution to the success can be measured, in bits, as active information.,,,”,,, “there exists no model successfully describing undirected Darwinian evolution. According to our current understanding, there never will be.,,,” https://evolutionnews.org/2017/06/top-ten-questions-and-objections-to-introduction-to-evolutionary-informatics/ “For many years I thought that it is a mathematical scandal that we do not have a proof that Darwinian evolution works.” Gregory Chaitin – Proving Darwin 2012 – Highly Respected Mathematician Active Information in Metabiology - Winston Ewert, William A. Dembski, Robert J. Marks II - 2013 Except page 9: Chaitin states [3], “For many years I have thought that it is a mathematical scandal that we do not have proof that Darwinian evolution works.” In fact, mathematics has consistently demonstrated that undirected Darwinian evolution does not work. http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2013.4/BIO-C.2013.4 "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. 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, which means it is not, in the Darwinian sense, an evolutionary algorithm after all. This mathematically proven law, based on the accepted No Free Lunch Theorems, seems to be lost on the champions of evolutionary computing. Researchers keep confusing an evolutionary algorithm (a form of artificial selection) with "natural evolution." ,,, Marks and Dembski account for the invisible hand required in evolutionary computing. The Lab's website states, "The principal theme of the lab's research is teasing apart the respective roles of internally generated and externally applied information in the performance of evolutionary systems." So yes, systems can evolve, but when they appear to solve a problem (such as generating complex specified information or reaching a sufficiently narrow predefined target), intelligence can be shown to be active. 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 What Does "Life's Conservation Law" Actually Say? - Winston Ewert - December 3, 2015 Excerpt: All information must eventually derive from a source external to the universe, http://www.evolutionnews.org/2015/12/what_does_lifes101331.html

BB then goes on to ask this very simplistic question

So, where is the robust mathematical model of Christ and his resurrection?

That is as nonsensical as asking where is the mathematical model of "Hamlet"? and not only of "Hamlet" but where is the mathematical model of the author of "Hamlet", William Shakespeare himself? Or better yet, as nonsensical as asking where is the mathematical model of Einstein the author of General Relativity? Question for you BB, since you are a reductive materialist who believes in Darwinian evolution, and therefore do not believe in free will and/or in agent causation, who or what wrote "Hamlet", Shakespeare or the laws of physics? and/or who or what wrote the mathematical formulation of Einstein's General Relativity, Einstein or the laws of physics?

Do You Like SETI? Fine, Then Let’s Dump Methodological Naturalism - Paul Nelson - September 24, 2014 Excerpt: Epistemology — how we know — and ontology — what exists — are both affected by methodological naturalism. If we say, "We cannot know that a mind caused x," laying down an epistemological boundary defined by MN, then our ontology comprising real causes for x won’t include minds. MN entails an ontology in which minds are the consequence of physics, and thus, can only be placeholders for a more detailed causal account in which physics is the only (ultimate) actor. You didn’t write your email to me. Physics did, and informed you of that event after the fact. "That’s crazy," you reply, "I certainly did write my email." Okay, then — to what does the pronoun "I" in that sentence refer? Your personal agency; your mind. Are you supernatural? ,,, You are certainly an intelligent cause, however, and your intelligence does not collapse into physics. (If it does collapse — i.e., can be reduced without explanatory loss — we haven’t the faintest idea how, which amounts to the same thing.) To explain the effects you bring about in the world — such as your email, a real pattern — we must refer to you as a unique agent. - per ENV Physicist George Ellis on the importance of philosophy and free will - July 27, 2014 Excerpt: And free will?: Horgan: Einstein, in the following quote, seemed to doubt free will: “If the moon, in the act of completing its eternal way around the Earth, were gifted with self-consciousness, it would feel thoroughly convinced that it was traveling its way of its own accord…. So would a Being, endowed with higher insight and more perfect intelligence, watching man and his doings, smile about man’s illusion that he was acting according to his own free will.” Do you believe in free will? Ellis: Yes. Einstein is perpetuating the belief that all causation is bottom up. This simply is not the case, as I can demonstrate with many examples from sociology, neuroscience, physiology, epigenetics, engineering, and physics. Furthermore if Einstein did not have free will in some meaningful sense, then he could not have been responsible for the theory of relativity – it would have been a product of lower level processes but not of an intelligent mind choosing between possible options. I find it very hard to believe this to be the case – indeed it does not seem to make any sense. Physicists should pay attention to Aristotle’s four forms of causation – if they have the free will to decide what they are doing. If they don’t, then why waste time talking to them? They are then not responsible for what they say. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/physicist-george-ellis-on-the-importance-of-philosophy-and-free-will/

And just as we can be certain that both Shakespeare and Einstein were in fact responsible for what they wrote, and just as we can be certain that every book ever written on the face of earth has a author, so to can we be certain that there was an original Author who “breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe.”, as well we can also be certain that there is an original Author behind the billions of letters of information that are encoded on human DNA:

BRUCE GORDON: Hawking’s irrational arguments – October 2010 Excerpt: ,,,The physical universe is causally incomplete and therefore neither self-originating nor self-sustaining. The world of space, time, matter and energy is dependent on a reality that transcends space, time, matter and energy. This transcendent reality cannot merely be a Platonic realm of mathematical descriptions, for such things are causally inert abstract entities that do not affect the material world,,, Rather, the transcendent reality on which our universe depends must be something that can exhibit agency – a mind that can choose among the infinite variety of mathematical descriptions and bring into existence a reality that corresponds to a consistent subset of them. This is what “breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe.” Anything else invokes random miracles as an explanatory principle and spells the end of scientific rationality. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/oct/1/hawking-irrational-arguments/ In a TED Talk, (the Question You May Not Ask,,, Where did the information come from?) – November 29, 2017 Excerpt: Sabatini is charming.,,, he deploys some memorable images. He points out that the information to build a human infant, atom by atom, would take up the equivalent of enough thumb drives to fill the Titanic, multiplied by 2,000. Later he wheels out the entire genome, in printed form, of a human being,,,,: [F]or the first time in history, this is the genome of a specific human, printed page-by-page, letter-by-letter: 262,000 pages of information, 450 kilograms.,,, https://evolutionnews.org/2017/11/in-a-ted-talk-heres-the-question-you-may-not-ask/

And the bible, long before DNA was ever discovered, claimed that life (and the universe) does indeed have an author:

Acts 3:15 You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this. John 1:1-4 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.

As Eric Metaxas pointed out in his recent talk at the Science and Faith conference, finding such a massive amount of information encoded in every cell of our bodies must really be a bummer for atheists. It is like having tattoos of the name of Jesus printed all over your body. For an atheist, having Jesus tattooed all over your body simply must be embarrassing. Thus, the atheist in order to deny that life has an author, and that the equations of the universe have an author, must also hold that books and/or mathematical equations somehow wrote themselves minus any authors writing them. Simply put, atheist have chosen to embrace sheer insanity rather than ever believing in God. Of supplemental note to the irresolvable 'infinity problem' in mathematics between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics (and how the resurrection of Jesus bridges that 'infinite divide" between the two theories):

General relativity, as the following articles show, simply refuses to be mathematically unified with quantum mechanics in any acceptable way. In technical terms, Gravity has yet to be successfully included into a theory of everything since the infinities that crop up in that attempt are not renormalizable as they were in Quantum-Electrodynamics.,,, https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/bill-nye-should-check-wikipedia/#comment-671692

bornagain77

BA77

That kind of would defeat everything I’m being arguing for thus far would it not BB?

That would assume that I, or anyone, actually reads all of your posts. However, I do rememember you saying something about evolution not being a valid theory because it doesn’t have a robust mathematical model supporting it (which, of course it does). So, where is the robust mathematical model of Christ and his resurrection? Brother Brian

"Can you provide the mathematic proof of this?" Too funny. I argue for I don't know how many posts that there will never be a purely mathematical theory of everything, and the first thing that BB wants is a mathematical proof for Christ's resurrection from the dead providing the correct solution for the theory of everything.. That kind of would defeat everything I'm being arguing for thus far would it not BB? Moreover, better than a mathematical proof, I can provide actual empirical evidence, via the shroud of Turin, that both gravity and Quantum Mechanics were dealt with in Christ's resurrection from the dead.

(February 19, 2019) To support Isabel Piczek’s claim that the Shroud of Turin does indeed reveal a true ‘event horizon’, the following study states that ‘The bottom part of the cloth (containing the dorsal image) would have born all the weight of the man’s supine body, yet the dorsal image is not encoded with a greater amount of intensity than the frontal image.’,,, Moreover, besides gravity being dealt with, the shroud also gives us evidence that Quantum Mechanics was dealt with. In the following paper, it was found that it was not possible to describe the image formation on the Shroud in classical terms but they found it necessary to describe the formation of the image on the Shroud in discrete quantum terms. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/experiment-quantum-particles-can-violate-the-mathematical-pigeonhole-principle/#comment-673178 https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/experiment-quantum-particles-can-violate-the-mathematical-pigeonhole-principle/#comment-673179 Supplemental notes defending the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin: https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/viruses-devolve/#comment-674732 To give us a small glimpse of the power that was involved in Christ resurrection from the dead, the following recent article found that, ”it would take 34 Thousand Billion Watts of VUV radiations to make the image on the shroud. This output of electromagnetic energy remains beyond human technology.” Astonishing discovery at Christ’s tomb supports Turin Shroud – NOV 26TH 2016 Excerpt: The first attempts made to reproduce the face on the Shroud by radiation, used a CO2 laser which produced an image on a linen fabric that is similar at a macroscopic level. However, microscopic analysis showed a coloring that is too deep and many charred linen threads, features that are incompatible with the Shroud image. Instead, the results of ENEA “show that a short and intense burst of VUV directional radiation can color a linen cloth so as to reproduce many of the peculiar characteristics of the body image on the Shroud of Turin, including shades of color, the surface color of the fibrils of the outer linen fabric, and the absence of fluorescence”. ‘However, Enea scientists warn, “it should be noted that the total power of VUV radiations required to instantly color the surface of linen that corresponds to a human of average height, body surface area equal to = 2000 MW/cm2 17000 cm2 = 34 thousand billion watts makes it impractical today to reproduce the entire Shroud image using a single laser excimer, since this power cannot be produced by any VUV light source built to date (the most powerful available on the market come to several billion watts )”. Comment The ENEA study of the Holy Shroud of Turin concluded that it would take 34 Thousand Billion Watts of VUV radiations to make the image on the shroud. This output of electromagnetic energy remains beyond human technology. http://westvirginianews.blogspot.com/2011/12/new-study-claims-shroud-of-turin-is.html As well, seeing is believing Shroud of Turin: From discovery of Photographic Negative, to 3D Information, to Hologram https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-TL4QOCiis Turin Shroud Hologram Reveals The Words “The Lamb” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Tmka1l8GAQ

I put this evidence out there for the Darwinian atheists, such as BB, hoping that they will be reasonable,,, but who am I kidding, these guys can’t even accept the fact that God created their very own ‘beyond belief’ brain ,,,

Human brain has more switches than all computers on Earth – November 2010 Excerpt: They found that the brain’s complexity is beyond anything they’d imagined, almost to the point of being beyond belief, says Stephen Smith, a professor of molecular and cellular physiology and senior author of the paper describing the study: …One synapse, by itself, is more like a microprocessor–with both memory-storage and information-processing elements–than a mere on/off switch. In fact, one synapse may contain on the order of 1,000 molecular-scale switches. A single human brain has more switches than all the computers and routers and Internet connections on Earth. http://news.cnet.com/8301-27083_3-20023112-247.html

,,, so. if Darwinists can’t even accept that their very own ‘beyond belief’ brain was intelligently designed by God, much less will they ever be willing to accept the fact that God raised Christ from the dead so as to provide a propitiation for our sins.

Matthew 13:15 For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’

bornagain77

BA77

Moreover, the correct solution to the ‘theory of everything’, as I have referenced for you twice now, is found in Christ’s resurrection from the dead:”

Can you provide the mathematic proof of this? Or does that requirement only apply to theories you don’t agree with? No need to answer. We already know the answer. Brother Brian

"Well, I’m sure that will bring all further research in QM, General Relativity, and their potential unification to a screeching halt." Never claimed that it would. But there certainly are louder and louder voices growing, i.e. (for example Woit and Hossenfelder), saying that all attempts thus far at finding a purely mathematical theory of everything have been a fool's errand. From what I can tell from the trend in empirical evidence, it will only get worse and worse for those who insist on going that route. Whereas 'my route', i.e. that Christianity is literally and empirically true, to put it mildly, has a far more promising future.

Luke 12:32 Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Imagine Heaven - (Near Death Experience) Evidence for the Afterlife https://vimeo.com/140585737

bornagain77

ba writes, "Moreover, the correct solution to the ‘theory of everything’, as I have referenced for you twice now, is found in Christ’s resurrection from the dead:" Well, I'm sure that will bring all further research in QM, General Relativity, and their potential unification to a screeching halt. This has been enlightening conversation, but obviously not one where there is room for anything further to be said. hazel

I'm not going to argue with you about your personal opinions as to how you prefer science to operate that have no empirical support. The empirical science is what it is. Take it or leave it. I don't care what you do. Moreover, the correct solution to the 'theory of everything', (which you apparently disingenuously previously claimed that you do not presuppose), as I have referenced for you twice now, is found in Christ's resurrection from the dead: Make it three times now:

Allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics, as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned,,,, (Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell, and Max Planck, to name a few of the Christian founders),,, and as quantum mechanics itself now empirically demands (with the closing of the free will loophole by Anton Zeilinger and company), rightly allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics provides us with a very plausible resolution for the much sought after ‘theory of everything’ in that Christ’s resurrection from the dead provides an empirically backed reconciliation, via the Shroud of Turin, between quantum mechanics and general relativity into the much sought after ‘Theory of Everything”. (April 2019) Overturning the Copernican principle (with our two most powerful theories in science) Excerpt: Thus in conclusion, the new interactive graph by Dr. Dembski provides a powerful independent line of evidence, along with several other powerful lines of scientific evidence (from Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity), that overturns the Copernican principle and restores humanity back to centrality in the universe, and even, when putting all those lines of evidence together, brings modern science back, full circle, to Christianity from whence it originated in the first place. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/bill-dembski-and-colleagues-create-an-updated-magnifying-the-universe-tool/#comment-675730 Verse: Colossians 1:15-22 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. Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation—

bornagain77

So you believe that no further mathematical advances are going to be made in QM or the General Theory of Relativity, which includes no mathematics that might tie them together in ways that are now unknown - true? Do you therefore think that scientists that are working in these fields should quit looking further on the grounds that you think no further improvements can be made? hazel

Yep, as far as the math itself is concerned, , prove me wrong with empirical evidence instead of your apriori assumption. bornagain77

ba writes,

Til then all empirical evidence produced thus far supports my claim that the empirical results perfectly match the predictions of the mathematical models of QM and General Relativity, and that we thus have reached ‘platonic perfection’ with those two mathematical models. i.e. As far as empirical science is concerned, no further improvement of those two theories is needed.

I understand that there are aspects of both theories that match empirical evidence to an extremely accurate degree. However, you seem to be saying that because of that the entire theories of both QM and General Relativity are done - that the theories themselves are perfect. Do you really mean that we are not going to improve or add to QM or General Relativity in any way in the future? hazel

"My claim is that both QM and General Relativity are good theories, in the light of the great deal that we know that support them, but that like all scientific theories they are provisional and tentative – that is, subject to change" And you let me know when you have a whiff of a hint that they disagree with empirical observation. Til then all empirical evidence produced thus far supports my claim that the empirical results perfectly match the predictions of the mathematical models of QM and General Relativity, and that we thus have reached 'platonic perfection' with those two mathematical models. i.e. As far as all the empirical evidence we have thus far is concerned, no further improvement of those two theories is needed. Moreover, I remind you that they are now confirmed to almost absurd levels of accuracy (14 or 15 decimal places) undreamt of for previous theories. Whereas your conjecture that the two theories are merely 'provisional and tentative' is based on nothing more than your apriori bias and/or imagination. i.e. You have no empirical warrant for your claim! In other words, I'm being 'scientific' and following the evidence where it leads, and you got nothing except your only personal subjective opinion as to how you prefer science to operate,,, Empirical science could care less about your druthers. bornagain77

Hazel@66, excellent point. Brother Brian

ba writes, "Hazel presupposes that there should be a unification of QM and General Relativity into a single overarching mathematical theory of everything." No, I didn't presuppose that. All I said was that if such a unification were found, then according to your logic, the current theories of QM and general relativity would not have been "good theories", because you claim that good theories don't change. All the rest of the stuff that you wrote is not relevant to your claim that "good theories don't change." My claim is that both QM and General Relativity are good theories, in the light of the great deal that we know that support them, but that like all scientific theories they are provisional and tentative - that is, subject to change - and if and when they do change they will be even better theories. hazel

Likewise, the empirical evidence itself certainly does not hint that there should be such a unification between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics:

Confirming Einstein, scientists find 'spacetime foam' not slowing down photons from faraway gamma-ray burst (Update) - Mar 16, 2015 Excerpt: Albert Einstein formulated the general theory of relativity, one of the theory's basic assumptions: the idea that all light particles, or photons, propagate at exactly the same speed.,, The researchers analyzed data, obtained by NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, of the arrival times of photons from a distant gamma-ray burst. The data showed that photons traveling for billions of years from the distant burst toward Earth all arrived within a fraction of a second of each other. This finding indicates that the photons all moved at the same speed, even though different photons had different energies. This is one of the best measurements ever of the independence of the speed of light from the energy of the light particles.,,, One of the attempts to reconcile the two theories (Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity) is the idea of "space-time foam." According to this concept, on a microscopic scale space is not continuous, and instead it has a foam-like structure. The size of these foam elements is so tiny that it is difficult to imagine and is at present impossible to measure directly. However light particles that are traveling within this foam will be affected by the foamy structure, and this will cause them to propagate at slightly different speeds depending on their energy. The fact that all the photons with different energies arrived with no time delay relative to each other indicates that such a foamy structure, if it exists at all, has a much smaller size than previously expected. "When we began our analysis, we didn't expect to obtain such a precise measurement," said Prof. Tsvi Piran, the Schwartzmann University Chair at the Hebrew University's Racah Institute of Physics and a leader of the research. "This new limit is at the level expected from quantum gravity theories. http://phys.org/news/2015-03-einstein-scientists-spacetime-foam.html The 'WIMP Miracle' Hope For Dark Matter Is Dead - Feb 22, 2019, Excerpt: The models of supersymmetry or extra dimensions that give the right dark matter abundances through the weak interactions are ruled out by these experiments. If there is WIMP dark matter, it must be weaker than the weak interaction permits to comprise 100% of the dark matter.,,, Theorists can always tweak their models, and have done so many times, pushing the anticipated cross-section down and down as null result after null result rolls in. That's the worst kind of science you can do, however: simply shifting the goalposts for no physical reason other than your experimental constraints have become more severe. There is no longer any motivation, other than preferring a conclusion that the data rules out, in doing so.,,, https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2019/02/22/the-wimp-miracle-is-dead-as-dark-matter-experiments-come-up-empty-again/#3123b5876dbc “string theory, while dazzling, has outrun any conceivable experiment that could verify it” Excerpt: string theory, while dazzling, has outrun any conceivable experiment that could verify it—there’s zero proof that it describes how nature works. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/physics/string-theory-while-dazzling-has-outrun-any-conceivable-experiment-that-could-verify-it/

Thus both mathematics and empirical evidence give us no hint that there should even be just one overarching mathematical theory of everything. So again, “just where does this presupposition of Hazel’s come from?” I hold that the reason that Hazel, and everybody else, automatically presupposes that there should even be just one overarching mathematical theory of everything is because they (we) are operating on hidden theistic presuppositions. As John D Barrow stated “Our monotheistic traditions reinforce the assumption that the universe is at root a unity, that is not governed by different legislation in different places.”

“Our monotheistic traditions reinforce the assumption that the universe is at root a unity, that is not governed by different legislation in different places.” John D. Barrow

Professor Steven Fuller articulates the hidden Theistic presumption, that undergirds the belief that there should even be a single overarching mathematical ‘theory of everything', very well in the following quote;

“So you think of physics in search of a “Grand Unified Theory of Everything”, Why should we even think there is such a thing? Why should we think there is some ultimate level of resolution? Right? It is part, it is a consequence of believing in some kind of design. Right? And there is some sense in which that however multifarious and diverse the phenomena of nature are, they are ultimately unified by the minimal set of laws and principles possible. Insofar as science continues to operate with that assumption, there is a presupposition of design that is motivating the scientific process. Because it would be perfectly easy,, to stop the pursuit of science at much lower levels. You know understand a certain range of phenomena in a way that is appropriate to deal with that phenomena and just stop there and not go any deeper or any farther.”,,, You see, there is a sense in which there is design at the ultimate level, the ultimate teleology you might say, which provides the ultimate closure,,” Professor Steve Fuller discusses intelligent design in Cambridge - Video - quoted at the 17:34 minute mark https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/news/in-cambridge-professor-steve-fuller-discusses-why-the-hypothesis-of-intelligent-design-is-not-more-popular-among-scientists-and-others/

Likewise, Father Robert Barron weighs in here:

Stephen Hawking's "God-Haunted" Quest - December 24, 2014 Excerpt: “Why in the world would a scientist blithely assume that there is or is even likely to be one unifying rational form to all things, unless he assumed that there is a singular, overarching intelligence that has placed it there? Why shouldn't the world be chaotic, utterly random, meaningless? Why should one presume that something as orderly and rational as an equation would describe the universe's structure? I would argue that the only finally reasonable ground for that assumption is the belief in an intelligent Creator, who has already thought into the world the very mathematics that the patient scientist discovers.” Robert Barron http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/12/stephen_hawking092351.html

Thus since neither mathematics or empirical evidence give us any hint that there should even be just one rational form of all things, then atheists, and everybody else working on string theory, whether they are even aware of their hidden Theistic presuppositions or not, in so far as they “blithely assume that there is or is even likely to be one unifying rational form to all things,” are, in reality, instinctually presupposing that God should be behind the single unifying rational order of the universe. Moreover, as was mentioned previously at the end of post 55,

Allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics, as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned,,,, (Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell, and Max Planck, to name a few of the Christian founders),,, and as quantum mechanics itself now empirically demands (with the closing of the free will loophole by Anton Zeilinger and company), rightly allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics provides us with a very plausible resolution for the much sought after ‘theory of everything’ in that Christ’s resurrection from the dead provides an empirically backed reconciliation, via the Shroud of Turin, between quantum mechanics and general relativity into the much sought after ‘Theory of Everything”. (April 2019) Overturning the Copernican principle (with our most powerful theories in science) Excerpt: Thus in conclusion, the new interactive graph by Dr. Dembski provides a powerful independent line of evidence, along with several other powerful lines of scientific evidence (from Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity), that overturns the Copernican principle and restores humanity back to centrality in the universe, and even, when putting all those lines of evidence together, brings modern science back, full circle, to Christianity from whence it originated in the first place. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/bill-dembski-and-colleagues-create-an-updated-magnifying-the-universe-tool/#comment-675730

Verse: Colossians 1:15-22

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. Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation—

bornagain77

Hazel states,

I’ll point out that at the current time there is no theory which unites QM and the general theory of relativity and gravity. Therefore, a theory which does unite the two will be a better theory. Thus, according to ba, in that case QM and the general theory of relativity are not good theories now, because they would then have changed, and according to ba good theories don’t change.

Hazel presupposes that there should be a unification of QM and General Relativity into a single overarching mathematical theory of everything. Not only Hazel holds this presupposition, but this presupposition is pervasive throughout the entire scientific community. In fact, it can be forcefully argued that such a hypothetical mathematical unification between QM and General Relativity is the number one goal within science today. But where does her presupposition come from? The mathematics itself certainly does not hint that there should be such a unification. Peter Woit states that string theory’s math is “a gory mess.”

The Admiral of the String Theory Wars - May 7, 2015 After a decade, Peter Woit still thinks string theory is a gory mess. Excerpt: Woit’s major complaint about the theory, then and now, is that it fails to make testable predictions, so it can’t be checked for errors—in other words, that it’s “not even wrong.”,,, Woit’s secondary grievance is aesthetic. He, like many physicists, perceives an intricate beauty in the math underlying successful physical theories like Einstein’s. In contrast, Woit says, string theory’s math is “a gory mess.” http://nautil.us/issue/24/error/the-admiral-of-the-string-theory-wars

Dr Bruce Gordon states that “string theory and its extension, M-theory,, is a mathematical fantasy.”

BRUCE GORDON: Hawking's irrational arguments - October 2010 Excerpt: Excerpt: the evidence for string theory and its extension, M-theory, is nonexistent; and the idea that conjoining them demonstrates that we live in a multiverse of bubble universes with different laws and constants is a mathematical fantasy. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/oct/1/hawking-irrational-arguments/

Roger Penrose said that “M-theory isn’t even a theory. It’s a collection of ideas, hopes, aspirations.”

'What is referred to as M-theory isn’t even a theory. It’s a collection of ideas, hopes, aspirations. It’s not even a theory and I think the book is a bit misleading in that respect. It gives you the impression that here is this new theory which is going to explain everything. It is nothing of the sort. It is not even a theory and certainly has no observational (evidence),,, I think the book suffers rather more strongly than many (other books). It’s not a uncommon thing in popular descriptions of science to latch onto some idea, particularly things to do with string theory, which have absolutely no support from observations.,,, They are very far from any kind of observational (testability). Yes, they (the ideas of M-theory) are hardly science." – Roger Penrose – former close colleague of Stephen Hawking – in critique of Hawking’s new book ‘The Grand Design’ the exact quote in the following video clip: Roger Penrose Debunks Stephen Hawking's New Book 'The Grand Design' - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg_95wZZFr4

In fact, general relativity and quantum theory are formulated in two very different mathematical languages, differential geometry and functional analysis.,,,

Shape from Sound: Toward New Tools for Quantum Gravity - 2013 Excerpt: To unify general relativity and quantum theory is hard in part because they are formulated in two very different mathematical languages, differential geometry and functional analysis.,,, http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v110/i12/e121301

Moreover, there are an infinite number of mathematical theorems that could have described the universe instead of just Quantum Theory and Relativity:

The Limits Of Reason – Gregory Chaitin – 2006 Excerpt: Unlike Gödel’s approach, mine is based on measuring information and showing that some mathematical facts cannot be compressed into a theory because they are too complicated. This new approach suggests that what Gödel discovered was just the tip of the iceberg: an infinite number of true mathematical theorems exist that cannot be proved from any finite system of axioms. http://www.umcs.maine.edu/~chaitin/sciamer3.pdf

On top of all that, mathematics itself, via Godel, is now shown to be ‘incomplete’. Hawking himself stated that, due to Godel’s incompleteness theorem, “Kurt Gödel halted the achievement of a unifying all-encompassing theory of everything in his theorem.”

"Note that despite the incontestability of Euclid's postulates in mathematics, Gödel's incompleteness theorem (1931), proves that there are limits to what can be ascertained by mathematics. Kurt Gödel halted the achievement of a unifying all-encompassing theory of everything in his theorem that: “Anything you can draw a circle around cannot explain itself without referring to something outside the circle—something you have to assume but cannot prove”. Thus, based on the position that an equation cannot prove itself, the constructs are based on assumptions some of which will be unprovable." Cf., Stephen Hawking & Leonard Miodinow, The Grand Design (2010)

Thus mathematics itself certainly does not give us any hint that there should be a single mathematical theory of everything. bornagain77

Well, this has been entertaining. One perspective is that good scientific theories don’t change over time. The other is that good scientific theories change as new evidence is amassed. One perspective is consistent with good scientific process. The other is...well, I don’t want to be accused of name calling. Brother Brian

I'll point out that at the current time there is no theory which unites QM and the general theory of relativity and gravity. Therefore, a theory which does unite the two will be a better theory. Thus, according to ba, in that case QM and the general theory of relativity are not good theories now, because they would then have changed, and according to ba good theories don't change. That doesn't make sense to me. Virtually all, if not all, scientific theories can be refined, at least to some extent, as new evidence comes in and new ideas are developed. Saying that good theories don't change is in fact antithetical to what science is all about. It seems there are good theories now that may become, and in fact are likely to become, better theories as they change in the future. hazel

The trolls Hazel and Ed George claim they have not engaged in logical fallacies. And yet my argument remains untouched. Go figure. Hazel's belief that 'better theories' may come along than relativity and Quantum Mechanics has no empirical warrant thus far. i.e. My argument for 'platonic perfection' being reached in GR and QM stands. She does not like it. I don't care what she (or Ed George or BB or Seversky) likes! Empirical science itself could care less for their likes or dislikes. bornagain77

I don't believe anyone called anyone names. Yes, there are places where we have parts of theories that are very accurate mathematically, but in general your responses were largely irrelevant to the points I was making, did have a Bible quote, and included one of your Youtube videos, so Ed's prediction was accurate. hazel

BA77

If people are calling names ...

Who is calling names? All I have seen is people pointing out predictable, and distracting, behavior. And, if you are honest with yourself, your behavior is very predictable. My only criticism of it, as I think Hazel would agree, is that very few people actually read your comments because of the way you present them. And I say this as a fellow theist. Ed George

“If people are calling names then that means they don't have a good argument against what we're doing. So I feel that that's actually a statement by them that I must be right." —Attorney Gloria Allred[1] Argumentum ad hominem (from the Latin, "argument to the person") is an informal logical fallacy that occurs when someone attempts to refute an argument by attacking the claim-maker, rather than engaging in an argument or factual refutation of the claim. There are many subsets of ad hominem, all of them attacking the source of the claim rather than attacking the claim or attempting to counter arguments. They are a type of fallacy of relevance. The fallacy is a subset of the genetic fallacy, as it focuses on the source of the argument, at the expense of focusing on the truth or falsity of the actual argument itself. An ad hominem should not be confused with an insult, which admittedly attacks a person, but does not seek to rebut that person's arguments by doing so — that type of rhetoric is better termed as poisoning the well. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_hominem

bornagain77

Hazel

You called it, Ed.

A trained monkey could have called it. Que ET with a comment about me being stupider than a trained monkey. :) Ed George

You called it, Ed. hazel

Another very important place where ‘platonic perfection’ is now shown to be ‘perfectly reached’ in the universe, (as far as our most precise testing will allow), is for the ‘flatness’ of the universe.

“When a geometry is described by a set of axioms, the notion of a line is usually left undefined (a so-called primitive object).” per wikipedia How do we know the universe is flat? Discovering the topology of the universe – by Fraser Cain – June 7, 2017 Excerpt: With the most sensitive space-based telescopes they have available, astronomers are able to detect tiny variations in the temperature of this background radiation. And here’s the part that blows my mind every time I think about it. These tiny temperature variations correspond to the largest scale structures of the observable universe. A region that was a fraction of a degree warmer become a vast galaxy cluster, hundreds of millions of light-years across. The cosmic microwave background radiation just gives and gives, and when it comes to figuring out the topology of the universe, it has the answer we need. If the universe was curved in any way, these temperature variations would appear distorted compared to the actual size that we see these structures today. But they’re not. To best of its ability, ESA’s Planck space telescope, can’t detect any distortion at all. The universe is flat.,,, We say that the universe is flat, and this means that parallel lines will always remain parallel. 90-degree turns behave as true 90-degree turns, and everything makes sense.,,, Since the universe is flat now, it must have been flat in the past, when the universe was an incredibly dense singularity. And for it to maintain this level of flatness over 13.8 billion years of expansion, in kind of amazing. In fact, astronomers estimate that the universe must have been flat to 1 part within 1×10^57 parts. Which seems like an insane coincidence. https://phys.org/news/2017-06-universe-flat-topology.html

Moreover, this ‘insane coincidence’ of ‘plantonic perfection’ being reached for the axiomatic ‘primitive object’ of the line just so happens to be necessary for us to even be able to practice math and science, (and apply technology in our world), in the first place:

How do we know the universe is flat? Discovering the topology of the universe – by Fraser Cain – June 7, 2017 Excerpt: We say that the universe is flat, and this means that parallel lines will always remain parallel. 90-degree turns behave as true 90-degree turns, and everything makes sense.,,, https://phys.org/news/2017-06-universe-flat-topology.html Why We Need Cosmic Inflation By Paul Sutter, Astrophysicist | October 22, 2018 Excerpt: As best as we can measure, the geometry of our universe appears to be perfectly, totally, ever-so-boringly flat. On large, cosmic scales, parallel lines stay parallel forever, interior angles of triangles add up to 180 degrees, and so on. All the rules of Euclidean geometry that you learned in high school apply. But there’s no reason for our universe to be flat. At large scales it could’ve had any old curvature it wanted. Our cosmos could’ve been shaped like a giant, multidimensional beach ball, or a horse-riding saddle. But, no, it picked flat. https://www.space.com/42202-why-we-need-cosmic-inflation.html

Simply put, if the universe were not ‘ever-so-boringly’ flat (and if the universal constants were not also ‘ever-so-boringly’ constant), but the universe were instead governed by randomness, as atheists presuppose, or governed by some other of the infinitude of ‘platonic topologies’ that were possible, modern science and technology would have never gotten off the ground here on earth.

Scientists Question Nature’s Fundamental Laws – Michael Schirber – 2006 Excerpt: “There is absolutely no reason these constants should be constant,” says astronomer Michael Murphy of the University of Cambridge. “These are famous numbers in physics, but we have no real reason for why they are what they are.”,,, The observed differences are small-roughly a few parts in a million-but the implications are huge (if they hold up): The laws of physics would have to be rewritten, not to mention we might need to make room for six more spatial dimensions than the three that we are used to.”,,, The speed of light, for instance, might be measured one day with a ruler and a clock. If the next day the same measurement gave a different answer, no one could tell if the speed of light changed, the ruler length changed, or the clock ticking changed. http://www.space.com/2613-scientists-question-nature-fundamental-laws.html

Nor, if platonic perfection were not present for the flatness of the universe would we have eventually been able to deduce the ‘platonic perfection’ that is revealed in the ‘higher dimensional’ mathematics that lay behind Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. More interesting still, these findings of ‘platonic perfection’ for the higher dimensional mathematics that lay behind Relativity and Quantum Mechanics are VERY friendly to overriding Christian presuppositions of life after death as well as the presupposition of God upholding this universe in its continual existence:

Quantum Mechanics, Special Relativity, General Relativity and Christianity – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4QDy1Soolo

Of supplemental and final note, Allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics, as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned,,,, (Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell, and Max Planck, to name a few of the Christian founders),,, and as quantum mechanics itself now empirically demands (with the closing of the free will loophole by Anton Zeilinger and company), rightly allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics provides us with a very plausible resolution for the much sought after ‘theory of everything’ in that Christ’s resurrection from the dead provides an empirically backed reconciliation, via the Shroud of Turin, between quantum mechanics and general relativity into the much sought after ‘Theory of Everything”.

(April 2019) Overturning the Copernican principle (with our most powerful theories in science) Excerpt: Thus in conclusion, the new interactive graph by Dr. Dembski provides a powerful independent line of evidence, along with several other powerful lines of scientific evidence (from Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity), that overturns the Copernican principle and restores humanity back to centrality in the universe, and even, when putting all those lines of evidence together, brings modern science back, full circle, to Christianity from whence it originated in the first place. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/bill-dembski-and-colleagues-create-an-updated-magnifying-the-universe-tool/#comment-675730

Verse:

Colossians 1:15-22 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. Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation—

bornagain77

Hazel asks,

ba, are there any good scientific theories today, based on both your criteria: 1) that they are unlikely to change for the better in the future (how would we know that?), and 2) they are based on rigidly mathematical empirical testing? Give an example, please.

Sure. Science has a history of looking for 'platonic perfection'. and assuming the Mind of God to be behind that ‘platonic perfection’. That is to say, that science has a history of reaching for perfect agreement between the immaterial mathematics that describe a facet of this universe and the experimental results that measure those mathematical predictions.

“Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe.” Galileo Galilei “Geometry is unique and eternal, a reflection from the mind of God. That mankind shares in it is because man is an image of God.” – Johannes Kepler

Copernicus, (who was heavily influenced by Platonic thinking), imagined (incorrectly) that the planets move in perfect circles (rather than ellipses). Later, Newton, for allowing God could adjust the orbits of the planets, was chastised by Leibniz, (and Laplace) for having a “very narrow ideas about the wisdom and the power of God.”.. i.e. For having a narrow view of the perfection of God.

“Leibniz, in his controversy with Newton on the discovery of infinitesimal calculus, sharply criticized the theory of Divine intervention as a corrective of the disturbances of the solar system. “To suppose anything of the kind”, he said, “is to exhibit very narrow ideas of the wisdom and power of God’.” – Pierre-Simon Laplace https://books.google.com/books?id=oLtHAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA73&lpg=PA73

It is also important note that 'normally' mathematical concepts do not have a precise instantiation in nature,,

Naturalism and Self-Refutation – Michael Egnor – January 31, 2018 Excerpt: Mathematics is certainly something we do. Is mathematics “included in the space-time continuum [with] basic elements … described by physics”? It seems a stretch. What is the physics behind the Pythagorean theorem? After all, no actual triangle is perfect, and thus no actual triangle in nature has sides such that the Pythagorean theorem holds. There is no real triangle in which the sum of the squares of the sides exactly equals the square of the hypotenuse. That holds true for all of geometry. Geometry is about concepts, not about anything in the natural world or about anything that can be described by physics. What is the “physics” of the fact that the area of a circle is pi multiplied by the square of the radius? And of course what is natural and physical about imaginary numbers, infinite series, irrational numbers, and the mathematics of more than three spatial dimensions? Mathematics is entirely about concepts, which have no precise instantiation in nature,, https://evolutionnews.org/2018/01/naturalism-and-self-refutation/

And indeed for most of the history of modern science in the Christian west, finding ‘platonic perfection’ for the mathematical descriptions of the universe has been a very elusive goal. This all changed with the discoveries of Special Relativity, General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. That is to say, as far as experimental testing will allow, there is no discrepancy to be found between what the mathematical descriptions of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics predict and what our most advanced scientific testing of those predictions are able to measure.

“Recent experiments have confirmed, to within one part in one hundred million billion (10^17), that the speed of light does not change when an observer is in motion.” Douglas Ell – “Counting To God” – pg. 41 – 2014 “When this paper was published (referring to the circa 1970 Hawking, Penrose paper) we could only prove General Relativity’s reliability to 1% precision, today we can prove it to 15 places of decimal.” Hugh Ross PhD. Astrophysics – quote taken from 8:40 mark of the following video debate Hugh Ross vs Lewis Wolpert – Is there evidence for a Cosmic Creator https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLMrDO0_WvQ Introduction to The Strange World of Quantum Mechanics Excerpt: quantum mechanics is the most successful theory that humanity has ever developed; the brightest jewel in our intellectual crown. Quantum mechanics underlies our understanding of atoms, molecules, solids, and nuclei. It is vital for explaining aspects of stellar evolution, chemical reactions, and the interaction of light with matter. It underlies the operation of lasers, transistors, magnets, and superconductors. I could cite reams of evidence backing up these assertions, but I will content myself by describing a single measurement. One electron will be stripped away from a helium atom that is exposed to ultraviolet light below a certain wavelength. This threshold wavelength can be determined experimentally to very high accuracy: it is 50.425 929 9 ± 0.000 000 4 nanometers. The threshold wavelength can also be calculated from quantum mechanics: this prediction is 50.425 931 0 ± 0.000 002 0 nanometers. The agreement between observation and quantum mechanics is extraordinary. If you were to predict the distance from New York to Los Angeles with this accuracy, your prediction would be correct to within the width of your hand. In contrast, classical mechanics predicts that any wavelength of light will strip away an electron, that is, that there will be no threshold at all. http://www.oberlin.edu/physics/dstyer/StrangeQM/intro.html Experimental non-classicality of an indivisible quantum system – Zeilinger 2011 Excerpt: Page 491: “This represents a violation of (Leggett’s) inequality (3) by more than 120 standard deviations, demonstrating that no joint probability distribution is capable of describing our results.” The violation also excludes any non-contextual hidden-variable model. The result does, however, agree well with quantum mechanical predictions, as we will show now.,,, https://vcq.quantum.at/fileadmin/Publications/Experimental%20non-classicality%20of%20an%20indivisible.pdf

As well, quantum electrodynamics (QED), which is a combination of special relativity and quantum mechanics, also now joins the list of perfect mathematical descriptions of the universe in which we can find no deviation from what the mathematics predict and what our best experimental testing can discern. In other words, as far as we can tell, 'platonic perfection' is reached for QED:

The Most Precisely Tested Theory in the History of Science - May 5, 2011 Excerpt: So, which of the two (general relativity or QED) is The Most Precisely Tested Theory in the History of Science? It’s a little tough to quantify a title like that, but I think relativity can claim to have tested the smallest effects. Things like the aluminum ion clock experiments showing shifts in the rate of a clock set moving at a few m/s, or raised by a foot, measure relativistic shifts of a few parts in 10^16. That is, if one clock ticks 10,000,000,000,000,000 times, the other ticks 9,999,999,999,999,999 times. That’s an impressively tiny effect, but the measured value is in good agreement with the predictions of relativity. In the end, though, I have to give the nod to QED, because while the absolute effects in relativity may be smaller, the precision of the measurements in QED is more impressive. Experimental tests of relativity measure tiny shifts, but to only a few decimal places. Experimental tests of QED measure small shifts, but to an absurd number of decimal places. The most impressive of these is the “anomalous magnetic moment of the electron,” expressed is terms of a number g whose best measured value is: g/2 = 1.001 159 652 180 73 (28) Depending on how you want to count it, that’s either 11 or 14 digits of precision (the value you would expect without QED is exactly 1, so in some sense, the shift really starts with the first non-zero decimal place), which is just incredible. And QED correctly predicts all those decimal places (at least to within the measurement uncertainty, given by the two digits in parentheses at the end of that). http://scienceblogs.com/principles/2011/05/05/the-most-precisely-tested-theo/ Bohemian Gravity - Rob Sheldon - September 19, 2013 Excerpt: Quanta magazine carried an article about a hypergeometric object that is as much better than Feynman diagrams as Feynman was better than Heisenberg's S-matrices. But the discoverers are candid about it, "The amplituhedron, or a similar geometric object, could help by removing two deeply rooted principles of physics: locality and unitarity. “Both are hard-wired in the usual way we think about things,” said Nima Arkani-Hamed, a professor of physics at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., and the lead author of the new work, which he is presenting in talks and in a forthcoming paper. “Both are suspect.”" What are these suspect principles? None other than two of the founding principles of materialism--that there do not exist "spooky-action-at-a-distance" forces, and that material causes are the only ones in the universe.,,, http://rbsp.info/PROCRUSTES/bohemian-gravity/

As Nima Arkani-Hamed, the discoverer of the amplituhedron, stated “It seems inconceivable that this intricate web of perfect mathematical descriptions is random or happenstance. This mystery must have an explanation.",,,

Physicist: It’s Not The Answers We Lack, It’s The Question - February 24, 2019 Excerpt: “It seems inconceivable that this intricate web of perfect mathematical descriptions is random or happenstance. This mystery must have an explanation. But what might such an explanation look like?” Nima Arkani-Hamed https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/physicist-its-not-the-answers-we-lack-its-the-question/

bornagain77

Hazel

Give an example, please.

And perhaps support it with several 500 word irrelevant quotes, links to some obscure YouTube videos and a couple bible verses. :) Ed George

ba, are there any good scientific theories today, based on both your criteria: 1) that they are unlikely to change for the better in the future (how would we know that?), and 2) they are based on rigidly mathematical empirical testing? Give an example, please. hazel

Hazel, like I said before,

You may want to hold that your stated theories started out as ‘good’ scientific theories but I hold that would be merely subjective opinion on your part.

And right on cue you appeal to subjective opinion. Which ironically, empirical science itself could care less about subjective opinions. And as I also stated, the very fact that the 'not so good' scientific theories you listed have had to change as our understanding has improved in and of itself proves that they were 'not so good' scientific theories in the first place as you want to falsely believe. And again, the criteria of a scientific theory being mature enough to be based on a rigid mathematical basis so as to enable empirical testing against its claim, is certainly not an unreasonable measure in orders to regard something as a 'good' scientific theory. Indeed, falsifiablity is considered the gold standard of discerning whether something is truly a good scientific theory or not.

“In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable; and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality.” Karl Popper – The Two Fundamental Problems of the Theory of Knowledge (2014 edition), Routledge

And also again, Darwinian evolution, since Darwinists refuse to accept any reasonable falsification criteria for their theory, does not even qualify as a real science in the first place, but is more realistically classified as a pseudoscientific religion for atheists. And also again, here are a few falsifications of Darwinian evolution that Darwinists simply refuse to accept as falsifications of their theory:

Darwin’s theory holds mutations to the genome to be random. The vast majority of mutations to the genome are not random but are found to be ‘directed’. Darwin’s theory holds that Natural Selection is the ‘designer substitute’ that produces the ‘appearance’ and/or illusion of design. Natural Selection, especially for multicellular organisms, is found to grossly inadequate as the ‘designer substitute. Darwin’s theory holds that mutations to DNA will eventually change the basic biological form of any given species into a new form of a brand new species. Yet, biological form is found to be irreducible to mutations to DNA, nor is biological form reducible to any other material particulars in biology one may wish to invoke. Darwin’s theory holds there to be an extremely beneficial and flexible mutation rate for DNA which was ultimately responsible for all the diversity and complexity of life we see on earth. The mutation rate to DNA is overwhelmingly detrimental. Detrimental to such a point that it is seriously questioned whether there are any truly beneficial, information building, mutations whatsoever. Charles Darwin himself held that the gradual unfolding of life would (someday) be self-evident in the fossil record. Yet, from the Cambrian Explosion onward, the fossil record is consistently characterized by sudden appearance of a group/kind in the fossil record(disparity), then rapid diversity within that group/kind, and then long term stability and even deterioration of variety within the overall group/kind, and within the specific species of the kind, over long periods of time. Of the few dozen or so fossils claimed as transitional, not one is uncontested as a true example of transition between major animal forms out of millions of collected fossils. Moreover, Fossils are found in the “wrong place” all the time (either too early, or too late). Darwin’s theory, due to the randomness postulate, holds that patterns will not repeat themselves in supposedly widely divergent species. Yet thousands of instances of what is ironically called ‘convergent evolution’, on both the morphological and genetic level, falsifies the Darwinian belief that patterns will not repeat themselves in widely divergent species. Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” Yet as Doug Axe pointed out, “Basically every gene and every new protein fold, there is nothing of significance that we can show that can be had in that gradualistic way. It’s all a mirage. None of it happens that way.” Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be proved that any part of the structure of any one species had been formed for the exclusive good of another species, it would annihilate my theory, for such could not have been produced through natural selection.” Yet as Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig pointed out, “in thousands of plant species often entirely new organs have been formed for the exclusive good of more than 132,930 other species, these ‘ugly facts’ have annihilated Darwin’s theory as well as the modern versions of it.” Charles Darwin himself stated that, ““The impossibility of conceiving that this grand and wondrous universe, with our conscious selves, arose through chance, seems to me the chief argument for the existence of God.”. Yet ‘our conscious selves’ are certainly not explainable by ‘chance’ (nor is consciousness explainable by any possible reductive materialistic explanation in general), i.e. ‘the hard problem of consciousness’. Besides the mathematics of probability consistently showing that Darwinian evolution is impossible, the mathematics of population genetics itself has now shown Darwinian evolution to be impossible. Moreover, ‘immaterial’ mathematics itself, which undergirds all of science, engineering and technology, is held by most mathematicians to exist in some timeless, unchanging, immaterial, Platonic realm. Yet, the reductive materialism that Darwinian theory is based upon denies the existence of the immaterial realm that mathematics exists in. i.e. Darwinian evolution actually denies the objective reality of the one thing, i.e. mathematics, that it most needs in order to be considered scientific in the first place! Donald Hoffman has, via population genetics, shown that if Darwin’s materialistic theory were true then all our observations of reality would be illusory. Yet the scientific method itself is based on reliable observation. Moreover, Quantum Mechanics itself has now shown that conscious observation must come before material reality, i.e. falsification of ‘realism’ proves that our conscious observations are reliable!. The reductive materialism that undergirds Darwinian thought holds that immaterial information is merely ’emergent’ from a material basis. Yet immaterial Information, via experimental realization of the “Maxwell’s Demon” thought experiment, is now found to be its own distinctive physical entity that, although it can interact in a ‘top down’ manner with matter and energy, is separate from matter and energy. Darwinists hold that Darwin’s theory is true. Yet ‘Truth’ itself is an abstract property of an immaterial mind that is irreducible to the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinian evolution. i.e. Assuming reductive materialism and/or Naturalism as the starting philosophical position of science actually precludes ‘the truth’ from ever being reached by science! Darwinist’s, due to their underlying naturalistic philosophy, insist that teleology (i.e. goal directed purpose) does not exist. Yet it is impossible for Biologists to do biological research without constantly invoking words that directly imply teleology. i.e. The very words that Biologists themselves use when they are doing their research falsifies Darwinian evolution.

On top of all that, all of science, every nook and cranny of it, is based on intelligent design and is certainly not based on methodological naturalism as is presupposed by Darwinists. From the essential Christian presuppositions that undergird the founding of modern science, i.e. that the universe is rational and that the minds of men, being made in the ‘image of God’, can dare understand that rationality, to the intelligent design of the scientific instruments and experiments themselves, to the logical and mathematical analysis of experimental results, from top to bottom science itself is certainly not ‘natural’. Not one scientific instrument would ever exist if men did not first intelligently design that scientific instrument. Not one test tube, microscope, telescope, spectroscope, or etc.. etc.., was ever just found laying around on a beach somewhere which was ‘naturally’ constructed by nature. Not one experimental result would ever be rationally analysed since there would be no immaterial minds to rationally analyze the immaterial mathematics that lay behind the intelligently designed experiments in the first place. bornagain77

hazel:

Also, I agree that theories have to be testable, although I don’t think they have to be limited to “rigid mathematical” tests.

And that is why there isn't any scientific theory of evolution. ET

Brother Brian:

Just as current evolutionary theory is the one the best explains the evidence we see today.

Nonsense- for one there still isn't any scientific theory of evolution. That is because evolutionism makes untestable claims. Which means it doesn't explain anything. Methinks you don't know what science is nor what a scientific theory entails. ET

BA77

Hazel, if the scientific theories you cited had to change to become better then obviously they were ‘not so good’ scientific theories’ to begin with.

They were the theories that best explained the evidence of the day. Just as current evolutionary theory is the one the best explains the evidence we see today. But if we take your claims as being true, that older theories must be bad, does that also mean that the Christianity contemptuously with Christ’s life was poor because we have developed countless variations on it since his death? Hazel

From ba’s point of view, there are almost no good scientific theories, because virtually all theories are going to change to some extent in the future, I am sure. This doesn’t seem like a realistic or useful definition of “good theory.”

According to BA77, Newton’s gravitation theory must be a poor theory because we know it to be incorrect. Yet NASA continues to use it to put probes on Mars. Or that relativity must be wrong because some believe that it contradicts quantum entanglement. Even if this is true, relativity is good enough to allow us to use our GPS. Brother Brian

Hmmm. This sounds sort of a "no true Scotman's" argument now: it couldn't have really been a good theory if in fact it changed. Many theories which I think we would say are good continue to get refined: good things can get better. Also, I agree that theories have to be testable, although I don't think they have to be limited to "rigid mathematical" tests. From ba's point of view, there are almost no good scientific theories, because virtually all theories are going to change to some extent in the future, I am sure. This doesn't seem like a realistic or useful definition of "good theory." hazel

Hazel, if the scientific theories you cited had to change to become better then obviously they were 'not so good' scientific theories' to begin with. Moreover, I showed that both of the 'not so good' scientific theories that you cited, as they have changed as our understanding has become better, now support ID not atheistic materialism. That our understanding of atoms in particular would now support ID instead of atheistic materialism, I would call that a rather stunning falsification of atheistic materialism. You may want to hold that your stated theories started out as 'good' scientific theories but I hold that would be merely subjective opinion on your part. I hold that until a scientific theory has some sort of rigid mathematical basis to experimentally test against, (such as we currently have with our present understanding of atoms), then the theory is 'not so good' as a scientific theory to begin with. Let's just say that a scientific theory, if it has to change as our understanding becomes better, has not achieved the level of mathematical maturity necessary to be considered a 'good' scientific theory yet.

"In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable; and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality." Karl Popper - The Two Fundamental Problems of the Theory of Knowledge (2014 edition), Routledge “On the other hand, I disagree that Darwin’s theory is as `solid as any explanation in science.; Disagree? I regard the claim as preposterous. Quantum electrodynamics is accurate to thirteen or so decimal places; so, too, general relativity. A leaf trembling in the wrong way would suffice to shatter either theory. What can Darwinian theory offer in comparison?” – Berlinski, D., “A Scientific Scandal?: David Berlinski & Critics,” Commentary, July 8, 2003 "For many years I thought that it is a mathematical scandal that we do not have a proof that Darwinian evolution works." Gregory Chaitin - Proving Darwin 2012 - Highly Respected Mathematician Why Do We Invoke Darwin? – Evolutionary theory contributes little to experimental biology – Philip S. Skell -The Scientist – August 29, 2005 Excerpt: I found that Darwin’s theory had provided no discernible guidance, but was brought in, after the breakthroughs, as an interesting narrative gloss.,,, Darwinian explanations for such things are often too supple: Natural selection makes humans self-centered and aggressive – except when it makes them altruistic and peaceable. Or natural selection produces virile men who eagerly spread their seed – except when it prefers men who are faithful protectors and providers. When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it experimentally, much less use it as a catalyst for scientific discovery. Darwinian evolution – whatever its other virtues – does not provide a fruitful heuristic in experimental biology. http://www.discovery.org/a/2816 “In science’s pecking order, evolutionary biology lurks somewhere near the bottom, far closer to phrenology than to physics. For evolutionary biology is a historical science, laden with history’s inevitable imponderables. We evolutionary biologists cannot generate a Cretaceous Park to observe exactly what killed the dinosaurs; and, unlike “harder” scientists, we usually cannot resolve issues with a simple experiment, such as adding tube A to tube B and noting the color of the mixture.” - Jerry A. Coyne – Of Vice and Men, The New Republic April 3, 2000 p.27 - professor of Darwinian evolution at the University of Chicago

bornagain77

But I understood what I was commenting on, ba: you said good theories don't change, and I know quite enough about the history of science to know that is not true. In fact, I gave two examples, and you agreed with me that both of them have changed. That's all that I addressed. hazel

ba, I, like most people here I imagine, do not read your posts very thoroughly or completely, if at all,

Is it too late to request a read more button. :) Ed George

Well maybe it would have behooved you to fully understand what you were trying to comment on before you actually commented? Off topic, what do you think happens to "you", the real "you", when your material body dies Hazel? bornagain77

Hazel

ba, I, like most people here I imagine, do not read your posts very thoroughly or completely, if at all,

Is it too late to ask for a “read more” button? :) Ed George

ba, I, like most people here I imagine, do not read your posts very thoroughly or completely, if at all, for various reasons. I saw, in the first paragraph of 34, the sentence "Good theories do not change," and I commented on that. Other than that point, I've paid no attention to whatever else you've written on this thread (which at one time was about quantum mechanics, as I recall.) hazel

LOL Hazel states:

Me: “Moreover, contrary to what you falsely believe, Darwin’s theory is certainly NOT improving. ” Hazel: I said absolutely NOTHING about “Darwin’s theory” Where the heck did you get that from? My remark was simply disagreeing with your statement that “Good scientific theories do not change.”

So you do not want to defend the indefensible proposition that Darwin's theory is improving? :) LOL Anyways Hazel, since my original post, the post that you jumped into the middle of to comment on, was precisely about Darwinism, I was well justified to assume you were trying to defend that theory in particular. You certainly did not make a caveat that you thought Darwinism was not improving and make an exception for it. Again, I was well justified to believe your assertion was inclusive of Darwinism. You criticize me for reading more into what you actually wrote but it seems fairly obvious that you are the one trying to avoid what I actually wrote in my post that you commented on. I could get into nuances to show how Darwinism should, if it were true, line up with the 'hard sciences' such as Newton's theory, but you actions thus far have dissuaded me of doing so. Bottom line, nuances aside, Darwinian evolution, since Darwinists refuse to accept any reasonable falsification criteria for their theory, does not even qualify as a real science in the first place, but is more realistically classified as a pseudoscientific religion for atheists. bornagain77

ba77, all I said was that theories change. I said nothing about ID, or materialism, or evolution. You write, "Moreover, the atom is far, far, more complex than the materialists/atheists, since the Greeks, had originally envisioned or ever anticipated with their fallacious ‘billiard ball’ model!" Absolutely, I agree that the atom is far different than our beginning theories about it, going back to the Greeks. This supports my point that theories change. You write, "Moreover, contrary to what you falsely believe, Darwin’s theory is certainly NOT improving. " I said absolutely NOTHING about "Darwin's theory" Where the heck did you get that from? My remark was simply disagreeing with your statement that "Good scientific theories do not change." You certainly read into things much more than are there! hazel

Moreover, contrary to what you falsely believe, Darwin's theory is certainly NOT improving. It is adding ad hoc theories to cover up its failed predictions. Imre Lakatos and also Thomas Kuhn, of 'paradigm shift' fame, considered such a characteristic of a theory to be a sure sign of a pseudoscience: Imre Lakatos stated that “In degenerating programmes, however, theories are fabricated only in order to accommodate known facts”

Science and Pseudoscience (transcript) – “In degenerating programmes, however, theories are fabricated only in order to accommodate known facts” – Imre Lakatos (November 9, 1922 – February 2, 1974) a philosopher of mathematics and science, , quote as stated in 1973 LSE Scientific Method Lecture http://www.lse.ac.uk/philosophy/science-and-pseudoscience-overview-and-transcript/

Thomas Kuhn, who introduced the term 'paradigm shift, also noted that when faced with an anomaly, a theory's defenders "will devise numerous articulations and ad hoc modifications of their theory in order to eliminate any apparent conflict."

Thomas Kuhn Excerpt: Thomas Samuel Kuhn (/ku?n/; July 18, 1922 – June 17, 1996) was an American physicist, historian and philosopher of science whose controversial 1962 book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions was influential in both academic and popular circles, introducing the term paradigm shift, which has since become an English-language idiom.,,, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Kuhn Inquiry-Based Science Education -- on Everything but Evolution - Sarah Chaffee - January 22, 2016 Excerpt: As Thomas Kuhn wrote in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, when faced with an anomaly, a theory's defenders "will devise numerous articulations and ad hoc modifications of their theory in order to eliminate any apparent conflict." http://www.evolutionnews.org/2016/01/inquiry-based_s102534.html

And in regards to a theory making predictions that are shown to be false and then making up ad hoc theories to try to cover up those falsified predictions, then by that ‘predictability’ falsification criteria set out by Lakatos and Kuhn, Darwinian evolution more than qualifies as a pseudoscience rather than a real science. Here is a site, that was put together by Dr. Cornelius Hunter, that goes over many of the failed predictions of Darwinian evolution.

Darwin’s (Failed) Predictions – Cornelius Hunter https://sites.google.com/site/darwinspredictions/

As Dr. Hunter states in the following article,,, “With each new absurdity another new complicated just-so story is woven into evolutionary theory. As Lakatos explained, some theories simply are not falsifiable. But as a result they sacrifice realism and parsimony.”

Here’s That Algae Study That Decouples Phylogeny and Competition – June 17, 2014 Excerpt: “With each new absurdity another new complicated just-so story is woven into evolutionary theory. As Lakatos explained, some theories simply are not falsifiable. But as a result they sacrifice realism and parsimony.” – Cornelius Hunter http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2014/06/heres-that-algae-study-that-decouples.html

Of humorous note, in regards to a theory adding ad hoc theories to cover up embarrassing findings, the only thing that anyone can ever seem to catch ‘evolving’ in the real world,,

How Biochemist Matti Leisola’s Lab Experience Persuaded Him of Intelligent Design – March 27, 2018 Excerpt: Dr. Leisola (a biochemist),, spoke via Skype recently to a gathering in Dallas and summarized the situation this way: “My experience as a scientist has been that although we can modify microorganisms to do something that we want them to do, or modify proteins to function better, this modification is fairly modest. We really cannot change nature’s system very much, very far. And even when we change the organism to do something we want [it] to do, they usually return to their natural, original state.”,,, ,,,there’s a limit to what can be achieved by bioengineers. Beyond that, nature resists mightily. Even his own design, as an expert researcher and with the most advanced technology at his disposal, is not sufficient to overcome such resistance. https://evolutionnews.org/2018/03/how-matti-leisolas-lab-experience-persuaded-him-of-intelligent-design/

,,, the only thing that anyone can ever seem to catch ‘evolving’ in the real world is the theory of Darwinian evolution itself. As Dr. Hunter notes in the following article, Darwin’s pseudo-theory is forever plastic and is able to explain completely contradictory results with equal ease.

“Being an evolutionist means there is no bad news. If new species appear abruptly in the fossil record, that just means evolution operates in spurts. If species then persist for eons with little modification, that just means evolution takes long breaks. If clever mechanisms are discovered in biology, that just means evolution is smarter than we imagined. If strikingly similar designs are found in distant species, that just means evolution repeats itself. If significant differences are found in allied species, that just means evolution sometimes introduces new designs rapidly. If no likely mechanism can be found for the large-scale change evolution requires, that just means evolution is mysterious. If adaptation responds to environmental signals, that just means evolution has more foresight than was thought. If major predictions of evolution are found to be false, that just means evolution is more complex than we thought.” ~ Cornelius Hunter - Arsenic-Based Biochemistry: Turning Poison Into Wine - December 2, 2010 http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2010/12/arsenic-based-biochemistry-turning.html

And as William James Murray quipped in the following quote, “Who would have thought that it would be biologists that came up with the first Theory of Everything? – Evolution explains everything. –”

“Who would have thought that it would be biologists that came up with the first Theory of Everything? Biological divergence? Evolution. Biological convergence? Evolution. Gradual variation? Evolution. Sudden variation? Evolution. Stasis? Evolution. Junk DNA? Evolution. No Junk DNA? Evolution. Tree of life? Evolution. No tree of life? Evolution. Common genes? Evolution. ORFan genes? Evolution. Cell with little more than a jelly-like protoplasm? Evolution. Cell filled with countless, highly-specified nano-machines directed by a software code? Evolution. More hardy, more procreative organisms? Evolution. Less hardy, less procreative organisms? Evolution.” – Evolution explains everything. – William J Murray

Thus Hazel, you entire rebuttal collapses in on itself. Moreover, to add further insult to injury, you have, or all people, the troll BB agreeing with you.,,, That in and of itself should let you know that you are on the completely wrong path. bornagain77

Hazel, your attempted dodge of the "refusal to accept falsification of their theory by Darwinists issue" which I clearly laid out, is without merit. You appealed to "the nature of the inside of the earth" and "the theory of atomic structure". Yet, both of those theories you cited, as more evidence has been gathered, (just like what has happened with Darwinism as more evidence has been gathered), now support ID, not atheistic materialism as you apparently falsely imagine and/or presuppose.

“I think that modern physics has definitely decided in favor of Plato. In fact the smallest units of matter are not physical objects in the ordinary sense; they are forms, ideas which can be expressed unambiguously only in mathematical language.” Werner Heisenberg Theory of Uncertain Principles - (The "Non-Particle" Basis Of Reality) – video 24:31 minute mark Discovering Science: Uncertain Principles - video https://youtu.be/iu6kqO4L0KQ?t=1471

Moreover, the atom is far, far, more complex than the materialists/atheists, since the Greeks, had originally envisioned or ever anticipated with their fallacious 'billiard ball' model!

Why Science Does Not Disprove God - April 27, 2014 Excerpt: "To explain the quantum-mechanical behavior of even one tiny particle requires pages and pages of extremely advanced mathematics. Why are even the tiniest particles of matter so unbelievably complicated? It appears that there is a vast, hidden "wisdom," or structure, or a knotty blueprint for even the most simple-looking element of nature." Amir D. Aczel - mathematician http://time.com/77676/why-science-does-not-disprove-god/ Does the atom have a designer? When science and spirituality meet - LAKHI GOENKA an Engineer - May 2012 Excerpt: Atoms are machines that enable the physical, electromagnetic (including light), nuclear, chemical, and biological (including life) functioning of the universe. Atoms are a complex assembly of interacting particles that enable the entire functioning of the universe. They are the machine that enables all other machines. It is virtually impossible to explain the structure, complexity, internal dynamics, and resulting functionality of the atom from chance events or through evolutionary mechanisms. The atom is a machine that provides multiple functions, and every machine is the product of intelligence. The atom must have a designer. http://www.annarbor.com/news/opinion/does-the-atom-have-a-designer/

Moreover, atoms are not self existent and/or self sustaining as was originally presupposed by atheistic materialists. Here is a delayed choice experiment that was done with atoms,

Experiment confirms quantum theory weirdness - May 27, 2015 Excerpt: The bizarre nature of reality as laid out by quantum theory has survived another test, with scientists performing a famous experiment and proving that reality does not exist until it is measured. Physicists at The Australian National University (ANU) have conducted John Wheeler's delayed-choice thought experiment, which involves a moving object that is given the choice to act like a particle or a wave. Wheeler's experiment then asks - at which point does the object decide? Common sense says the object is either wave-like or particle-like, independent of how we measure it. But quantum physics predicts that whether you observe wave like behavior (interference) or particle behavior (no interference) depends only on how it is actually measured at the end of its journey. This is exactly what the ANU team found. "It proves that measurement is everything. At the quantum level, reality does not exist if you are not looking at it," said Associate Professor Andrew Truscott from the ANU Research School of Physics and Engineering. Despite the apparent weirdness, the results confirm the validity of quantum theory, which,, has enabled the development of many technologies such as LEDs, lasers and computer chips. The ANU team not only succeeded in building the experiment, which seemed nearly impossible when it was proposed in 1978, but reversed Wheeler's original concept of light beams being bounced by mirrors, and instead used atoms scattered by laser light. "Quantum physics' predictions about interference seem odd enough when applied to light, which seems more like a wave, but to have done the experiment with atoms, which are complicated things that have mass and interact with electric fields and so on, adds to the weirdness," said Roman Khakimov, PhD student at the Research School of Physics and Engineering. http://phys.org/news/2015-05-quantum-theory-weirdness.html

Moreover, the interior of the earth is now known to be extremely fine tuned so as to allow a long term magnetic field to exist (which is necessary for life to exist on earth)

Scientists 'Iron Out' Phenomenon That Sustains Magnetic Field Of Earth - 2 June 2016 Excerpt: "Without Earth's magnetic field, life on the planet might not exist. For 3.4 billion years, this magnetic field has prevented Earth from becoming extremely vulnerable to high-energy particles called cosmic radiation. Scientists know that what generates the protective magnetic field is the low heat conduction of liquid iron in the planet's outer core. This phenomenon is known as "geodynamo." However, although geodynamo has been identified, experts have yet to understand how it was first created and sustained all throughout history....In the end, researchers found that the ability of iron to transmit heat were not at par with previous estimates of thermal conductivity in the core. It was actually between 18 and 44 watts per meter per kelvin. This suggests that the energy needed to sustain the geodynamo has been present since very early in Earth's history, researchers concluded. http://www.techtimes.com/articles/162458/20160602/scientists-iron-out-phenomenon-that-sustains-magnetic-field-of-earth.htm Strong planetary magnetic fields like Earth's may protect oceans from stellar storms - March 14, 2019 Excerpt: A study by scientists at ANU on the magnetic fields of planets has found that most planets discovered in other solar systems are unlikely to be as hospitable to life as Earth. Plants and animals would not survive without water on Earth. The sheer strength of Earth's magnetic field helps to maintain liquid water on our blue planet's surface, thereby making it possible for life to thrive. Scientists from the ANU Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics modelled the magnetic fields of exoplanets—planets beyond our solar system—and found very few have a magnetic field as strong as Earth. They contend that techniques for finding exoplanets the size of Earth are more likely to find slowly rotating planets locked to their host star in the same way the Moon is locked to Earth, with the same side always facing their host star. The lead author of the study, Ph.D. scholar Sarah McIntyre, said strong magnetic fields may be necessary to keep wet rocky exoplanets habitable.,,, "Venus and Mars have negligible magnetic fields and do not support life, while Earth's magnetic field is relatively strong and does," she said. "We find most detected exoplanets have very weak magnetic fields, so this is an important factor when searching for potentially habitable planets." https://m.phys.org/news/2019-03-strong-planetary-magnetic-fields-earth.html

bornagain77

BA77

BB claims ” The teaching of evolution, like all good sciences, changes with the times as new information is discovered and the theories adjusted to account for it.” That statement is a joke.

The best response to this is a concatenation. Of a male bovine and solid excrement. If you don’t realize this, you have little to add to this conversation. Brother Brian

ba77 writes,

Good scientific theories do not change. Newton’s theory of Gravity has not changed one iota since Newton first formulated it. When evidence came in that Newton’s theory could not explain, particularly the anomalous orbit of Mercury, physicists knew, after a couple of blind alleys, that Newton’s theory, although approximate, was incorrect. Newton’s theory was not modified in any way, shape, or form, (though some may have tried), but was eventually entirely replaced by the entirely new theoretical framework of Einstein’s theory of general relativity.

In general, I disagree with that. Many theories incrementally improve in their ability to accurately describe the world, to describe parts of the world that originally were not considered, to interact with other theories, etc. To say that is "not change" doesn't seem accurate to me. For instance, our theories about the nature of the inside of the earth have changed since it was first shown that the earth has a solid core about 80 years ago. Since then improvements in various type of measurements have improved many details about the theory. Or take the theory of atomic structure: it has a fascinating history ending in the current quantum picture of quarks, etc accounting for the more classical element s of proton, electrons, neutrons, nuclei, electron shells, etc. It would be wrong to say that that theory hasn't changed. I think most theories do change: few have had as radical an overhaul as Newton's theory of gravity. hazel

BB claims " The teaching of evolution, like all good sciences, changes with the times as new information is discovered and the theories adjusted to account for it." That statement is a joke. Good scientific theories do not change. Newton's theory of Gravity has not changed one iota since Newton first formulated it way back in the late 17th century. When evidence came in that Newton's theory could not explain, particularly the anomalous orbit of Mercury, physicists knew, after a couple of blind alleys, that Newton's theory, although approximate, was incorrect. Newton's theory was not modified in any way, shape, or form, (though some may have tried), but was eventually entirely replaced by the entirely new theoretical framework of Einstein's theory of general relativity.

When Did Isaac Newton Finally Fail? - May 20, 2016 Excerpt: The first idea was that there was a planet interior to Mercury with the right properties to cause that additional advance, or that the Sun’s corona was very massive; either one of those could cause the additional gravitational effects needed. But the Sun’s corona isn’t massive, and there is no Vulcan (and we’ve looked!), so that’s out. The second idea came from two scientists?—?Simon Newcomb and Asaph Hall?—?who determined that if you replaced Newton’s inverse square law, which says that gravity falls off as one over the distance to the power of 2, with a law that says gravity falls off as one over the distance to the power of 2.0000001612, you could get that extra precession. As we know today, that would mess up the observed orbits of the Moon, Venus and Earth, so that’s out. And the third hint came from Henri Poincare, who noted that if you took Einstein’s special relativity into account?—?the fact that Mercury moves around the Sun at 48 km/s on average, or 0.016% the speed of light?—?you get part (but not all) of the missing precession. It was putting those second and third ideas together that led to general relativity. The idea that there was a fabric?—?a spacetime?—?came from one of Einstein’s former teachers, Hermann Minkowski, and when Poincare applied that concept to the problem of Mercury’s orbit, there was an important step towards the missing solution. The idea by Newcomb and Hall, although incorrect, showed that if gravity were stronger than Newton’s predictions by the orbit of Mercury, additional precession could occur. Einstein’s big idea, of course, was that the presence of matter/energy results in a curvature of space, and that the closer you are to a more massive object, the stronger gravity behaves. Not only that, but the greater the departure is from the predictions of Newtonian gravity as well. https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2016/05/20/when-did-isaac-newton-finally-fail/

Evolution, in contrast to a good scientific theory, such as Newton's theory of Gravity which could be falsified and discarded for a better scientific theory, simply refuses falsification. Or more precisely I should say, (since the foundational precepts of Darwinism are indeed falsifiable), that Darwinists themselves refuse to accept falsification of their theory since they would then have to accept the correct theoretical framework of Intelligent Design.,, And that is simply unacceptable for them no matter what scientific evidence contradicts their preferred atheistic theory, i.e. Darwin's theory. Like I said, it is not that Darwinian evolution is not falsifiable, it is that Darwinists themselves refuse to accept falsification of their theory.

Darwin’s Theory vs Falsification – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rzw0JkuKuQ

Here are a few more falsifications of Darwinian evolution that Darwinists simply refuse to accept as falsifications of their theory:

Darwin’s theory holds mutations to the genome to be random. The vast majority of mutations to the genome are not random but are found to be ‘directed’. Darwin’s theory holds that Natural Selection is the ‘designer substitute’ that produces the ‘appearance’ and/or illusion of design. Natural Selection, especially for multicellular organisms, is found to grossly inadequate as the ‘designer substitute. Darwin’s theory holds that mutations to DNA will eventually change the basic biological form of any given species into a new form of a brand new species. Yet, biological form is found to be irreducible to mutations to DNA, nor is biological form reducible to any other material particulars in biology one may wish to invoke. Darwin’s theory holds there to be an extremely beneficial and flexible mutation rate for DNA which was ultimately responsible for all the diversity and complexity of life we see on earth. The mutation rate to DNA is overwhelmingly detrimental. Detrimental to such a point that it is seriously questioned whether there are any truly beneficial, information building, mutations whatsoever. Charles Darwin himself held that the gradual unfolding of life would (someday) be self-evident in the fossil record. Yet, from the Cambrian Explosion onward, the fossil record is consistently characterized by sudden appearance of a group/kind in the fossil record(disparity), then rapid diversity within that group/kind, and then long term stability and even deterioration of variety within the overall group/kind, and within the specific species of the kind, over long periods of time. Of the few dozen or so fossils claimed as transitional, not one is uncontested as a true example of transition between major animal forms out of millions of collected fossils. Moreover, Fossils are found in the “wrong place” all the time (either too early, or too late). Darwin’s theory, due to the randomness postulate, holds that patterns will not repeat themselves in supposedly widely divergent species. Yet thousands of instances of what is ironically called ‘convergent evolution’, on both the morphological and genetic level, falsifies the Darwinian belief that patterns will not repeat themselves in widely divergent species. Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” Yet as Doug Axe pointed out, “Basically every gene and every new protein fold, there is nothing of significance that we can show that can be had in that gradualistic way. It’s all a mirage. None of it happens that way.” Charles Darwin himself stated that “If it could be proved that any part of the structure of any one species had been formed for the exclusive good of another species, it would annihilate my theory, for such could not have been produced through natural selection.” Yet as Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig pointed out, “in thousands of plant species often entirely new organs have been formed for the exclusive good of more than 132,930 other species, these ‘ugly facts’ have annihilated Darwin’s theory as well as the modern versions of it.” Charles Darwin himself stated that, ““The impossibility of conceiving that this grand and wondrous universe, with our conscious selves, arose through chance, seems to me the chief argument for the existence of God.”. Yet ‘our conscious selves’ are certainly not explainable by ‘chance’ (nor is consciousness explainable by any possible reductive materialistic explanation in general), i.e. ‘the hard problem of consciousness’. Besides the mathematics of probability consistently showing that Darwinian evolution is impossible, the mathematics of population genetics itself has now shown Darwinian evolution to be impossible. Moreover, ‘immaterial’ mathematics itself, which undergirds all of science, engineering and technology, is held by most mathematicians to exist in some timeless, unchanging, immaterial, Platonic realm. Yet, the reductive materialism that Darwinian theory is based upon denies the existence of the immaterial realm that mathematics exists in. i.e. Darwinian evolution actually denies the objective reality of the one thing, i.e. mathematics, that it most needs in order to be considered scientific in the first place! Donald Hoffman has, via population genetics, shown that if Darwin’s materialistic theory were true then all our observations of reality would be illusory. Yet the scientific method itself is based on reliable observation. Moreover, Quantum Mechanics itself has now shown that conscious observation must come before material reality, i.e. falsification of ‘realism’ proves that our conscious observations are reliable!. The reductive materialism that undergirds Darwinian thought holds that immaterial information is merely ’emergent’ from a material basis. Yet immaterial Information, via experimental realization of the “Maxwell’s Demon” thought experiment, is now found to be its own distinctive physical entity that, although it can interact in a ‘top down’ manner with matter and energy, is separate from matter and energy. Darwinists hold that Darwin’s theory is true. Yet ‘Truth’ itself is an abstract property of an immaterial mind that is irreducible to the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinian evolution. i.e. Assuming reductive materialism and/or Naturalism as the starting philosophical position of science actually precludes ‘the truth’ from ever being reached by science! Darwinist’s, due to their underlying naturalistic philosophy, insist that teleology (i.e. goal directed purpose) does not exist. Yet it is impossible for Biologists to do biological research without constantly invoking words that directly imply teleology. i.e. The very words that Biologists themselves use when they are doing their research falsifies Darwinian evolution.

On top of all that, all of science, every nook and cranny of it, is based on intelligent design and is certainly not based on methodological naturalism as is presupposed by Darwinists. From the essential Christian presuppositions that undergird the founding of modern science, i.e. that the universe is rational and that the minds of men, being made in the ‘image of God’, can dare understand that rationality, to the intelligent design of the scientific instruments and experiments themselves, to the logical and mathematical analysis of experimental results, from top to bottom science itself is certainly not ‘natural’. Not one scientific instrument would ever exist if men did not first intelligently design that scientific instrument. Not one test tube, microscope, telescope, spectroscope, or etc.. etc.., was ever just found laying around on a beach somewhere which was ‘naturally’ constructed by nature. Not one experimental result would ever be rationally analysed since there would be no immaterial minds to rationally analyze the immaterial mathematics that lay behind the intelligently designed experiments in the first place. In fact, (as I have pointed out several times now), assuming (Methodological) Naturalism instead of Theism as the worldview on which all of science is based leads to the catastrophic epistemological failure of science itself.

Basically, because of reductive materialism (and/or methodological naturalism), the atheistic materialist is forced to claim that he is merely a ‘neuronal illusion’ (Coyne, Dennett, etc..), who has the illusion of free will (Harris), who has unreliable beliefs about reality (Plantinga), who has illusory perceptions of reality (Hoffman), who, since he has no real time empirical evidence substantiating his grandiose claims, must make up illusory “just so stories” with the illusory, and impotent, ‘designer substitute’ of natural selection (Behe, Gould, Sternberg), so as to ‘explain away’ the appearance (i.e. illusion) of design (Crick, Dawkins), and who must make up illusory meanings and purposes for his life since the reality of the nihilism inherent in his atheistic worldview is too much for him to bear (Weikart), and who must also hold morality to be subjective and illusory since he has rejected God (Craig, Kreeft). Bottom line, nothing is real in the atheist’s worldview, least of all, morality, meaning and purposes for life.,,, – Darwin’s Theory vs Falsification – 39:45 minute mark https://youtu.be/8rzw0JkuKuQ?t=2387

Thus, although the Darwinist may firmly believes he is on the terra firma of science (in his appeal, even demand, for methodological naturalism), the fact of the matter is that, when examining the details of his materialistic/naturalistic worldview, it is found that Darwinists/Atheists are adrift in an ocean of fantasy and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to. It would be hard to fathom a worldview more antagonistic to modern science than Atheistic materialism and/or methodological naturalism have turned out to be.

2 Corinthians 10:5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

Bottom line, by any reasonable measure by which someone may wish to judge whether a proposition is even scientific or not, Darwinian evolution fails to qualify as a science:

“There are five standard tests for a scientific hypothesis. Has anyone observed the phenomenon — in this case, Evolution — as it occurred and recorded it? Could other scientists replicate it? Could any of them come up with a set of facts that, if true, would contradict the theory (Karl Popper’s “falsifiability” tests)? Could scientists make predictions based on it? Did it illuminate hitherto unknown or baffling areas of science? In the case of Evolution… well… no… no… no… no… and no.” – Tom Wolfe – The Kingdom of Speech – page 17 Darwinian Evolution Fails the Five Standard Tests of a Scientific Hypothesis – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7f_fyoPybw

In short, Darwinian evolution, since it fails to even qualify as a science in any meaningful sense, is much more realistically classified as a pseudoscientific religion for atheists. Darwinists, (and I have no doubt that many of them are sincere in their belief that Darwinism is truly ‘scientific’), are simply profoundly deceived in their belief that Darwinian evolution even qualifies as a science in the first place. Verse:

1 Thessalonians 5:21 but test everything; hold fast what is good.

bornagain77

Brother Brian:

The teaching of evolution, like all good sciences, changes with the times as new information is discovered and the theories adjusted to account for it.

And yet the "evidence" for the alleged evolution of eyes/ vision systems has remained pretty much the same-> there exist populations with differing complexities of eyes/ vision systems in organisms of differing complexities. For the most part the teaching of evolution has always been a story-telling venture. That "new information" goes into the new narratives. And the narratives always fail the science test. ET

BA77

If these facts are well known, One is forced to wonder why neo-Darwinism has such a hegemony on education still today.

Are you referring to the neo-Darwinism in the 1890s, or the neo-Darwinism in the 1940s, or the neo-Darwinism in the 21st century? The teaching of evolution, like all good sciences, changes with the times as new information is discovered and the theories adjusted to account for it. Brother Brian

", well over 40 years ago, we were taught that embryonic development and the subsequent end product were not determined by the DNA alone." If these facts are well known, One is forced to wonder why neo-Darwinism has such a hegemony on education still today. A few more semi-related notes:

,, In the following video, Dr Denis Noble states that around 1900 there was the integration of Mendelian (discrete) inheritance with evolutionary theory, and about the same time Weismann established what was called the Weismann barrier, which is the idea that germ cells and their genetic materials are not in anyway influenced by the organism itself or by the environment. And then about 40 years later, circa 1940, a variety of people, Julian Huxley, R.A. Fisher, J.B.S. Haldane, and Sewell Wright, put things together to call it ‘The Modern Synthesis’. So what exactly is the ‘The Modern Synthesis’? It is sometimes called neo-Darwinism, and it was popularized in the book by Richard Dawkins, ‘The Selfish Gene’ in 1976. It’s main assumptions are, first of all, is that it is a gene centered view of natural selection. The process of evolution can therefore be characterized entirely by what is happening to the genome. It would be a process in which there would be accumulation of random mutations, followed by selection. (Now an important point to make here is that if that process is genuinely random, then there is nothing that physiology, or physiologists, can say about that process. That is a very important point.) The second aspect of neo-Darwinism was the impossibility of acquired characteristics (mis-called “Larmarckism”). And there is a very important distinction in Dawkins’ book ‘The Selfish Gene’ between the replicator, that is the genes, and the vehicle that carries the replicator, that is the organism or phenotype. And of course that idea was not only buttressed and supported by the Weissman barrier idea, but later on by the ‘Central Dogma’ of molecular biology. Then Dr. Nobel pauses to emphasize his point and states “All these rules have been broken!”. Professor Denis Noble is President of the International Union of Physiological Sciences. Denis Noble - Rocking the foundations of biology - video http://www.voicesfromoxford.org/video/physiology-and-the-revolution-in-evolutionary-biology/184 "Physiology Is Rocking the Foundations of Evolutionary Biology": Another Peer-Reviewed Paper Takes Aim at Neo-Darwinism - Casey Luskin March 31, 2015 Excerpt: Noble doesn't mince words: "It is not only the standard 20th century views of molecular genetics that are in question. Evolutionary theory itself is already in a state of flux (Jablonka & Lamb, 2005; Noble, 2006, 2011; Beurton et al. 2008; Pigliucci & Muller, 2010; Gissis & Jablonka, 2011; Shapiro, 2011). In this article, I will show that all the central assumptions of the Modern Synthesis (often also called Neo-Darwinism) have been disproved." Noble then recounts those assumptions: (1) that "genetic change is random," (2) that "genetic change is gradual," (3) that "following genetic change, natural selection leads to particular gene variants (alleles) increasing in frequency within the population," and (4) that "inheritance of acquired characteristics is impossible." He then cites examples that refute each of those assumptions,,, He then proposes a new and radical model of biology called the "Integrative Synthesis," where genes don't run the show and all parts of an organism -- the genome, the cell, the body plan, everything -- is integrated. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2015/03/physiology_is_r094821.html How life changes itself: the Read-Write (RW) genome. - 2013 Excerpt: Research dating back to the 1930s has shown that genetic change is the result of cell-mediated processes, not simply accidents or damage to the DNA. This cell-active view of genome change applies to all scales of DNA sequence variation, from point mutations to large-scale genome rearrangements and whole genome duplications (WGDs). This conceptual change to active cell inscriptions controlling RW genome functions has profound implications for all areas of the life sciences. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23876611 Ask an Embryologist: Genomic Mosaicism - Jonathan Wells - February 23, 2015 Excerpt: humans have a "few thousand" different cell types. Here is my simple question: Does the DNA sequence in one cell type differ from the sequence in another cell type in the same person?,,, The simple answer is: We now know that there is considerable variation in DNA sequences among tissues, and even among cells in the same tissue. It's called genomic mosaicism. In the early days of developmental genetics, some people thought that parts of the embryo became different from each other because they acquired different pieces of the DNA from the fertilized egg. That theory was abandoned,,, ,,,(then) "genomic equivalence" -- the idea that all the cells of an organism (with a few exceptions, such as cells of the immune system) contain the same DNA -- became the accepted view. I taught genomic equivalence for many years. A few years ago, however, everything changed. With the development of more sophisticated techniques and the sampling of more tissues and cells, it became clear that genetic mosaicism is common. I now know as an embryologist,,,Tissues and cells, as they differentiate, modify their DNA to suit their needs. It's the organism controlling the DNA, not the DNA controlling the organism. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2015/02/ask_an_embryolo093851.html Embryonic Development Reveals Staggering Complexity - January 23, 2018 Excerpt: I recently cited a paper on the evolution of embryonic development and how the evidence contradicts evolutionary theory and common descent. Even the evolutionists, though in understated terms, admitted there were problems. Evolutionary analyses are “reaching their limits,” it is difficult to “conclude anything about evolutionary origins,” genetic similarities “do not necessarily imply common ancestry,” and “conserved regulatory networks can become unrecognizably divergent.” In other words, like all other disciplines within the life sciences, embryonic development is not working. The science contradicts the theory. But there is much more to the paper, and as a reader noticed, the authors give a rather blunt admission of the magnitude of the problem, not often seen in the literature: ,,, "One of the main reasons for Duboule’s pessimism about the return of the EvoDevo comet is the staggering complexity and diversity of cellular and developmental regulatory processes. The configuration space for realistic models of such systems is vast, high dimensional, and potentially infinitely complex.",,, Staggering complexity? Staggering diversity? The configuration space is vast and high-dimensional? And it is potentially infinitely complex? And we are to believe this is the product of random mutations? http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2018/01/embryonic-development-reveals.html

bornagain77

Brother Brian:

When I was at university, well over 40 years ago, we were taught that embryonic development and the subsequent end product were not determined by the DNA alone.

Know we know that DNA only influences and helps control development. We still do not know what determines the subsequent end product. And that is just one reason why universal common descent is untestable. ET

BA77

In making this point clear, it is first important to learn that many lines of evidence have now revealed that the biological form and/or shape of any particular organism is not reducible to the sequential information on DNA.

This isn’t exactly groundbreaking news. When I was at university, well over 40 years ago, we were taught that embryonic development and the subsequent end product were not determined by the DNA alone. And given that much that is taught st school was discovered many years earlier, I can only assume that this was well understood long before I was introduced to it. Brother Brian

Moreover, this 'positional information' that is somehow coming into the developing embryo, ‘from the outside’, by some ‘non-material’ method, and that is also constraining organisms to be so far out of thermodynamic equilibrium during their lifetime, is also now found to be optimal. As the following recent 2019 article stated, "It’s now known that some form of positional information makes genes variously switch on and off throughout the embryo, giving cells distinct identities based on their location.,,, when researchers have been able to appropriately determine what cells are doing, many have been surprised to see clear indications of optimization.,,,”

The Math That Tells Cells What They Are - March 13, 2019 Excerpt: It’s now known that some form of positional information makes genes variously switch on and off throughout the embryo, giving cells distinct identities based on their location.,,, That mounting evidence is leading some biologists to a bold hypothesis: that where information is concerned, cells might often find solutions to life’s challenges that are not just good but optimal — that cells extract as much useful information from their complex surroundings as is theoretically possible.,,, when researchers have been able to appropriately determine what cells are doing, many have been surprised to see clear indications of optimization.,,, “I don’t think optimization is an aesthetic or philosophical idea. It’s a very concrete idea,” Bialek said.,,, https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-math-that-tells-cells-what-they-are-20190313/

"Optimal" is not just some word that they are carelessly tossing around. When they describe a biological system as being in a 'optimal' state, they mean exactly what they are saying. As the following article states, "Scientists have identified and mathematically anatomized an array of cases where optimization has left its fastidious mark, among them;,, the precision response in a fruit fly embryo to contouring molecules that help distinguish tail from head;,,, In each instance, biophysicists have calculated, the system couldn’t get faster, more sensitive or more efficient without first relocating to an alternate universe with alternate physical constants."

William Bialek: More Perfect Than We Imagined - March 23, 2013 Excerpt: photoreceptor cells that carpet the retinal tissue of the eye and respond to light, are not just good or great or phabulous at their job. They are not merely exceptionally impressive by the standards of biology, with whatever slop and wiggle room the animate category implies. Photoreceptors operate at the outermost boundary allowed by the laws of physics, which means they are as good as they can be, period. Each one is designed to detect and respond to single photons of light — the smallest possible packages in which light comes wrapped. “Light is quantized, and you can’t count half a photon,” said William Bialek, a professor of physics and integrative genomics at Princeton University. “This is as far as it goes.” … Scientists have identified and mathematically anatomized an array of cases where optimization has left its fastidious mark, among them;,, the precision response in a fruit fly embryo to contouring molecules that help distinguish tail from head;,,, In each instance, biophysicists have calculated, the system couldn’t get faster, more sensitive or more efficient without first relocating to an alternate universe with alternate physical constants. http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2013/03/william-bialek-more-perfect-than-we.html

Moreover, as the following article states, “There are a surprisingly limited number of ways a network could be constructed to perform perfect adaptation.”,,, Moreover, the "amazing and surprising" outcome of the study is applicable to any living organism or biochemical network of any size.,,,”

Math sheds light on how living cells 'think' - May 2, 2018 Excerpt: "Proteins form unfathomably complex networks of chemical reactions that allow cells to communicate and to 'think' --,,, "We could never hope to measure the full complexity of cellular networks -- the networks are simply too large and interconnected and their component proteins are too variable. "But mathematics provides a tool that allows us to explore how these networks might be constructed in order to perform as they do.,,, Dr Araujo's work has focused on the widely observed function called perfect adaptation -- the ability of a network to reset itself after it has been exposed to a new stimulus. "An example of perfect adaptation is our sense of smell," she said. "When exposed to an odour we will smell it initially but after a while it seems to us that the odour has disappeared, even though the chemical, the stimulus, is still present. "Our sense of smell has exhibited perfect adaptation. This process allows it to remain sensitive to further changes in our environment so that we can detect both very faint and very strong odours. "This kind of adaptation is essentially what takes place inside living cells all the time. Cells are exposed to signals -- hormones, growth factors, and other chemicals -- and their proteins will tend to react and respond initially, but then settle down to pre-stimulus levels of activity even though the stimulus is still there. "I studied all the possible ways a network can be constructed and found that to be capable of this perfect adaptation in a robust way, a network has to satisfy an extremely rigid set of mathematical principles. There are a surprisingly limited number of ways a network could be constructed to perform perfect adaptation.,,, Professor Lance Liotta, said the "amazing and surprising" outcome of Dr Araujo's study is applicable to any living organism or biochemical network of any size.,,, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180502094636.htm

On top of all that, and most importantly, this massive ammount of 'optimal' positional information that is somehow coming into the developing embryos "from the outside by some non-material method', and which is constraining our bodies to be so far out of thermodynamic equilibrium, is also found to be a property of an observer who describes the system. In establishing this point, in the following 2010 experimental realization of Maxwell’s demon thought experiment, it was demonstrated that knowledge of a particle's location and/or position turns information into energy.

Maxwell's demon demonstration turns information into energy - November 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 the demon creates a temperature difference simply from information about the gas molecule temperatures and without transferring any energy directly to them.,,, 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. As the particle traveled up the staircase it gained energy from moving to an area of higher potential, and the team was able to measure precisely how much energy had been converted from information. http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-maxwell-demon-energy.html

And as the following 2010 article stated about the preceding experiment, "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

And as the following 2011 article states, "In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object's entropy is always dependent on the observer. Applied to the example of deleting data, this means that if two individuals delete data in a memory and one has more knowledge of this data, she perceives the memory to have lower entropy and can then delete the memory using less energy.,,,"

Quantum knowledge cools computers: New understanding of entropy - June 1, 2011 Excerpt: Recent research by a team of physicists,,, describe,,, how the deletion of data, under certain conditions, can create a cooling effect instead of generating heat. The cooling effect appears when the strange quantum phenomenon of entanglement is invoked.,,, The new study revisits Landauer's principle for cases when the values of the bits to be deleted may be known. When the memory content is known, it should be possible to delete the bits in such a manner that it is theoretically possible to re-create them. It has previously been shown that such reversible deletion would generate no heat. In the new paper, the researchers go a step further. They show that when the bits to be deleted are quantum-mechanically entangled with the state of an observer, then the observer could even withdraw heat from the system while deleting the bits. Entanglement links the observer's state to that of the computer in such a way that they know more about the memory than is possible in classical physics.,,, In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object's entropy is always dependent on the observer. Applied to the example of deleting data, this means that if two individuals delete data in a memory and one has more knowledge of this data, she perceives the memory to have lower entropy and can then delete the memory using less energy.,,, No heat, even a cooling effect; In the case of perfect classical knowledge of a computer memory (zero entropy), deletion of the data requires in theory no energy at all. The researchers prove that "more than complete knowledge" from quantum entanglement with the memory (negative entropy) leads to deletion of the data being accompanied by removal of heat from the computer and its release as usable energy. This is the physical meaning of negative entropy. Renner emphasizes, however, "This doesn't mean that we can develop a perpetual motion machine." The data can only be deleted once, so there is no possibility to continue to generate energy. The process also destroys the entanglement, and it would take an input of energy to reset the system to its starting state. The equations are consistent with what's known as the second law of thermodynamics: the idea that the entropy of the universe can never decrease. Vedral says "We're working on the edge of the second law. If you go any further, you will break it." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110601134300.htm

And as 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/

Again to repeat that last sentence, “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: “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/

That statement is just fascinating! Why in blue blazes should the finely tuned entropic actions of the universe, entropic actions which happen to explain time itself, even care how I am describing them unless consciousness and/or immaterial mind really is more foundational to reality than the finely tuned 1 in 10^10^123 entropy of the universe is? To state the obvious, this finding of entropy being “a property of an observer who describes a system” is very friendly to a Mind First, and/or to a Theistic view of reality. Moreover, since some ‘outside observer’ who is outside the space-time of the universe, is required in order to give us an adequate causal account so as to explain how it is even possible for this immense amount of positional information to somehow be coming into the developing embryo ‘from the outside’, by some ‘non-material’ method, then the reductive materialism explanations of Darwinism are further found to be a grossly inadequate in order to account for biological life. On the other hand, Christian Theism just so happens to give us an adequate causal account for exactly Who this outside observer might be Who is imparting this immense amount of positional information into developing embryos. As Hebrews chapter 4 verse 13 states, “And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”

Hebrews 4:13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

And as Psalm 139:13-14 states,

Psalm 139:13-14 For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, And that my soul knows very well.

Here are few more verses to further get this point across:

Acts 17:28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ John 1:1-4 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.

bornagain77

Moreover, the failure of reductive materialism to be able to give an adequate account for the basic form of any particular living organism occurs at a very low level. Much lower than DNA itself. In the following article entitled 'Quantum physics problem proved unsolvable: Gödel and Turing enter quantum physics', which studied the derivation of macroscopic properties from a complete microscopic description, the researchers remarked that even a perfect and complete description of the microscopic properties of a material is not enough to predict its macroscopic behaviour.,,, The researchers further commented that their findings “challenge the reductionists' point of view, as the insurmountable difficulty lies precisely in the derivation of macroscopic properties from a microscopic description."

Quantum physics problem proved unsolvable: Gödel and Turing enter quantum physics - December 9, 2015 Excerpt: A mathematical problem underlying fundamental questions in particle and quantum physics is provably unsolvable,,, It is the first major problem in physics for which such a fundamental limitation could be proven. The findings are important because they show that even a perfect and complete description of the microscopic properties of a material is not enough to predict its macroscopic behaviour.,,, "We knew about the possibility of problems that are undecidable in principle since the works of Turing and Gödel in the 1930s," added Co-author Professor Michael Wolf from Technical University of Munich. "So far, however, this only concerned the very abstract corners of theoretical computer science and mathematical logic. No one had seriously contemplated this as a possibility right in the heart of theoretical physics before. But our results change this picture. From a more philosophical perspective, they also challenge the reductionists' point of view, as the insurmountable difficulty lies precisely in the derivation of macroscopic properties from a microscopic description." http://phys.org/news/2015-12-quantum-physics-problem-unsolvable-godel.html

As is hopefully clear to see by now, the, what is termed the 'positional information' of any particular organism simply is not reducible to the sequential information that is encoded on DNA as is presupposed within the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinian thought. In fact, as is also hopefully clear to see by now, we must appeal to a 'beyond space and time' cause in order to give an adequate account for massive amount of quantum entanglement/information that characterizes this non-reducible positional information within organisms. To develop this line of thought further, at about the 41:00 minute mark of the following video, Dr. Wells, using a branch of mathematics called category theory, demonstrates that, during embryological development, ‘positional information’ must somehow be added to the developing embryo, ‘from the outside’, by some ‘non-material’ method, in order to explain the transdifferentiation of cells into multiple different states during embryological development.

Design Beyond DNA: A Conversation with Dr. Jonathan Wells – video (41:00 minute mark) – January 2017 https://youtu.be/ASAaANVBoiE?t=2484

The amount of ‘positional information’ that is somehow coming into a developing embryo from the outside by some non-material method is immense. Vastly outstripping, by many orders of magnitude, the amount of sequential information that is contained within DNA itself. As Doug Axe states in the following video, “there are a quadrillion neural connections in the human brain, that’s vastly more neural connections in the human brain than there are bits (of information) in the human genome. So,,, there’s got to be something else going on that makes us what we are.”

“There is also a presumption, typically when we talk about our genome, (that the genome) is a blueprint for making us. And that is actually not a proven fact in biology. That is an assumption. And (one) that I question because I don’t think that 4 billion bases, which would be 8 billion bits of information, that you would actually have enough information to specify a human being. If you consider for example that there are a quadrillion neural connections in the human brain, that’s vastly more neural connections in the human brain than there are bits (of information) in the human genome. So,,, there’s got to be something else going on that makes us what we are.” Doug Axe – Intelligent Design 3.0 – Stephen C. Meyer – video https://youtu.be/lgs6J4LqeqI?t=4575

And as the following article states, the information to build a human infant, atom by atom, would take up the equivalent of enough thumb drives to fill the Titanic, multiplied by 2,000.

In a TED Talk, (the Question You May Not Ask,,, Where did the information come from?) – November 29, 2017 Excerpt: Sabatini is charming.,,, he deploys some memorable images. He points out that the information to build a human infant, atom by atom, would take up the equivalent of enough thumb drives to fill the Titanic, multiplied by 2,000. Later he wheels out the entire genome, in printed form, of a human being,,,,: [F]or the first time in history, this is the genome of a specific human, printed page-by-page, letter-by-letter: 262,000 pages of information, 450 kilograms.,,, https://evolutionnews.org/2017/11/in-a-ted-talk-heres-the-question-you-may-not-ask/ Will Teleportation Ever Be Possible? - video - 2013 https://youtu.be/yfePpMTbFYY?t=76 Quote from video: "There are 10^28 atoms in the human body.,, The amount of data contained in the whole human,, is 3.02 x 10^32 gigabytes of information. Using a high bandwidth transfer that data would take about 4.5 x 10^18 years to teleport 1 time. That is 350,000 times the age of the universe."

As to how thermodynamics itself relates to this immense amount of positional information that is somehow coming into the developing embryo from the outside by some non-material method, work done on bacteria can give us a small glimpse into just how far out of thermodynamic equilibrium multicellular organisms actually are. The information content that is found to be in a simple one cell bacterium, when working from the thermodynamic perspective, is found to be around 10 to the 12 bits,,,

Biophysics – Information theory. Relation between information and entropy: - Setlow-Pollard, Ed. Addison Wesley Excerpt: Linschitz gave the figure 9.3 x 10^12 cal/deg or 9.3 x 10^12 x 4.2 joules/deg for the entropy of a bacterial cell. Using the relation H = S/(k In 2), we find that the information content is 4 x 10^12 bits. Morowitz' deduction from the work of Bayne-Jones and Rhees gives the lower value of 5.6 x 10^11 bits, which is still in the neighborhood of 10^12 bits. Thus two quite different approaches give rather concordant figures. http://www.astroscu.unam.mx/~angel/tsb/molecular.htm

,,, Which is equivalent of 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. 'In comparison,,, the largest libraries in the world,, have about 10 million volumes or 10^12 bits.”

“a one-celled bacterium, e. coli, is estimated to contain the equivalent of 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. Expressed in information in science jargon, this would be the same as 10^12 bits of information. In comparison, the total writings from classical Greek Civilization is only 10^9 bits, and the largest libraries in the world – The British Museum, Oxford Bodleian Library, New York Public Library, Harvard Widenier Library, and the Moscow Lenin Library – have about 10 million volumes or 10^12 bits.” – R. C. Wysong - The Creation-evolution Controversy 'The information content of a simple cell has been estimated as around 10^12 bits, comparable to about a hundred million pages of the Encyclopedia Britannica." Carl Sagan, "Life" in Encyclopedia Britannica: Macropaedia (1974 ed.), pp. 893-894

Thus since Bacterial cells are about 10 times smaller than most plant and animal cells.

Size Comparisons of Bacteria, Amoeba, Animal & Plant Cells Excerpt: Bacterial cells are very small - about 10 times smaller than most plant and animal cells. https://education.seattlepi.com/size-comparisons-bacteria-amoeba-animal-plant-cells-4966.html

And since there are conservatively estimated to be around 30 trillion cells in the average human body,

Revised Estimates for the Number of Human and Bacteria Cells in the Body - 2016 Abstract: Reported values in the literature on the number of cells in the body differ by orders of magnitude and are very seldom supported by any measurements or calculations. Here, we integrate the most up-to-date information on the number of human and bacterial cells in the body. We estimate the total number of bacteria in the 70 kg "reference man" to be 3.8·10^13. For human cells, we identify the dominant role of the hematopoietic lineage to the total count (?90%) and revise past estimates to 3.0·10^13 human cells. Our analysis also updates the widely-cited 10:1 ratio, showing that the number of bacteria in the body is actually of the same order as the number of human cells, and their total mass is about 0.2 kg. https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002533

Then that gives us a rough ballpark estimate of around 300 trillion times 100 million pages of Encyclopedia Britannica. Or about 300 trillion times the information content contained within the books of the largest libraries in the world. Needless to say, that is a massive amount of positional information that is somehow coming into a developing embryo from the outside by some non-material method. bornagain77

A few more thoughts. I use to naively assume that the information content of a fertilized human egg cell, specifically the information encoded on the DNA of a fertilized human egg cell, was enough in and of itself to explain the entirety of embryological development. But I have now realized that I was wrong in my naive assumption. In making this point clear, it is first important to learn that many lines of evidence have now revealed that the biological form and/or shape of any particular organism is not reducible to the sequential information on DNA.

Darwinism vs Biological Form - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyNzNPgjM4w

In fact, not only does the sequential information on DNA not control the biological form and/or shape of any particular organism, the sequential information on DNA does not even control the shape of the DNA molecule itself. As the following article states, “Our results demonstrate that the spatial organization of genomes is tissue-specific and point to a role for tissue-specific spatial genome organization in the formation of recurrent chromosome arrangements among tissues.”

Tissue-specific spatial organization of genomes - June 21, 2004 Results Using two-dimensional and three-dimensional fluorescence in situ hybridization we have carried out a systematic analysis of the spatial positioning of a subset of mouse chromosomes in several tissues. We show that chromosomes exhibit tissue-specific organization. Chromosomes are distributed tissue-specifically with respect to their position relative to the center of the nucleus and also relative to each other. Subsets of chromosomes form distinct types of spatial clusters in different tissues and the relative distance between chromosome pairs varies among tissues. Consistent with the notion that nonrandom spatial proximity is functionally relevant in determining the outcome of chromosome translocation events, we find a correlation between tissue-specific spatial proximity and tissue-specific translocation prevalence. Conclusions Our results demonstrate that the spatial organization of genomes is tissue-specific and point to a role for tissue-specific spatial genome organization in the formation of recurrent chromosome arrangements among tissues. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC463291/

Likewise, the sequential information of any particular protein molecule does not even explain what final form and/or shape that a specific protein molecule may ultimately take. The following article reveals that the same sequence of amino acids can be folded differently to produce proteins with different three-dimensional shapes. Conversely, proteins with different amino acid sequences can be folded to produce similar shapes and functions.

Not Junk After All: Non-Protein-Coding DNA Carries Extensive Biological Information – Jonathan Wells – May 2013 Conclusion:,, Protein function depends on three-dimensional shape, and the same sequence of amino acids can be folded differently to produce proteins with different three-dimensional shapes [144–147]. Conversely, proteins with different amino acid sequences can be folded to produce similar shapes and functions [148,149]. Many scientists have pointed out that the relationship between the genome and the organism – the genotype-phenotype mapping = cannot be reduced to a genetic program encoded in DNA sequences. http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/pdf/10.1142/9789814508728_0009

Moreover, protein folding itself is an unresolved enigma for the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinists. As the following article states, "the Levinthal paradox states that when one calculates the number of possible topological (rotational) configurations for the amino acids in even a small (say, 100 residue) unfolded protein, random search could never find the final folded conformation of that same protein during the lifetime of the physical universe."

The Humpty-Dumpty Effect: A Revolutionary Paper with Far-Reaching Implications - Paul Nelson - October 23, 2012 Excerpt: Put simply, the Levinthal paradox states that when one calculates the number of possible topological (rotational) configurations for the amino acids in even a small (say, 100 residue) unfolded protein, random search could never find the final folded conformation of that same protein during the lifetime of the physical universe. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/10/a_revolutionary065521.html

But as the following article states, the unresolved enigma for how a protein might achieve its basic 3-dimensional form, can be easily explained if the process of folding is a quantum affair.

Physicists Discover Quantum Law of Protein Folding – February 22, 2011 Quantum mechanics finally explains why protein folding depends on temperature in such a strange way. Excerpt: First, a little background on protein folding. Proteins are long chains of amino acids that become biologically active only when they fold into specific, highly complex shapes. The puzzle is how proteins do this so quickly when they have so many possible configurations to choose from. To put this in perspective, a relatively small protein of only 100 amino acids can take some 10^100 different configurations. If it tried these shapes at the rate of 100 billion a second, it would take longer than the age of the universe to find the correct one. Just how these molecules do the job in nanoseconds, nobody knows.,,, Today, Luo and Lo say these curves can be easily explained if the process of folding is a quantum affair. By conventional thinking, a chain of amino acids can only change from one shape to another by mechanically passing through various shapes in between. But Luo and Lo say that if this process were a quantum one, the shape could change by quantum transition, meaning that the protein could ‘jump’ from one shape to another without necessarily forming the shapes in between.,,, Their astonishing result is that this quantum transition model fits the folding curves of 15 different proteins and even explains the difference in folding and unfolding rates of the same proteins. That's a significant breakthrough. Luo and Lo's equations amount to the first universal laws of protein folding. That’s the equivalent in biology to something like the thermodynamic laws in physics. http://www.technologyreview.com/view/423087/physicists-discover-quantum-law-of-protein/

What makes this 'quantum affair' of protein folding troubling for Darwinists, or more particularly, troubling for the reductive materialistic explanations of Darwinists, is that "quantum correlations somehow arise from outside space-time, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,,,"

Looking beyond space and time to cope with quantum theory – 29 October 2012 Excerpt: “Our result gives weight to the idea that quantum correlations somehow arise from outside spacetime, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,” http://www.quantumlah.org/highlight/121029_hidden_influences.php

Simply put, Darwinists, with their reductive materialism, have no cause that they can appeal to whereas I, as a Christian Theist, do have a cause that I can appeal to.

Colossians 1:17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

In fact, besides proteins, "quantum criticality is now found in a wide range of important biomolecules,,,"

Quantum criticality in a wide range of important biomolecules – Mar. 6, 2015 Excerpt: “Most of the molecules taking part actively in biochemical processes are tuned exactly to the transition point and are critical conductors,” they say. That’s a discovery that is as important as it is unexpected. “These findings suggest an entirely new and universal mechanism of conductance in biology very different from the one used in electrical circuits.” The permutations of possible energy levels of biomolecules is huge so the possibility of finding even one (biomolecule) that is in the quantum critical state by accident is mind-bogglingly small and, to all intents and purposes, impossible.,, of the order of 10^-50 of possible small biomolecules and even less for proteins,”,,, “what exactly is the advantage that criticality confers?” https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/the-origin-of-life-and-the-hidden-role-of-quantum-criticality-ca4707924552

Moreover, due to there being a massive amount of quantum entanglement and/or quantum information within the molecular biology of living organisms, it is now known that there is far less ‘random thermodynamic jostling’ within living organisms than was originally presupposed within the reductive materialistic framework that undergirds Darwinian thought:

Darwinian Materialism vs. Quantum Biology – video https://youtu.be/LHdD2Am1g5Y

As Jim Al-Khalili states in the following video, “living matter seems to behave in its order and its structure just like inanimate matter cooled down to near absolute zero.”

“To paraphrase, (Erwin Schrödinger in his book “What Is Life”), he says at the molecular level living organisms have a certain order. A structure to them that’s very different from the random thermodynamic jostling of atoms and molecules in inanimate matter of the same complexity. In fact, living matter seems to behave in its order and its structure just like inanimate matter cooled down to near absolute zero. Where quantum effects play a very important role. There is something special about the structure, about the order, inside a living cell. So Schrodinger speculated that maybe quantum mechanics plays a role in life”. Jim Al-Khalili – Quantum biology – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOzCkeTPR3Q

bornagain77

BA77 @ #12 'The issue is psychiatric. We have a highly accomplished physicist, who regards the existence of God as preposterous, asserting that the unceasing creation of infinite numbers of new universes by every atom in the cosmos at every moment is actually happening (as we speak!), and that it is a perfectly rational and sane inference. People have been prescribed anti-psychotic drugs for less. Now of course Carroll isn’t crazy, not in any medical way. He’s merely given his assent to a crazy ideology — atheist materialism.' Same difference ! Crazy is as crazy does. You were right the frst time. He's as mad as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking-chairs, BA. Don't take my word for it. Ask his dear, old, long-suffering granny in County Tipperary. Axel

How interesting that that second law of thermodynamics should be so quintessentially Judaeo-Christian. Drawing order from chaos - a duty delegated to us. Even the '2' is evocative of the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity ; a figure that I believe even atheist Linus Pauling noted cropped up with extraordinary regularity in biology. Axel

Darwinists try to get around the obvious contradiction in principles, between the second law and Darwinism, by appealing to what is known as the 'compensation argument'. To say that the compensation argument is less than satisfying is to make a severe understatement,

On “compensating” entropy decreases - Granville Sewell Mathematics Department, University of Texas El Paso, El Paso, Texas 79968, USA - 2017 Abstract: The “compensation" argument, widely used to dismiss the claim that evolution violates the more general statements of the second law of thermodynamics, is based on the idea that there is a single quantity called “entropy" which measures disorder of all types. This article shows that there is no such total entropy, and that the compensation argument is not a valid way to dismiss the claim that evolution violates the second law. Note that the article does not argue that evolution violates the second law, only that the compensation argument is logically invalid. http://www.math.utep.edu/Faculty/sewell/articles/pe_sewell.pdf

Moreover, unlike the evidence free just-so story telling of Darwinists, Dr. Sewell actually has empirical evidence backing up his claim that the compensation argument is without any true foundation in science. Specifically, empirical evidence and numerous numerical simulations tell us that “Genetic Entropy”, i.e. the tendency of biological systems to drift towards decreasing complexity, and decreasing information content, holds true as an overriding rule for biological adaptations over long periods of time:

“The First Rule of Adaptive Evolution”: Break or blunt any functional coded element whose loss would yield a net fitness gain – Michael Behe – December 2010 Excerpt: In its most recent issue The Quarterly Review of Biology has published a review by myself of laboratory evolution experiments of microbes going back four decades.,,, The gist of the paper is that so far the overwhelming number of adaptive (that is, helpful) mutations seen in laboratory evolution experiments are either loss or modification of function. Of course we had already known that the great majority of mutations that have a visible effect on an organism are deleterious. Now, surprisingly, it seems that even the great majority of helpful mutations degrade the genome to a greater or lesser extent.,,, I dub it “The First Rule of Adaptive Evolution”: Break or blunt any functional coded element whose loss would yield a net fitness gain. http://behe.uncommondescent.com/2010/12/the-first-rule-of-adaptive-evolution/ Genetic Entropy – references to several peer reviewed numerical simulations analyzing and falsifying all flavors of Darwinian evolution,, (via John Sanford and company) http://www.geneticentropy.org/#!properties/ctzx Also see Dr. Behe's new book "Darwin Devolves"

In their compensation argument, Darwinists claim that the second law of thermodynamics does not contradict Darwinian evolution as long as you have energy entering the ‘open system’. In this case the open system is the Earth. Yet, one of things that Darwinists do not tell you is that the energy allowed to enter the atmosphere of the Earth is constrained, i.e. finely-tuned, to 1 trillionth of a trillionth of the entire electromagnetic spectrum:

8:12 minute mark,,, “These specific frequencies of light (that enable plants to manufacture food and astronomers to observe the cosmos) represent less than 1 trillionth of a trillionth (10^-24) of the universe’s entire range of electromagnetic emissions.” Fine tuning of Light, Atmosphere, and Water to Photosynthesis (etc..) – video (2016) – https://youtu.be/NIwZqDkrj9I?t=384

Moreover, even though the energy allowed to enter the atmosphere of the Earth is constrained, i.e. finely-tuned, to 1 trillionth of a trillionth of the entire electromagnetic spectrum, that still does not fully negate the disordering effects of pouring raw energy into an open system. The disordering effect of raw energy is made evident by the fact that objects left in a warm sunny environment are known to deteriorate much more quickly than objects that are left in a cold environment. The following video, at the 46 minute mark, clearly illustrates that just pouring raw energy into a ‘open system’ actually accelerates the rate in which a system deteriorates

Thermodynamic Arguments for Creation – Thomas Kindell (46:39 minute mark) – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1yto0-z2bQ&feature=player_detailpage#t=2799

To offset this disordering effect that raw energy has on objects, the raw energy from the sun, which I remind is already finely-tuned to 1 in 10^24, must be further processed to be of biological utility. This harnessing of raw energy is accomplished in biology by the elaborate process of photosynthesis which converts sunlight into ATP. To say that the elaborate process of photosynthesis defies Darwinian explanations is to make another dramatic understatement:

Evolutionary biology: Out of thin air John F. Allen & William Martin: The measure of the problem is here: “Oxygenetic photosynthesis involves about 100 proteins that are highly ordered within the photosynthetic membranes of the cell.” http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v445/n7128/full/445610a.html

Moreover, in regards to how entropy relates to biology in particular, advances in quantum biology have now shown that Darwinists are not even on the correct theoretical foundation to properly understand biology and entropy in the first place

Darwinian Materialism vs. Quantum Biology - video https://youtu.be/LHdD2Am1g5Y

As Jim Al-Khalili at the 6:52 minute mark of the following video states, "living organisms have a certain order. A structure to them that’s very different from the random thermodynamic jostling of atoms and molecules in inanimate matter of the same complexity. In fact, living matter seems to behave in its order and its structure just like inanimate matter cooled down to near absolute zero. Where quantum effects play a very important role. There is something special about the structure, about the order, inside a living cell."

",,and Physicists and Chemists have had a long time to try and get use to it (Quantum Mechanics). Biologists, on the other hand have got off lightly in my view. They are very happy with their balls and sticks models of molecules. The balls are the atoms. The sticks are the bonds between the atoms. And when they can't build them physically in the lab nowadays they have very powerful computers that will simulate a huge molecule.,, It doesn't really require much in the way of quantum mechanics in the way to explain it." At the 6:52 minute mark of the video, Jim Al-Khalili goes on to state: “To paraphrase, (Erwin Schrödinger in his book “What Is Life”), he says at the molecular level living organisms have a certain order. A structure to them that’s very different from the random thermodynamic jostling of atoms and molecules in inanimate matter of the same complexity. In fact, living matter seems to behave in its order and its structure just like inanimate matter cooled down to near absolute zero. Where quantum effects play a very important role. There is something special about the structure, about the order, inside a living cell. So Schrodinger speculated that maybe quantum mechanics plays a role in life”. Jim Al-Khalili – Quantum biology – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOzCkeTPR3Q

Thus not only do Darwinists apparently not have nearly a good understanding of the second law as they falsely imagine themselves to have, but their supposedly 'good understanding' of exactly how the second law was suppose to operate within biology, i.e. "the random thermodynamic jostling of atoms and molecules", has now been empirically shown to be completely wrong. It is amazing how easily, and how often, Darwinists are led completely astray into completely false foundational presuppositions by their apriori acceptance of Darwinian evolution as a somehow unquestionable axiom within science. Extreme gullibility must be a prerequisite for being a Darwinist. As the bible itself states,,,

Romans 1:22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools,

bornagain77

Apparently some people with a self-proclaimed good understanding of the second law somehow think that the general principle behind the second law,,, i.e. the "natural tendency of any isolated system to degenerate into a more disordered state.,,,"

What is the Second Law of Thermodynamics? By Jim Lucas - May 22, 2015 Excerpt: The Second Law also states that there is a natural tendency of any isolated system to degenerate into a more disordered state.,,, The Second Law also predicts the end of the universe, according to Boston University. "It implies that the universe will end in a ‘heat death’ in which everything is at the same temperature. This is the ultimate level of disorder; http://physics.bu.edu/~duffy/py105/Secondlaw.html

Apparently some people with a self proclaimed good understanding of the second law somehow think that the general principle behind the second law does not contradict the general principle behind Darwinian evolution,, of "complex creatures evolve from more simplistic ancestors naturally over time."

Darwin's Theory Of Evolution Excerpt: Darwin's general theory presumes the development of life from non-life and stresses a purely naturalistic (undirected) "descent with modification". That is, complex creatures evolve from more simplistic ancestors naturally over time. https://www.darwins-theory-of-evolution.com/

If some people with a self proclaimed good understanding of the second law really think that those two principles do not contradict each other, might I suggest their supposedly 'good understanding' of the second law is not nearly as good as they have deluded themselves into believing it is? As Granville Sewell asks, "So, how does the spontaneous rearrangement of matter on a rocky, barren, planet into human brains and spaceships and jet airplanes and nuclear power plants and libraries full of science texts and novels, and supercomputers running partial differential equation solving software , represent a less obvious or less spectacular violation of the second law—or at least of the fundamental natural principle behind this law—than tornados turning rubble into houses and cars? Can anyone even imagine a more spectacular violation?"

Why Tornados Running Backward do not Violate the Second Law – Granville Sewell Professor of Mathematics at University of Texas – El Paso – May 2012 – article with video Excerpt: So, how does the spontaneous rearrangement of matter on a rocky, barren, planet into human brains and spaceships and jet airplanes and nuclear power plants and libraries full of science texts and novels, and supercomputers running partial differential equation solving software , represent a less obvious or less spectacular violation of the second law—or at least of the fundamental natural principle behind this law—than tornados turning rubble into houses and cars? Can anyone even imagine a more spectacular violation? https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/why-tornados-running-backward-do-not-violate-the-second-law/ Video: Why Evolution is Different – Granville Sewell – April 7, 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_nlfaXU46Y

And please note that the principle behind the second law, i.e. entropy, actually IS A LAW of science whereas the principle behind Darwinian evolution, i.e. simple to more and more complex, certainly IS NOT A LAW of science. In fact, there have never been any known universal laws in science that have ever corresponded to what Darwinists claim for their theory. And is thus other primary reason why Darwinian evolution fails to even qualify as a testable, potentially falsifiable, science. As Ernst Mayr himself conceded, “In biology, as several other people have shown, and I totally agree with them, there are no natural laws in biology corresponding to the natural laws of the physical sciences.”

The Evolution of Ernst: Interview with Ernst Mayr – 2004 (page 2 of 14) Excerpt: biology (Darwinian Evolution) differs from the physical sciences in that in the physical sciences, all theories, I don’t know exceptions so I think it’s probably a safe statement, all theories are based somehow or other on natural laws. In biology, as several other people have shown, and I totally agree with them, there are no natural laws in biology corresponding to the natural laws of the physical sciences. ,,, And so that’s what I do in this book. I show that the theoretical basis, you might call it, or I prefer to call it the philosophy of biology, has a totally different basis than the theories of physics. https://www.scientificamerican.com/media/pdf/0004D8E1-178C-10EB-978C83414B7F012C.pdf

In the following article, Roger Highfield makes much the same observation as Ernst Mayr and states, ,,, Whatever the case, those universal truths—’laws’—that physicists and chemists all rely upon appear relatively absent from biology.

WHAT SCIENTIFIC IDEA IS READY FOR RETIREMENT? Evolution is True – Roger Highfield – January 2014 Excerpt: If evolutionary biologists are really Seekers of the Truth, they need to focus more on finding the mathematical regularities of biology, following in the giant footsteps of Sewall Wright, JBS Haldane, Ronald Fisher and so on. ,,, Whatever the case, those universal truths—’laws’—that physicists and chemists all rely upon appear relatively absent from biology. Little seems to have changed from a decade ago when the late and great John Maynard Smith wrote a chapter on evolutionary game theory for a book on the most powerful equations of science: his contribution did not include a single equation. http://www.edge.org/response-detail/25468

Professor Murray Eden of MIT, in a paper entitled “Inadequacies of Neo-Darwinian Evolution as a Scientific Theory” stated that “the randomness postulate is highly implausible and that an adequate scientific theory of evolution must await the discovery and elucidation of new natural laws—physical, physico-chemical, and biological.”

“It is our contention that if ‘random’ is given a serious and crucial interpretation from a probabilistic point of view, the randomness postulate is highly implausible and that an adequate scientific theory of evolution must await the discovery and elucidation of new natural laws—physical, physico-chemical, and biological.” Murray Eden, “Inadequacies of Neo-Darwinian Evolution as a Scientific Theory,” Mathematical Challenges to the Neo-Darwinian Interpretation of Evolution, editors Paul S. Moorhead and Martin M. Kaplan, June 1967, p. 109. https://people.eecs.berkeley.edu/~christos/evol/compevol_files/Wistar-Eden-1.pdf

bornagain77

Brother Brian- No one says that the second law of thermodynamics and evolution are incompatible. It refers to BLUIND WATCHMAKER evolution. And anyone who thinks that BWE can produce new proteins via new genes has a very poor understanding of the mechanisms behind BWE. Also the claims of BWE are untestable and as such outside of science. The point is it doesn't matter about the second law. BWE is total nonsense. And it is always deceitful and equivocating cowards who switch the context from "Darwinian evolution" to "evolution". ET

BA77

Over the years here on UD, Gordon Davisson has also often times tried to unsuccessfully defend his Darwinian belief that the second law of thermodynamics, entropy, is somehow not incompatible with Darwinian evolution, (or at least defend the possibility that entropy is not directly defeating to Darwinism).

GD

“Unsuccessful” only in the sense that I haven’t convinced you.

I think this is a very accurate statement of the case. In my experience, those who think that the second law of thermodynamics and evolution are incompatible either have a very poor understanding of thermodynamics and/or a very poor understanding of the mechanisms behind evolution. Rather than try to find BA77's argumement as to why they are incompatible maybe BA77 could summarize his argument in a couple short paragraphs. Brother Brian

For instance, this recent 2019 experimental confirmation of the “Wigner’s Friend” thought experiment established that “measurement results,, must be understood relative to the observer who performed the measurement”.

More Than One Reality Exists (in Quantum Physics) By Mindy Weisberger – March 20, 2019 Excerpt: “measurement results,, must be understood relative to the observer who performed the measurement”. https://www.livescience.com/65029-dueling-reality-photons.html

Moreover, although there have been several major loopholes in quantum mechanics over the past several decades that atheists have tried to appeal to in order to try to avoid the ‘spooky’ Theistic implications of quantum mechanics, over the past several years each of those major loopholes have each been closed one by one. The last remining major loophole that was left to be closed was the “setting independence” and/or the ‘free-will’ loophole:

Closing the ‘free will’ loophole: Using distant quasars to test Bell’s theorem – February 20, 2014 Excerpt: Though two major loopholes have since been closed, a third remains; physicists refer to it as “setting independence,” or more provocatively, “free will.” This loophole proposes that a particle detector’s settings may “conspire” with events in the shared causal past of the detectors themselves to determine which properties of the particle to measure — a scenario that, however far-fetched, implies that a physicist running the experiment does not have complete free will in choosing each detector’s setting. Such a scenario would result in biased measurements, suggesting that two particles are correlated more than they actually are, and giving more weight to quantum mechanics than classical physics. “It sounds creepy, but people realized that’s a logical possibility that hasn’t been closed yet,” says MIT’s David Kaiser, the Germeshausen Professor of the History of Science and senior lecturer in the Department of Physics. “Before we make the leap to say the equations of quantum theory tell us the world is inescapably crazy and bizarre, have we closed every conceivable logical loophole, even if they may not seem plausible in the world we know today?” https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140220112515.htm

And yet now Anton Zeilinger and company have recently, as of 2018, pushed the ‘free will loophole’ back to 7.8 billion years ago, thereby firmly establishing the ‘common sense’ fact that the free will choices of the experimenter in the quantum experiments are truly free and are not determined by any possible causal influences from the past for at least the last 7.8 billion years, and that experimenters themselves are therefore shown to be truly free to choose whatever measurement settings in the experiments that he or she may so desire to choose so as to ‘logically’ probe whatever aspect of reality that he or she may be interested in probing.

Cosmic Bell Test Using Random Measurement Settings from High-Redshift Quasars – Anton Zeilinger – 14 June 2018 Abstract: In this Letter, we present a cosmic Bell experiment with polarization-entangled photons, in which measurement settings were determined based on real-time measurements of the wavelength of photons from high-redshift quasars, whose light was emitted billions of years ago; the experiment simultaneously ensures locality. Assuming fair sampling for all detected photons and that the wavelength of the quasar photons had not been selectively altered or previewed between emission and detection, we observe statistically significant violation of Bell’s inequality by 9.3 standard deviations, corresponding to an estimated p value of ? 7.4 × 10^21. This experiment pushes back to at least ? 7.8 Gyr ago the most recent time by which any local-realist influences could have exploited the “freedom-of-choice” loophole to engineer the observed Bell violation, excluding any such mechanism from 96% of the space-time volume of the past light cone of our experiment, extending from the big bang to today. https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.080403

Moreover, here is another recent interesting experiment by Anton Zeilinger, (and about 70 other researchers), that insured the complete independence of the measurement settings in a Bell test by using the free will choices of 100,000 human participants instead of having a super fast randomizer determine the measurement settings (as is usually done in these quantum experiments).

Challenging local realism with human choices – A. Zeilinger – 20 May 2018 Abstract: A Bell test, which challenges the philosophical worldview of local realism against experimental observations, is a randomized trial requiring spatially-distributed entanglement, fast and high-efficiency detection, and unpredictable measurement settings. While technology can perfect the first two of these, and while technological randomness sources enable device-independent protocols based on Bell inequality violation, challenging local realism using physical randomizers inevitably makes assumptions about the same physics one aims to test. Bell himself noted this weakness of physical setting choices and argued that human free will could rigorously be used to assure unpredictability in Bell tests. Here we report a suite of local realism tests using human choices, avoiding assumptions about predictability in physics. We recruited ~100,000 human participants to play an online video game that incentivizes fast, sustained input of unpredictable bits while also illustrating Bell test methodology. The participants generated 97,347,490 binary choices, which were directed via a scalable web platform to twelve laboratories on five continents, in which 13 experiments tested local realism using photons, single atoms, atomic ensembles, and superconducting devices. Over a 12-hour period on the 30 Nov. 2016, participants worldwide provided a sustained flow of over 1000 bits/s to the experiments, which used different human-generated bits to choose each measurement setting. The observed correlations strongly contradict local realism and other realist positions in bi-partite and tri-partite scenarios. Project outcomes include closing of the freedom-of-choice loophole, gamification of statistical and quantum non-locality concepts, new methods for quantum-secured communications, a very large dataset of human-generated randomness, and networking techniques for global participation in experimental science. https://arxiv.org/abs/1805.04431

Thus regardless of how Steven Weinberg and other atheists may prefer the universe to behave, with the closing of the last remaining free will loophole in quantum mechanics, “humans are indeed brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level”, and thus these recent findings from quantum mechanics directly undermine, as Weinberg himself stated, the “vision that became possible after Darwin, of a world governed by impersonal physical laws that control human behavior along with everything else.” Of one final note, the denial of the reality of free will by atheists has always been a self-defeating argument for atheists to try to make.

Sam Harris’s Free Will: The Medial Pre-Frontal Cortex Did It – Martin Cothran – November 9, 2012 Excerpt: There is something ironic about the position of thinkers like Harris on issues like this: they claim that their position is the result of the irresistible necessity of logic (in fact, they pride themselves on their logic). Their belief is the consequent, in a ground/consequent relation between their evidence and their conclusion. But their very stated position is that any mental state — including their position on this issue — is the effect of a physical, not logical cause. By their own logic, it isn’t logic that demands their assent to the claim that free will is an illusion, but the prior chemical state of their brains. The only condition under which we could possibly find their argument convincing is if they are not true. The claim that free will is an illusion requires the possibility that minds have the freedom to assent to a logical argument, a freedom denied by the claim itself. It is an assent that must, in order to remain logical and not physiological, presume a perspective outside the physical order. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/11/sam_harriss_fre066221.html 1) rationality implies a thinker in control of thoughts. (2) under materialism a thinker is an effect caused by processes in the brain. (3) in order for materialism to ground rationality a thinker (an effect) must control processes in the brain (a cause). (1)&(2) (4) no effect can control its cause. Therefore materialism cannot ground rationality. per Box UD

But alas, even though the denial of the reality of his own free will renders any claim from the atheist that he is even making a logically coherent argument in the first place null and void, the atheist is apparently more than willing, so as to prevent a 'divine foot in the door', to forsake rationality itself just so that he does not have to accept the reality of God into his life. Basically, atheists, with their rejection of free will, have chosen insanity over sanity because of their apriori bias against God. So much for Godon's claim that I was being unfairly biased in my weighing of the evidence. Moreover, not only does the mental attribute of free will make its presence known in present day experiments is quantum mechanics, but also the mental attribute of the 'persistence of self identity through time', and/or 'the experience of the now' also makes its presence known in present day experiments in quantum mechanics, and indeed is what gives us a hand and glove fit for inferring that immaterial mind must be central to any correct understanding of quantum mechanics that we may wish to have. You can see that hand and glove fit between consciousness and quantum mechanics starting around the 9:30 minute mark of the following video:

How Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness Correlate https://youtu.be/4f0hL3Nrdas?t=569

Moreover, allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics, as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned,,,, (Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell, and Max Planck, to name a few of the Christian founders),,, and as quantum mechanics itself now empirically demands (with the closing of the free will loophole by Anton Zeilinger and company), rightly allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics provides us with a very plausible resolution for the much sought after ‘theory of everything’ in that Christ’s resurrection from the dead provides an empirically backed reconciliation, via the Shroud of Turin, between quantum mechanics and general relativity into the much sought after ‘Theory of Everything”.

(April 2019) Overturning the Copernican principle Thus in conclusion, the new interactive graph by Dr. Dembski provides a powerful independent line of evidence, along with several other powerful lines of evidence, that overturns the Copernican principle and restores humanity back to centrality in the universe, and even, when putting all those lines of evidence together, brings modern science back, full circle, to Christianity from whence it originated in the first place. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/bill-dembski-and-colleagues-create-an-updated-magnifying-the-universe-tool/#comment-675730 Colossians 1:15-22 The Supremacy of the Son of God 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. Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation—

bornagain77

Gordon Davisson states

"I think you should take a serious look at the possibility that it might be you that’s being blinded by your biases."

Really??? Too funny, a Darwinian atheist, of all people, asking someone else to consider the possibility that they may be blinded by their apriori biases? Speaking of which, since in your atheistic materialism there is no "I" and/or "you", (i.e. no agent causation and/or no immaterial minds), in the first place to take a serious look at anything, perhaps you care to tell us exactly how a person taking a serious look at anything can even be possible in your worldview?

Do You Like SETI? Fine, Then Let's Dump Methodological Naturalism - Paul Nelson - September 24, 2014 Excerpt: "Epistemology -- how we know -- and ontology -- what exists -- are both affected by methodological naturalism (MN). If we say, "We cannot know that a mind caused x," laying down an epistemological boundary defined by MN, then our ontology comprising real causes for x won't include minds. MN entails an ontology in which minds are the consequence of physics, and thus, can only be placeholders for a more detailed causal account in which physics is the only (ultimate) actor. You didn't write your email to me. Physics did, and informed you of that event after the fact. "That's crazy," you reply, "I certainly did write my email." Okay, then -- to what does the pronoun "I" in that sentence refer? Your personal agency; your mind. Are you supernatural?,,, You are certainly an intelligent cause, however, and your intelligence does not collapse into physics. (If it does collapse -- i.e., can be reduced without explanatory loss -- we haven't the faintest idea how, which amounts to the same thing.) To explain the effects you bring about in the world -- such as your email, a real pattern -- we must refer to you as a unique agent.,,, http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/09/do_you_like_set090071.html

Or perhaps you would care to try to explain how it is even possible in your atheistic worldview for the material brain to even contemplate immaterial mathematics in the first place?

What Does It Mean to Say That Science & Religion Conflict? - M. Anthony Mills - April 16, 2018 Excerpt: Barr rightly observes that scientific atheists often unwittingly assume not just metaphysical naturalism but an even more controversial philosophical position: reductive materialism, which says all that exists is or is reducible to the material constituents postulated by our most fundamental physical theories. As Barr points out, this implies not only that God does not exist — because God is not material — but that you do not exist. For you are not a material constituent postulated by any of our most fundamental physical theories; at best, you are an aggregate of those constituents, arranged in a particular way. Not just you, but tables, chairs, countries, countrymen, symphonies, jokes, legal contracts, moral judgments, and acts of courage or cowardice — all of these must be fully explicable in terms of those more fundamental, material constituents. In fact, more problematic for the materialist than the non-existence of persons is the existence of mathematics. Why? Although a committed materialist might be perfectly willing to accept that you do not really exist, he will have a harder time accepting that numbers do not exist. The trouble is that numbers — along with other mathematical entities such as classes, sets, and functions — are indispensable for modern science. And yet — here’s the rub — these “abstract objects” are not material. Thus, one cannot take science as the only sure guide to reality and at the same time discount disbelief in all immaterial realities. https://www.realclearreligion.org/articles/2018/04/16/what_does_it_mean_to_say_that_science_and_religion_conflict.html

As Berlinski rightly noted, “There is no argument against religion that is not also an argument against mathematics. Mathematicians are capable of grasping a world of objects that lies beyond space and time…

An Interview with David Berlinski - Jonathan Witt Berlinski: There is no argument against religion that is not also an argument against mathematics. Mathematicians are capable of grasping a world of objects that lies beyond space and time…. Interviewer:… Come again(?) … Berlinski: No need to come again: I got to where I was going the first time. The number four, after all, did not come into existence at a particular time, and it is not going to go out of existence at another time. It is neither here nor there. Nonetheless we are in some sense able to grasp the number by a faculty of our minds. Mathematical intuition is utterly mysterious. So for that matter is the fact that mathematical objects such as a Lie Group or a differentiable manifold have the power to interact with elementary particles or accelerating forces. But these are precisely the claims that theologians have always made as well – that human beings are capable by an exercise of their devotional abilities to come to some understanding of the deity; and the deity, although beyond space and time, is capable of interacting with material objects. http://tofspot.blogspot.com/2013/10/found-upon-web-and-reprinted-here.html

And as Godel himself noted, “Either mathematics is too big for the human mind or the human mind is more than a machine.”

“Either mathematics is too big for the human mind or the human mind is more than a machine.” - Kurt Godel

As well, Albert Einstein, of relativity fame, and Eugene Wigner, who won a Nobel prize for quantum symmetries, are both on record as to considering it a miracle that man is able to accurately model the universe using mathematics: Specifically, Einstein stated “You find it strange that I consider the comprehensibility of the world (to the extent that we are authorized to speak of such a comprehensibility) as a miracle or as an eternal mystery. Well, a priori, one should expect a chaotic world, which cannot be grasped by the mind in any way,,, That is the ‘miracle’ which is constantly reinforced as our knowledge expands.”

“You find it strange that I consider the comprehensibility of the world (to the extent that we are authorized to speak of such a comprehensibility) as a miracle or as an eternal mystery. Well, a priori, one should expect a chaotic world, which cannot be grasped by the mind in any way .. the kind of order created by Newton’s theory of gravitation, for example, is wholly different. Even if a man proposes the axioms of the theory, the success of such a project presupposes a high degree of ordering of the objective world, and this could not be expected a priori. That is the ‘miracle’ which is constantly reinforced as our knowledge expands. There lies the weakness of positivists and professional atheists who are elated because they feel that they have not only successfully rid the world of gods but “bared the miracles”. Oddly enough, we must be satisfied to acknowledge the “miracle” without there being any legitimate way for us to approach it.,,,” - Albert Einstein – On the Rational Order of the World: a Letter to Maurice Solovine - March 30, 1952 http://inters.org/Einstein-Letter-Solovine

And along that same line, Eugene Wigner stated “,,certainly it is hard to believe that our reasoning power was brought, by Darwin’s process of natural selection, to the perfection which it seems to possess.,,, It is difficult to avoid the impression that a miracle confronts us here,,,, The miracle of the appropriateness of the language of mathematics for the formulation of the laws of physics is a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve.”

The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences – Eugene Wigner – 1960 Excerpt: ,,certainly it is hard to believe that our reasoning power was brought, by Darwin’s process of natural selection, to the perfection which it seems to possess.,,, It is difficult to avoid the impression that a miracle confronts us here, quite comparable in its striking nature to the miracle that the human mind can string a thousand arguments together without getting itself into contradictions, or to the two miracles of the existence of laws of nature and of the human mind’s capacity to divine them.,,, The miracle of the appropriateness of the language of mathematics for the formulation of the laws of physics is a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve. We should be grateful for it and hope that it will remain valid in future research and that it will extend, for better or for worse, to our pleasure, even though perhaps also to our bafflement, to wide branches of learning. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/MathDrama/reading/Wigner.html

Here is a question for you Gordon Davisson, "How many miracles are allowed in your atheistic worldview?" Let me help you with the answer, the answer is zero miracles! As Lewontin stated, "we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door”

"we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door” Richard Lewontin - 1997

Zero miracles are allowed in your worldview and yet here we have two giants of science, Einstein and Wigner themselves, openly claiming that it is an outright miracle that the human mind is able to comprehend the universe with immaterial mathematics. The funny thing about miracles, is that once you are forced, by the applicability of mathematics itself, to allow that 'divine foot' in the door then there is absolutely no reason, scientifically speaking, why miracles, (i.e. the Agent causality of God and even the agent causality of man), should be forbidden as a rational explanatory principle in science. Only someone with a severe irrational apriori bias against God would even try to attempt to argue otherwise..... Enter Gordon Davisson and his atheistic Darwinian brethren. Moreover, although there is much confusion in the genral public over various interpretations in quantum mechanics, as Steven Weinberg points out in the following article, those various interpretations in quantum mechanics all boil down to just two possible interpretations. The realist approach and the instrumentalist approach respectively. Weinberg, after dismissing decoherence as a plausible explanation, states that, “Today there are two widely followed approaches to quantum mechanics, the “realist” and “instrumentalist” approaches, which view the origin of probability in measurement in two very different ways. For reasons I will explain, neither approach seems to me quite satisfactory.”

The Trouble with Quantum Mechanics - Steven Weinberg - January 19, 2017 The trouble is that in quantum mechanics the way that wave functions change with time is governed by an equation, the Schrödinger equation, that does not involve probabilities. It is just as deterministic as Newton’s equations of motion and gravitation. That is, given the wave function at any moment, the Schrödinger equation will tell you precisely what the wave function will be at any future time. There is not even the possibility of chaos, the extreme sensitivity to initial conditions that is possible in Newtonian mechanics. So if we regard the whole process of measurement as being governed by the equations of quantum mechanics, and these equations are perfectly deterministic, how do probabilities get into quantum mechanics? One common answer is that, in a measurement, the spin (or whatever else is measured) is put in an interaction with a macroscopic environment that jitters in an unpredictable way. For example, the environment might be the shower of photons in a beam of light that is used to observe the system, as unpredictable in practice as a shower of raindrops. Such an environment causes the superposition of different states in the wave function to break down, leading to an unpredictable result of the measurement. (This is called decoherence.) It is as if a noisy background somehow unpredictably left only one of the notes of a chord audible. But this begs the question. If the deterministic Schrödinger equation governs the changes through time not only of the spin but also of the measuring apparatus and the physicist using it, then the results of measurement should not in principle be unpredictable. So we still have to ask, how do probabilities get into quantum mechanics?,,, Today there are two widely followed approaches to quantum mechanics, the “realist” and “instrumentalist” approaches, which view the origin of probability in measurement in two very different ways.9 For reasons I will explain, neither approach seems to me quite satisfactory.10 http://quantum.phys.unm.edu/466-17/QuantumMechanicsWeinberg.pdf

Weinberg rightly rejects the ‘realist approach’ to quantum mechanics because of the many irresolvable problems inherent within the ‘many worlds interpretation’ (such as properly deriving the Born rule), but, on the other hand, it is interesting to note the main reason why he rejects the ‘instrumentalist approach’ to quantum mechanics:

“The instrumentalist approach,, (the) wave function,, is merely an instrument that provides predictions of the probabilities of various outcomes when measurements are made.,, In the instrumentalist approach,,, humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level. According to Eugene Wigner, a pioneer of quantum mechanics, “it was not possible to formulate the laws of quantum mechanics in a fully consistent way without reference to the consciousness.”11 Thus the instrumentalist approach turns its back on a vision that became possible after Darwin, of a world governed by impersonal physical laws that control human behavior along with everything else. It is not that we object to thinking about humans. Rather, we want to understand the relation of humans to nature, not just assuming the character of this relation by incorporating it in what we suppose are nature’s fundamental laws, but rather by deduction from laws that make no explicit reference to humans. We may in the end have to give up this goal,,, Some physicists who adopt an instrumentalist approach argue that the probabilities we infer from the wave function are objective probabilities, independent of whether humans are making a measurement. I don’t find this tenable. In quantum mechanics these probabilities do not exist until people choose what to measure, such as the spin in one or another direction. Unlike the case of classical physics, a choice must be made,,,” - Steven Weinberg - The Trouble with Quantum Mechanics - January 19, 2017

In short Weinberg, an atheist, rejected the instrumentalist approach precisely because “humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level” and because it undermined the Darwinian worldview from within. Yet, regardless of how he and other atheists may prefer the world to behave, quantum mechanics itself could care less how atheists prefer the world to behave. bornagain77

Gordon Davisson @11 I have not given you my interpretation of QM - maybe I have none. Hence "we're all in the same boat" (your claim) won't work. Btw, perhaps there's no such thing as "wave-particle duality". What's a QM particle anyway? What about s a QM wave? Of course I'm right about determinism - it's 100% and most definitely dead AS OF TODAY - no ifs and buts. You're also glossing over your mission impossible: free will is compatible with up to 99.(9)% determinism, but determinism [philosophy] is not compatible with ANY free will. I need not rule out any fantasy out there. The burden is on you to prove, not on anyone else to disprove. Thanks BA. You keep up the good work too. Nonlin.org

Here's an interesting quote from Rovello's book:

“[QM] oes not describe things as they “are”: it describes how things “occur,” and how they “interact with each other.” It doesn’t describe where there is a particle but how the particle shows itself to others. The world of existent things is reduced to a realm of possible interactions. ... Reality is reduced to interaction. “Quantum mechanics teaches us not to think about the world in terms of “things” that are in this or that state but in terms of “processes” instead. A process is the passage from one interaction to another. The properties of “things” manifest themselves in a granular manner only in the moment of interaction—that is to say, at the edges of the processes—and are such only in relation to other things. They cannot be predicted in an unequivocal way, but only in a probabilistic one.”

His book does not mention consciousness once. The quote above supports Gordon's point: that is the interaction of different quantum events that produces the "things" we experience. It doesn't take a conscious observer to "collapse the wave form" (or whatever understanding one has of what happens): it just takes an interaction with some other part of the world. I agree that mostly likely the quote News offers is correct: "that the wisest course at present is accepting a pluralism of interpretations, or “at least humility.”, but I offer Rovello as a legitimate voice in the discussion. hazel

Bornagain77 @ 10:

Over the years here on UD, Gordon Davisson has also often times tried to unsuccessfully defend his Darwinian belief that the second law of thermodynamics, entropy, is somehow not incompatible with Darwinian evolution, (or at least defend the possibility that entropy is not directly defeating to Darwinism).

"Unsuccessful" only in the sense that I haven't convinced you. But is that due to my not making a solid case, or you you refusing to accept anything that doesn't fit your views? Funny thing is that almost all of the competent physicists and chemists agree with me, and not you. I think you should take a serious look at the possibility that it might be you that's being blinded by your biases. But you're actually talking about something completely different here:

In short, experiments in Quantum Mechanics have now demonstrated that, (directly contrary to what Gordon Davisson and other Darwinists apriorily believe), entropy is not a property of a system, but is a property of an observer who describes a system.

This has nothing to do with evolution or "uphill" vs. "downhill"; the second law has essentially the same implications no matter which definition you use (or rather, it had better be the same, or else you're going to have trouble matching the last century-and-a-half of research, usage, and testing). You appear to be arguing that it does have something to do with consciousness having a special role in the universe, which is a completely different question from evolution. But you're wrong about it implying a special role for consciousness, because: A) It implies that observers are special to themselves, not in any objective sense. That is, to me, my observations and knowledge are special but yours aren't; you're just another part of the universe. To you, yours are special, but mine aren't; I an just another part of the universe. To a third observer, neither one of us is anything special. B) Even more importantly, there's no implication that the observers being talked about are conscious observers. A non-conscious observer might seem like nonsense to you, but to the physicists actually working on this it seem to consider it entirely normal. Worse, when they run experiments to test these ideas, they actually use non-conscious "observers". This means that they are specifically not showing something special about consciousness. Let's look at some examples of non-conscious "observers". In your video (or at least, the linked paper version), you cite the quantum zeno effect, in which continuous "observation" prevents something from changing state. You cited two experimental demonstrations of this effect. In the first experiment (phys.org summary, actual paper), they used used a laser beam to "observe" atoms' positions via fluorescent scattering:

The fluorescence emitted by the atoms can, in principle, be captured by a detector and thus constitutes a position measurement of the emitting atom. [...] We introduce a position measurement rate Γm which we define to be the scattering rate of photons from the imaging beam, and note that this underestimates the actual scattering rate since it neglects the spontaneous emissions during the subsequent recooling of atoms to |D>.

...I don't see anywhere that they bother to mention whether they actually captured the emitted photons or what the detector's efficiency (if any) was, let alone whether they had a conscious observer watching the detector's output. If conscious observation were required, all of these things would've been critical elements of the experiment, but they left them out. Furthermore, to show that conscious observation is a critical part of this, they would've had to compare runs where they had the laser on but no (running) detector vs. runs where the laser and detector were both on but no conscious observer was watching the detector vs runs where laser, detector, and conscious observer were all there. Instead, they just looked at how the effect depended on the laser's intensity (and hence the "position measurement rate" defined in the quote). In the second experiment you cited, an interaction-free version of the quantum Zeno effect (paper) they also used a laser beam as the "observer". The descriptions are a bit hard to follow, since they sort of turn the observer/observed relation backward, and use whether a Bose-Einstein condensate remains in an unstable state to detect whether it's being "observed" by a laser:

In our experiments, we employ an ultracold gas in an unstable spin configuration, which can undergo a rapid decay. The object ["observer" -GD]--realized by a laser beam--prevents this decay because of the indirect quantum Zeno effect and thus, its [the laser beam/"observer"'s] presence can be detected without interacting with a single atom.

Again, the quantum Zeno effect happened without any sign that a conscious observer was involved, let alone necessary. In fact, it's pretty clear that they didn't have an actual conscious observer watching the laser, because they were using the Bose-Einstein condensate to tell whether the laser was on or off. The last example I'll discuss is one you cited in your comment #11 where "quantum knowledge" can allow deleting data to absorb heat rather than producing it (ScienceDaily summary, actual paper). Here there are explicit (if hypothetical) observers involved. Three of them: Alice, who knows something classical about the state of the system; Bob, who doesn't, and Quasimodo, who has a quantum memory that's entangled with the state of the system. But they never discuss whether these "observers" are actually conscious, only how their states relate to the system. When analysing Quasimodo's interactions with the system, "he" is treated as a normal quantum system. Furthermore, there's a (somewhat fanciful) picture of "him" in figure 2, where he's shown as a rectangular box with two robotic-looking arms (and the desciption starts "An observer, here represented by a machine with a quantum memory, Q, erases a system, S."). So, basically, you've latched onto the term "observer" and assumed it has to do with consciousness, but the actual physics -- in all of these cases -- is the same whether the "observer" is conscious or not. Gordon Davisson

Thanks to News for posting about Becker's book, and to Gordon Davisson for his posts. I decided to buy Becker's book and will try reading it. (I just read Rovello's "Reality Is Not What It Seems", so this will be an interesting comparison, perhaps.) hazel

As to pilot wave theory:

The quantum world remains weird: Remembering the doomed “pilot wave” October 16, 2018 French physicist Louis de Broglie (1892-1987) hoped that quantum mechanics could be brought within the same frame as classical physics via pilot wave theory, which envisioned “concrete particles, always with definite locations, that are guided through space by real pilot waves.” Apparently not. But a series of bouncing-droplet findings since 2015 has crushed this dream. The results indicate that Couder’s most striking demonstration of quantum-like phenomena, back in 2006 — “the experiment that got me hooked on this problem,” the fluid dynamicist Paul Milewski said — was in error. Repeat runs of the experiment, called the “double-slit experiment,” have contradicted Couder’s initial results and revealed the double-slit experiment to be the breaking point of both the bouncing-droplet analogy and de Broglie’s pilot-wave vision of quantum mechanics. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/the-quantum-world-remains-weird-remembering-the-doomed-pilot-wave/ Einstein vs quantum mechanics, and why he’d be a convert today – Margaret Reid – June 13, 2014 Excerpt: In a nutshell, experimentalists John Clauser, Alain Aspect, Anton Zeilinger, Paul Kwiat and colleagues have performed the Bell proposal for a test of Einstein’s hidden variable theories. All results so far support quantum mechanics. It seems that when two particles undergo entanglement, whatever happens to one of the particles can instantly affect the other, even if the particles are separated! http://phys.org/news/2014-06-einstein-quantum-mechanics-hed-today.html

As well a new experiment (re)confirmed that “entangled objects do not cause each other to behave the way they do.”

Quantum correlations do not imply instant causation – August 12, 2016 Excerpt: A research team led by a Heriot-Watt scientist has shown that the universe is even weirder than had previously been thought. In 2015 the universe was officially proven to be weird. After many decades of research, a series of experiments showed that distant, entangled objects can seemingly interact with each other through what Albert Einstein famously dismissed as “Spooky action at a distance”. A new experiment by an international team led by Heriot-Watt’s Dr Alessandro Fedrizzi has now found that the universe is even weirder than that: entangled objects do not cause each other to behave the way they do. http://phys.org/news/2016-08-quantum-imply-instant-causation.html

Of related interest: Another insurmountable problem for pilot wave theory, i.e. Bohmian mechanics, is that it simply doesn’t mesh with Quantum Electrodynamics, (i.e. Quantum Mechanics as applied to Special Relativity), which is regarded as one of our most precisely tested theories ever in the history of science.

Bohmian mechanics, a ludicrous caricature of Nature - Lubos Motl - July 15, 2013 Excerpt: There's no way out here. If you attempt to emulate a quantum field theory (QED) in this Bohmian way, you introduce lots of ludicrous gears and wheels – much like in the case of the luminiferous aether, they are gears and wheels that don't exist according to pretty much direct observations – and they must be finely adjusted to reproduce what quantum mechanics predicts (sometimes) without any adjustments whatsoever. Every new Bohmian gear or wheel you encounter generally breaks the Lorentz symmetry and makes the (wrong) prediction of a Lorentz violation and you will need to fine-tune infinitely many properties of these gears and wheels to restore the Lorentz invariance and other desirable properties of a physical theory (even a simple and fundamental thing such as the linearity of Schrödinger's equation is really totally unexplained in Bohmian mechanics and requires infinitely many adjustments to hold – while it may be derived from logical consistency in quantum mechanics). It's infinitely unlikely that they take the right values "naturally" so the theory is at least infinitely contrived. More likely, there's no way to adjust the gears and wheels to obtain relativistically invariant predictions at all. I would say that we pretty much directly experimentally observe the fact that the observations obey the Lorentz symmetry; the wave function isn't an observable wave; and lots of other, totally universal and fundamental facts about the symmetries and the interpretation of the basic objects we use in physics. Bohmian mechanics is really trying to deny all these basic principles – it is trying to deny facts that may be pretty much directly extracted from experiments. It is in conflict with the most universal empirical data about the reality collected in the 20th and 21st century. It wants to rape Nature. A pilot-wave-like theory has to be extracted from a very large class of similar classical theories but infinitely many adjustments have to be made – a very special subclass has to be chosen – for the Bohmian theory to reproduce at least some predictions of quantum mechanics (to produce predictions that are at least approximately local, relativistic, rotationally invariant, unitary, linear etc.). But even if one succeeds and the Bohmian theory does reproduce the quantum predictions, we can't really say that it has made the correct predictions because it was sometimes infinitely fudged or adjusted to produce the predetermined goal. On the other hand, quantum mechanics in general and specific quantum mechanical theories in particular genuinely do predict certain facts, including some very general facts about Nature. If you search for theories within the rigid quantum mechanical framework, while obeying the general postulates, you may make many correct predictions or conclusions pretty much without any additional assumptions. https://motls.blogspot.com/2013/07/bohmian-mechanics-ludicrous-caricature.html

A more detailed critique of Bohmian Mechanics (Pilot Wave theory) is here,

A Critique of Bohmian Mechanics (Pilot Wave theory) - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pn2hoU4jaQQ

And whereas the atheist has been stymied time and again in his preferred MWI and hidden variable theories by advances in quantum theory, On the other hand, recent advances in the experiments of Quantum Mechanics fit hand in glove with what we should apiori expect if consciousness and information is the ultimate substratum of the universe:

How Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness Correlate - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f0hL3Nrdas

Thus contrary to what Gordon Davisson believes, we have very good experimental reason to favor the consciousness and/or information theoretic interpretation of Quantum Mechanics over his atheistic/materialistic interpretations:

Why the Quantum? It from Bit? A Participatory Universe? Excerpt: “In conclusion, it may very well be said that information is the irreducible kernel from which everything else flows. Thence the question why nature appears quantized is simply a consequence of the fact that information itself is quantized by necessity. It might even be fair to observe that the concept that information is fundamental is very old knowledge of humanity, witness for example the beginning of gospel according to John: "In the beginning was the Word." Anton Zeilinger - a leading expert in quantum mechanics http://www.metanexus.net/archive/ultimate_reality/zeilinger.pdf 48:24 mark: “It is operationally impossible to separate Reality and Information” 49:45 mark: “In the Beginning was the Word” John 1:1 Prof Anton Zeilinger speaks on quantum physics. at UCT - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3ZPWW5NOrw 49:28 mark: "This is now my personal opinion OK. Because we cannot operationally separate the two. Whenever we talk about reality, we think about reality, we are really handling information. The two are not separable. So maybe now, this is speculative here, maybe the two are the same? Or maybe information constitutive to the universe. This reminds me of the beginning the bible of St. John which starts with “In the Beginning was the Word”.,,, https://youtu.be/s3ZPWW5NOrw?t=2969

bornagain77

Gordon Davisson may not consider it possible to experimentally distinguish which interpretation in Quantum Mechanics is correct, but I certainly consider it possible to do so. For instance, The irresolvable problem of deriving the "Born rule” within the MWI is discussed at the 4:30 minute mark of the following video:

A Critique of the Many Worlds Interpretation – InspiringPhilosophy – video https://youtu.be/_42skzOHjtA?t=273

Moreover, Many Worlds (MWI) denies the actuality of wave-function collapse:

Quantum mechanics Excerpt: The Everett many-worlds interpretation, formulated in 1956, holds that all the possibilities described by quantum theory simultaneously occur in a multiverse composed of mostly independent parallel universes.[43] This is not accomplished by introducing some new axiom to quantum mechanics, but on the contrary by removing the axiom of the collapse of the wave packet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mechanics#Philosophical_implications The many-worlds interpretation is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that asserts the objective reality of the universal wavefunction and denies the actuality of wavefunction collapse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation

Yet, contrary to MWI, the following experiment shows that the collapse of the wave function is a real effect,,

Quantum experiment verifies Einstein's 'spooky action at a distance' - March 24, 2015 Excerpt: An experiment,, has for the first time demonstrated Albert Einstein's original conception of "spooky action at a distance" using a single particle. ,,Professor Howard Wiseman and his experimental collaborators,, report their use of homodyne measurements to show what Einstein did not believe to be real, namely the non-local collapse of a (single) particle's wave function.,, According to quantum mechanics, a single particle can be described by a wave function that spreads over arbitrarily large distances,,, ,, by splitting a single photon between two laboratories, scientists have used homodyne detectors—which measure wave-like properties—to show the collapse of the wave function is a real effect,, This phenomenon is explained in quantum theory,, the instantaneous non-local, (beyond space and time), collapse of the wave function to wherever the particle is detected.,,, "Einstein never accepted orthodox quantum mechanics and the original basis of his contention was this single-particle argument. This is why it is important to demonstrate non-local wave function collapse with a single particle," says Professor Wiseman. "Einstein's view was that the detection of the particle only ever at one point could be much better explained by the hypothesis that the particle is only ever at one point, without invoking the instantaneous collapse of the wave function to nothing at all other points. "However, rather than simply detecting the presence or absence of the particle, we used homodyne measurements enabling one party to make different measurements and the other, using quantum tomography, to test the effect of those choices." "Through these different measurements, you see the wave function collapse in different ways, thus proving its existence and showing that Einstein was wrong." http://phys.org/news/2015-03-quantum-einstein-spooky-action-distance.html

As well, besides that experimental refutation of MWI, MWI is just plain insane.

Too many worlds - Philip Ball - Feb. 17, 2015 Excerpt:,,, You measure the path of an electron, and in this world it seems to go this way, but in another world it went that way. That requires a parallel, identical apparatus for the electron to traverse. More – it requires a parallel you to measure it. Once begun, this process of fabrication has no end: you have to build an entire parallel universe around that one electron, identical in all respects except where the electron went. You avoid the complication of wavefunction collapse, but at the expense of making another universe.,,, http://aeon.co/magazine/science/is-the-many-worlds-hypothesis-just-a-fantasy/ Atheist Physicist Sean Carroll: An Infinite Number of Universes Is More Plausible Than God - Michael Egnor - August 2, 2017 Excerpt: as I noted, the issue here isn’t physics or even logic. The issue is psychiatric. We have a highly accomplished physicist, who regards the existence of God as preposterous, asserting that the unceasing creation of infinite numbers of new universes by every atom in the cosmos at every moment is actually happening (as we speak!), and that it is a perfectly rational and sane inference. People have been prescribed anti-psychotic drugs for less. Now of course Carroll isn’t crazy, not in any medical way. He’s merely given his assent to a crazy ideology — atheist materialism —,,, What can we in the reality-based community do when an ideology — the ideology that is currently dominant in science — is not merely wrong, but delusional? I guess calling it what it is is a place to start. https://evolutionnews.org/2017/08/atheist-physicist-sean-carroll-an-infinite-number-of-universes-is-more-plausible-than-god/

If sanity is to count for anything in science, then MWI should rightly be rejected. But Darwinian atheists have never let sanity stand in their way before, so I hardly think they will do so now bornagain77

Nonlin.0rg @ 10: You say there's no "experimental basis" for either the de Broglie-Bohm or Many-Worlds interpretations; you're sort-of right, but the same is true for all of the viable interpretations of QM. Including yours. Basically, the situation is that we have a number of very different interpretations of QM that all make indistinguishable predictions, and hence there's (at present) no experimental way to choose between them. To claim that this is a huge problem for dBB or MWI but somehow not a problem for your favorite interpretation is straight-up special pleading. There's no evidence for either of them (relative to any of the other still-viable interpretations), but there's no evidence against them either, so the only reasonable conclusion we can draw is that we just don't know. As the quoted review says

The book’s final section sketches some of its current research and concludes modestly that the wisest course at present is accepting a pluralism of interpretations, or “at least humility.” “Quantum physics is at least approximately correct…. We just don’t know what that means yet. And it’s the job of physics to find out.”

So, you might be right about determinism, or you might be wrong. But the claim that you do know, or that the other possibilities have been somehow ruled out, is clearly and unambiguously wrong. Gordon Davisson

Nonlin.Org at 9, contrary to what Brother Brian may say about your posts, that was a very nice response. Short, sweet, and concise. Over the years here on UD, Gordon Davisson has also often times tried to unsuccessfully defend his Darwinian belief that the second law of thermodynamics, entropy, is somehow not incompatible with Darwinian evolution, (or at least defend the possibility that entropy is not directly defeating to Darwinism). Yet, Quantum Mechanics has now, in no uncertain terms, recently further defeated any possibility that Gordon Davisson, and other Darwinists, had of finding a workaround between the contradictory notions of 'downhill' Entropy and 'uphill' Darwinian evolution. In short, experiments in Quantum Mechanics have now demonstrated that, (directly contrary to what Gordon Davisson and other Darwinists apriorily believe), entropy is not a property of a system, but is a property of an observer who describes a system. As the following article states, "In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object's entropy is always dependent on the observer."

Quantum knowledge cools computers: New understanding of entropy - June 1, 2011 Excerpt: Recent research by a team of physicists,,, describe,,, how the deletion of data, under certain conditions, can create a cooling effect instead of generating heat. The cooling effect appears when the strange quantum phenomenon of entanglement is invoked.,,, The new study revisits Landauer's principle for cases when the values of the bits to be deleted may be known. When the memory content is known, it should be possible to delete the bits in such a manner that it is theoretically possible to re-create them. It has previously been shown that such reversible deletion would generate no heat. In the new paper, the researchers go a step further. They show that when the bits to be deleted are quantum-mechanically entangled with the state of an observer, then the observer could even withdraw heat from the system while deleting the bits. Entanglement links the observer's state to that of the computer in such a way that they know more about the memory than is possible in classical physics.,,, In measuring entropy, one should bear in mind that an object does not have a certain amount of entropy per se, instead an object's entropy is always dependent on the observer. Applied to the example of deleting data, this means that if two individuals delete data in a memory and one has more knowledge of this data, she perceives the memory to have lower entropy and can then delete the memory using less energy.,,, No heat, even a cooling effect; In the case of perfect classical knowledge of a computer memory (zero entropy), deletion of the data requires in theory no energy at all. The researchers prove that "more than complete knowledge" from quantum entanglement with the memory (negative entropy) leads to deletion of the data being accompanied by removal of heat from the computer and its release as usable energy. This is the physical meaning of negative entropy. Renner emphasizes, however, "This doesn't mean that we can develop a perpetual motion machine." The data can only be deleted once, so there is no possibility to continue to generate energy. The process also destroys the entanglement, and it would take an input of energy to reset the system to its starting state. The equations are consistent with what's known as the second law of thermodynamics: the idea that the entropy of the universe can never decrease. Vedral says "We're working on the edge of the second law. If you go any further, you will break it." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110601134300.htm

And as 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/

Again to repeat that last sentence, “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: “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/

Of course Gordon Davisson, being the faithful Darwinist that he is, will completely ignore these recent experimental results that directly falsify his apriori belief about entropy being a property of a system and not of an observer, but regardless of his apparent religious devotion to Darwinism, quantum mechanics, or more specifically quantum information theory, has now shown, in no uncertain terms, that entropy is not a property of a system, as reductive materialists a-priorily believe, but is a property of an observer who describes a system.,,, The implications of these recent experimental findings also go to the heart of the Intelligent Design vs. Darwinism debate. The following video, starting around the 17:00 minute mark, goes into a bit more detail as to exactly how these recent findings from quantum information theory defeat the Darwinian worldview:

How Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness Correlate https://youtu.be/4f0hL3Nrdas?t=1034

bornagain77

Gordon Davisson @8 Except there's no experimental basis whatsoever for the Pilot Wave interpretation as there is none for the Many-Worlds interpretation. The scientific method requires experimental evidence, not wishful thinking. You can't just posit "hidden variables" and "evolution" when all known evidence is to the contrary and most certainly CAN'T REFUTE something without said experimental evidence. Determinism may have looked good to Laplace, but IS DEAD as of today. Don't hold your breath for it's return. Meanwhile: Determinism is self-defeating as lack of Free Will would render all decisions illusory. The Sun, the dead, and the rocks do not decide anything, so why would a determinism proponent decide any more than these entities? And without decisions, ‘good’, ‘bad’, ‘worry’, ‘fair’, ‘guilt’, ‘self’, and so on do not make any more sense either. Convincing others that Free Will is not true makes absolutely no sense if Free Will were indeed illusory. Free Will is a function of the living. Randomness and Determinism apply equally to the inorganic, but only the living (organic) has Free Will. Anything less than 100% combination of Randomness and Determinism is not sufficient to disprove Free Will. That's right, 100% is your Mission Impossible! Nonlin.org

Eugene@2: There are several interpretations of QM that address the origin of randomness (whether it's real or illusory). In the transactional interpretation, the amplitude of the offer and confirmation waves provides a fairly natural explanation of the Born probability rule. (I seem to recall that the Born rule was actually the original inspiration for this interpretation.) In the De Broglie–Bohm (/pilot wave) interpretation, on the other hand, the randomness is only apparent and is really due to not knowing the actual position of the particles involved (this is known as a "hidden variable" in the lingo). According to this interpretation, the wave function evolves pretty much like standard QM, and the way the particles follow the wave, they spend most of their time in the densest part of the wave, so if you sample many similar setups you'll find that the proportion of times you find a particle at a position is proportional to the square of the wave amplitude at that point (i.e. the Born rule). BTW, this also refutes Nonlin.org@7's claim that quantum physics "utterly demolishes determinism." We cannot know if we "can have a perfectly deterministic setup", because we don't necessarily control (or know about) all the variables. If there are hidden variables, they're likely to be different for each run of the experiment, and can thus explain why we get different results each time. And this isn't the only deterministic explanation consistent with the QM results. The Many-Worlds interpretation is objectively deterministic (i.e. the evolution of the universal wavefunction is deterministic) but subjectively random (because which part of the wavefunction -- which "world" -- each of us sees is subjectively random). There's also the possibility of superdeterminism, which basically denies that it's meaningful to talk about what could happen, just what actually does happen. This means that questions like "why did we detect the particle here instead of over there?" are meaningless, and you can't ask the relevant questions. Pretty much everyone (including me) rejects this idea, but we can't actually prove it's wrong. Gordon Davisson

One thing is certain: Quantum Physics utterly demolishes determinism. http://nonlin.org/free-will In the double slit experiment, one can have a perfectly deterministic setup, yet every time the experiment is repeated, it cannot be known (except statistically) where the particle will end up even if the setup is calibrated to the n-th degree. This is totally different than the deterministic systems (hereby invalidated!) where the normal distribution of outputs can be narrowed by tightening the inputs / set-up with the theoretical conclusion that perfect inputs / set-up will result in perfect outputs (determinism). Nonlin.org

MatSpirit, My 2017 Physics Essays article includes a little history of my 2011 AML article: www.math.utep.edu/Faculty/sewell/articles/pe_sewell.html I did not ask for or receive any money for myself from Applied Mathematics Letters, just wanted them to acknowledge publicly what the editor told me in his e-mail, that it was not withdrawn because of errors, but because he "concluded that the content was more philosophical than mathematical." And they did acknowledge this. Granville Sewell

Does it not make sense from a Christian perspective that the deeper that physicists penetrate the nature of matter at the quantum level, the more paradoxical it will become, until it can no longer be recognised as belonging to any area of empirical science ? Or do you all think that it will continue to progress, albeit haltingly ? Axel

By the way, what's that about a "kill fee"? I remember when Barry was triumphantly telling us that he got money out of the journal that decided that publishing Granville Sewell's piece on the Second Law of Thermodynamics would be too painful for the reputations of all involved, theirs and Dr. Sewell's. Do you suppose Dr. Sewell had signed a "letter of agreement"? MatSpirit

Speaking of Inference Review, here's what Sabine Hossenfelder says about it: February 2, 2019 at 11:43 pm I was contacted by someone from Inference some years ago. They asked me to write an essay for them and made a pretty good financial offer. I put a lot of effort in this and submitted the piece as requested. After some while I received a revision from an anonymous editor who had garbled up my argument so badly and misrepresented my opinion so much that I could see no common ground and just refused to agree it be published. Luckily I hadn’t signed the letter of agreement, so I had no trouble pulling out of this. (Otoh, I didn’t get the kill fee either.) I then shortened the piece and published it elsewhere. By now I have dealt with quite a number of editors at many different publications and let me just say I have never seen anything remotely like this. Normally they are are little more… restrained. Also, while it’s rather common that fact checkers and copyeditors remain anonymous, I don’t know any other place where they don’t tell you who is the editor. In any case, if you have been wondering why I never share or comment on anything from that magazine, now you know why. I got away with the impression that this magazine’s editors have a rather heavy hand. http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=10814 MatSpirit

I don't think I have seen a single paper (besides the "Many worlds" interpretation) attempting to at least touch on the subject of where the randomness in QM could be coming from. Who rolls the dice? Eugene

Of related interest:

How Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness Correlate https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f0hL3Nrdas

bornagain77