KF Sums it Up Nicely

_{Barry Arrington

August 17, 2012

Intelligent Design}

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DWG:

I see:

Bill is saying that IF you can demonstrate (and not just assert) that no other process can possibly produce the material observations, then your logic is correct.

Stop right there, we are dealing with an empirical situation. No inductive or empirical fact or principle can be established beyond possible contradiction. To demand such a proof for a case where you should know better is selective hyperskepticism, here a form of question-begging. That’s like the rhetorical fast move played by Darwin when he spoke of a like condition.

That boils down to demanding a default you have no right to.

What inductive evidence can and does support is that there are two observed sources of highly contingent outcomes under more or less similar conditions: chance and choice.

It further supports that in every case where we directly can see the cause of functionally specific complex information, in this case digitally coded algorithmic or otherwise semiotic info, this is by intelligent choice.

We can then take up the analysis of chance based random walks in a config space of sufficient complexity, to see why that should be so for complex and functionally specific patterns. Namely, there is too much haystack, you can only make a relatively tiny sample, and there is just too little needle.

Sampling theory — notice, not an exact probability calculation [which is not at all necessary for the conclusion to be all but certain . . . cf. here on] — tells us, with maximum likelihood, you will get hay not needle under such circumstances. Indeed, that sort of analysis is the foundation of the statistical form of the second law of thermodynamics.

This is what your side is really doing:

a: in the teeth of a base of billions of test cases across 5,000+ years of recorded history where we directly and routinely observe the ONLY directly known source of digitally coded complex functionally specific information,

b: Where also the only observed alternative to choice for highly contingent outcomes is intelligent choice,

c: With the needle in the haystack search challenge also being on the table,

d: It is being insisted that — to save an a priori commitment to materialism now being imposed on the definition of science and its methods —

e: The bare logical possibility that chance can throw up any contingent pattern must hold the default unless a logically certain disproof can be produced,

f: This in a context where it is already known that no scientific — empirical and inductive — conclusion can be shown to demonstrative certainty.

In short, you are insulating an a priori from empirical test, which is the same as saying that it is not a scientific claim.

Do you really want to turn science into applied materialist philosophy?

That is what you are doing.

If you are doing so, then the rules change.

We have every right to expose how you rigged the game, and to call you out as materialist ideologues and fellow travellers hiding in the holy lab coat and pronouncing ex cathedra statements as a new magisterium.

I suggest that you do not want to go down that a priori materialist ideology road.

Comments

Surely correlations are scientific. Mung

F/N: It seems we are dealing with a drive-by slander attack. For record, I have no control of moderation at UD, nor has MP to my knowledge been banned. I suspect, the notion of undue banning for mere disagreement is being promoted as a smear, where in fact there has been a huge problem of abusive behaviour up to and including hate sites by objectors. Let that shameful record of the likes of TWT et al and enablers such as Petrushka, speak for itself. Dr Liddle, why do you tolerate slander at your site, TSZ? Please think about what you are enabling. KF kairosfocus

Looks like a definite chirp, chirp, chirp. kairosfocus

Chirp, chirp, chirp? kairosfocus

PS: In addressing UB by preseting an alleged summary of UB and the design view, MP gives another illustration of the problems, at 149 in the Craig crushes Ayala thread (it is also reproduced elsewhere):
X1. All irreducibly complex systems are designed. [--> Misrepresentation, cf Behe, who talks of the challenge to Darwinian mechanisms] X2. All semiotic systems are irreducibly complex. X3. Therefore, all semiotic systems are designed. [--> Misrepresents the actual case: it is sufficiently complex complex organisaiton and information that function linguistically, algorithmically or cybernetically that are in actual view] Y1. A system involving representation(s) and protocol(s) is a semiotic system. [--> Distorts by failing to give context: symbols imply a system of representaiton and a protocol for communication, codes implies language and language is universally observed -- where we can see the source -- to come from mind. Similarly, algorithms are purposive and linguistic, involving in our experience mind, so there is a reason for an inductive inference that is not hasty.] Y2. Protein synthesis involves a representation and a protocol. [--> in fact we have digital data storage in DNA, the algorithmic transcription process involving several C-chemistry cellular nanomachines, the gated transfer of these to the ribosome, the similarly algorithmic code based step by step assembly of protein chains, the chaperoned folding and the Golgi apparatus etc for routing and more. This is a case of ducking the key details by making a simplistic summary. What do we know about automated, control tape driven assembly plants?] Y3. Therefore, protein synthesis is a semiotic system. [--> of a very high degree of complex, spscific functionality] Z1. All [--> functionally specific, complex] semiotic systems are designed (by X3). [strawman alert] Z2. Protein synthesis is a [--> FSCI-based] semiotic system (by Y3). Z3. Therefore, the protein synthesis system is designed [--> per inference to best, empirically warranted explanation].
This makes the matter look like an a priori assumption is being used to ground the claim that semiotic -- effectively, meaningful coded symbol using -- systems are designed. It does o by misrerepresenting the conditions under which design thinkers argue for the routinely and only observed source of such semiotic systems as we see being made. In addition, it misrepresents what design thinkers form Behe on have argued concerning irreducibly complex systems. let me cite Behe from Darwin's Black Box, to first and foremost clear the air:
What type of biological system could not be formed by “numerous successive, slight modifications?” Well, for starters, a system that is irreducibly complex. By irreducibly complex I mean a single system composed of several well-matched interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the [core] parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning. [DBB, p. 39]
Angus Mengue gives one pivotal reason for that, namely the need for such all-or-none functional systems to meet the following five criteria, explained with reference to the flagellum but of much wider applicability:
For a working [bacterial] flagellum to be built by exaptation, the five following conditions would all have to be met: C1: Availability. Among the parts available for recruitment to form the flagellum, there would need to be ones capable of performing the highly specialized tasks of paddle, rotor, and motor, even though all of these items serve some other function or no function. C2: Synchronization. The availability of these parts would have to be synchronized so that at some point, either individually or in combination, they are all available at the same time. C3: Localization. The selected parts must all be made available at the same ‘construction site,’ perhaps not simultaneously but certainly at the time they are needed. C4: Coordination. The parts must be coordinated in just the right way: even if all of the parts of a flagellum are available at the right time, it is clear that the majority of ways of assembling them will be non-functional or irrelevant. C5: Interface compatibility. The parts must be mutually compatible, that is, ‘well-matched’ and capable of properly ‘interacting’: even if a paddle, rotor, and motor are put together in the right order, they also need to interface correctly. ( Agents Under Fire: Materialism and the Rationality of Science, pgs. 104-105 (Rowman & Littlefield, 2004). HT: ENV.)
In short the challenge to suggested exaptation or co-option by chance to fit together and work, points to the issue that IC systems exhibit significant functionally specific complexity. A simple analysis of getting alternative possible configs by chance, or simple familiarity with the tight specificity of replacement car parts, will show the basic problem: we are looking at specified complexity barriers. In addition, MP et al routinely ignore the issue that we have vast experience of IC systems, and how they are caused. Consistently, by design. That is, we have good reason -- taking in the previous remarks just above -- to see that both IC and FSCO/I are empirically reliable signs of design as best causal explanation. To overturn that, as Newton pointed out, all that is required is to provide sound empirically observed counter-examples. Needless to say,the sort of verbal gymnastics we keep on seeing from objectors to design theory inadvertently testifies to the basic problem: such counterexamples are strangely unforthcoming. So, once we see that we are dealing with FSCO/I and IC in that context, we see why there is an inference to best explanation -- and notice how consistently an abductive argument along the same lines that broader scientific investigations of a great many things we do not directly observe routinely proceeds is being willfully misrepresented as a question-begging deductive one in the teeth of repeated correction -- namely, we have good reason to infer from sign to the signified cause. Just as we routinely infer from deer tracks to deer as the responsible best explanation, never mind the abstract possibility that some unknown animal somehow could have the same tracks, or someone somehow could be faking etc. So, we correct the same errors yet again. Now see if there is any reasonable responsiveness to the correction. That will tell us a lot about what we are dealing with. KF kairosfocus

Onlookers: While we await MP's answer to the root challenge, the following exchange with Joe as clipped at 43 above, will show some of the strawman tactics and demand for Darwin by default that are going on:
[Joe:] Living organisms exist. Necessity and/ or chance cannot account for the origins of living organisms. Living organisms fit the criteria for designed objects. Living organisms were designed. [MP:] How have you determined that Necessity and/ or chance cannot account for the origins of living organisms when you don’t know how living organisms originated? On what are you basing this claim? Sure, we know intelligent beings like us can (potentially) create life. That does not mean that that’s how it happened and to do that you’d have to do as I suggest, rule out any alternatives. And to do that you’d have a complete knowledge of physics and knowledge of the trajectory of every particle in the universe.
A few notes: 1 --> The background is of course that per a massive body of experience, we observe causal patterns in our world that trace to mechanical necessity (law), to randomness leading to stochastic distributions (chance) and to intentional intelligently directed configuration (design). 2 --> In fact, in say physics, we have large bodies of theory that address the first two and the related studies in engineering and computer science and information theory are riddled through and through with the third. 3 --> Next, we can observe and study the processes in action and see the pattern of traces they leave, noting -- as could be explored here on in context [also cf. here and here on] as MP was invited to read but has plainly ignored -- the differences between, say:
i: heavy, unsupported objects near earth's surface tend to fall at 9.8 N/kg ii: if such an object is a fair die, it can be dropped and will tumble to read values from 1 to 6 more or less per a flat distribution, or we could generate text at random using various mechanisms iii: such a die may also be loaded, which could bias outcomes, or it could be manually set to a value, or of course text can be intelligently generated as is this post
4 --> Now it turns out that these processes often have characteristic consequences, most notably degree of contingency and how the space of possibilities is sampled. 5 --> Necessity leads to natural regularities, of low contingency. That is how we establish laws like the law of falling objects. 6 --> From large experience, high contingency traces to chance and/or choice. For instance, consider a black box that emits successive bits on an output line:
|| BLACK BOX ||--> o/p bit train . . .
7 --> We may not examine the box but we may infer on its innards and mechanisms from its output. (Way back, I recall a class exercise in IPS on such a BB, duly painted black.) 8 --> Similarly in a lot of science, there are many things we cannot directly observe, but must infer on from observable traces. Star physics is a classic, since Newton and before. 9 --> Now, BB is monitored, and across time seems to give bits that are 1/0 in no particular order, and in a long fast train. Along the way we hit on the bright idea of hooking it up to adevice that searches for ASCII text patterns. Lo and behold, some short word matches occur, and after a time, "2,737,850 million billion billion billion monkey-years" [per Wiki], we find 24 matching characters:
RUMOUR. Open your ears; 9r"5j5&?OWTY Z0d...
10 --> BB has emitted a fairly long text string, evidently by chance! But, such a string is well within the FSCI threshold of 500 bits or about 72 ASCII characters of 7 bits each. The explanatory filter expects this. 11 --> Now, lo and behold, one morning we find that BB has emitted the ASCII text string for this comment. 12 --> Should we assign that to chance also, or rule out an intelligent source, save only if:
you’d have to do as I suggest, rule out any alternatives. And to do that you’d have a complete knowledge of physics and knowledge of the trajectory of every particle in the universe.
13 --> Well, maybe I am a random BB, but the same obviously extends to the posts by MP. 14 --> That is, we can see the self-referential absurdity, in a world where MINDS -- as opposed to brains -- are inherently not observed. (We infer mind from the behaviour of certain bodies, as say the Glasgow Coma Scale discussed here highlights.) 15 --> We thus see the selectively hyperskeptical demand for an evolutionary materialist Darwin default, and how it leads to self-referential incoherence. (Cf here at IOSE.) 16 --> A more reasonable approach would ask, how can we tell the difference, reliably. The simple answer is to impose a joint criterion of functional specificity AND complexity. That puts us in a domain where we have a sufficiently large space of possibilities that islands of function will be deeply isolated making it maximally unlikely that chance based random walks will hit on shores of such islands, per the well known pattern exhibited by chance samples of populations. 17 --> The reality of such islands of function is commonly challenged, but it should be fairly clear to the unprejudiced and reasonable inquirer, that where we have multiple parts that in effect form a pattern of nodes and arcs that must be well matched, properly places and integrated to function, only very limited ranges of arrangements will work. 18 --> WLOG, and courtesy AutoCad etc, that can be reduced to arrangements of string structures: . . . -*-*-*- . . . 19 --> That means the random text test has astonishingly broad relevance. 20 --> As a useful rule of thumb, our solar system of 10^57 or so atoms is our practical universe, and for fast chemical reaction rates as step-size, a space for 500 bits will be sufficiently large that by estimate the sample size will be comparable to one straw to a cubical haystack 1,000 LY on the side. If such a stack were superposed on our galaxy ( comparably thick) centred on Earth, and such a sample were made, with all but certainty the reliably predictable outcome -- at a level of assurance comparable to the 2nd law of thermodynamics, statistical grounding -- would be: straw, not anything else. 21 --> So, MP's demand is in effect that we swallow a statistical miracle -- actually, an astonishingly long train of such -- in preference to inferring design when we see the actual relevant BB's output: the digitally coded information system in the heart of cell based life, which starts at about 100,000 bits and goes on to billions. 22 --> The reason for that is obvious: a priori materialism, or being a fellow traveller to that. 23 --> That is why there is a repeated strawmannish projection of question-begging conclusion jumping [in the teeth of repeated correction as can be seen in this and other recent UD threads], and it is the reason for demanding what MP knows no empirically based investigation can deliver: an absolute proof by elimination of all alternative possibilities. 24 --> It is also the evident reason why MP has studiously avoided discussing the logic of warranting knowledge claims by provisional inference to best, empirically grounded explanation leading to inferring credible cause on empirically reliable signs. 25 --> But the problem for MP here is that this is the key scientific method for studying origins and many other cases where we cannot make a direct observation. And, it is quite clear from MP's general level of discussion that s/he knows this or should know this. (Hence the MORAL challenge MP faces, of willful neglect of duties of care to truth and fairness. And this problem reminds us of the issue that evolutionary materialist ideology, since the days of Plato in The Laws, Bk X, has been notorious for opening the door to ruthless nihilistic factions and their cynical notion that might and manipulation make 'right.') ___________ Okay, something to chew on while we wait for MP to actually seriously address the merits. KF kairosfocus

mphillips needs to read the papers he links to. In order to refute my claim pertaing to the fixation of a (beneficial) mutation, mphillips linked to "The spread of a beneficial mutation in experimental bacterial populations: the influence of the environment and genotype on the fixation of rpoS mutations." here The fixation of rpoS mutations
Despite the magnitude of the fitness advantage conferred by rpoS mutations in high-RpoS strains under glucose limitation, none of the eight populations studied so far became 100% rpoS. The proportion of rpoS+ bacteria decreased to below 1% in some populations, but the rpoS+ sub-population was stably maintained. Indeed, in all chemostat cultures studied, the proportion of rpoS+ bacteria recovered within 100 generations to become >30% of the population (Maharjan et al., 2006). An important question arising from these findings is if such very strongly beneficial mutations as in rpoS do not lead to complete fixation, is it likely that any mutation in a large bacterial population purges diversity? The ever-increasing complexity of long-term populations almost to the level of individuality (Papadopoulos et al., 1999; Maharjan et al., 2007) suggests a negative answer to this question. The universality of this conclusion will of course depend on data with other cell types and experimental systems.
No fixy, no laudry... Joe

If all ID has going for it, as Joe seems to say, is that what appears random might not be random after all then, well I guess ID is not anti evolution after all.
That's not all but it is more than your position has
But then again you’ve all just seen Joe deny that it’s impossible for a beneficial mutation to become fixed in a population without intelligent design.
Why do you lie? That is not what I said, you are demented. Besides "beneficial" is a relative word as what is beneficial one day may not be the next. Then there are competeting benefits, cooperation and behavioural changes that must also be accounted for.
And you presumably have evidence for this that beats everything discovered from the 60?s to today?
Nothing has been discovered that refutes what I said.
I can provide links to where people are studying exactly the question you already, somehow, known the answer to.
Doubt it but go ahead, what are you waiting for? But please read the article I cited. Joe

mphillips, choking on mutation fixation:
Incorrect. For example: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm.....MC2674819/
Umm that is a MODEL, not the real world. See-Burke, M. K. et al. 2010. Genome-wide analysis of a long-term evolution experiment with Drosophila. Nature. 467 (7315): 587-590, for a glimpse of what one can expect in the real world Joe

The fitter = more reproduction = non-random as fitness is correlated to survival therefore the state of genome is correlated to fitness is correlated to survival.
How does that make it non-random, especially when fitness is not always correlated to the state of the genome? Whatever is good enough and that is random.
I’ve got you arguing simultaneously two opposing points of view.
LoL! You only think you do. As I said I was trying to figure out what YOUR nonsensical point was and as it turns out you didn't have one. Joe

F/N: Do I need to explicitly note that the sort of tactics Alinsky espoused have now spread far and wide in our civilisation, and are part of why it is mortally wounded and bleeding out? (HINT: As in, what happens when "everybody" begins to violate key maxims that help hold society together, per Kant on the CI.) kairosfocus

PWS: MP, the problem is not with disagreeing with my views, it is with putting strawmannish caricatures of them into my mouth then insisting on ignoring corrections then repeating the same mischaracterisation, which after a time becomes clearly the Alinsky tactic of slanderous mockery; which does indeed have a serious moral component, having to do with willful neglect of duties of care; and those victimised by such have a right to object, FYI. So, now can you kindly stop the further strawman tactics, and show us that you can accurately present what I have to say, as a first step to a civil, reasonable discussion? (Surely, that is not too much to ask, if you really have a sound case on the merits and if I really am so obviously wrong on all counts as you want to suggest.) kairosfocus

PS: Onlookers, let us take a simple, illustrative example of the problem. In a world of AutoCad files and the like, MP wants me to set up a calculation to estimate the complex, specified information in the schematics for a building, apparently imagining that unless I can do this and any number of other things on demand, what I have to say can be dismissed as evidently wrong-headed, ignorant and stupid or else evil or insane effusions (that is plainly there in context). That is sadly revealing of a major attitude problem leading to a gross error, as obviously, all one really would have to do is read off the DWG file size. That would serve handily as an estimate, in bytes or bits, per your preference. And, in a computer age it is an obvious fact that MP did not need to make a dramatic scene over, if there was a genuine intention to understand. Let's put it this way: any entity that can be digitally represented can be reduced to a collection of addressable strings of bits. That is how computer memories work, and it is the basis for the use of the sort of stacked string map of a config space I gave above in answer to yet another MP challenge. of course, the problem with a space of 2^500 strings, is that it swamps the atomic and temporal resources of our solar system to attempt to search it blindly. kairosfocus

MP: It seems that you are insistent on a strawman caricaturing tactic, and if I point out and correct it, you think that I am the problem. That speaks volumes. None of it to your benefit, I am afraid. I am trying to deal with the underlying problem, which unless it is resolved, will simply block any real progress. As for my ignoring what you have said, has it ever dawned on you that I have repeatedly started from a major point of misrepresentation on your part, and have corrected it over and over again, only to see it repeated. What is that telling me about whether you really care about duties of care to be accurate and fair? (And BTW, just above you have twisted my context and words in responding to DWG into pretzels. I spoke to a definite, well-known problem of an Alinskyite agenda, and I spoke in correction that those who are the victims of willful slander have a right of reply. How dare you twist that into an imagined personal attack!) Let me be direct, as nothing else seems likely to get through: you are putting words and thoughts in my mouth that do not belong there. You are refusing to address the foundational issue of how we can reasonably infer about the past we cannot observe, by working back from what causes the sort of signs that we can observe. When I point this out, again and again you take occasion to further twist my words. That tells me that you are working in bad faith -- no-one working in GOOD faith would so repeatedly ignore specific and well warranted correction; most likely that bad faith is driven by a blinding emotion such as ignorant rage or else by being part of a willfully deceitful agenda. Now, I ask you, one last time, please step back from what you are doing and think again. I have already asked you to address the issue of warranted inference on reliable sign. I have provided you a link. If you do not come to a clear understanding of what that is about, you CANNOT understand what design thinkers are speaking about and what they mean. I don't care if you choose to disagree with the point just yet (though that has onward implications that may surprise you), I simply ask: can you accurately sum up what such thinkers are saying about inference on such signs, and why they say it? If, after you have seen that, you disagree, why? Then, tell us what that implies for the whole scientific enterprise of researching the past of origins, which we do not see, or inferring say the composition and inner behaviour of stars, which we cannot ever directly examine. Then, tell us you overall conclusion. I trust this will help you find a way back form the sort of confrontation that otherwise lies ahead. For, to speak in willful disregard for the truth and fairness, hoping that what you say will be taken as though it were the truth, to whatever advantage, is a very serious and improper thing to do, MP. There is a short, sharp little word for such behaviour, one that you would probably imagine is a personal attack, when it would only be an accurate description and correction. And right now, that is the road down which you are quite plainly headed. KF kairosfocus

The spread of a beneficial mutation in experimental bacterial populations: the influence of the environment and genotype on the fixation of rpoS mutations. The spread of beneficial mutations through populations is at the core of evolutionary change. A long-standing hindrance to understanding mutational sweeps was that beneficial mutations have been slow to be identified, even in commonly studied experimental populations. The lack of information on what constitutes a beneficial mutation has led to many uncertainties about the frequency, fitness benefit and fixation of beneficial mutations. A more complete picture is currently emerging for a limited set of identified mutations in bacterial populations. In turn, this will allow quantitation of several features of mutational sweeps. Most importantly, the 'benefit' of beneficial mutations can now be explained in terms of physiological function and how variations in the environment change the selectability of mutations. Here, the sweep of rpoS mutations in Escherichia coli, in both experimental and natural populations, is described in detail. These studies reveal the subtleties of physiology and regulation that strongly influence the benefit of a mutation and explain differences in sweeps between strains and between various environments.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18073783 Of course, I can't prove the negative that what the research showed was not secretly directed, or that what appeared to be random mutations were not in fact random at all but the only person that seems to be a problem for is Joe. If all ID has going for it, as Joe seems to say, is that what appears random might not be random after all then, well I guess ID is not anti evolution after all. But then again you've all just seen Joe deny that it's impossible for a beneficial mutation to become fixed in a population without intelligent design. Yet we see that all the time, and I just liked to such a study. If you really were following the evidence where it leads then you'd consider studies like this as significant. No doubt Joe requires absolute proof that his wife has not poisoned his coffee in the morning also.
Only by design or via a severe bottle-neck.
And you presumably have evidence for this that beats everything discovered from the 60's to today? Why are you holding onto it? Why not release it? Otherwise it seems to me you are just saying that, making it up if you will. I can provide links to where people are studying exactly the question you already, somehow, known the answer to. Why not give them a call, save them all that time and money? mphillips

Joe,
Just how is survival and reproductive success non-random?
You said it yourself
If one dies due to some genetic mishap but leaves 1000s of offspring that individual is more “fit” than a healthy individual that leads a long life who only leaves 10.
The fitter = more reproduction = non-random as fitness is correlated to survival therefore the state of genome is correlated to fitness is correlated to survival.
Only by design or via a severe bottle-neck.
Incorrect. For example: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2674819/ I could add more but I know you deny the validity of "On the Probability of Fixation of Mutant Genes in a Population." and that's from the 60's so what's the point in bringing anything later up.
Design, duh.
So ID is pro design? That it?
So you are too much of a coward to make your point. Got it.
I've made my point. I've got you arguing simultaneously two opposing points of view. mphillips

Is there anything else included that you’ve failed to mention?
It shouldn't need to be mentioned. Obviously in order to reproduce one needs to survive to do so, duh.
Suddenly for a process with only random inputs and outputs we’ve got a lot of non-random information. Survival. Reproductive success.
Cuz you say so. Just how is survival and reproductive success non-random?
So you are agreeing that in a population should there be an individual that has a beneficial mutation that it will tend to spread in the population and eventually every member of the population will carry it?
Only by design or via a severe bottle-neck.
I know you said ID is not anti-evolution but I think you’ve just thrown the baby out with the bathwater Joe.
Cuz you say-so- got it.
Remind me, if ID is not anti evolution what is it pro?
Design, duh. IOW mphillips, I was trying to figure out what your nonsensical point was seeing that you were too much of a coward to actually make it.
Well, I’m asking on what basis are you judging the “broken” gene to be broken if individuals with it are much fitter then individuals without?
So you are too much of a coward to make your point. Got it. Joe

Joe,
And survival is included in “reproductive success”- so what was your point?
Hmm. Is there anything else included that you've failed to mention? Suddenly for a process with only random inputs and outputs we've got a lot of non-random information. Survival. Reproductive success.
Always did. Again what was YOUR point? YOU made it seem as if I was incorrect when I said fitness = reproductive success. You even spewed a bunch of nonsense and provided a link- what for?
So you are agreeing that in a population should there be an individual that has a beneficial mutation that it will tend to spread in the population and eventually every member of the population will carry it? Even despite the fact that sometimes that individual will trip over a log and die thus that mutation vanishing with that individual? I know you said ID is not anti-evolution but I think you've just thrown the baby out with the bathwater Joe. Remind me, if ID is not anti evolution what is it pro?
IOW mphillips, I was trying to figure out what your nonsensical point was seeing that you were too much of a coward to actually make it.
Well, I'm asking on what basis are you judging the "broken" gene to be broken if individuals with it are much fitter then individuals without? Simple question really. mphillips

kariosfocus,
Are you even aware of how insistently you are caricaturing my views and those of others, or of how irritating that becomes, when such is laced with implicit personal attacks?
Actually I'm not. How could I be, you've ignored almost every thing I've said and question I've asked. You said
We have every right to expose how you rigged the game, and to call you out as materialist ideologues and fellow travellers hiding in the holy lab coat and pronouncing ex cathedra statements as a new magisterium.
And given that you were addressing DWG you've no problem with personal attacks. That that's just from this thread. I've seen many where you imply all sorts of things about people and their motives.
All of this comes straight out of Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals playbook
Or perhaps that's what it feels like to be wrong on many fronts?
Or, are you willfully and knowingly — as apropaganda act — distorting the views and smearing the character of those you disagree with, for purposes that obviously are otherwise indefensible?
I don't know that I'm distorting your views - please tell me how am I doing so? Am I smearing your character? Well, give that I'm calling you on claims that you've made I guess you could say I am. For indefensible purposes? I don't think so. For example, I'd like to write a program that would calculate the CSI in building scematics, as yo claim can be done in principle here:
Of course the digitised charts that specify the cathedral or the shack could in principle be used to quantify the CSI involved, especially to show that it is obviously well beyond 500 – 1,000 bits. (The same could be done per a nodes and arcs plot of Mt Rushmore.)
If it's "of course" possible then what is stopping you telling me, in pseudocode, how it could be done "in practice"? I'd much rather talk about that to be honest. At least a program can be examined and argued over.
Let’s ask one basic question: do you understand what inference to best, empirically grounded explanation in light of tested reliable signs is about?
Yes, it's about asking just exactly the right question so you get the answer you wanted to get all along.
If you don’t know what it is, and do not care enough for fairness to those with whom you differ, to get such things straight, that is bad enough.
But that's exactly what I'm trying to do when I ask you to relate your "needle in a haystack" example (in fact it's the crux of your argument) to actual biology. And when you totally ignore that.... <blockquote(I invite you to again look here, taking particular note of the deer track photo, and taking time to think about what you see there.) I invite you to submit me a link that supports a claim that you make where demonstrably impartial knowledgeable people have had a chance to critique your work. I need not elaborate on what you would be doing if you know better but insist on distorting those who hold views you object to. Mote? Eye? I don't "object" to your views, what I object to is your behavior. You make a claim, I ask you about it, I end up labeled a immoral radical.
Until that is resolved, it is pointless trying to discus merits.
Well, could you link me to where you have attempted to do so rather then just regurgitate another one of your talking points or links back to your geocities website?
But, you need to know that you are setting yourself up to be a poster child of how some objectors to design theory caricature what they object to.
Good for you.
I ask you to correct yourself, before I have to take stronger measures in correction.
What, like answering a direct question with a direct answer? Please. mphillips

IOW mphillips, I was trying to figure out what your nonsensical point was seeing that you were too much of a coward to actually make it. Joe

Suddenly, reproductive success = fitness again.
Always did. Again what was YOUR point? YOU made it seem as if I was incorrect when I said fitness = reproductive success. You even spewed a bunch of nonsense and provided a link- what for? Joe

No, it’s based on both the reproductive success and the ability to survive. You can’t reproduce if you have not survived, can you?
And survival is included in "reproductive success"- so what was your point? Joe

Joe,
Dude, YOU were the one who questioned me when I said fitness = reproductive success. And like the coward you are you have refused to explain yourself
You said:
BWAAAAAHAAAAAAAHAAAAAHAAAAA- fitness is based on reproductive success- it is an after-the-fact assessment.
Then I said
No, it’s based on both the reproductive success and the ability to survive. You can’t reproduce if you have not survived, can you?
then you said
If one dies due to some genetic mishap but leaves 1000s of offspring that individual is more “fit” than a healthy individual that leads a long life who only leaves 10.
Who said anything about leading a long life? The ability to survive comes before reproduction becomes relevant. Until you've survived to reproductive age your ability to reproduce is irrelevant. So therefore your healthy individual that leads a long life is less fit as it's about to be out-competed by the young sickly ones. It'll vanish like it never existed, unless we got a peek at a fossil fragment. No disagreement there. The fact that it lived a healthy long live will be of no comfort when it's out-competed by sheer population numbers and all members start to carry the "broken" gene. That you think it's significant that it lived a "long life" is irrelevant. Joe, a question. Why do you suppose so many things go wrong with people in their old age? Most things you might visit the doctor for don't apply to the under 40's but 100's of different conditions apply after. It's almost like long life and health after the ability to reproduce has not really been selected for strongly You, Joe, then said:
The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only one should be able to see the gentic defect in the organism that had 1000s of offspring and a clean genome in the other, and that person would say the second organism was the fittest.
Yet you now say
Dude, YOU were the one who questioned me when I said fitness = reproductive success. And like the coward you are you have refused to explain yourself
Suddenly, reproductive success = fitness again. Nice. Yet your criteria when looking at the genome alone is "clean" and "defect". Hardly as easily measurable as "ability to reproduce". Hence my question, - look at some genomes and tell me just by looking at them which are "fitter". Give me some specific empirical examples of what you mean. The fact that you perceive a gene as "broken" means you think there's a "original" unbroken version of it. Yet what you fail to realize is before that "unbroken" version is another version, perhaps slightly different, stretching back through unimaginable time all the way back to the origin of life. I really do think your lack of imagination is your main problem. To solve a problem you first have to be able to imagine solution's. Your imagination stopped at "I make things, thinks make by people too". mphillips

MP: Are you even aware of how insistently you are caricaturing my views and those of others, or of how irritating that becomes, when such is laced with implicit personal attacks? Are you so willful in ignorance that you cannot yield to repeated correction? Or, are you willfully and knowingly -- as apropaganda act -- distorting the views and smearing the character of those you disagree with, for purposes that obviously are otherwise indefensible? Let's ask one basic question: do you understand what inference to best, empirically grounded explanation in light of tested reliable signs is about? If you don't know what it is, and do not care enough for fairness to those with whom you differ, to get such things straight, that is bad enough. (I invite you to again look here, taking particular note of the deer track photo, and taking time to think about what you see there.) I need not elaborate on what you would be doing if you know better but insist on distorting those who hold views you object to. Until that is resolved, it is pointless trying to discus merits. But, you need to know that you are setting yourself up to be a poster child of how some objectors to design theory caricature what they object to. I ask you to correct yourself, before I have to take stronger measures in correction. KF kairosfocus

measuring information- choke on that
Don’t link, do.
Sed the coward who can't do anything:
The causal tie between an artifact and its intended character — or, strictly speaking, between an artifact and its author’s productive intention — is constituted by an author’s actions, that is, by his work on the object.- Artifact
When discussing information some people want to know how much information does something contain? If it is something straight-forward such as a definition, we can count the number of bits in that definition to find out how much information it contains. For example:
aardvark: a large burrowing nocturnal mammal (Orycteropus afer) of sub-Saharan Africa that has a long snout, extensible tongue, powerful claws, large ears, and heavy tail and feeds especially on termites and ants
A simple character count reveals 202 characters which translates into 1010 bits of information/ specified complexity. Now what do we do when all we have is an object? One way of figuring out how much information it contains is to figure out how (the simplest way) to make it. Then you write down the procedure without wasting words/ characters and count those bits. The point is that you have to capture the actions required and translate that into bits. That is if you want to use CSI. However by doing all of that you have already determined the thing was designed Now you are just trying to determine how much work was involved. But anyway, that will give you an idea of the minimal information it contains- Data collection and compression (six sigma DMAIC- define, measure, analyze, improve, control). CSI is a threshold, meaning you don't need an exact number. And it is a threshold that nature, operating freely has never been observed to come close to. Once CSI = yes you know it was designed. On Shannon Information and measuring biological information:
The word information in this theory is used in a special mathematical sense that must not be confused with its ordinary usage. In particular, information must not be confused with meaning.- Warren Weaver, one of Shannon's collaborators
Is what Weaver said so difficult to understand? Kolmogorov complexity deals with, well, complexity. From wikipedia:
Algorithmic information theory principally studies complexity measures on strings (or other data structures).
Nothing about meaning, content, functionality, prescription. IOW nothing that Information Technology cares deeply about, namely functional, meaningful, and useful information. Not only Information Technology but the whole world depends on Information Technology type of information, ie the type of information Intelligent Design is concerned with. And both Creationists and IDists make it clear, painfully clear, that when we are discussing "information" we are discussing that type of information. And without even blinking an eye, the anti-IDists always, and without fail, bring up the meaningless when trying to refute the meaningful. “Look there is nature producing Shannon Information, you lose!”- ho-hum. Moving on-
Biological specification always refers to function. An organism is a functional system comprising many functional subsystems. In virtue of their function, these systems embody patterns that are objectively given and can be identified independently of the systems that embody them. Hence these systems are specified in the same sense required by the complexity-specification criterion (see sections 1.3 and 2.5). The specification of organisms can be crashed out in any number of ways. Arno Wouters cashes it out globally in terms of the viability of whole organisms. Michael Behe cashes it out in terms of minimal function of biochemical systems.- Wm. Dembski page 148 of NFL
In the preceding and proceeding paragraphs William Dembski makes it clear that biological specification is CSI- complex specified information. In the paper "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories", Stephen C. Meyer wrote:
Dembski (2002) has used the term “complex specified information” (CSI) as a synonym for “specified complexity” to help distinguish functional biological information from mere Shannon information--that is, specified complexity from mere complexity. This review will use this term as well.

In order to be a candidate for natural selection a system must have minimal function: the ability to accomplish a task in physically realistic circumstances.- M. Behe page 45 of “Darwin’s Black Box”
With that said, to measure biological information, ie biological specification, all you have to do is count the coding nucleotides of the genes involved for that functioning system, then multiply by 2 (four possible nucleotides = 2^2) and then factor in the variation tolerance: from Kirk K. Durston, David K. Y. Chiu, David L. Abel, Jack T. Trevors, “Measuring the functional sequence complexity of proteins,” Theoretical Biology and Medical Modelling, Vol. 4:47 (2007):
[N]either RSC [Random Sequence Complexity] nor OSC [Ordered Sequence Complexity], or any combination of the two, is sufficient to describe the functional complexity observed in living organisms, for neither includes the additional dimension of functionality, which is essential for life. FSC [Functional Sequence Complexity] includes the dimension of functionality. Szostak argued that neither Shannon’s original measure of uncertainty nor the measure of algorithmic complexity are sufficient. Shannon's classical information theory does not consider the meaning, or function, of a message. Algorithmic complexity fails to account for the observation that “different molecular structures may be functionally equivalent.” For this reason, Szostak suggested that a new measure of information—functional information—is required.
Here is a formal way of measuring functional information: Robert M. Hazen, Patrick L. Griffin, James M. Carothers, and Jack W. Szostak, "Functional information and the emergence of biocomplexity," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA, Vol. 104:8574–8581 (May 15, 2007). See also: Jack W. Szostak, “Molecular messages,” Nature, Vol. 423:689 (June 12, 2003). original posts can be found here, here and here Joe

How can you judge fitness by looking only at the genome and without considering how the genome will interact with the environment?
Dude, YOU were the one who questioned me when I said fitness = reproductive success. And like the coward you are you have refused to explain yourself Joe

How have you determined that Necessity and/ or chance cannot account for the origins of living organisms when you don’t know how living organisms originated? On what are you basing this claim?
Science. Joe

Joe,
Living organisms exist. Necessity and/ or chance cannot account for the origins of living organisms. Living organisms fit the criteria for designed objects. Living organisms were designed.
How have you determined that Necessity and/ or chance cannot account for the origins of living organisms when you don't know how living organisms originated? On what are you basing this claim? Sure, we know intelligent beings like us can (potentially) create life. That does not mean that that's how it happened and to do that you'd have to do as I suggest, rule out any alternatives. And to do that you'd have a complete knowledge of physics and knowledge of the trajectory of every particle in the universe. Which you don't have, obviously. So how have you ruled it out? Perhaps it's because we've never seen life spring into being in a beaker of chemicals in the lab? Or in some warm pond somewhere? Lol. mphillips

Joe,
measuring information- choke on that
Don't link, do. What is the "information" in your past post? Quantify it. Now do the same for your "broken" gene and the "perfect original garden of eden" version. Show that the two are different. mphillips

Joe,
The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only
How can you judge fitness by looking only at the genome and without considering how the genome will interact with the environment? Sure, you can add arbitrary constraints as you like in order to make your point but you've moved so far away from reality that it's meaningless. And anyway, if you were just looking at the genome the only way you could tell that a gene was broken in the first place was if you know what it's "supposed" to look like.
But anyways obviously you can’t follow along…
What's your actual point Joe? And does anybody else here agree with Joe?
Ya see mphilips you challenged me when I said fitness = reproductive success- explain yourself, coward.
If fitness = reproductive success then the "broken gene" is fitter and you've just disproved your own point. mphillips

mphillips:
When it rains, the ground becomes wet. Therefore when the ground is wet the only cause could have been rain.
Yes, that is how YOUR thinking goes. But that is because you have serious issues. ID thinking goes like this: More like: Living organisms exist. Necessity and/ or chance cannot account for the origins of living organisms. Living organisms fit the criteria for designed objects. Living organisms were designed. And as with all scientific inferences someone can come along and falsify it by demonstrating living organisms can arise via physics and chemistry- testable and falsifiable. That is what has you so confused. Joe

mphillips:
I’m perfectly able to understand it, as far as it goes.
No evidence for that. measuring information- choke on that Joe

On what basis would they say that the second organism was the fittest, given that it is out bred by the other one with the “broken gene” by several orders of magnitude.
Geez I take it that you can't read: The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only GENOMES ONLY- that means you don't know about the offspring. Man you are dense. So I take it that you are too much of a coward to explain yourself as requested. Ya see mphilips you challenged me when I said fitness = reproductive success- explain yourself, coward.
But like I already said, if you can’t survive it does not matter how many offspring you’d have if you got the chance to breed.
LoL! As I said "reproductive success" includes survival, duh. But anyways obviously you can't follow along... Joe

Kariosfocus
We know what makes codes, data structures, algorithms and executing machines, and we see these things in the living cell, even the “simplest” that were hoped to be stripped down.
When it rains, the ground becomes wet. Therefore when the ground is wet the only cause could have been rain. People create codes. We find codes in biology. Therefore the codes in biology were created by people. As an argument, it has some holes. And it seems that your "argument for ID" uses this as a crucial component. All this stuff about "needle in a haystack" is just chaff, thrown out to put people off the scent when they get too close to the core. You find a code in biology. You know that people create codes. Therefore biology's codes are created by people. I ask you the same question I ask Upright (I've already asked you this several times however) - how do you know that the existing symbol system was in place at the origin of life? If you don't know that then you can't really say anything about how unlikely it's origin is or is not based on the extant system. mphillips

Joe,
Actually you are unable to grasp the concept and you think your ignorance is some sort of refutation.
I'm perfectly able to understand it, as far as it goes. What I don't understand is how to calculate it and as far as I can tell, nobody else knows how either. Perhaps you could help by calculating the FSCI/FSCI in this comment? Show your working! mphillips

Joe,
The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only one should be able to see the gentic defect in the organism that had 1000s of offspring and a clean genome in the other, and that person would say the second organism was the fittest.
On what basis would they say that the second organism was the fittest, given that it is out bred by the other one with the "broken gene" by several orders of magnitude. So it seems to me that this "broken" gene is actually providing a survival advantage and although you might perceive it as "broken" that's not how evolution treats it. So although to you, with knowledge of how the gene was originally created in the garden of eden, it looks "broken" in fact it's "breakage" has resulted in a much fitter organism.
So I take it that you are too much of a coward to explain yourself as requested.
Then it falls to you to say why somebody would say that the organism without the "genetic defect" is fitter despite the fact that an organism with the "defect" can our breed it 1000's of times over. What metric are you using to measure fitness Joe? If it's reproductive success then the defect obviously wins. Ah, but I guess I said it's not just reproductive success and that's what you are hanging your hopes on. But like I already said, if you can't survive it does not matter how many offspring you'd have if you got the chance to breed. So give that the "defect" allows the organism to both live and breed many more times the organisms without it then on what basis are you saying it's the less fit? What metric are you using to make that decision? mphillips

Joe, ignorance refutes all knowledge. Mung

But you are unable to define FSCI in the first place so any process that creates it can be tested.
Actually you are unable to grasp the concept and you think your ignorance is some sort of refutation. Joe

The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only one should be able to see the gentic defect in the organism that had 1000s of offspring and a clean genome in the other, and that person would say the second organism was the fittest.
Would they?
Yes they would. So I take it that you are too much of a coward to explain yourself as requested. And no, I don't wish I could edit my comments. You have not shown anything I have said to be incorrect. Joe

Joe,
The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only one should be able to see the gentic defect in the organism that had 1000s of offspring and a clean genome in the other, and that person would say the second organism was the fittest.
Would they? So then perhaps you can do the same, there have been many genomes sequenced - care to pick some and say which are fitter then the others? If what you say is true.... On what basis is something a "defect" if it results in or does not prevent many many more offspring and hence that "defects" spread in the population? B'Coz Joe looks at it's genome and says "it has changed from it's once perfect form when the designer created it". Joe, I bet at this point you are wishing you could edit your comments. Perhaps a mail to a moderator? mphillips

kairosfocus
where first viable life, just for the coded info is looking at WELL PAST 100,000+ BITS
Tell me more about first viable life. What is that then? What is that "specification"?
for ANY chance contingency driven process to face the needle in the haystack challenge on FSCI on the gamut of the solar system is 500 bits; 1,000 bits more than takes in the observed cosmos,
I think I see the problem. You see the "process" as looking for something. When in fact it's simply using what has been provided and taking it from there. After all, every configuration even in this massive space will do something, sometimes. And something that does something some of time time is all that's required. Not a specific thing, not a specific needle in a haystack. You are looking for something however, a specific target - your needle in a haystack you love so much. And when you calculate the chance of finding it randomly you conclude design. Yet that needle is embedded in a strawman of your own devising. Actual work is being done on the origin of protein family's
Functional primordial proteins presumably originated from random sequences, but it is not known how frequently functional, or even folded, proteins occur in collections of random sequences. Here we have used in vitro selection of messenger RNA displayed proteins, in which each protein is covalently linked through its carboxy terminus to the 3? end of its encoding mRNA1, to sample a large number of distinct random sequences. Starting from a library of 6?×?1012 proteins each containing 80 contiguous random amino acids, we selected functional proteins by enriching for those that bind to ATP. This selection yielded four new ATP-binding proteins that appear to be unrelated to each other or to anything found in the current databases of biological proteins. The frequency of occurrence of functional proteins in random-sequence libraries appears to be similar to that observed for equivalent RNA libraries
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v410/n6829/full/410715a0.html
But, to defend the materialist a priori, it is demanded that we surrender what we know per observation and accept materialist just so stories.
Don't you get it? That's the exact opposite of what I'm suggesting you do. Look, let's face it, does your faith in the "intelligent designer" rest entirely on if the symbol system, protiens or bodyplans are designed or not? If not, then why does the default have to be "they were designed"? Can't you just want and see where the evidence leads? I ask again, what biological process is operating when you talk about "needle in a haystack" probabilities?
for ANY chance contingency driven process to face the needle in the haystack challenge on FSCI on the gamut of the solar system is 500 bits
But what is it you are asking? That you want a demonstration of a chance contingency driven process (I notice no mention of "selection" there) that produces FSCI? But you are unable to define FSCI in the first place so any process that creates it can be tested I've asked you several times for the pseudocode that would translate building schematics into a CSI value and you've ignored me. Yet it's something you claim "in principle" can be done. Somehow I doubt it.
Worse, ALL of the scenarios being presented to us with breezily confident manner as just so stories dressed up in lab coats, lack one vital necessity for inference to best explanation on sign: observed processes in the present that produce the same signs.
What rubbish. Who is presenting anything to anyone breezily confident manner, an intent to deceive? As that's what you mean.
lack one vital necessity for inference to best explanation on sign: observed processes in the present that produce the same signs
Yes yes, everyday experience demonstrated billions of times each day – intelligent agents routinely create abstract digital codes. Could you tell me just one example of an abstract digital code you created today Kariosfocus? Don't be shy. If it's a billion's of times a day thing then you can do 10 examples. And don't forget, it has to actually be a abstract symbol system, not a "text paragraph, as can be seen on this thread" as you usualy say. An abstract code. Like the one in DNA. You said it, now prove it. But no doubt you'll also ignore this and continue to repeat the same over and over and then start to talk about my civility and tone. All that remains is for you to post your "foot in the door" quote where you argue that science must allow for miracles and I think that's the trifecta.
You now demand a picture or map of a multidimensional phase space absent the momentum considerations. This, given the repeated pattern already evident (and sources you have been pointed to), simply makes you come across as being willfully obtuse. However, for the reasonable onlooker . . . I simply point out that the easiest map of such a space for a string structure of 500 bits is:
So, one last time. You are making claims based on the "sea of functionality" and therefore must have a map, otherwise on what basis are you making those claims? So I ask you for that map and you call me willfully obtuse. But they are your claims Kariosfocus! Not mine!
I simply point out that the easiest map of such a space for a string structure of 500 bits is
And what if every position in that map had some function? What then? And what if, usually, nearby positions had similar function? And, what if, regions that proved fatal when explored proved fatal when explored. Etc etc. So yes, the space is big. But the point is with protein (for example) systems we're dealing with actual physical things. Mix it all up, something will always happen. It's called chemistry. Totally the opposite to the strawman caricature of evolution you are using. Yes, if you look at a protein in isolation and work out the probability of getting exactly that one then it's going to be very unlikely via random iteration. Nobody disagrees with that. Except that's not how you do it. It exists, it's probability is one. Now, if you really had a map you could say that a specific protein only does this specific function. But there may be many more configurations out there that do exactly the same thing and without that knowledge you can't do the calculation you are trying to do, even if it had any relevance which is does not for the reasons I've already explained. Please continue to ignore this. mphillips

F/N: Somewhere above, MP tried to raise the suggested scenario of OOL on clay beds. He evidently does not realise that this scenario faces insuperable difficulties getting to the set of required info by chance variation and mechanism, where complex, specifically functional coded digital info has just one empirically warranted source: design. Boiled down, the needle in the haystack challenge leads to a need for a credible source of codes, algorithms etc as well as implementing machinery, before you get to the von Neumann self replicator that is required for cell based life. Worse, no vNSR, no possibility of evolution. No encapsulation and protection, no preservation of the controlled environment necessary to life. No intelligently controlled gates, no correct materials and energy flow control. And more, much more, cf. here from the recent conference on the minimal requisites issue. It is easy to write dismissive words about 747s formed by tornadoes in junkyards, only, the challenge starts way before that, with getting to the equivalent of one instrument on the flight deck. and so forth and so more; remember the threshold -- for ANY chance contingency driven process to face the needle in the haystack challenge on FSCI on the gamut of the solar system is 500 bits; 1,000 bits more than takes in the observed cosmos, where first viable life, just for the coded info is looking at WELL PAST 100,000+ BITS. Worse, ALL of the scenarios being presented to us with breezily confident manner as just so stories dressed up in lab coats, lack one vital necessity for inference to best explanation on sign: observed processes in the present that produce the same signs. We know what makes codes, data structures, algorithms and executing machines, and we see these things in the living cell, even the "simplest" that were hoped to be stripped down. But, to defend the materialist a priori, it is demanded that we surrender what we know per observation and accept materialist just so stories. Par for the course. Cf the IOSE unit on OOL here. kairosfocus

If one dies due to some genetic mishap but leaves 1000s of offspring that individual is more “fit” than a healthy individual that leads a long life who only leaves 10. The point of that is if someone were to take at look at the genomes only one should be able to see the gentic defect in the organism that had 1000s of offspring and a clean genome in the other, and that person would say the second organism was the fittest. Joe

Onlookers (and MP): This is what I noted to MP at 19 above, 9:13 am:
You have your map, but I can predict that you will just keep on manufacturing further specious objections. That — pardon directness — is because the root issue is not the warrant for the design inference but your a priori materialism or fellow traveller status with such ideologues. To break this machine gun spray of objections, I simply put this to you: observe the issue of warrant through best explanation on empirically grounded sign. Do you or do you not agree that this is integral to origins sciences that try to reconstruct the past of life, of our solar system and cosmos. If not, why not, and what then do you think about these sciences. If so, then why do you choose to reject the same reasoning in the case of inference on the sign, functionally specific complex organisation and associated information, apart from ideological a prioris. Failing cogent answers, all that is going on is that you are here to spew talking points, not to seriously examine a serious matter on the merits. And, right now that is what the evidence is suggesting.
As predicted. So, I have every reason to conclude that we are dealing with yet another talking point pusher, interested only to spew objections, not to seriously dialogue. And yet, what I raised is what is needed if there is to be any real progress. Beyond this point I will use examples of how the objectors are going off the rails, as those of MP's ilk have undermined any basis for genuine discussion. The cited excerpt above is of course the first such problem. We are dealing with those who refuse to come to terms with the requisites of dealing scientifically with the remote, unobservable past in any consistent and reasonable way. (Cf also the original post.) That tells us a lot. KF kairosfocus

fitness is based on reproductive success- it is an after-the-fact assessment.
No, it’s based on both the reproductive success and the ability to survive. You can’t reproduce if you have not survived, can you?
Umm the term "reproductive success" INCLUDES the ability (or inability) to survive AND reproduce. Ya see mphillips you just don't have a clue, and it shows. Joe

The length/health of the life it leads is meaningless in your example, you must think you have a point or why did you mention it?
Look, I said that reproductive success = fitness, see comment 14. Then in comment 15, thinking you were "smart" replied:
No, it’s based on both the reproductive success and the ability to survive.
Well yes, duh. If one doesn't reach reproducing age... IOW you added nothing, yet think you really did something. Then you linked to a paper- why? It appears what I said was correct all along and you just jumped in for no reason and tried to "correct" me even though you offered nothing that did so. So explain yourself. Joe

Joe,
I know that. That is what I said- reproductive success = fitness.
Therefore the "healthy" individual is less fit
If one dies due to some genetic mishap but leaves 1000s of offspring that individual is more “fit” than a healthy individual that leads a long life who only leaves 10.
Yet
I know that. That is what I said- reproductive success = fitness.
So what relevance is the fact that one dies due to a genetic mishap? It's still the fitter. Don't you get it? The length/health of the life it leads is meaningless in your example, you must think you have a point or why did you mention it? You just fundamentally don't understand the core issues. mphillips

BUT AS I KEEP SAYING you have not shown that this search space has any relevance to what ACTUALLY HAPPENS IN BIOLOGY.
Right, by actually saying there is a search space gives evolutionism too much credit. Neither you nor your alleged scientific community can demonstrate the search space exists. Joe

Kariosfocus
But — as has been linked to you and obviously ignored — the atomic resources of our solar system, for its lifespan, running at the rate of fast ionic reactions, could not sample more than 1 straw to a cubical hay bale 1,000 light years on the side of it. No chance based random walk can reasonably find islands of function constituting such valid texts. The vast majority of this map will be nonsense strings of no meaning, and that is what any reasonable chance based random walk will pick up.
Tell me specifically what biological process is occurring here during this "search for islands of function"? What is actually happening at a biological level? If you can't explain that then what relevance does this search space you describe have?
And FYI, highly contingent outcomes have two empirically credible sources: chance or choice.
Random choice in a massive search space or design? BUT AS I KEEP SAYING you have not shown that this search space has any relevance to what ACTUALLY HAPPENS IN BIOLOGY. What biological process is occurring that as the the atomic resources of our solar system, for its lifespan, running at the rate of fast ionic reactions, could not sample more than 1 straw to a cubical hay bale 1,000 light years on the side of it? What are the "atomic resources of our solar system" doing at that point that relates to biology? You simply have a fundamental flaw in your understanding here and it's like you don't want to be corrected. I suspect it's the keystone fundamental to how you support ID on a "scientific" level. The illusion can only be sustained if the "light year hay bale" image is strong. What is happening that you think is searching is going on? Is there a set of molecules trying one configuration after another in a primordial sea? What? Relate it to biology or stop using it as an argument. mphillips

Why don’t you create a model and see if this is the devastating blow that you actually think it is.
Why don't you get a life as opposed to making stuff up?
What sort of “genetic mishap” is it that causes an individual to leave 1000?s of offspring but be considered less fit then one that leaves 10?
YOU tell me. YOU said that reproductive success isn't the only measure of fitness.
So, Joe, as far as evolution is concerned the individual that leaves 1000?s of offspring is fitter then the one that leaves 10 even if the one that leaves 1000?s has to hobble around with a walking stick in it’s old age.
I know that. That is what I said- reproductive success = fitness. You appear to have some mental issue. Perhaps you should seek help... Joe

Joe,
If one dies due to some genetic mishap but leaves 1000s of offspring that individual is more “fit” than a healthy individual that leads a long life who only leaves 10.
Why don't you create a model and see if this is the devastating blow that you actually think it is. The fact is there is a fatal flaw in your argument. What sort of "genetic mishap" is it that causes an individual to leave 1000's of offspring but be considered less fit then one that leaves 10? Less "fit" to you perhaps, but you are not evolution are you Joe? The fact is, Joe, that evolution does not care if in your old age you live a long time sick - once you are past the age of reproduction your "fitness" (as in health, I noted your equivocation) is invisible to evolution. So, Joe, as far as evolution is concerned the individual that leaves 1000's of offspring is fitter then the one that leaves 10 even if the one that leaves 1000's has to hobble around with a walking stick in it's old age. How long a life it leads is irrelevant - ask a bacteria. You clever riposte is nothing of the sort. It's actually just an illustration of how alien the basic concepts are to you. As I say, crack a book or two. mphillips

PS: You now demand a picture or map of a multidimensional phase space absent the momentum considerations. This, given the repeated pattern already evident (and sources you have been pointed to), simply makes you come across as being willfully obtuse. However, for the reasonable onlooker . . . I simply point out that the easiest map of such a space for a string structure of 500 bits is:
00000 . . . 00 00000 . . . 01 00000 . . . 10 . . . 11111 . . . 11
This list of 2^500 items contains in it every possible string of 500 bits, which includes every 73 character ASCII string in English that can ever exist, and every similar string of functional software that can ever exist. But -- as has been linked to you and obviously ignored -- the atomic resources of our solar system, for its lifespan, running at the rate of fast ionic reactions, could not sample more than 1 straw to a cubical hay bale 1,000 light years on the side of it. No chance based random walk can reasonably find islands of function constituting such valid texts. The vast majority of this map will be nonsense strings of no meaning, and that is what any reasonable chance based random walk will pick up. And FYI, highly contingent outcomes have two empirically credible sources: chance or choice. Now, I have no doubt that once we do have an island in hand, we may be able to play around a bit and move from one successful string to another in a zone within a fairly short Hamming distance. Similar to mat --> cat --> rat -- tat --> tam --> tan etc. But, you will notice that this string is very short. The DNA for simplest reasonable cell based life will require 100,000 - 1 mn bases, from the evidence we have in hand. You know full well, or full well should know, that any digital representation or analogue one for that matter, can be reduced to bit strings [the node and arcs representations that I have pointed to are simply a simple way to picture this], so the map above is WLOG, save that it is far too short. Think about the 2^100,000 long, 100,000 bit map. You have your map, but I can predict that you will just keep on manufacturing further specious objections. That -- pardon directness -- is because the root issue is not the warrant for the design inference but your a priori materialism or fellow traveller status with such ideologues. To break this machine gun spray of objections, I simply put this to you: observe the issue of warrant through best explanation on empirically grounded sign. Do you or do you not agree that this is integral to origins sciences that try to reconstruct the past of life, of our solar system and cosmos. If not, why not, and what then do you think about these sciences. If so, then why do you choose to reject the same reasoning in the case of inference on the sign, functionally specific complex organisation and associated information, apart from ideological a prioris. Failing cogent answers, all that is going on is that you are here to spew talking points, not to seriously examine a serious matter on the merits. And, right now that is what the evidence is suggesting. kairosfocus

So if the environment is an input, and the environment is not “random” over the scales that lifeforms typically occupy then that’s not a “random” input at all is it Joe?
The environment is an external factor, not an input. The 3 inputs to NS are: 1- Variation 2- Heritability 3- Fecundity Joe

MP: Something is very wrong here. You must know that OOL speaks to the origin of cell-based life. In that light, this is indefensible, as a simple matter of playing at self-refuting selective hyperskepticism and assocated question begging:
[Joe:] But the OoL is BEFORE evolution gets started. [MP:} Is it? Why? Perhaps you are right, perhaps not. But support your answer?
FYI, OOL -- which is what I specifically referenced and which Joe followed up on -- has to account for the origin of a self replicating entity that uses code based representations in that process. No reproduction, no succession of generations. No succession of generations on genetic code and no variations of same leading to variations of phenotype etc that yield differential reproductive success in ecological niches. Which you are too well informed not to have known all along. Your "prove it to me beyond dispute" talking point just collapsed. Again. KF kairosfocus

No, it’s based on both the reproductive success and the ability to survive. You can’t reproduce if you have not survived, can you?
If one dies due to some genetic mishap but leaves 1000s of offspring that individual is more "fit" than a healthy individual that leads a long life who only leaves 10. And just because evios can change definitions to suit their needs, that means what to the rest of us? Joe

Joe,
Yes, as we arbitrarily chose the artificial selection pressure.
That's not an answer to "was that random"?
And whatever is good enough for one genration may not be for the next.
That's true, but trivially so. As I mentioned, conditions for the next generation will generally be similar to the previous generation. Agree/disagree?
So there is no way to predict what will be selected for at any point in time and no way of predicting what mutation will pop up at any point in time.
And that's a problem because........
BWAAAAAHAAAAAAAHAAAAAHAAAAA- fitness is based on reproductive success- it is an after-the-fact assessment.
No, it's based on both the reproductive success and the ability to survive. You can't reproduce if you have not survived, can you? Seems you don't know quite as much as you think you know. If you can be wrong about that, fairly fundamental thing, then what else are you wrong about Joe but don't even know? Here's a little reading: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2753274/?tool=pmcentrez
Although the operation of natural selection requires that genotypes differ in fitness, for some geneticists it seems easier to understand natural selection than fitness. Partly this reflects the fact that the word “fitness” has been used to mean subtly different things. Here I distinguish among these meanings (e.g., individual versus absolute versus relative fitness) and explain how evolutionary geneticists use fitness to predict changes in the genetic composition of populations through time.
I'll write the author and let them know that they are wrong as Joe say you can't make predictions in evolution. mphillips

Tell me Joe (although I don’t know why I bother to even ask as you don’t respond to questions) what % of the time does the most fit die and the lesser survive?
BWAAAAAHAAAAAAAHAAAAAHAAAAA- fitness is based on reproductive success- it is an after-the-fact assessment. Joe

But the OoL is BEFORE evolution gets started.
Is it? Why? Perhaps you are right, perhaps not. But support your answer?
Umm, that is the whole point from keeping the two seperated- they are not the same, duh.
If we put some bacteria on a plate and put a heat gradient across the plate which is too high for some to tolerate at it’s highest point but over time they grow to cover the entire plate, was that random?
Yes, as we arbitrarily chose the artificial selection pressure. But anyways your blind spot is bigger than you- with NS whatever is good enough survives to reproduce and that is according to Mayr. And whatever is good enough for one genration may not be for the next. So there is no way to predict what will be selected for at any point in time and no way of predicting what mutation will pop up at any point in time. Joe

mphillips- Toktaalik was NOT a prediction borne from accumulations of gentic accidents. Also it was found in the wrong place- according to Shubin. Well we are told that pre-biotic natural selection is a contradition in terms, so what else is there?
Are we?
Yup, Dobzhansky said it- an evolutionary biologist, no less.
In any case, where are you getting your information from about the origin of life and what happened?
Scientific research.
So perhaps it’s just your lack of imagination that’s at fault Joe?
BWAAAAAAHAAAAAHAAA I told you guys these nitwits think that imagination is actual evidence! Also those thousands of people who do this for a living can’t even demonstrate anything beyond two new protein-to-protein binding sites, if even that. So that was just another one of your bluffs.
Therefore Intelligent Design.
Nope, therfor your scientists are all losers and cry-babies.
Crack a book Joe. If you have a specific reference you want, then I’ll be glad to supply it.
Been there done that- your position doesn't have anything but lies, misrepresentations and equivocations. Not one of those "predictions" has anything to do with accumulations of random mutations. Your bluff is duly noted. Joe

Joe,
But the OoL is BEFORE evolution gets started.
Is it? Why? Perhaps you are right, perhaps not. But support your answer?
Also even natural selection, a result of three random inputs, has to also be random.
And we circle back to your blindspot Joe. If we put some bacteria on a plate and put a heat gradient across the plate which is too high for some to tolerate at it's highest point but over time they grow to cover the entire plate, was that random? IOW Joe you are of course correct - at any point on that plate a brick could fall from the ceiling (a random effect) and kill all the bacteria on the plate so regardless of their individual fitness they'll all die due to what's in essence a random event. And that's your dam against the power of evolution. You can see it, you can understand it but all you can say against it is "well, the fittest might not survive because it might die by tripping over" or somesuch. And I'm sure that does happen. But for your position to work Joe that has to happen each and every time and of course that's not the case. Tell me Joe, is the environment "random"? What do you say? If I move 1mm north form where I currently am will it be A)Quite like where I came from most of the time. B)Very unlike where I came from most of the time. So if the environment is an input, and the environment is not "random" over the scales that lifeforms typically occupy then that's not a "random" input at all is it Joe? Tell me Joe (although I don't know why I bother to even ask as you don't respond to questions) what % of the time does the most fit die and the lesser survive? 1% 50% 100% Just give it your best shot, caek boy. mphillips

Joe,
Well we are told that pre-biotic natural selection is a contradition in terms, so what else is there?
Are we? In any case, where are you getting your information from about the origin of life and what happened? Prayer?
In simplified form, the clay hypothesis runs as follows: Clays form naturally from silicates in solution. Clay crystals, as other crystals, preserve their external formal arrangement as they grow, snap and grow further. Masses of clay crystals of a particular external form may happen to affect their environment in ways which affect their chances of further replication — for example, a 'stickier' clay crystal is more likely to silt a stream bed, creating an environment conducive to further sedimentation. It is conceivable that such effects could extend to the creation of flat areas likely to be exposed to air, dry and turn to wind-borne dust, which could fall at random in other streams. Thus by simple, inorganic, physical processes, a selection environment might exist for the reproduction of clay crystals of the 'stickier' shape. There follows a process of natural selection for clay crystals which trap certain forms of molecules to their surfaces (those which enhance their replication potential). Quite complex proto-organic molecules can be catalysed by the surface properties of silicates. The final step occurs when these complex molecules perform a 'Genetic Takeover' from their clay 'vehicle', becoming an independent locus of replication - an evolutionary moment that might be understood as the first exaptation. Despite its frequent citation as a useful model of the kind of process that might have been involved in the prehistory of DNA, the 'clay hypothesis' of abiogenesis has not been widely accepted. As it was current and fashionable at that time, Richard Dawkins used it as the example model of abiogenesis in his 1986 book The Blind Watchmaker.
So perhaps it's just your lack of imagination that's at fault Joe?
Also those thousands of people who do this for a living can’t even demonstrate anything beyond two new protein-to-protein binding sites, if even that. So that was just another one of your bluffs.
Therefore Intelligent Design.
Emlighten us with a reference. Also there is a huge difference between the claims it makes and teh claims it can support.
Given that every single time you are presented with a scientific reference you dispute it with "they don't even know if the mutations are even random or not" I think it would be a bit like throwing pearls to swine. Crack a book Joe. If you have a specific reference you want, then I'll be glad to supply it.
But your position doesn’t do that.
Predicted where Tiktaalik would be found, didn't it? Here's a few more.
arwin predicted, based on homologies with African apes, that human ancestors arose in Africa. That prediction has been supported by fossil and genetic evidence (Ingman et al. 2000). Theory predicted that organisms in heterogeneous and rapidly changing environments should have higher mutation rates. This has been found in the case of bacteria infecting the lungs of chronic cystic fibrosis patients (Oliver et al. 2000). Predator-prey dynamics are altered in predictable ways by evolution of the prey (Yoshida et al. 2003). Ernst Mayr predicted in 1954 that speciation should be accompanied with faster genetic evolution. A phylogenetic analysis has supported this prediction (Webster et al. 2003). Several authors predicted characteristics of the ancestor of craniates. On the basis of a detailed study, they found the fossil Haikouella "fit these predictions closely" (Mallatt and Chen 2003). Evolution predicts that different sets of character data should still give the same phylogenetic trees. This has been confirmed informally myriad times and quantitatively, with different protein sequences, by Penny et al. (1982). Insect wings evolved from gills, with an intermediate stage of skimming on the water surface. Since the primitive surface-skimming condition is widespread among stoneflies, J. H. Marden predicted that stoneflies would likely retain other primitive traits, too. This prediction led to the discovery in stoneflies of functional hemocyanin, used for oxygen transport in other arthropods but never before found in insects (Hagner-Holler et al. 2004; Marden 2005).
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA210.html What predictions does ID make, in advance of the fact? "Things are complex"? mphillips

So mphillips is full of rhetoric but short on evidence- typical. Joe

mphillips:
Sure, there is a random element to evolution, but it’s not the totality of it.
But the OoL is BEFORE evolution gets started. Also even natural selection, a result of three random inputs, has to also be random. Joe

mphillips:
Nobody is claiming that “chance” produced biology.
Well we are told that pre-biotic natural selection is a contradition in terms, so what else is there? Please reference your answer. Also those thousands of people who do this for a living can't even demonstrate anything beyond two new protein-to-protein binding sites, if even that. So that was just another one of your bluffs.
But for you this simple fact is indisputable proof of ID simply because you don’t actually understand the claims that modern biology is making.
Emlighten us with a reference. Also there is a huge difference between the claims it makes and teh claims it can support.
Simply produce some novel knowledge or insight, make a prediction then test it. You know, do some actual science.
But your position doesn't do that. Joe

Maus,
Which is why every grade school textbook in the Western world speaks of the default designer instead. Either you tripped on your tongue or you have a very non-random notion of randomness that you need to flesh out for your notion to make sense.
It's not my notion. It's Kariosfocus'. He believes that cells are formed "by chance" in a tornado in a junkyard scenario which makes their intelligent design much more probable. Sure, there is a random element to evolution, but it's not the totality of it. Rewind that tape and things will play out differently. Yet nobody can seem to provide a citation to a "darwinist" who is making the claim which Kariosfocuus is representing as the opponents position. mphillips

kariosfocus
To empirically demonstrate how to get from a soup of molecules to a gated, encapsulated, metabolic entity with an embedded von Neumann self replicator using hundreds or thousands of diverse proteins as workhorse molecules is quite another.
I quite agree. And personally I am unsatisfied with the answer you are happy with, to wit: "it was by design". That does not really say much at all does it? And if empirical demonstrations are required then please demonstrate how the intelligent designer did it.
And, we are “only” at 100K to 1 mn bits of coded functional info here!
Again, the same blindspot as Upright Biped. You are assuming that life is at OoL as it is now. You simply don't know that and hence this is a strawman. "Look at how many things are in the cell and look at the probability of that coming into existence randomly - it's too small by far for the lifetime of the universe". And when you put it like that, you are quite right. Except that nobody is making the claim that's how it happened except you, and you are only doing it so that your alternative does not look quite so transparent.
Don’t even try showing how such, step by step can traverse intervening seas of non function to move by blind chance and mechanical necessity to novel body plans with genomes of 10?s to 100?s or more millions of bases.
Again, your blindspot. Please provide a map of these "seas of non function". You simply don't have one yet you continue to make these claims. And you fail at the first hurdle I'm afraid. Let's look again at what you just said:
Don’t even try showing how such, step by step can traverse intervening seas of non function to move by blind chance and mechanical necessity to novel body plans with genomes of 10?s to 100?s or more millions of bases.
If you have landed on a port of non-function you are dead. So if you are searching the space randomly, most moves will kill you. Yet if you are exploring a nearby space, where most changes won't outright kill you then long journeys are suddenly possible. You simply don't get this despite being told over and over and over.
That simply shows that on YOUR part, there is an attitude of rudely dismissive contempt.
Says the person who simply drops links into their own website as a "corrective" and then when people don't' immediately fall into line you label then immoral monstrosities.
So rude that you have not bothered to think out why it is that I keep speaking the language of inference to best, empirical observation grounded explanation.
So if you have empirical observations, perhaps you could note when the designer acted? Just once, or all the time? From your "bodyplan" comments I assume that each "bodyplan" event requires the designers intervention. Correct? When/how does that happen? Does it happen to the DNA? Somewhere else? How?
If after repeated corrections, you keep on setting up and knocking over the SAME strawman caricature, that begins to go to character, MP.
As I noted, you have been corrected many times on your misunderstandings about "tornado in a junkyard" ideas yet have never once changed your perspective. You can't make a cell by iterating around all the component parts in a random order while randomly iterating those component parts configuration. Yet this is the strawman you've had to construct just so your version of OoL seems less outlandishly improbable.
Please, think again, and have more regard for your duties of care to the truth and to fairness to your interlocutors.
I would ask you the same thing. Perhaps if you learn just a little about the subject your think you are critiquing you'd rub people up the wrong way a bit less.
You are far too intelligent and knowledgeable to be making that repeated propaganda talking point strawman up by ignorant accident.
Yet you keep repeating the same strawman arguments (needle in a haystack) despite knowing better. Why? mphillips

MP: to assert is one thing:
Yes, NOBODY DISPUTES THAT PROTEIN SPACE IS LARGE. And that searching it randomly would take longer then the universe has existed to get to where we are now. But there are many routes through, the more that are found the more can be found. And different configurations can have similar effects.
To empirically demonstrate how to get from a soup of molecules to a gated, encapsulated, metabolic entity with an embedded von Neumann self replicator using hundreds or thousands of diverse proteins as workhorse molecules is quite another. And, we are "only" at 100K to 1 mn bits of coded functional info here! Don't even try showing how such, step by step can traverse intervening seas of non function to move by blind chance and mechanical necessity to novel body plans with genomes of 10's to 100's or more millions of bases. As for:
But for you this simple fact is indisputable proof of ID simply because you don’t actually understand the claims that modern biology is making.
That simply shows that on YOUR part, there is an attitude of rudely dismissive contempt. So rude that you have not bothered to think out why it is that I keep speaking the language of inference to best, empirical observation grounded explanation. If after repeated corrections, you keep on setting up and knocking over the SAME strawman caricature, that begins to go to character, MP. Please, think again, and have more regard for your duties of care to the truth and to fairness to your interlocutors. You are far too intelligent and knowledgeable to be making that repeated propaganda talking point strawman up by ignorant accident. Please, do better next time. KF kairosfocus

"Nobody is saying that “chance” is the default." Which is why every grade school textbook in the Western world speaks of the default designer instead. Either you tripped on your tongue or you have a very non-random notion of randomness that you need to flesh out for your notion to make sense. Maus

Kariosfocus,
We can then take up the analysis of chance based random walks in a config space of sufficient complexity, to see why that should be so for complex and functionally specific patterns. Namely, there is too much haystack, you can only make a relatively tiny sample, and there is just too little needle.
And this is *your* blindspot. What do you think is more likely, you've got it wrong or thousands of people who do this for a living and who are honest and decent people have got it wrong? You are searching a space much bigger then that which is actually searched. Only the nearby areas to that which already works are traversed. Then yes, you will say, your problem is to get to the shorelines of functionality. And then we're back at the origin of life. Which you know less about them I. And I know very little indeed.
The bare logical possibility that chance can throw up any contingent pattern must hold the default unless a logically certain disproof can be produced,
And here again, your blindspot. Nobody is claiming that "chance" produced biology. The only person making that claim is you. There is much more to it then that. But if you juggle some numbers, get it up into more numbers then can be written on the atoms in the universe you think you've proven that design is the only option. Yet all you've done is to demonstrate your ignorance, and how little is known in general not only about OoL but physics and the universe in general. Nobody is saying that "chance" is the default. And when you frame it as "chance vs design and look at the improbability of chance" you are doing your own argument a disservice. Yes, NOBODY DISPUTES THAT PROTEIN SPACE IS LARGE. And that searching it randomly would take longer then the universe has existed to get to where we are now. But there are many routes through, the more that are found the more can be found. And different configurations can have similar effects. But for you this simple fact is indisputable proof of ID simply because you don't actually understand the claims that modern biology is making. So, once again, what is more likely, that you, with no formal (that I'm aware of, you trained in electronics and politics) biological learning behind you has spotted a show stopper for evolution or that you simply have misunderstood what it is that you do know? Which is too little to make the kinds of determinations you are making here. It's nothing to be ashamed of, I've not formal biology qualifications either. But I do know you are dead wrong about the "needle in a haystack" mathematics and their applicability to evolution. The answer is easy to determine. Simply produce some novel knowledge or insight, make a prediction then test it. You know, do some actual science. mphillips

The problem here is one of Logical Positivism. LP itself being an absurdly unworkable notion, but if it is given an uninspected credibility it necessarily becomes Pop Positivism. Which is not that one can 'verify the truth' but that the consequent observed is 'evidence' for the unobserved, and possibly unobservable, priors. And therefore the unknown and unknowable is a True Fact of the universe. And we know so because we failed to look at it. But if one takes Falsificationism seriously then the vast raft of what passes today as 'science' is right out the window as cultist claptrap swaddled in a labcoat. There is a very significant and serious social dimension involving power, status, money, and morality. Which we cannot, of course, acknowledge lest the sham be revealed and we refuse to continue shoveling money at snake oil, prophets, and the University system. Maus

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