Science and Freethinking

_{GilDodgen
September 23, 2011

Intelligent Design

2}_{Categories
Intelligent Design}

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Everyone has a religion, a raison d’être, and mine was once Dawkins’. I had the same disdain for people of faith that he does, only I could have put him to shame with the power and passion of my argumentation.

But something happened. As a result of my equally passionate love of science, logic, and reason, I realized that I had been conned. The creation story of my atheistic, materialistic religion suddenly made no sense.

This sent a shock wave through both my mind and my soul. Could it be that I’m not just the result of random errors filtered by natural selection? Am I just the product of the mindless, materialistic processes that “only legitimate scientists” all agree produced me? Does my life have any ultimate purpose or meaning? Am I just a meat-machine with no other purpose than to propagate my “selfish genes”?

Ever since I was a child I thought about such things, but I put my blind faith in the “scientists” who taught me that all my concerns were irrelevant, that science had explained, or would eventually explain, everything in purely materialistic terms.

But I’m a freethinker, a legitimate scientist. I follow the evidence wherever it leads. And the evidence suggests that the universe and living systems are the product of an astronomically powerful creative intelligence.

Comments

Elizabeth Liddle first posted the link to this research. Perhaps she would like to weigh in. Consider this quote from the introduction of this paper.
A simple synthetic cell, or protocell, must be able to grow, divide, and maintain heritable information. We are attempting to construct such a system through the integration of two complementary components: (1) a spatially localized replicating compartment or vesicle and (2) a spontaneously replicating genetic polymer.
I understand that their aim is to support their hypothesis that this might relate to some form of undirected abiogenesis. Let me emphasize that I am not challenging this in any way. But does their research not also demonstrate how to produce the same result deliberately? In fact, which does it support better - that similar results could be obtained by repeating the experiment, or that similar results may have occurred outside such an experiment? I repeat that I am not challenging their conclusion, only adding my own. The unreasonable claim has been made repeatedly that ID does not offer any detailed explanation of how one might construct a living thing. It is unreasonable because that is not the subject of ID. That claim is nonetheless answered and that answer is tied to to validity of OOL research. Such research demonstrates what intelligent agents can deliberately accomplish. Those results cannot be invalidated without also invalidating their implications for abiogenesis. So take your pick. Heads we win, tails you lose.ScottAndrews_{October 3, 2011
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Petrushka, How on earth does this relate to what I said?
OK, you are saying that anything (within reasonable bounds of time and energy expenditure) that can be produced without intervention can also be produced by humans or by an agent that has equivalent resources and capabilities. I see nothing wrong with that. But that is engineering. Copying.
I'm saying that if the results of a controlled experiment can be extrapolated to suggest what might happen naturally, how much more do they demonstrate what can be done deliberately? It's simple. Focus on that, and find the flaw in that logic. Instead, you're making a pretzel out of it by saying that the controlled experiment is a copy of what has been extrapolated from the controlled experiment. Forget that. Explain to me how a controlled, repeatable experiment that results in the formation of fatty vesicles does not demonstrate that one can deliberately create fatty vesicles. Please do not evade my argument. Address it head on or not at all.ScottAndrews_{October 3, 2011
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Petrushka, That's very interesting.
Science can only look for regularities in nature. As others here have pointed out, one can only see intervention against a background of consistency.
What you see as objective I see as arbitrary. How do you perceive living cells (and people, and space shuttles, etc., etc.) as part of a background of consistency? With what are they consistent, and why?ScottAndrews_{October 3, 2011
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If we’re seeking an undirected explanation for something that was directed, or vice versa, then we’re looking in the wrong place.
Science can only look for regularities in nature. As others here have pointed out, one can only see intervention against a background of consistency. We know that mutations and genomic changes occur and we know that selection occurs. We don't have any other candidates for the cause of change in the genomes of populations. Simply asserting that the known explanations are inadequate is not science. Science already knows that existing explanations are incomplete. That's why there are still scientists, and why they are still doing research. If you know of another way, perhaps a direct way of observing intervention, perhaps you should share it. Otherwise it is the business of science to continue building on regularity.Petrushka_{October 3, 2011
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If an experiment that produces fatty vesicles suggests that such events might occur by chance, then it conclusively demonstrates that they can be produced deliberately by repeating the experiment. If I am wrong then please tell me why I am wrong.
OK, you are saying that anything (within reasonable bounds of time and energy expenditure) that can be produced without intervention can also be produced by humans or by an agent that has equivalent resources and capabilities. I see nothing wrong with that. But that is engineering. Copying. Douglas Axe has pointed out that it will be difficult to impossible to invent (rather than copy) protein sequences, because there is no short cut to knowing what kind of fold a sequence will produce. In engineering terms, this is equivalent to making a product out of materials having unknowable properties. When making sequence libraries, sequences are mass produces and selected for those that result in folds having certain characteristics. In at least one experiment, a small subset of these proved functional in a bacterium. But you have to realize that this required two levels of selection. There is no way to know in advance, from first principles, what kind of fold will be produced by an arbitrary sequence, or whether a fold of a certain class will in fact be functional. In other words, there is no foresight.Petrushka_{October 3, 2011
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Petrushka, You're missing the point by a mile and a half. I'm not arguing against the extrapolation or the interpretation. I'm supporting it. I'm taking the side of this abiogenesis research. I'm also using it to my advantage.
Or Newton extrapolating the behavior of cannonballs to the behavior of planets.
This is good, but it requires that Newton first quantifies the behavior of cannonballs. You can't accept the behavior of the planets while denying the behavior of the cannonballs, can you? Likewise, how you can extrapolate what might happen "in the wild" from a controlled OOL experiment while simultaneously denying the literal results of that controlled experiment? If an experiment that produces fatty vesicles suggests that such events might occur by chance, then it conclusively demonstrates that they can be produced deliberately by repeating the experiment. If I am wrong then please tell me why I am wrong.
I find it not surprising that n ID supporter would be unfamiliar with the most elementary concepts in scientific investigation. Ideas that are supposed to be learned while doing high school science projects.
Actually I think it's your reading comprehension that has failed us :) That's why I've explained in more detail so that you can respond to my actual statement without making an irrelevant ad hominem accusation.ScottAndrews_{October 3, 2011
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How is it possible to demonstrate in a controlled experiment what might assemble by chance without even better demonstrating what can be accomplished by design?
Science studies complex phenomena by trying to isolate and quantify the elements. A prototype might be Galileo trying to quantify the acceleration of gravity by rolling balls down an inclined plane. Or Newton extrapolating the behavior of cannonballs to the behavior of planets. I find it not surprising that n ID supporter would be unfamiliar with the most elementary concepts in scientific investigation. Ideas that are supposed to be learned while doing high school science projects. That seems to be why nearly every thread on this forum interprets mainstream science findings as supportive of ID. After all, experiments are designed.Petrushka_{October 3, 2011
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but overall, meaningful states are known to be very rare AND isolated in the solution spaces.
That seems to be something not agreed upon. the concept of landscape is about 70 years old and was invented by mainstream biologists. I would just point out two rather important things: 1. No two individuals are genetically identical, other than identical twins. And yet countless individuals exist with countless variations in their genomes that are not fatal. 2.The kinds of genetic changes that separate individuals from each other -- and indeed species from each other -- are mostly non-coding regulatory sequences. Far more variation is allowable in non-coding genes. For example, on another thread it was pointed out by an ID advocate that there are 22 proteins different in humans and chimpanzees. That's a one tenth of one percent difference in coding genes. That's about one new protein every quarter million years. The other differences will be found in regulatory networks. It's much easier to survive differences in bone length or muscle mass than survive a defective protein coding gene. The really heavy lifting of inventing proteins was mostly done billions of years ago by bacteria. Now that we can sequence whole genomes, it has been noted that even newer proteins have sequence similarities that can be traced through lineages.Petrushka_{October 3, 2011
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Petrushka, They are searching for paths to self-assembly by trying to assemble stuff. When they succeed they demonstrate that a given component can be designed. Whether it could self-assemble is always less certain. How is it possible to demonstrate in a controlled experiment what might assemble by chance without even better demonstrating what can be accomplished by design? All your bases are belong to us.ScottAndrews_{October 3, 2011
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Although ID examines the finished product and not the process, I have provided you with an abundance of peer-reviewed research considering the specifics of how an intelligent designer might have assembled living things.
Odd, your link goes to publications by a person searching for paths to self-assembly.Petrushka_{October 3, 2011
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Dmullenix, To say that everything searches the nearest space does depend upon a condition which is tautological - that everything is where it is. I'm pointing that out to you and you are in turn pointing it out back to me. I said it first. You state,
It “finds” sweet spots for its offspring by only changing one or two DNA base pairs at a time which means, for an organism with 1,000,000 base pairs, that its offspring’s DNA, which is identical to its parents except for one different base pair is 99.999 % the same as the parents.
apparently oblivious to the fact that it does not explain how it came to be in the "sweet spot" from which it is searching and where the heck 1,000,000 base pairs came from. I can climb Mount Everest if you place me six inches from the peak. "How did you reach the peak," they will ask. "It's easy, I stuck my arm out." (And no, I am not using Mount Everest to imply that there is a single, specific target.) Although ID examines the finished product and not the process, I have provided you with an abundance of peer-reviewed research considering the specifics of how an intelligent designer might have assembled living things. You said there was no such evidence, and I have given it to you. Why are you ignoring it? You already know where to find it, but here's a link to some of the research papers.ScottAndrews_{October 3, 2011
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ID is a litmus test that reliably identifies intelligent interference in cases where a priori knowledge of such interference is available independently.
That's a confusing statement. The term a priori implies a statement that is true by definition. If that is what you intend, it means your are defining the interference to be true by definition, and that is circular. That is inconsistent with independent evidence. Where we use the design inference in criminal forensics or in archaeology, we do have independent observations of human activity, human capabilities, human motives.Petrushka_{October 3, 2011
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9 --> The more modest claim would be that 500 - 1,000+ bits worth of functionally specific DNA, in a living population, has been observed to come about de novo from chance variations and differential reproductive success leading to descent with modifications. This, too, your side has not demonstrated and so the implication or claim should be likewise withdrawn. 10 --> the yet more modest claim, would be that by selection for performance, on chance variations, you have been able to demonstrate the origin of FSCI. For this, Genetic Algorithms and the like have often been trotted out, sometimes rather triumphalistically. 11 --> And, yet, closer inspection invariably reveals that the key input is intelligent design. As in Dr Schneider et al, this means YOU. The algoreit6hms are intelligently designed to produce a constricted outcome, and often that outcome is well within the relevant limit. This too has not been shown to any reasonable level of warrant. 12 --> Instead, you and your ilk would be well advised to examine the issue that when we have high contingency plus complexity, with a requirement of fairly specific organisation to function in a system, the overwhelmingly vast majority of physically possible configs will predictably be non-functional. 13 --> So, we naturally find an empirically easily seen pattern of islands of functional configs in a vast space of physically possible but non-functional configs. For, random disturbances will easily make text indecipherable, will make programs corrupt, will reduce pictures to snow, and will reduce machinery to junk. All of that is commonplace. 14 --> Try the Humpty Dumpty exercise sometime: prick a living cell and decant its contents and wall into a small drop of fluid medium, where Brownian motion will move its components about at random. 15 --> Ask yourself: is it reasonable to ever expect the cell to reassemble itself by forces of chance and necessity? Why or why not? What is this telling you about the significance of the islands of function and search challenge issues? [You can then explore the thought exercise here in my always linked, App 1] 16 --> Then, to cap off, consider the discussion here on the significance of the log-reduced form of the Chi metric for CSI, and what it says about the validity of the explanatory filter considered on a per aspect basis (which can deal with the issue of combinations of chance and necessity, especially as we can see that the signature of necessity is low contingency, i.e high contingency traces to design and/or chance): Chi_500 = I*S - 500, bits beyond the solar system threshold. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 3, 2011
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DM:
Re: ID is the BELIEF that there is a designer and the WISH that they could find some evidence of His existence. The cream of the ID theorists have been trying for well over a decade now and they haven’t come up with a single bit of evidence for a Designer that stands up to even the simplest scrutiny. As far as OOL is concerned, I’ll give you the sum of all ID OOL research: Nil.
Why do you -- and your ilk -- insist on willful strawmannish misrepresentations in the teeth of easily accessible corrective evidence to the contrary? 1 --> First, ID is about inference to design as causal process, on empirically tested, reliable signs of design. 2 --> You can even see that in the definition accessible through the resources tab at the top of this and every UD page. 3 --> So, pardon directness, bu that is plainly needed: your misrepresentation is WILLFUL and IRRESPONSIBLE. And, it is thus deceptive, harmful and wrongful. Kindly, cease and desist from propagating agenda-serving deceit, starting with ceasing from willfully distorting the definition of Design Theory. 4 --> As to OOL, the very first technical ID work, TMLO -- 1984 [so there is no excuse for ignorance at this late stage . . . ], constituted not only a critical review but includes reporting of original research and key analysis and proposals on OOL studies. 5 --> Subsequent to that, a great deal of life- related ID research [and a growing peer-review published corpus, despite all the efforts of the thought police censors in NCSE etc] is directly on or directly relevant to OOL issues and topics. 6 --> You may wish to look at the DI list here (pay close attention to the work of Abel, Trevors, and co), and the work at the evolutionary informatics lab, here. 7 --> You also simply assert that evolutionary processes produce CSI without intelligent direction, and appeal to the notion of the combination of chance and necessity being sufficient to -- in the case of DNA in the living cell, create a von Neumann, self replicating molecular nanotechnology entity with codes [i.e. language], algorithms and data structures with co-ordinated executing machinery. 8 --> Kindly identify where this astounding claim was demonstrated empirically, i.e. per observations; peer-reviewed article preferred. Actually, it is known that your side cannot do that, so kindly, withdraw this unwarranted assertion and apologise. [ . . . ]kairosfocus_{October 3, 2011
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dmullenix is sooooo confused:
I do NOT call ID a “determination of intelligent causes.” ID is a movement that BELIEVES there is an intelligent cause and WISHES it could find some evidence for this, but it has failed in every attempt.
Positive evidence has not only been found but has been presented. And all you can do is choke on it.
1: Dembski claimed that all CSI was evidence for design. But evolution produces CSI.
1- ID is not anti-evolution 2- No one has ever observed blind and undirected processes producing CSI
2: Dembski came up with the Explanatory Filter. But that just “proves” that purely random process and purely lawful process won’t do anything. It isn’t even possible to put a two-step process, like evolution with its random variation and lawful natural selection into the EF.
Your ignorance is not a refutation as the EF considers both chance and necessity operating together. Also natural selection has been shown to be total BS in the grand scheme of evolution.
3: Dembski claimed that the “No Free Lunch” theorem somehow proves that evolution is impossible. It only proves that some search spaces, such as a random string of letters, can’t be searched efficiently by any known method and we have to use random searches or the equivalent.
Again ID is not anti-evolution and your position still doesn't have any positive evidence.
4: Behe claimed that some features of cellular life couldn’t be built by evolution. He forgot scaffolding and co-option.
Except that is NOT what Behe said and you STILL don't have any evidence that scaffolding nor co-option can do what you think.Joseph_{October 3, 2011
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DMullenix, "ID is the BELIEF that there is a designer and the WISH that they could find some evidence of His existence." Says who? ID is a litmus test that reliably identifies intelligent interference in cases where a priori knowledge of such interference is available independently. Evolutionism untenably holds on to the hypothesis that microeffects can be extrapolated to the grand scale of life. Today, after 150 years after macroevolution was proposed it still remains a hypothesis. The real trouble is that over those years it has become an ideology. Why can't we see hypothetical abiogenesis type first self-replicators today? Because they have been invented by imaginations of wishful thinking biologists/chemists. If abiogenesis were a plasibility, it would be possible to observe it in nature now on mass. To put it plainly, self-assembling nanometre precision machinery without a designer is a nonsense. So the TOE is a complete bankrupt.Eugene S_{October 3, 2011
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ScottAndrews: “If you remove the assumption of a “search space” from the origin, then yes I agree, because it’s a tautology. It reduces to “All modern day life is where it is.” It is the limitations of future searches and how they relate historically that are relevant. I’m sorry, but that doesn’t begin to make sense. All modern life has DNA that’s in the sweet spot. How do we know this? Because all modern life is alive and it’s using its DNA to stay alive. No tautology there. That says nothing about how it got there or where it’s going. It “finds” sweet spots for its offspring by only changing one or two DNA base pairs at a time which means, for an organism with 1,000,000 base pairs, that its offspring’s DNA, which is identical to its parents except for one different base pair is 99.999 % the same as the parents. Thus the new DNA is very very close in the search space and likely to be in another sweet spot. I do NOT call ID a “determination of intelligent causes.” ID is a movement that BELIEVES there is an intelligent cause and WISHES it could find some evidence for this, but it has failed in every attempt. 1: Dembski claimed that all CSI was evidence for design. But evolution produces CSI. 2: Dembski came up with the Explanatory Filter. But that just “proves” that purely random process and purely lawful process won’t do anything. It isn’t even possible to put a two-step process, like evolution with its random variation and lawful natural selection into the EF. 3: Dembski claimed that the “No Free Lunch” theorem somehow proves that evolution is impossible. It only proves that some search spaces, such as a random string of letters, can’t be searched efficiently by any known method and we have to use random searches or the equivalent. 4: Behe claimed that some features of cellular life couldn’t be built by evolution. He forgot scaffolding and co-option. NOTICE THAT ALL FOUR OF THOSE DREAMS REQUIRE EVOLUTION TO BE FALSE and then they present themselves as the only possible alternative. I'm hardly the only person to notice this. Stephen Barr of "First Things" wrote about the same thing in "The End of Intelligent Design" on "First Things" - http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2010/02/the-end-of-intelligent-design ID is the BELIEF that there is a designer and the WISH that they could find some evidence of His existence. The cream of the ID theorists have been trying for well over a decade now and they haven’t come up with a single bit of evidence for a Designer that stands up to even the simplest scrutiny. As far as OOL is concerned, I’ll give you the sum of all ID OOL research: Nil.dmullenix_{October 3, 2011
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My comment above (#49) was instigated by a materialist visitor who suggested that the ID proponents on this site won't deal with the evidence "head-on". Yet I am getting the distinct impression that the materialist visitors here don't want to talk about the observable physical entailments of recorded information. Perhaps one of them will step up and refute the observations with equally observable evidence supporting a materialistic origin ... ?Upright BiPed_{October 2, 2011
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Petrushka,
Producing genomic mutations rather than base pair mutations enhances the likelihood of finding something adaptive.
Doing anything because it will or might have a beneficial effect requires foresight. The scenario you describe is something taking action to produce a desired effect. Desired, intended, whichever.ScottAndrews_{October 2, 2011
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I have dug deeper. I have the book and I've read most of it. The response to the environment -- producing a higher rate of mutations -- is a non-random response. Producing genomic mutations rather than base pair mutations enhances the likelihood of finding something adaptive. But did you notice the part about not having foresight? the changes are still "random" with respect of adaptive value, just as are the trial balloons cranked out by the immune system.Petrushka_{October 2, 2011
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Petrushka:
Why yes, I see the theme. The immune system cranks out truly random variation until one of them works or the organism dies.
This is NOT what Shapiro is saying. When he writes: "production of novel molecular tools with an enhanced likelihood of real-world utility", this is non-random behavior. You're still thinking in typical neo-Darwinian terms. He's moved well beyond that. You need to dig deeper.PaV_{October 2, 2011
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Why yes, I see the theme. The immune system cranks out truly random variation until one of them works or the organism dies. Same wit populations. they manage to hit upon a change that solves an adaptive problem, or the species goes extinct. Did you note the part about future needs being unknowable?Petrushka_{October 2, 2011
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Petrushka: You quote Shapiro:
The fact that future adaptive needs are unknowable does not mean that filling those needs has to be a blind process. In immune system natural genetic engineering, and in evolutionary change in general, we have been able to discern regular features of genome restructuring that facilitate the production of novel molecular tools with an enhanced likelihood of real-world utility. A measure of success for the more informational perspective sketched out in this book will be the extent of future research into the cognitive cellular operations that have led to successful evolutionary inventions. We have a great deal to learn in this respect.
Shapiro is saying that we're not dealing with "random variation"; built-in "natural genetic engineering" programs produce, instead "enhanced" molecular tools. Do you see this theme here?PaV_{October 2, 2011
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Petrushka? Back to the subject? I had only made an example of a signal whose reception would allow a design inference. Do you agree on the design inference? That was the subject.gpuccio_{October 2, 2011
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Colleagues, What an interesting discussion indeed. Petrushka, "One is a relationship between idealized objects, and one is the real product of evolution." The latter is an open question. You assume something that must be rigorously proved. Such a rigorous proof is still missing in what is claimed to be a solid edifice of evolution. You say this over and over again as if the number of repetitions could reinforce the assertion. All we need is evidence that minor (i.e. microevolutionary) adaptational effects can really cause such huge complexity gaps as are observed between different forms of life. As regards observation vs interpretation I agree with Scott Andrews. Meaning/Interpretation is bestowed through intelligence agency. Complexity in the form of formal relationships/interfaces within systems composed of various interacting components can only be a result of intelligence at work. No evidence has been available to date to counter this observation. Indeed, machines using the laws of nature do not come about by themselves. Such a scenario is operationally impossible.Eugene S_{October 2, 2011
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OK, back to the subject. Seeing the first 100 digits of pi would be equivalent to finding a watch on the beach. Now how is pi not changing the subject from evolution, which involves the differential success of individuals within a population? I see no relationship between the digits of pi and the genome. One is a relationship between idealized objects, and one is the real product of evolution. One is Platonic and occurs by definition of terms, and one is real and messy and constantly changing. As Shapiro points out:
The one issue that has effectively been settled in a convincing way is the evidence for a process of evolutionary change over the past three billion years. The reason the answer to this question is so solid is that every new technological development in biological investigation—from the earliest days of paleontology through light microscopy and cytogenetics up to our current molecular sequence methodologies—has told the same story: living organisms, past and present, are related to each other, share evolutionary inventions, and have changed dramatically over the history of the Earth. Shapiro, James A. (2011-06-08). Evolution: A View from the 21st Century (FT Press Science) (Kindle Locations 2358-2362). FT Press. Kindle Edition. Evolution is life’s way of dealing with the unpredictable. We have seen that principle most clearly at work in the adaptive immune system, where antibodies have to be synthesized that can recognize unknown invaders. The fact that future adaptive needs are unknowable does not mean that filling those needs has to be a blind process. In immune system natural genetic engineering, and in evolutionary change in general, we have been able to discern regular features of genome restructuring that facilitate the production of novel molecular tools with an enhanced likelihood of real-world utility. A measure of success for the more informational perspective sketched out in this book will be the extent of future research into the cognitive cellular operations that have led to successful evolutionary inventions. We have a great deal to learn in this respect. Shapiro, James A. (2011-06-08). Evolution: A View from the 21st Century (FT Press Science) (Kindle Locations 2679-2684). FT Press. Kindle Edition.
Petrushka_{October 2, 2011
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Rhampton7,
I think the point of contention is whether abstraction is (can be) a “physical” association held by the determinant interpreter (in regards to biological information). That is, do chemical bonds dictate the meaning of a gene’s encoding instructions (to produce a protein)? To which I answer yes, but you seem to suggest no.
If the abstraction (as in the case of DNA) is a physical association held by the determinant interpreter, then how is it that the meaning can be interpreted without that interpreter? The meaning in DNA is present whether or not it is being interpreted. Therefore the chemical bonds employed by the interpreter cannot give it its meaning. Moreover, would anyone argue that the interpreter is what arranged the DNA in the first place? Going back to your comparison of the photon: A photon is emitted from a star because of specific natural laws. What natural laws arranged the molecules in DNA to represent the proteins that form the simplest living thing? Photons reflect off a house and enable you to observe that there is a house. The photons are behaving according to natural laws. That is not the same as schematics for a house which describe the potential for a house, many houses, the house someone hopes to build but hasn't, or a flawed house that wouldn't stand. Do you see why the schematics are an abstraction and the photons are not?ScottAndrews_{October 2, 2011
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Petrushka: Was that an answer to my hypothetical? I must have missed something. Or was it the usual "change the subject" tactic?gpuccio_{October 2, 2011
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Hollywood aside, SETI folks are looking for an unmodulated carrier frequency. It is assumed that any encoded information would be lost to noise. But that doesn't affect your hypothetical. Except in the sense that any signal encoded in DNA would be lost to noise over billions of years. Genetic entropy, you know. The fact that life in general hasn't experienced genetic meltdown, even though countless species have gone extinct, indicates that the fitness landscape is not as rugged as ID proponents would allege.Petrushka_{October 2, 2011
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Petrushka: I have not hypothesized that we receive something which incorporates pi. A single circle would be enough for that. That the Fibonacci sequence is found so often expressed in living things is certainly reason for reflection, but it is wrong to say that it is "encoded" in them. That's why I asked for a message that can be read "as the sequence of 1000 decimal digits of pi". Of course, it could be the sequence of the first 1000 digits of pi in another base, that would be the same. The important thing is that we receive a message that "codes", thorugh a process of mathemathical abstraction, for the first n digits of pi.gpuccio_{October 2, 2011
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PDT}

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