Sober Rebukes Evolution’s Religion (Sometimes)

_{Cornelius Hunter

June 26, 2009

Intelligent Design}

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The religion in evolution can be subtle and it can fool even sophisticated thinkers. Elliott Sober, for example, has recognized that religious premises are used by evolutionists. He says they don’t work because they rely on gratuitous assumptions. In his book Evidence and Evolution he writes the following:

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Comments

You seem to have directed me to a website that theoriezes that such useless, or half-useful, mutations exist.
William, I had hoped you would have read more carefully. The neutral theory of evolution is based on ample evidence for the existence of apparently useless mutations and was developed by Kimura to explain their possible role in evolution. Whenever you have a recessive allele you have a "useless" mutation, in the sense that the mutant gene has no direct influence on fitness. All diploid organisms are loaded with recessive alleles.Adel DiBagno_{June 29, 2009
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As for birds is there any genetic data which would demonstrate that a bird can "evolve" from a non-bird? No. We don't even know what makes a bird a bird. And we have no idea whether or not any amount of genetic change can take a non-bird and transform it into a bird.Joseph_{June 29, 2009
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How does ID explain vestigial parts? Well first one has to prove they are vestigial. Good luck with that. However ID would explain them as random effects on a once very good design. Ya see evo morons no one said that the design had to be perfect. And even if it started out perfect no one is saying it had to remain that way. Not that I expect the evos to understand any of that. Heck if they don't like ID all THEY have to do is to actually start substantiating their claims!!!! Yet they cannot so here we are beating back strawman after strawman.Joseph_{June 29, 2009
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Adel, You seem to have directed me to a website that theoriezes that such useless, or half-useful, mutations exist. I realize it is theorized; however, I don't see such chaotic taxonmic diversity in the categories and classes of life in the real world. What I observe are very distinct and well-ordered categories and subcategories, much as one might expect from a design system. I'm not sure how a "random" mutation system and essentially "randomized" natural selection processes are thought to generate such categorical organization of taxonomies and maintain their structure and order over long periods of time; I also don't understand why random mutation wouldn't erase evidence of common descent, instead of provide it.William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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Mark Frank: My question wasn't answered - or, if it was, I didn't understand it, so I have asked for a clarification. I'm not presenting a "false dichotomy". Is it possible, or impossible, in our universe, for a bird (as described above) to spontaneously generate out of inanimate matter? It is either possible or impossible .. correct? Notice my question used the term "could"; it seems the question as asked bothers you. Could such a bird come into existence in our universe, yes or no? If you wish, you can add how unlikely it would be, as it seems Nakashima has done. As far as your question is concerned, the answer is that I don't know if every bird has a parent, and I don't know if there was a time when there were no birds. I have no predilection either way.William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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William J. Murray:
However, in this thread, evolutionists want similar evolutionary traits to be regarded as “not” convergent or parallel, but rather as evidence of common descent. Apparently, blind evolution only engages in convergent or parallel evolution of the same trait, if that trait is “useful” in the minds of the evolutionists.
Sober discusses this point in his paper if you interested in knowing something about it. (See under the heading "Exceptions to Darwin's principle"). Apparently, your claim is wrong...Hoki_{June 29, 2009
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Re #85 I agree with Nakashima's answer. You followed up by asking in #92 if it is a physical impossibility or just extremely unlikely. This is a false dichotomy. Is it a physical impossibility or extremely unlikely that a table will rise spontaneously and travel across the room? I would say both. Now how about you answer my question. Do you accept that all birds must have had an ancestor that was not a bird? And if the answer is "no" - which of these two is wrong: Do you accept: (1) Every bird has a parent. (2) Once upon a time there were no birds.Mark Frank_{June 29, 2009
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William, We, and they, do carry around useless and half-useful mutations. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutral_theory_of_molecular_evolutionAdel DiBagno_{June 29, 2009
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Nakashima: I'm sure if those bacteria could look at the world, they'd see the same category and order we see, even if the creatures were bizarre looking. For instance, the rampant quadrapedalism, the symmetry of features, the use of two eyes in higher life forms, tails, teeth, etc. In fact, I imagine that if we found a planet full of alien life, we would set about categorizing them according to large-scale taxonomic similarities; why should such meaningful categories exist at all, if it is all based on random mutations generating anything at all, and natural selection only selecting against that which is deleterious (and not even all of that)? Do beneficial and neutral mutation results ALWAYS generate ordered and categorical taxonomies as a rule? If so, why?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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Adel: Why should the survivors not carry around all sorts of usless or half-useful mutations, as long as the are not deleterious?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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#90: Nakashima: so it is a physical impossiblity in this universe, or just extremely unlikely?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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Mr Murray, If random mutation is the driving force of life, why isn’t life a mutant, monstrous world full of bizarre offspring and random mutations? I'm sure that is exactly what we look like to our ancestral fish! And even worse to our ancestral "bacteria".Nakashima_{June 29, 2009
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Mr Murray, Given enough time and chance, could a bird spontaneously generate (as a whole, taxonomically recognizable bird) from inanimate matter, without any biological ancestors whatsoever? In this universe, no. Every proton would decay before it happened. If you give away an infinite amount of mass and energy, in an infinite number of starting configurations, then it is certain.Nakashima_{June 29, 2009
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William J. Murray [84]:
If random mutation is the driving force of life, why isn’t life a mutant, monstrous world full of bizarre offspring and random mutations?
You're looking only at the survivors. See http://www.perinatology.com/ultrasound.htmAdel DiBagno_{June 29, 2009
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Mr Phineas, You can assign a time and feature weighted probability of non-relatedness (to modern birds) to every fossil you want. Multiply it all together and see what expected value is that no fossil is ancestral to any modern bird. BTW, what is your alternative hypothesis?Nakashima_{June 29, 2009
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I would like any and all materialist evolutionists to answer the question: Given enough time and chance, could a bird spontaneously generate (as a whole, taxonomically recognizable bird) from inanimate matter, without any biological ancestors whatsoever? If not, why not?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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Let's look at the Manatee's hip socket; where did the first hip socket come from? Why was it in place? Was it fully functional? Were there legs already in place? Did the legs or lower extremity exist at the time? Do evolutionists believe that an entire arm evolved at once? Bingo, there's the bone structure, the muscle tissue, the nervous structure, the joints, the cartilage, the fingers, all the new materials and design .. BINGO!It's all there at once? Shoulder, supporting and connecting tissue, arm, bone, muscle, skin, fingers ... Is the Manatee evolving legs? If a manatee was to evolve legs, or some such swiveling lower extremity, what would come first? Hip sockets? Legs? Paired, extended fins? Muscle tissue? Circulatory system? How does one discern between an evolutiary "vestigial" feature, and a feature that is "in the process" of evolving into something "more useful"? I'll tell you how: whatever story is most convenient to whatever point that particular evolutionist is trying to make at the time.William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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Mark: You didn't answer my second question, Mark: Unless, of course, birds spontaneously generated from inanimate matter. Given enough time and chance, couldn’t this have happened?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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When a feature doesn't appear to do what other similar - looking features do for other organisms, calling those features "vestigial" directly implicates design as the comparing system. Why should the wing-like features on an ostrich be considered "vestigial"? Let's look at the case of the evolution of winged flight, for the first time, if it indeed happened; wouldn't there be, at some point, a feature on a creature much like a wing, but still not providing flight? Wouldn't that feature be exactly like an ostrich's wing? So, would that "flightless wing" of the birds supposed ancestory be "vestigial", since it didn't meet the requirements of providing flight? Of course not; it would just be another manatee's hip socket; some feature without much apparent use when compared with other similar evolved features that have much greater apparent uses. How does one distinguish between a vestigial feature, and a feature that is in the process of evolving into a more useful feature, or a feature that evolved that has little or no discernible use? As we can see, it is all simply convenient story-telling. For the manatee, it is evidence of common descent; for the ostrich, it is a vestigial feature; for other features, it is parallel or convergent evolution; for some features that don't seem to have much of a useful function, it is evolution in the process of generating something more useful down the road. But, since evolution is blind, and has no goals, one would expect almost all life forms to be chock full of half-useful, or non-useful but non-detrimental features and parts, wouldn't one? And since such features can be infinitely, independently repeated via parallel or convergent evolution, then RM&NS can't be falsified, and as such is a trivial theory. It seems to me, though, that a more interesting question here is, why should RM & NS produce a lineage that is traceable at all? In other words, why isn't the DNA and features it produces generating utter chaos in the world of taxonmic form and DNA variation? Why aren't semi-useful, or useless features the rule? Why is life so categorical? Why all the symmetry and apparent relationship? It seems to me that a system based on random mutation would create a chaotic, monstrous world where virtually anything could breed with virtually anything else (I mean, how man times did sexual reproduction evolve?) - or where virtually nothing could interbreed with anything else. Where are the 6-armed babboons, the 10-eyed tigers, the mer-men, the intelligent bugs, the apes with scales, the super-diseases that can destroy all life, the super-predator that cannot be killed because of multiple-redundant backup systems and healing features? If random mutation is the driving force of life, why isn't life a mutant, monstrous world full of bizarre offspring and random mutations? Why so much order and category? I don't see why "common descent", if true, would even be available for evidencing if it is carried out by random mutation over billions of years; it could just as easily erase its history through mutational variation. Also, if life can spontaneously generate once, why not several times? Why is "common descent" even considered? Why should life just occur once?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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#76: I'm afraid you are mistaken, ID is a known fact. Humans employ it all the time. The only question is if it exists in demonstrable capacity outside of humanity. Common descent is at best a well-supported theory. Common descent is not anathemic to ID; in fact, they are entirely consonant. ID doesn't claim that each form of life was created by itself, but rather that ID is required to generate functional, significant new body plans, even if that goal is achieved through common descent by sequences of deliberate mutation and protein arrangements, or by "front-loading" the necessary information at the start.William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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##80 By “ancestors”, do you include inanimate chemicals? Direct ancestor (= parent) of an animal? No. Animals are multicellular complex organisms. Once upon a time an animal had an ancestor that you would hesitate to call an animal - but I have no doubt it was alive. Anyhow none of this affects the logic of my argument. Do you accept: (1) Every bird has a parent. (2) Once upon a time there were no birds. If so, you must accept that all birds have at least one ancestor that was not a bird.Mark Frank_{June 29, 2009
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BVZ: You are making a straw man argument. Please read the faq linked to at the right hand side of the page. ID is not in competition with all aspects of evolutionary theory; ID only claims that some features and processes are better explained as the product of design. Evolutionary theory contains elements that ID has no necessary quarrel with, like common descent and micro-evolution, so ID doesn't need to provide alternative explanations for those things. Perhaps you can direct me to the hard data, statistical analysis of the point by point random mutations and natural selection processes required in the construction of the eye, which clearly shows that it is possible for random mutation and natural selection to, in fact, create an eye? Because, if you cannot point me to such a hard data, hard science analysis that demonstrates it as even possible, then it is simply a convenient story that assumes such sequences are possible, and there is no hard evidence that it could have occurred that way. Also, should you fail to provide such evidence, then what we have on the one hand is a theory that cannot even demonstrate that it is possibly a sufficient answer, and on the other hand, ID has demonstrated that it is probably a sufficient answer, since human ID has been shown capable of designing similar mechanisms. By the principle of best theory available, ID becomes the better explanation for such features, not "random mutation and natural selection".William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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Mark Frank asserts: "All animals have ancestors of some kind. Do I need to provide evidence for this?" By "ancestors", do you include inanimate chemicals? Mark asserts: "It follows from these facts that modern birds must have had an ancestor that was not a bird." Unless, of course, birds spontaneously generated from inanimate matter. Given enough time and chance, couldn't this have happened?William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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In the thread about evolution's repeating performances, evolutionists claim that when two nearly identical taxonomic traits are generated separately, this is "convergent" or "parallel" evolution. Evolution is just creating the same thing again and again. However, in this thread, evolutionists want similar evolutionary traits to be regarded as "not" convergent or parallel, but rather as evidence of common descent. Apparently, blind evolution only engages in convergent or parallel evolution of the same trait, if that trait is "useful" in the minds of the evolutionists. By their own argument in the other thread, non-useful features can simply be the product of convergent or parallel evolution, and not common descent. As far as "why" a designer would place a seemingly non-useful part in an organism: aesthetics, future use, as a convenient storage for the design, or it is a design flaw. Perhaps the designer had an idea in mind, but then changed his mind; perhaps the designer changed the design, no longer needed the part, but since it wasn't causing any problems, left it in. What the motivations of the designer were is, however, irrelvant as to whether or not design was necessary in the first place. Read the following sentence: uYo are nto undertsadning eth rela probmel. Bad design doesn't mean "no design"; design we don't understand the purposes of doesn't mean "no design". If we believe design was involved, however, we can follow make certain hypothesi about design processes in general that can guide future research and discovery. However, I would like to say this; whether or not a finding of design leads to more or better scientific discover under that heuristic, the finding of design would in itself be one of the most profound and paradigm-altering discoveries of science in history; it could alter the face of society and culture.William J. Murray_{June 29, 2009
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#73 (and similar comments above) Why would I rule this out unless I’ve got a prior commitment to the notion that there *must* be an ancestor to birds? I’m not particularly committed to that notion, nor have I seen evidence to support it. All animals have ancestors of some kind. Do I need to provide evidence for this? Once upon a time there were no birds. 1) The fossil record shows no evidence of birds before about 200 mya. 2) Modern birds or anything like them would be unable to live in the oxygenless atmosphere of the early earth It follows from these facts that modern birds must have had an ancestor that was not a bird. Others have answered this very well but I can't resistMark Frank_{June 29, 2009
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The best way to make evolution irrelevant is to replace it with a theory that works better. In this thread it has already been demonstrated that there is at least one thing the theory of evolution CAN explain, and ID CANNOT. (The Manitee example.) Evolution will not be replaced with something inferior. So all you have to do is work on ID until it explains EVERYTHING evolution does, AT LEAST. But you have not even left the starting blocks, since you have not provided a version of the theory that is of ANY USE WHATSOEVER. It cannot even be falsified. I find it interesting that the OP even brings up vestigial features, especially since it must be extremely embarresing for you guys. So how does ID explain vestigial features?BVZ_{June 29, 2009
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Phinehas asked:
I’ve often wondered, however, whether the inference to common descent has ever been subjected to the same mathematical rigor as the design inference.
It's been demonstrated far more rigorously than any design inference. As Theobald explains:
The degree of phylogenetic congruence between these independent data sets is nothing short of incredible... So, how well do phylogenetic trees from morphological studies match the trees made from independent molecular studies? There are over 10^38 different possible ways to arrange the 30 major taxa represented in Figure 1 into a phylogenetic tree (see Table 1.3.1; Felsenstein 1982; Li 1997, p. 102). In spite of these odds, the relationships given in Figure 1, as determined from morphological characters, are completely congruent with the relationships determined independently from cytochrome c molecular studies (for consensus phylogenies from pre-molecular studies... Speaking quantitatively, independent morphological and molecular measurements such as these have determined the standard phylogenetic tree, as shown in Figure 1, to better than 38 decimal places.
mereologist_{June 28, 2009
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Upright Biped:
You are quite right, your question is not meaningless because it was ill-formed, but because it was ill informed.
I'm actually rather well-informed about the kind of question that ID proponents hate to answer. You and vividbleau demonstrated that by running for cover when I asked why you thought the designer had placed vestigial pelvis bones, complete with unused hip sockets, in the manatee's body. Why do ID proponents hate this sort of question? Because it's difficult, if not impossible, to come up with a rationale for this sort of bizarre design decision, and it doesn't comport well with the idea of the designer as the Christian God, which is the thesis that most of you are ultimately hoping to support. And manatee hip sockets are only the tip of the iceberg.
Committing oneself to ideas based solely on the evidence may be unusual as practical matter, but it’s a requirement within the design argument.
It's actually a fatal mistake, as I explained earlier in the thread, because it makes the design hypothesis unfalsifiable. As Mark Frank put it:
It is just that given any set of data you can always offer the explanation: “An entity of unspecified power did it for reasons unknown”
You advised:
Stick around Mere, you might learn something interesting.
I already have, though probably not what you intended.mereologist_{June 28, 2009
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I think I now understand the source of Cornelius Hunter's confusion. Write Cornelius:
Sober knows that Darwin's Principle is foundational to evolutionary claims. But amazingly he departs from his earlier thinking, where he criticized Gould for using religious assumptions, and now attempts to portray Darwin's Principle as metaphysically neutral. He explains that for "useless" designs, the likelihood ratio (the ratio of the probability of the design on common ancestry to the probability of the design on separate ancestry) is large because the denominator (the probability of the design on separate ancestry) is so small. But Sober mysteriously fails to explain the obvious. The elephant in the room ignored as Sober moves on to an analogy about term papers. The reason the denominator is so small is that a religious premise about divine intent was smuggled in. The reason those creationist concerns about insuperable boundaries do not hold is because common ancestry is likely. And common ancestry is likely because nature's designs given separate ancestry is unlikely. And those designs given separate ancestry are unlikely because god would not have given us our "useless" tailbones.
Cornelius, the last sentence in the quote above seems, to me, to be the key to your misunderstanding. Sober doesn't talk about the separate ancestry being down to any divine intervention. The separate ancestry hypothesis isn't unlikely because of a god's wishes but because it is improbable that species that don't share common ancestry would somehow manage to display the same "useless" trait.Hoki_{June 28, 2009
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Nakashima-san Are *all* the fossils with the birdlike features ancestral to birds? How does that work? Or is it only some of them that are ancestral? If only some, then it is obviously possible (and, in fact, likley) that a fossil may appear ancestral (to the point that scientists stake their reputation on it), yet not be. Therefore, it seems prudent to me to leave open the possibility that all of the fossil that appear ancestral to birds are not. Why would I rule this out unless I've got a prior commitment to the notion that there *must* be an ancestor to birds? I'm not particularly committed to that notion, nor have I seen evidence to support it.Phinehas_{June 28, 2009
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