Steve Meyer on the logic of design detection

_{Denyse O'Leary

April 8, 2022

Design inference, Intelligent Design}

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This is another excerpt from Steve Meyer’s chapter in The Comprehensive Guide to Science and Faith: Exploring the Ultimate Questions About Life and the Cosmos (2021). He is discussing design theorist William Dembski’s Design Inference:

Dembski notes that complex sequences exhibit an irregular and improbable arrangement that defies expression by a simple rule or algorithm, whereas specification involves a match or correspondence between a physical system or sequence and an independently recognizable pattern or set of functional requirements.
By way of illustration, consider the following three sets of symbols: “nehya53nslbyw1`jejns7eopslanm46/J”
“TIME AND TIDE WAIT FOR NO MAN”
“ABABABABABABABABABABAB”
The first two sequences are complex because both defy reduction to a simple rule. Each represents a highly irregular, aperiodic, improbable sequence. The third sequence is not complex, but is instead highly ordered and repetitive. Of the two complex sequences, only the second, however, exemplifies a set of independent functional requirements — i.e., it is specified.
Steve Meyer, “The Logic of Design Detection” at Evolution News and Science Today (March 25, 2022)

That first string could possibly be a code but if we don’t know what it is a code for, it is not communication.

A great deal has been invested in not understanding something as simple and obvious as the design inference. That’s powerful evidence that it is an important insight.

The whole series here.

Comments

WJM, that which draws out details of God's capability, character and action to eternal, necessary being, root of reality is not contrdictory, KFkairosfocus_{April 27, 2022
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SA, I'm fully prepared to logically support everything I've said, and how I've said it. As I have done many times here in the past, if someone else has the superior argument, I'm perfectly willing to admit it. As far as your views, as I've said many times before, I'm not here to change anyone's beliefs. If you don't want to engage when someone criticizes your logic or some statement you make, then don't.William J Murray_{April 13, 2022
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WJM
That’s the beauty of idealism. All potentials are actual, at least from the God perspective ? Meaning, everything that can possibly occur is occurring simultaneously in the “hyper-dimensional” eternal now – again, from God’s perspective, so to speak (as if God has a perspective.)
I'm not going to attack this as illogical since you're using the phrases "from God's perspective" and also "so to speak". So, I respect that what you're saying cannot be fully subject to strict logic. As such, it's a philosophical perspective. It may be convincing or not, it may be of interest to someone or not. But it would not be correct to say that it's strictly logical. Again, I don't think one can speak about "God's perspective" as entirely fitting the human perspective of logic. You have a "hyper-dimensional" reality that works for you. At the same time, as I concede with respect to your views, I'd hope you could do the same for mine. If I said, for example, that the move from potential to act is the creation act - then I have potentials that change to actuals. That is no more illogical from a timeless eternal now, than the idea that "all potentials are actuals". From the human perspective, neither of those ideas are logically consistent. That which has actual existence is no longer potentially what it is. And again, if all potential is actual, then there's no need to speak of potential. Finally, potentials can only become actual (as we understand it from the human perspective) by an existing actual. Cold water has the potential to boil. It cannot boil itself. It requires an actual heat-source. When applied and it reaches 212 degrees, it is no longer potentially boiling but it is actually boiling. Then again, as above, this is from the limits of human philosophy. Having a comprehensive understanding from God's perspective is not possible, although as you've done, we can propose that God's actions can occur in certain ways that seem reasonable to us. If you and anybody else who speaks about "how God does things" could accept that we can only speak with partial knowledge, that would be a good step forward in the discussions.Silver Asiatic_{April 12, 2022
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I don’t have much of a problem with that. But I apologize that I missed your explanation previously, but how you explain the movement from potential to actual in the context of the eternal now?
And that's where consciousness, and space-time as the experiential, potential-derived reality of that consciousness, comes in.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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SA said:
It’s not that easy since you already divided up existence into potential and actualized existence. If potentials can be actualized, then it would not be true that everything exists as actuals.
That's the beauty of idealism. All potentials are actual, at least from the God perspective :) Meaning, everything that can possibly occur is occurring simultaneously in the "hyper-dimensional" eternal now - again, from God's perspective, so to speak (as if God has a perspective.) Which, I might add, beautifully and elegantly corresponds to what we see in quantum physics research.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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WJM
Which, again, is why “potential” is the best concept we have for thinking about the root of existence.
I don't have much of a problem with that. But I apologize that I missed your explanation previously, but how you explain the movement from potential to actual in the context of the eternal now?Silver Asiatic_{April 12, 2022
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But if you think the terms timeless, spaceless, unchangeable and eternal now – or any of the other classical philosophical definitions are “nonsense”, then just say that.
I would if that's what I thought. What I've explicitly said is that when you pair those proposed attributes of God with certain activities, like "create" and "author," it generates a logical contradiction or a nonsensical string of ideas. An eternal now, timeless, spaceless, entity that is the root of existence can be, it just can't do anything. Which, again, is why "potential" is the best concept we have for thinking about the root of existence.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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WJM
You don’t get to throw up the “God” card as if that word solves a logical contradiction.
Spacelessness is a logical contradiction in itself - it violates the law of identity, as does an absolute infinite. But that's why we have the term "God" - it's a transcendent concept and yes, we do get to throw that card as the first principle being, creator of the universe, the laws of physics - and creator of logic itself.Silver Asiatic_{April 12, 2022
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WJM
Here’s the easy answer: from the God perspective, everything that ever exists always exists.
It's not that easy since you already divided up existence into potential and actualized existence. If potentials can be actualized, then it would not be true that everything exists as actuals.Silver Asiatic_{April 12, 2022
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WJM
No, you cannot, if you then turn around and claim that we can’t understand what those words mean in terms of being that entity.
There's a difference between having a full comprehension of something and having a partial, working knowledge by analogy. But if you think the terms timeless, spaceless, unchangeable and eternal now - or any of the other classical philosophical definitions are "nonsense", then just say that. There's no sense in you using the terms for my sake. If you have other terms, then you can use and define whatever you want. But I bring it back to you - to claim that a creation act from the eternal now is "nonsensical" then the term "eternal now" itself should be categorized that way. If that's your argument, then all we know is linear time and a finite universe and those concepts lead to "nonsensical" absurdities also.Silver Asiatic_{April 12, 2022
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Here's the easy answer: from the God perspective, everything that ever exists always exists. It's not that hard; it's just inconvenient to you and KF because of your religious beliefs.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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But we shouldn’t treat them that way because doing so assumes that our human intellects have existed from all eternity and are capable of understanding all of the workings of God.
I treat logical contradictions as logical contradictions, whether or not the word "God" is involved. You don't get to throw up the "God" card as if that word solves a logical contradiction.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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SA said:
You’re assuming that the human intellect is capable of understanding what the eternal now is, and how events like your birth into the world can be explained in that context.
I'm assuming it because I'm assuming you're using terms and concepts that can be understood by the human intellect. If not, what's the point of using those terms? How do you know they even apply to what we are discussing?
Philosophically, we can reason that the first, principle, non-contingent being is unchanging, spaceless, timeless and absolutely infinite. Those are concepts.
No, you cannot, if you then turn around and claim that we can't understand what those words mean in terms of being that entity. You and KF are trying to have your cake and eat it too; you want to apply terms as if you understand what they mean, as if they apply to God, but then when it's pointed out that they are nonsensical and self-contradictory in relationship to each other, you then say we can't understand it.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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WJM
If space and time are part of God’s eternal now, to say God created it is nonsense. Everything that has ever existed and will ever exist will always exist in God’s eternal now.
You're assuming that the human intellect is capable of understanding what the eternal now is, and how events like your birth into the world can be explained in that context. Why should we think that we are capable of understanding such things? Philosophically, we can reason that the first, principle, non-contingent being is unchanging, spaceless, timeless and absolutely infinite. Those are concepts. We have no real world experience of such a situation. So, on that basis, as you say even "the eternal now" is nonsense. Fullness and perfection of being, timelessness, spacelessness -- all of those things are "nonsense". But we shouldn't treat them that way because doing so assumes that our human intellects have existed from all eternity and are capable of understanding all of the workings of God. We can see the conflict between a created world and an absolutely infinite, unchangeable first mover. But that's the problem for finite minds like our own. Philosophy only takes us a few steps along the path.Silver Asiatic_{April 12, 2022
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KF said @36:
WJM, Changeless as to core nature, connected to maximal greatness of being, which implies key attributes to maximal compossible degree.
The only concept that fits that bill is potential.
There is much more, our world is clearly derivative and is CTThD.
That's not clear at all, given the past 100+ years of quantum physics research.
In this context God as author of time speaks to authorship of the CTThD.
As I've already pointed out, God can't be the "author of time" because the concept of being "an author" requires time to "author" something. It's a nonsensical sequence of ideas.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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WJM, Changeless as to core nature, connected to maximal greatness of being, which implies key attributes to maximal compossible degree. There is much more, our world is clearly derivative and is CTThD. In this context God as author of time speaks to authorship of the CTThD. KFkairosfocus_{April 12, 2022
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WJM, I made the abbreviation a bit above, Causal-Temporal-Thermodynamic Domain, CTThD. That defines time at cosmological level and points to how we construct clocks and calendars. Entropy is the arrow of time. I think the cluster is important. KFkairosfocus_{April 12, 2022
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OH, I see, KF, you explained CTThD prior to that comment. It has nothing to do with my argument because my argument is not limited to the CTThD world. My argument is about how terms and phrases are being applied to "God" that logically contradict other terms and phrases used to describe that God. Such as God being changeless, yet making decisions. Such as God existing in an eternal "now" state that encompasses everything we call the "past" and "future," yet also "creating" this world. Those are nonsensical, self-conflicting statements. If this world has always existed in God's "eternal now," God didn't create it. It has always existed and will always exist in that eternal "now" that encompasses all of existence, past and future. God makes no decisions and doesn't create anything from that perspective. That's not me claiming to know what God's perspective is; that's me applying logic to the descriptions of God and actions attributed to God that contradict those descriptions. If we cannot know what it is like to be God, then stop attributing actions and characteristics to God that, when challenged because they are logically self-contradictory or nonsensical, the response is "you don't know what it is like to be God."William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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Dogdoc said:
While all this is fascinating, we’re departing a bit from my argument. I am arguing against your claim that “Highly complex interdependent functional machinery appears to require not only intelligence to design and build, but conscious, deliberate planning directed towards a goal.”
Well, did you not read the rest of what I said there in #8?
That doesn’t make it the correct conclusion; but it does make it the best one and actually the only one we have available to us at this time to explain what we see in biology. At least, it’s the only one we have without entering an entirely different paradigm of causation. Do I personally believe some super-intelligence purposefully designed and built life? No, but I don’t base my personal beliefs on things like facts and evidence.
This is not something I am arguing for; I just said that currently, given the evidence, it appears to be the best explanation, the only apparent explanation. Later in #17 I said:
If every possible designed thing already exists in full as potential information, it is not necessary for a conscious, deliberate entity to do any of the “designing.” All that is necessary is to directly access that design information, which could be directly drawn out of potential as an entirely physical experience. IOW, the physical manifestation (as experience) of a perfectly designed thing without any deliberate designing whatsoever on anyone’s part.
Where I say "accessing the design information," that would be comparable, but under different ontological paradigms, to your hidden brain processes that precede conscious thought.
What do you mean? What sort of information, and how do you know it could not be encoded in your brain?
I didn't say I know it could not be encoded in my brain. I said it would be hard to explain. For instance, when I was about six years old, I had a dream where I experienced someone teaching me how to access something I learned much later that people, especially athletes, called "the flow," where everything around you seemed to slow down and you were in this optimal state of reaction capacity. When I woke up I remembered how to do it and could access "the flow" on demand ever since. Another example would be that I never had to study in school because I could take a test and just "know" what the answers were by staring at the question. This same capacity led me to be able to build a successful career and self-employed business. I could intuit how to do just about anything.
I would understand this as your conscious experience of non-conscious processes which are preparing, at a high level of abstraction, to proceed with further imagining.
I agree that aware consciousness is always interacting with unaware consciousness, which we call the unconscious or the subconscious. In your paradigm, the latter would be unexperienced brain states until they cause an aware experience, such as a thought. Perhaps the salient question here is: what is causing the latter (either the unaware brain states, or the subconscious/unconscious filters, as I call them?) This is where we get into the division between independent, top-down agency vs bottom-up processes causing every thought and aware experience, every decision and choice. I think your perspective is that the choice is made before we are even aware of it; I actually agree with you that for most people, this is 100% true. I think most people are "running on automatic," so to speak. They might have the capacity to intervene via top-down authority, but they aren't even aware they have that capacity. What I call the filters, or the habits, patterns of thought, the subconscious programming is incredibly difficult to intervene in or to exercise top-down power over. I consider most people to "be" this programming, for all intents and purposes. Anyway, I don't know that any of this is anything you wish to discuss, seeing as I'm not arguing for the thing you thought I was in the beginning. Nice discussion, I appreciate it.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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SA said:
but that God is the creator of time.
This is a nonsensical phrase as I've already argued.
God does not travel through time.
If space and time are part of God's eternal now, to say God created it is nonsense. Everything that has ever existed and will ever exist will always exist in God's eternal now.William J Murray_{April 12, 2022
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WJM,
What do you mean by “the reality of the higher-level description?” Do you mean that an atomic account of a block of wood doesn’t change the fact it’s still a block of wood?
Yes. In the context here, reducing our thoughts, intentions, and emotions to neural activity would not render those mental terms meaningless nor show those subjective states don't exist. NB: I am not suggesting that we are anywhere near capable of such a reduction, nor do I believe our current understanding gives any hint regarding how to begin solving the "hard problem" of consciousness by reduction.
That’s not meaningful in this conversation unless your “higher-level description” assumes the validity of your “reductionist account” when it comes to consciousness.
Look again - I was responding to this comment:
WJM: Unfortunately, if conscious, aware perception is caused by non-conscious brain activities, our discussion is rendered nothing more than physical process making noises and producing mental states that may or may not have any correlation whatsoever.
You are saying that IF conscious thought could be reduced to non-conscious brain activity THEN our mental states would not be reliable (in Alvin Plantinga's usage of that term). This just doesn't follow, just as it doesn't in Plantinga's argument against naturalism, which your argument seems to be analogous to.
The higher-level description you are apparently arguing against is consciousness explicitly as an uncaused, top-down supervisor of thought; the reductive account of that in the papers you refer to explicitly negate that.
I'm trying to understand this sentence here. To be clear: (1) It is true that I am arguing against the claim that consciousness is known to be "an uncaused, top-down supervisor of thought" (or action). (2) It is not true that I am arguing for any reduction of consciousness to brain activity. (3) The papers I linked to support my position (1), and I don't believe they take an explicit stance on (2). In any case, again, I am not arguing for the possibility of such a reduction.
I don’t know if you’ve read my other comments here, but I’ve essentially laid out the argument that nobody is ever designing anything; all we can do is access designs already present in potential. Some people, like Tesla, can/could access a full design all at once without going through the process of “figuring it out.”
Ok, that's interesting; I'd have to read to undestand your view.
I actually think we have very similar views in that conscious thought comes from a non-conscious source (I think yours may be that it comes from brain processes or states), while mine is that they come from informational potential and are interpreted & organized via various subconscious, or unconscious, filters.
Ah, I'm beginning to see what you mean. I assume you're familiar with Roger Penrose and his "realm of Platonic logic" (or something to that effect) that our brains access via quantum gravitational mechanisms; your view seems to be a little like that. While all this is fascinating, we're departing a bit from my argument. I am arguing against your claim that "Highly complex interdependent functional machinery appears to require not only intelligence to design and build, but conscious, deliberate planning directed towards a goal.". I am arguing that for all the reasons described in the linked papers, we have no good reason to believe that whatever was responsible for the initial creation of complex form and function in biology was conscious. Even if humans are the only thing we know of that can produce such machinery, and even if humans have conscious experience, we have no reason to think some unknown, hypothetical thing (entity, process, force, whatever) would also be conscious.
What I have found by paying close attention to my thoughts for decades is that what precedes what is usually described as a deliberate thought, be it image or inner voice, is a pre-inner-language, pre-inner-imagery intent. Such as, an intent to respond to you brings forth into my conscious mind options on how to do so. I then intend, you might say directionally, and I start accessing the design of a response and the words and grammatical structure flow – in my model, from that intentionally selected area of potential into an orderly structure, fashioned through the subconscious and unconscious filter system (something akin to deep psychological programming.)
I understand this. Whether or not - and how - we connect these processes to neural activity, the point here is that the so-called "design inference", which holds that a mind that experiences consciousness the way we understand it was responsible for the origin of life, is not based upon things we know about how minds work.
As a writer, I’ve certainly noticed that quite often I’m totally surprised, even astonished at what information comes into my conscious mind via this process.
Indeed! I had a colleague who would often say "How do I know what I think until I hear what I say?"
I’ve found that the translation and interpretation process can be altered intentionally. I’ve found access to information that would be hard to explain as already being “in my brain” in any format.
What do you mean? What sort of information, and how do you know it could not be encoded in your brain?
It is the intent itself – pre-verbal, pre-imagery intent – that I hold as the uncaused, free will capacity to direct my mind to access areas of potential and translate that into conscious thoughts and imagery.
I would understand this as your conscious experience of non-conscious processes which are preparing, at a high level of abstraction, to proceed with further imagining. Again, there is great mystery surrounding how brains work, how minds work, and the connection between the two. I object to those who pick one particular metaphysical speculation (usually some sort of dualist interactionism) and claim that it provides support for believing that something conscious created life, the universe, and so on.dogdoc_{April 11, 2022
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WJM I attempted to show that your statement here does not follow:
If God had no beginning, then in a linear-time framework where a decision can be made, there’s an eternity of time before God made that decision
It's not merely that "God has no beginning" but that God is the creator of time. So, He is timeless. God is not subject to time, since He created time in the eternal now. So, this makes your statement nonsensical. "Since God lives in the timeless-now, there was an eternity of time before he created time." See why that doesn't work? God is not subject to time or change. So, there's no before or after. There's no "eternity of time" before God created time. There's simply the present. God does not travel through time. Human beings do, since time is the concept created by God by which we measure duration and change as finite, changeable, created beings.Silver Asiatic_{April 11, 2022
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SA @24, For whatever reason, you're reiterating the same sequences of words and phrases that I have argued are nonsensical. Why are you doing that as if it's a response to that argument?William J Murray_{April 11, 2022
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Dogdoc said:
Providing a reductionist account for some phenomena does not negate the reality of the higher-level description.
What do you mean by "the reality of the higher-level description?" Do you mean that an atomic account of a block of wood doesn't change the fact it's still a block of wood? That's not meaningful in this conversation unless your "higher-level description" assumes the validity of your "reductionist account" when it comes to consciousness. The higher-level description you are apparently arguing against is consciousness explicitly as an uncaused, top-down supervisor of thought; the reductive account of that in the papers you refer to explicitly negate that.
There are so many. An obvious example is speaking: We assemble grammatical sentences – complex structures – as we converse without consciously designing them.
I don't know if you've read my other comments here, but I've essentially laid out the argument that nobody is ever designing anything; all we can do is access designs already present in potential. Some people, like Tesla, can/could access a full design all at once without going through the process of "figuring it out." I actually think we have very similar views in that conscious thought comes from a non-conscious source (I think yours may be that it comes from brain processes or states), while mine is that they come from informational potential and are interpreted & organized via various subconscious, or unconscious, filters. What I have found by paying close attention to my thoughts for decades is that what precedes what is usually described as a deliberate thought, be it image or inner voice, is a pre-inner-language, pre-inner-imagery intent. Such as, an intent to respond to you brings forth into my conscious mind options on how to do so. I then intend, you might say directionally, and I start accessing the design of a response and the words and grammatical structure flow - in my model, from that intentionally selected area of potential into an orderly structure, fashioned through the subconscious and unconscious filter system (something akin to deep psychological programming.) As a writer, I've certainly noticed that quite often I'm totally surprised, even astonished at what information comes into my conscious mind via this process. I've found that the translation and interpretation process can be altered intentionally. I've found access to information that would be hard to explain as already being "in my brain" in any format. It is the intent itself - pre-verbal, pre-imagery intent - that I hold as the uncaused, free will capacity to direct my mind to access areas of potential and translate that into conscious thoughts and imagery.William J Murray_{April 11, 2022
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Animated Dust, Oh, well, uh... I actually meant when people forgo the opportunity to use their hands when talking. No? Okay, actually I typed this on my phone and it was that darn auto-correct! Not buying it? Oh okay, I just wrote the wrong word. Thanks for the correction :-)dogdoc_{April 11, 2022
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Interesting convo, but the grammar nazi in me has to correct this: You wave hands; you don't waive hands, DogDoc.AnimatedDust_{April 11, 2022
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WJM,
DD: First, you assuming that consciousness is causal rather than perceptual, something that may or may not be true. WJM: I’m not assuming it. I directly experience it.
You think you do. Wegner showed experimentally that we can be fooled into believing that we are exerting conscious control when we do not, and also that we are not exerting conscious control when we actually are. And when people (including me) introspect closely, trying to perceive if conscious intent preceeds action or perceives it, it becomes apparent that the latter is true. Here's a brief interview that lays out some of these ideas: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/there-is-no-such-thing-as-conscious-thought/ and another brief article: https://theconversation.com/what-if-consciousness-is-just-a-product-of-our-non-conscious-brain-107973 And here is a more in-depth exploration: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01924/full
You are apparently trying to redefine the word “design” to suit your argument.
Sorry for the confusion, I meant "to create complex form and function". The question at hand is whether creating complex form and function is always the result of conscious intent; my position is that we do not know the answer but without the neural correlates of consciousness that we study, it may be that consciousness does not arise - even if complex form and function does.
Again, we are certainly capable of performing complex, intelligent behaviors that require planning without conscious involvement, WJM: That’s interesting. Care to provide an example?
There are so many. An obvious example is speaking: We assemble grammatical sentences - complex structures - as we converse without consciously designing them.
Unfortunately, if conscious, aware perception is caused by non-conscious brain activities, our discussion is rendered nothing more than physical process making noises and producing mental states that may or may not have any correlation whatsoever.
This argument is what Daniel Dennet calls "nothing but-ery". Providing a reductionist account for some phenomena does not negate the reality of the higher-level description.
We would both be saying and thinking whatever various lower-level processes dictated without conscious oversight, control, error-correction, value-recognition, etc. Without conscious free will as a top-down supervisory cause, we might as well just be two trees making noises caused by the wind going through our leaves.
I think that perusing the articles I've linked here may actually change your thinking about this. It is not that I think science has figured out what consciousness is or what its relationship is to the contents of our experience - I think it is all really quite mysterious. But there is plenty of reason to think that our intuitive narrative of top-down conscious control is mistaken.
Again, from MW, the definition of intelligence: (1): the ability to learn or understand or to deal with new or trying situations : REASON also : the skilled use of reason (2): the ability to apply knowledge to manipulate one’s environment or to think abstractly as measured by objective criteria (such as tests)
In that case, what is the evidence that whatever caused biological systems to exist could learn, or could deal with new or trying situations? How could we test that?dogdoc_{April 11, 2022
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WJM
If God had no beginning, then in a linear-time framework where a decision can be made, there’s an eternity of time before God made that decision. And so, we shouldn’t be here pondering the question.
God is simple, unchanging and therefore timeless. So, no time elapsed - linear time is what God created within this universe. God is the eternal now, not a being traveling in time. God is at the beginning and the end of created, linear time. So, that shouldn't be a problem. We just need to ponder the changeless present - that's spiritual contemplation.
Linear time cause and effect is actually a concept that is self-refuting even if you apply an eternal causeless cause.
An eternal, spaceless, timeless cause created the concept of time, which is a concept understandable in human terms. Why should human beings, created by God, have the natural capability of knowing the mind and actions of God? We came into existence out of nothing and cannot be expected to know what came before, without the light and help of God Himself anyway.Silver Asiatic_{April 11, 2022
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Good comment by WJM at 19 about it being wrong to think that linear cause-and-effect imbued time can logically be applied to the idea of an eternal god.Viola Lee_{April 11, 2022
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I have no idea what CTThD means.William J Murray_{April 11, 2022
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