The Consensus of Scientists

_{Gil Dodgen

August 1, 2010

Intelligent Design}

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Some people have concluded that the hideously complex, functionally integrated information-processing machinery of the cell — with its error-detection-and-repair algorithms and much more — is best explained by an intelligent cause. But this idea is only held by superstitious religious fanatics who want to destroy science and establish a theocracy.

That’s the consensus of “scientists” in the academy.

The other consensus of “scientists” in the academy is that random errors screwing up computer code can account for everything in biology.

Who is thinking logically here?

I have no interest in arguing with people who can’t think and don’t want to follow the evidence where it leads, because it’s a lost cause from the outset.

Comments

It is time to push a wood stake through the heart of that particular darwinist talking point:
scientists reject arguments from incredulity
The heart of scientific methods is critical examination of ... OR, we could just laugh at the DarwinDefenders for their implicit act of counseling, via this particular talking-point, that we all ought to be credulous. Foolish assertions deserve to be mocked, and not infrequently must be mocked.Ilion_{August 2, 2010
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From the journal Cell; a new discovery of evolutionist predicted "JunkDNA" being functional yet again: "Recently, more than 1000 large intergenic noncoding RNAs (lincRNAs) have been reported. These RNAs are evolutionarily conserved in mammalian genomes and thus presumably function in diverse biological processes. Here, we report the identification of lincRNAs that are regulated by p53. One of these lincRNAs (lincRNA-p21) serves as a repressor in p53-dependent transcriptional responses. Inhibition of lincRNA-p21 affects the expression of hundreds of gene targets enriched for genes normally repressed by p53. The observed transcriptional repression by lincRNA-p21 is mediated through the physical association with hnRNP-K. This interaction is required for proper genomic localization of hnRNP-K at repressed genes and regulation of p53 mediates apoptosis. We propose a model whereby transcription factors activate lincRNAs that serve as key repressors by physically associating with repressive complexes and modulate their localization to sets of previously active genes." More evidence that predictions by evolutionist fail based upon Neo-Darwinian principles of vestigial leftovers. I'm growing more confident with each finding that the Design Theorist will continue to gain momentum as more areas of so-called "non-coding" regions are continuously discovered as regulators. Gil, this is another day of celebration for all your efforts and that of all Design Theorist. :) The Cell link below has a short video and graphic associated with it... No More "junkDNA" but fully Functional LincRNA regulators Credit: Cell Regulation Doesn't Just Happen . . . . Question to ellazimm: Could it be that the slicing of large areas of conserved information from the mouse genome do not appear to harm the reproduction of healthy mice due to the fact that as regulators and suppressors, lincRNA(thousands of them) are not called upon by celluar code messengers, unless a particular damange to cells is invoked by the surrounding environmental input? Therefore, simply slicing and dicing out huge chunges of conserved previously suppposed "JunkDNA" by evolutionist cannot possibly test a Design? And it is exactly what I described it to be. A trivial method of ignorance to the full scope of information in the genome? Evolutionist predicted Junk DNA. Their predictions fail again and again. What will PZ and his faithful blind followers of a blind process do? But Design Theorist said, wait, wait, we need to do more research. Do not shut off research into these areas. Unguided Theory fails again and again in predictions yet is still used as the great unified theory of being by militant atheist and Darwinian zealots. Unguided evolutionist are condescending towards Design Theorist all the time, shouting as loud as they can in taunting jeers; "If God did it, that stops science" It appears that Blind Theorist of unguided evolution were the ones that could lead to stopping science in their quick judgement that evolution would lead to JunkDNA. Just as their abject failure in predictions of vestigial organs. If a theory leads to such large failures of logical reasoning by its adherants. Should we not look outside of neo-Darwinian theory? And should not students be informed of the failures of Blind Theory?DATCG_{August 2, 2010
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"This is clearly absent from the theory, which makes it an account, not an explanation." I am wondering whether science does both things: "accounts" and "explains". Think of an examples such as the Big Bang. No one in science can expain why the Big Bang, assuming it is truly the starting point, happened vs. not happened. However, gathering and tracking evidence that points to the fact that the Big Bang occured is certainly science. Perhaps another way to look at it is -- with material existence there will always be the pursuit of understanding the initial state or condition. By its nature, however, we will never, through science, understand the why. Is it not possible that the evidence will point to another initial state that is, at some level, inexplicable? That other initial state is the start of biological life. Sure, it breaks our paradigm and mindset about how things work. But it will not be the first time in human history.Ekstasis_{August 2, 2010
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veilsofmaya: Until ID provides an underlying premise that explains the specific complexity we observe, it will be discarded. Maybe veilsofmaya will be so kind as to tell us when it will be discarded. And who in particular will be doing the discarding. Kind of funny verbiage considering the explosion of interest worldwide in ID. Even as a young guy in my twenties, I began to laugh at the self appointed role of science in "explaining" the universe to the rest of humanity. Yes scientists can "explain" what they observe. And even the mathematics predicting such. But the idea of scientists "explaining" why or how everything exists in the first place or in the poster's words an "underlying premise" is pretty laughable. And just as entertaining is to query a scientist as to why human engendered mathematical constructs comport so well with observation in many cases. There is no standard answer for this. Unless the poster can "explain" it to us.groovamos_{August 2, 2010
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@kairosfocus (#5) You wrote:
The whole internet and he whole computer and publishing industries have stood in direct demonstration of the easily and reliably observed fact that such dFSCI is routinely produced by intelligence; and for good reason it is not observed to be produced by blind chance and mechanical necessity, having to do with the limited search resources relative tot he vastness of config spaces specified by even so short a case as 1,000 bits.
First, your assuming specific outcomes were "desired" by the designer in the first place. Things are they way they ought to be because there is an ultimate ought in the first place. While I can understand why you might hold this view, it's not an assumption make by science. Second, the problem with probabilistic barriers, such as protein folding geometries, is that, while they may be accurate, they do not necessarily not represented the only way a particular outcome can be achieved. Let's take the following analogy…. Assume I'm a entrepreneur who is dissatisfied with the current aircraft available in the market and decides to start my own aeronautics company. Furthermore, let's assume i know nothing about aeronautics, so I put two of my on-staff engineers on the project and ask them to separately determine why airplanes fly. A week later, both present their findings. The first engineer reports that planes fly because of a pressure differential caused by air moving at different speeds over the aircraft's wings. This differential is caused by the fact that the top of the wing has a greater surface area than the bottom, while still maintaining the same length. The resulting pressure is higher on the bottom of the wing and lower on the top, which lifts the aircraft into the air. Varying the speed of the plane and the shape of each individual wing varies the pressure and causes the plane to fly at different altitudes, changes its direction and orientation, etc. Controls in the cockpit allow an individual to vary these factors in a coordinated way to pilot the plane. However, the second engineer turns in a strikingly different report. Aircraft fly because they were designed by an intelligent agent. However, this intelligent is more powerful and intelligent than we are since he directly and willfully manipulates the exact velocity and direction of individual air molecules around the wings of every aircraft. This highly coordinated and directed effort causes the plane to fly through the air. Due to the massive number of possible combinations and interactions that occur during a flight, it's empirically impossible for us to anticipate and calculate exactly which air molecules should move at just the velocity force in just the right direction and at just the right time to cause aircraft to follow any specific flightpaths. Even if we could, we empirically lack the ability to change just the specific air molecules required, while leaving the others unaffected. How the designer does this is something we cannot know for sure. However, empirical evidence tells us the designer must be capable of such a feat since we observe planes flying. Please note that we know an intelligent designer really did design and build the modern day aircraft we observe. This is NOT the point I'm trying to make, nor am I suggesting otherwise. My point is that the second engineer used an accurate probabilistic scenario to exclude a natural process and support the existence of an abstract agent with supposed specific capabilities we have yet to observe. Aircraft designers exploit the natural phenomena described by the first enginnere rather than "design" or "cause" it. While it is true that we currently lack the computational ability to individually track and modify the air molecules around an aircraft wing in a way that causes flight, there is a natural process which makes it unnecessary. Furthermore, this process provides an underlying principle of flight which actually explains the specific outcomes what we observe. For example, if an intelligent designer "causes" an aircraft to fly by directly changing the force and direction of individual air molecules, why do traditional aircraft need to reach a particular rate of speed before they can take off? Why do they stall at low airspeeds? Why not chance the air molecules around the fuselage and and get rid of the wings all together? Why not flying cars, boats or even buildings? Why doesn't the designer use this specific ability in other domains, such as creating heat, drilling, construction, etc.? I could go on, but I think you get my point. In other words, by claiming an agent exists with these abilities, an implied theory is presented about observations that are directly and indirectly related. Apparently, this agent must not be interested in applying his ability elsewhere, otherwise he would. Furthermore, the first engineer not only identifies a cause, but this same cause provides an underlying principal of flight which answers all of these questions. In fact, it explains many details of the entire aeronautics industry, from design, manufacturing, passenger and commercial carriers, the role of pilots and even the kind of training they need. It even provides an explanation for the kind of experience we have as passengers during flight, including why we need to wait for wings to be de-iced in the winter. The second report accounts for airplanes flying via an intelligent agent but it also concludes the agent has specific abilities. It does this by appealing to specific complexities and observed limitations which are factual, yet represent only one possible way the process could occur. However, in doing so, he invalidates not only the underlying principle provided by the first engineer but all of the explanations it provides as well. Suddenly the entire aeronautics industry makes no sense. Furthermore, he provides no explanation to replace it while remaining virtually identical in regards to observations. As such, the second engineer's theory appears to be a convoluted elaboration of the first. In both cases a difference in pressure causes aircraft to fly. But in the case of the second engineer, the designer just so happens to wait until the aircraft is at a particular airspeed before causing such changes. He just so happens to decide to stop making changes if the airplane slows down or if ice forms on the plane's wings. He just so happens decide to agree to send thousands of passengers to the predetermined, specific locations we observe each day, 24 hours a day, world wide, while maintaining each and every private, commercial and military schedule, and so on. These are logical possibilities, but the second engineer offers no explanation as to why these particular outcomes occur rather than some other specific outcomes. That's just what the designer chooses or wanted to do. It's a bad explination. Finally, as the CEO of an aeronautics company, the explanation provided by the second engineer doesn't get me one jot closer to being able to build an aircraft that can actually fly. Should I accept it, I'll spend billions of dollars trying to build elaborate devices that can track an manipulate individual air molecules and super computers that can do the necessary math to run them. Fortunately, there is another theory that accounts for flight while using a good explanation, which I'll tentatively accept in case some other theory with a better explication comes along.veilsofmaya_{August 2, 2010
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@kairosfocus (#5) You wrote:
You know or should know [cf the Weak Argument Correctives and ID Definition accessible on this and every UD page] that the design inference is based on empirical investigation of phenomena that are observable, and in light of known and reliable patterns of causation.
Which is an appeal to causation, not an explanation of what we observe. Yes, intelligent agents cause somethings to happen, but not others. But ID doesn't explain why an agent should choose one specific thing we observe over another. This is clearly absent from the theory, which makes it an account, not an explanation. An intelligent agent merely choosing one thing over another could be the cause of anything, including tornados, earthquakes, the formation of stars, the survival of some individuals but not others in a plane or car crashes, etc. All of these events and processes could be influenced on an Infinitesimal scale by an intelligent agent to "design" specific outcomes. Yet analogs to biological ID in other domains are conspicuously absent. Why is this?
Do you know of an observed case where on undirected chance and forces of mechanical necessity, digitally coded, functionally specific complex information and associated execution machines, protocols for data structures, etc etc have come about?
While I could respond here, the exchange will be one that has occurred time and time again. The ability to digest nylon in bacteria, which occurred in less that 70 years isn't new information because information can only be created by intelligent agents by definition, or that this is actually a decrease in information, etc. This is NOT my point. Instead, I'm pointing to the particular form of ID in that it's incomplete for reasons that are obvious and transparent. Despite introducing agency into the mix, ID fails to create an underlying premise that shows why agency in particular is the best explanation for the specific things we observe (in contrast to anything specific). Instead, ID attempts to invalidate Darwinism via probabilistic claims or via specific definitions of information. For example, ID provides no explanation why an intelligent agent who can supposedly search the problem space of 10^300 protein folding geometries would end up intentionally creating an eye with a retina that is backwards rather than forwards (or ended up sideways due to inherited limitations of the designer.) The closest thing to an explanation ID provides for the specific things we observe is the designer is "creative" or "beyond our understanding", etc., which could be said for all of the other processes or events mentioned above. In fact, if you're a theist, you may think there is some designer that intervenes in these situations as well. This appears to be an attempt reformulate the "why do good things happen to some people but not others?" question as a scientific theory on biological complexity. Why do some species survive while others go extinct? Why do some species have specific features but not others? That's just how the designer decided it should be, which is a non-explanation.
So, we have every right on principles of like causes like and induction form reliable pattern of observations, to hold that dFSCI is a credible and credibly relible sign of design.
First, please see above. This could be applied to any outcome with as much of an explanation. Second, you seem to have forgotten the crisis caused when Hume pointed out the problem of induction. We can't know for sure either way. Any theory can make any prediction. We must compare explanations of completing theories and accept those which have the most explanatory power. However, all ID does is explain away Darwinism without providing an explination of its own. Nor is it likely that one will be forthcoming for reasons that are obvious. Of course, this part of my comment will be ignored as usual. Again, you have a right to your own opinions and beliefs. You have the right to perform your own research, should you actually choose to. But claiming science is somehow biased for not accepting ID is disingenuous.veilsofmaya_{August 2, 2010
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Carl: It is time to push a wood stake through the heart of that particular darwinist talking point:
scientists reject arguments from incredulity
The heart of scientific methods is critical examination of alternative hypotheses in light of existing and emerging bodies of observational evidence and logical reasoning. Thus, certain claims are ~~"falsified"~~ -- more correctly find themselves deemed implausible in light of the body of evidence and reasoned discussion thereof. At least, in the ideal case, not always approached in reality. That boils down to an issue on criteria for rejection of particular claims. In the case of the inference to design, the basic problem is not: (a) induction from reliable observed patterns [as, reliably dFSCI is observed produced by intelligence], nor (b) projection of present patterns of cause and effect tot he unobserved past as a way to credibly model that past [as the projection of intelligent cause on reliable signs of intelligence does just that], but instead . . . (c) That the design inference puts the prevalent Lewontinian a priori evolutionary materialism under challenge [and so we see an a priori, worldview level question-begging imposition enforced through TODAY'S MAGISTERIUM IN The HOLY LAB COAT]. Wheel and tun and come again wid somethin betta dan dat . . . GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{August 2, 2010
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VOM: You know or should know [cf the Weak Argument Correctives and ID Definition accessible on this and every UD page] that the design inference is based on empirical investigation of phenomena that are observable, and in light of known and reliable patterns of causation. Gil has put the issue in a nutshell. Do you know of an observed case where on undirected chance and forces of mechanical necessity, digitally coded, functionally specific complex information and associated execution machines, protocols for data structures, etc etc have come about? If so, in just which journals, monographs, conference proceedings or trade press books has it been published? [And, remember, genetic algorithms and their kin are precisely the opposite of what proponents often pretend they are. They are intelligently designed constrained searches within islands of known function, seeking to optimise some objective function or performance parameter.] The whole internet and he whole computer and publishing industries have stood in direct demonstration of the easily and reliably observed fact that such dFSCI is routinely produced by intelligence; and for good reason it is not observed to be produced by blind chance and mechanical necessity, having to do with the limited search resources relative tot he vastness of config spaces specified by even so short a case as 1,000 bits. So, we have every right on principles of like causes like and induction form reliable pattern of observations, to hold that dFSCI is a credible and credibly relible sign of design. Without imposing a prioris, apart from refusing to beg the question by imposing a priori materialism as a criterion of science, robbing science of its power to fearlessly pursue the evidence in the direction of truth. GEM of TKI PS: Gil: Semper Fi!kairosfocus_{August 2, 2010
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So you're no longer going to post because scientists reject arguments from incredulity?Carl_{August 2, 2010
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Gill, It may be that biological life was created by an intelligent agent. You personally may feel there are "good reasons" to believe this is the case. However, the theory presented by ID is defined in a way that makes it a bad explanation of what we observe. This is because ID is intentionally incomplete for reasons which are obvious. It merely accounts for what we observe, rather than explains it, by assigning an intelligent agent as the cause. And in doing so, it invalidates the explanations provided by Darwinism. In other words, ID's explanation is limited to explaining away darwinism. So, yes. You might be right. But this doesn't mean that the actual theory presented by ID is sufficient to reach that conclusion. You reach this conclusion for reasons which are implied and are absent from the theory. Until ID provides an underlying premise that explains the specific complexity we observe, it will be discarded. However, given the implied designer, it seems very unlikely as such an explanation will be forthcoming as it would be impossible by definition. It's a catch 22 situation. On one hand, you want ID to be accepted as science. But on the other hand, you intentionally stop short because of the 'nature' you personally attribute to the designer. Regardless of your intuition or your personal incredulity on the matter. Regardless if what your believe represents the true state of affairs in reality. Being "right" for the "wrong reasons" is still wrong. This is how science works. To claim that science is biased for not accepting an incomplete theory is not "thinking logically." It's disingenuous.veilsofmaya_{August 1, 2010
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Gil, you said, "The other consensus of “scientists” in the academy is that random errors screwing up computer code can account for everything in biology." Did you intend to say "... computer software"? It looks like the latter is the parallel you were aiming for. Your vitriol with the biological "consensus" is shared by many of us who develop software as you do. I have a religious faith as you do, but it is the software engineer in me that finds neo-Darwinism to be ludicrous.bFast_{August 1, 2010
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Oh come on Gil. You just have to trust the scientists on that. They know what they are talking about. People like me are too dumb to understand because we are not scientists. Who am I to question the hallowed "consensus"? You should know better than that! Where's your faith?tjm_{August 1, 2010
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Ah, Gil. I've followed you on this blog for some time now, and watched as you've grown more frustrated as time goes on. But don't give up; you never know who is lurking and might be swayed by following some patient, thoughtful argument, even if it is with someone who will never change their mind. Let's not grow tired of defending the truth as we see it, in a way that brings credit to ourselves and the whole movement. Semper fi! (A great motto, not just for the USMC)SCheesman_{August 1, 2010
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