This is Stunning!

_{Barry Arrington
August 12, 2011

Intelligent Design

1}_{Categories
Intelligent Design}

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Eric Anderson writes: “Darwinists regularly admit [the physical systems we see in life] look designed and they have to keep reminding themselves that they aren’t designed.”

Elizabeth Liddle writes later in the same thread: “…by intelligence I mean the power and facility to choose between options–this coincides with the Latin etymology of “intelligence,” namely, “to choose between”which is much more precise, but which would in fact include evolutionary processes”

And Upright BiPed asks: “Which evolutionary process has the facility to make a choice between alternate options?”

And Barry sums up: Ms. Liddle forgot to remind herself that she cannot use teleological language in a literal sense. Sometimes I wonder if the entire Darwinist program is built on nothing but linguistic equivocations.

Comments

Would you just stop it, UBP? Denyse herself commented that my site was a good idea, as threads move so fast on this one. We were also derailing a large number of threads on completely different topics. Which was why I set up a dedicated thread on my site. And no, I don't know what your claim is. That's what we've been trying to clarify for three months. I'm not going to try to rebut a claim it turns out you haven't made.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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Well, it certainly made sense to Nirenberg, as evidenced by the Nobel Prize he won for employing it, and it is something that practitioners in a number of disciplines would easily recognize and rely upon. As far as your continued protest, I assume you penned the following to your own satisfaction (is that not a reasonable assumption to make?). I have since said to use it, so what more can be said?
LIDDLE: Starting only with non-self-replicating entities in a physics-and-chemistry (plus random kinetics) environment, self-replicating “virtual organisms” can emerge that contain arrangements of virtual matter represented as strings that cause the virtual organism to self-replicate with fidelity, and thus determine the output of that system, namely a copy of that system. The arrangement must produce its output by means of an intermediary “virtual object”. This “virtual object” must take the form of a second arrangement of “virtual matter” that may interact with the strings and with some other “virtual object” that affect the fidelity of the self-replication of the “virtual organisms” without either permanently altering, or being altered by, the interaction.
Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Well, quite a few were also written by me, Upright BiPed, and I do actually appreciate the effort you put in. Perhaps we could both use a break. Whatever, I need one. Peace LizzieElizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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Interesting that Cornelius Hunter did this for quite a while without being accused of being disrespectful. I guess disrespect and dishonesty are mostly determined by which side you argue.Petrushka_{August 14, 2011
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This, again, is a comment that flies in the face of literally tens of thousands of words and over ten weeks of my involvement in this conversation - all of which was done in the hopes that you would actually attempt to falsify my claim.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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I always thought it a peculiar tactic to be a visitor on a site, then strike up a conversation and try to move that conversation (and its traffic) elsewhere. I think its disrespectful as a guest - whatever reasons you invent to justify it. You know what my claim is and you what operation is required to validate it. If you are interested in falsifying it, then get on with it.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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And to demonstrate that I am there has to be some willingness to accept the possibility. That appears to be lacking. And that, precisely, is the problem.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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You might want to think of it as Historical Scientific Facts 101.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Upright BiPed?
Dr Liddle, the last post I made on the previous thread, is one in which I accepted a definiton that you yourself penned. I only suggested that we should work out a couple of details. That thread is still open with the opportunity to proceed, but you stopped going there. This fact, observable by anyone is yet another demonstration of the vacuity of your ongoing protests. You want to use your definition as it is? And you want to follow Nirenberg’s method of determining the presence of information – then I am all for it. Get on with it.
I'm not going to rebut a claim no-one will stand by, Upright BiPed. And frankly, I was so bloody furious by your behaviour on that thread I could hardly bring myself to click on it. I did, however, post that we could continue on my blog. If you show up there, we can. If you don't, then that is as revealing of your vacuity as my failure to revisit the thread here is of mine . No more, no less. Here's the link to the thread: http://theskepticalzone.com/wp/?p=1Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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Dr Liddle, the operation required for confirming the presence of recorded information is a matter of historical record. It hasn't changed one iota, and is the exact method Nirenberg won the Nodel Prize for. Your continue protest about not having an operation to confirm the presence of information (within your simulation) flies in the face of that historical fact.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Dr Liddle, the last post I made on the previous thread, is one in which I accepted a definiton that you yourself penned. I only suggested that we should work out a couple of details. That thread is still open with the opportunity to proceed, but you stopped going there. This fact, observable by anyone is yet another demonstration of the vacuity of your ongoing protests. You want to use your definition as it is? And you want to follow Nirenberg's method of determining the presence of information - then I am all for it. Get on with it. - - - - - - - Even so, your claim that IDist have not made an argument that is not also the possible product of neoDarwinian processes, has been demonstrated false by the need to create a simulation in order to falsify it.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Please! This has been explained to you many times. The response to the demand must take into account observed reality and history. It isn't enought that you demand to be assumed to be arguing in good faith ... you also have to demonstrate that you are.Ilion_{August 14, 2011
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Liddle, your original claim mentioned nothing whatsoever of CSI, and in fact, I told you more than once I was not basing my argument on CSI.
True, but I took it for granted, until the time when you corrected me, which, as you will remember, took me by surprise.
But I did ask you to retract your claim on numerous occasions, and in each instance you refused on the grounds of the conversation we were having – nothing else. You cannot logically have spent all this time working with my terms, only to now claim that you actually meant something else. The disenginuous logic is matched to the more egregious act of falsly claiming that you don’t have what you need to create a simulation.You yourself have even been forced to acknowledge that Nirenberg’s method was completely valid. Yet you continue to harp about not having a method to determine the presence of information; the facts be damned. so, on the back of these false claims and disengiuous logic, you have made your retraction.
That is clearly your view. Just as clearly, it is not mine, as I have explained.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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Just as an acknowledgment. Your retraction of this claim:
"IDists have failed to demonstrate that what they consider the signature of intentional design is not also the signature of Darwinian evolutionary processes”
...would logically result in this statement:
IDists have suceeded in demonstrating that what they consider the signature of intentional design is not also the signature of Darwinian evolutionary processes
Now if you would stop hiding behind definitions, I would love to see you try to falsify the argument you have been given. As is abundantly obvious the definitions are not your problem Dr Liddle, it is the evidence itself.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Upright BiPed: you still have not addressed the point I have made, over and over: If you want to measure a construct you have to define it first. Otherwise there is no guarantee that what you have measured is what you wanted to measure. You say:
You want to argue over an operational definition, all under the auspices that you’ll be able to use this definition to ‘measure something’ in order to confirm that recorded information has indeed arisen in your system.
Exactly. And, as I suggested, one thing we could do is correlate effects with sequences, as per Webster. Which is what Nirenberg did. But you weren't happy with that. You can scoff all you like, Upright BiPed, at "operational definitions" but you can't do science without them. And yet, rather than work together on developing one to our mutual satisfaction you have ignored almost all my attempts to develop such a definition, and instead cast repeated aspersions on my integrity. So yes I give up. I readily concede I cannot falsify your claim. It is, as it stands, unfalsifiable. That you cannot see that is a problem, but it is not my problem, nor is does it reflect on my integrity. I have done my best to get it into falsifiable form, and I thought we were nearly there. It seems not. If you change your mind, you will find me on my blog. Best wishes LizzieElizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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Liddle, your original claim mentioned nothing whatsoever of CSI, and in fact, I told you more than once I was not basing my argument on CSI. But I did ask you to retract your claim on numerous occasions, and in each instance you refused on the grounds of the conversation we were having - nothing else. You cannot logically have spent all this time working with my terms, only to now claim that you actually meant something else. The disenginuous logic is matched to the more egregious act of falsly claiming that you don't have what you need to create a simulation.You yourself have even been forced to acknowledge that Nirenberg's method was completely valid. Yet you continue to harp about not having a method to determine the presence of information; the facts be damned. so, on the back of these false claims and disengiuous logic, you have made your retraction.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Upright BiPed, as usual, and dispiritingly, you jump to the conclusion that I have scurrilous motivations when I have none. I thank you for posting the claim you wish me to retract:
LIDDLE: ”IDists have failed to demonstrate that what they consider the signature of intentional design is not also the signature of Darwinian evolutionary processes” I am an IDists. I have demonstrated that the presence of recorded information within DNA (considered a major signature of design) is not also the result of Darwinian processes. You were unable to refute any of the observations made in discovery, or provide any counter examples.
My original claim, as I recall, was something along the lines of: it can be readily demonstrated that the signature of intentional design is also the signature of Darwinian evolutionary processes, and by "signature", I meant "CSI". When I realised you meant something else, I was willing to have a go at falsifying your claim as well. But as I have failed to operationalise your claim as a testable counter-hypothesis, I concede I cannot falsify it. Which is a shame, as it would have been fun.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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The remainder of your post is much of the same, all over again. You want to argue over an operational definition, all under the auspices that you’ll be able to use this definition to ‘measure something’ in order to confirm that recorded information has indeed arisen in your system. You do this in the face of the fact that there is only one method (operation) to confirm the presence of recorded information. It’s the one Nirenberg used to win the Nobel Prize, so I think it comes with the appropriate scientific credentials. It is the only method that has even been used, the only one known to exist, and the only one practiced for centuries. I asked you the specific question about what you intended to measure, and you gave me a complete answer. In that answer there was absolutely nothing about the only operation known to confirm the existence of recorded information. And as I already said, that method is non-negotiable for the reasons stated. This “I can’t get an operational definition” tactic grows even more tiring when you listen to your second reason for wanting the operational definition – that is, to assure that no one can question your results. If you continue to avoid using the only method that actually confirms the presence of recorded information, then I can guarantee you that your results will be challenged. In other words, Dr Liddle, if you would get off the pot and simply recognize the only operation known to accomplish what you want to accomplish, then your simulation could finally move forward. But to do so, would remove one of your most potent stalling techniques. Along with being a master of Definition Derby, you want to remove the required dynamics from the definition then claim I reject them without reason. And also you want to make the repeated claim of circularity – which to this very moment (including for instance, your last post) you have failed to demonstrate what you see as circular. In the end, you've accomplished your goal of killing this conversation. You've done so without having to produce anything, nor admit to anything. I would salute you, but you ruined your credibility in the process.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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Dr Liddle, what you are doing is adding insult to injury. After repeatedly saying that you had no intentions of retracting your claim, you now want to pursue a line of defense based upon the idea that you never made the claim, or that there was a misunderstanding of what was meant.
BIPED You made the claim that ID proponents cannot make a case for ID that couldn’t also be the result of neo-Darwinian processes.
LIDDLENo, I did not.
- - - - - - LIDDLE: ”IDists have failed to demonstrate that what they consider the signature of intentional design is not also the signature of Darwinian evolutionary processes” I am an IDists. I have demonstrated that the presence of recorded information within DNA (considered a major signature of design) is not also the result of Darwinian processes. You were unable to refute any of the observations made in discovery, or provide any counter examples. - - - - - You owe a retraction of this claim.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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From where I'm standing Upright BiPed, I have been struggling to cut a swathe through your wordfests for a few weeks. But here is another attempt: You can't demonstrate the presence of something without an operational definition of that something. It's Science Methodology 101.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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So you keep repeating Upright BiPed, and it makes no more sense now than the first time you said it. You can't define information by citing methods of confirming its existence. You need to define information before you can confirm its existence. That's the Whole Point of an operational definition.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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What sand? Is it "sand" to require that one's interlocutor assumes one is posting in good faith?Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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No, that is not a translation, Barry. If people cannot do each other the courtesy of assuming the other is posting in good faith, no communication is possible. It is perfectly possible for two intelligent people to hold opposing views and for neither to lack integrity. Recognising that possibility - indeed assuming it - is the key to resolving the differences. Assuming the other is being evasive or dishonest makes it impossible. And repeatedly implying that the other is being evasive, dishonest, or stupid is what is called "poisoning the well" and is a logical fallacy. We play properly or we don't play at all.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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UBP
You made the claim that ID proponents cannot make a case for ID that couldn’t also be the result of neo-Darwinian processes. So I gave you one.
No, I did not. I claimed that ID claims that information (by any definition ID proponents wish to use) cannot be generated by Darwinian processes, or indeed Chance and Necessity, can be demonstrated to be false.
1) DNA is an example of recorded information (by means of a sequence of material representations mapped to specific effects).
Yes.
2) All instances of such recorded information have certain physical entailments that can be observed. 3) Those physical entailments include dissociated representations that must be actualized by discrete protocols in order to have an effect.
Not by, for example, the Webster definition of information. That does not require "discrete protocols" or "dissociated representations". But I'm happy to use your definition, as long as it can be operationalised.
4) Dissociated representations occur when the state of an object/thing is mapped to an arrangement of matter or energy, but where the object/thing being represented and the representation itself have no direct physical interaction.
Well, that's getting closer. You still need a non-circular definition of "representation" though. Also "mapped".
5) Protocols are a discrete facilitator which physically establish the mapping between the representation and what is being represented. They occur when dissociated representations determine the output of a system by allowing the representations and the output to remain individually discrete.
Ditto.
6) The presence of recorded information can be confirmed by isolating the representations, deciphering the protocols, and documenting the effects.
Ditto, plus protocols.
Over the course of several weeks, you attacked each of these observations, and each was found to be legitimate and accounted for within the genetic information system.
Sez you. Look UBP, you cannot be both judge and jury here. Discourse doesn't work like that. For a start, your numbered points are not, primarily "observations". They are wordy high-level descriptions of various things (not always clear what) that defy clear operationalisation. From my PoV, I have spent many hours trying to explain what an operationalisation of a hypothesis is, and, indeed, presenting several for your approval. On each occasion you have gone back to your hi-falutin, high level, circular wordings and rejected my operationalisation. In the end I went to Meyer, hoping that at least, as a widely admired ID writer and thinker, his preferred definition would do the trick. I made it more stringent, though, with some extra criteria, then operationalised it. Your response was to accuse me of lack of integrity.
You have failed to produce any documentation that neo-Darwinian processes can establish such a system, and were therefore going to create a simulation where such a system would arise by chance contingency and physical law alone. The very fact that you have to create such a simulation is a real-time demonstration that you have (in fact) been given an argument for design that is not also known to be the product of neo-Darwinian processes. So your claim has been refuted by your very own involvement.
No, it has not. My original claim was made for CSI or other Dembski-derived information,by Darwinian processes. I then said I would attempt to demonstrate it for yours, and I also said I'd attempt to do it starting with non-Darwinian conditions but that I wasn't sure that I could.
You have been asked several times to do the intellectually honest thing and retract your claim, but thus far, you have refused to do so. This situation eventually led to a particular example of twisted logic (which took place well after the observations had been found legitimate and accounted for): BIPED: You have thus far refused to acknowledge that one cannot logically be testing a falsification of an ID argument, while simultaneously claiming it doesn’t exist. LIDDLE: It’s a fair cop. In mitigation, I plead that I did not understand the charge. I do now. I did not mean what you thought I was saying, but as I now understand what you thought I was saying, I willingly clarify that I did not mean what you thought I meant. This roller-coaster response does not rise to the level of being even remotely plausible. To be believable, one would have to think that you are willing to spend months going to the trouble of testing your hypothesis against an argument that you think is already invalidated by some other means, and are withholding what those other means are. Instead of being a remark that is integrated with the observable facts of the challenge, it has all the earmarks of being flatly dishonest by refusing to admit to those very facts. In short, you have made a claim that has been proven false in real time by your own involvement, and you simply refuse to acknowledge that fact. In other words, you are withholding your honesty from this conversation, and specifically from me.
Upright BiPed: please state, clearly, with link, the claim I made that you want me to retract. If I no longer consider it supportable, I will retract it.Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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Thank you BA, I think the semotic argument for design is one of the strongest for the very reason there is only one way to demonstrate the presence of recorded information. This is the method that Dr Liddle has steadfastly avoided at all cost. I predict a wordfest, or a dismissal.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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You might find this of interest too Upright; The DNA Enigma - The Ultimate Chicken and Egg Problem (No Chemical Forces to cause the Code to be as it is)- Chris Ashcraft - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/5542033/bornagain77_{August 14, 2011
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Liddle:
"But as I’ve said, I’m not willing to engage with someone on an extended without an mutual assumption of integrity. Without that assumption, communication is impossible. As, indeed, it has proved to be."
Translation: You kicked the stuffing out of me on the intellectual playing field. I can either do the honorable thing and admit that and congratulate you on a job well done or I can take my ball and go home. I choose the latter.
Barry Arrington_{August 14, 2011
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Upright, this post is very well put!!!, Reflects the following principle very well, and more clearly,,,, The DNA Code - Solid Scientific Proof Of Intelligent Design - Perry Marshall - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4060532 ============================= Codes and Axioms are always the result of mental intention, not material processes https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1PrE2Syt5SJUxeh2YBBBWrrPailC3uTFMdqPMFrzvwDYbornagain77_{August 14, 2011
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Putting your head in the sand is the weakest of defenses, but I suppose that is all you have left yourself.Upright BiPed_{August 14, 2011
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should read "on an extended project"Elizabeth Liddle_{August 14, 2011
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