We cannot live by scepticism alone

_{Mario Lopez

March 5, 2009

Science}

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Scientists have been too dogmatic about scientific truth and sociologists have fostered too much scepticism — social scientists must now elect to put science back at the core of society, says Harry Collins.

Comments

kairosfocus, hello. I don't think I've said anything against arranged marriages. I imagine many were happy enough. I've only said that the kinds of marriages common in some traditional societies -- in which girls as young as 13 or so may be assigned a husband with no choice on the daughter's part in exchange for a bride-price (or a dowry in the alternative scenario) -- are incompatible with modern societies, where childhood lasts longer and self-determination is part of the ethical makeup. My point is that moral standards can and do change. In fact, this corresponds with your point:
Such systems may have defects, but hey developed for a reason: on average, they worked and helped families survive.
Indeed. We might even call them adaptive!David Kellogg_{March 10, 2009
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kairosfocus @ 311
This is another alert: note the allusion to Paley’s inference to design from stumbling across a watch in a field [we have now stumbled across a computer in the cell]; thence to the claimed dis-analogy between watches and biosystems. (Observe onlookers, no-one is able above to cogently or plausibly explain the existence of a digital computer in the cell starting with first life, on chance + necessity. As for computers, we know their routinely observed cause: design. But, a distraction is a very effective rhetorical substitute for an explanation. [And note; Weasel runs on -- a computer.])
As mentioned before, the rhetorical force of the argument from analogy - in other words, it's power to persuade an uncritical audience - depends upon emphasising the similarities between the two cases being compared. A fair comparison would require drawing up a comprehensive list of both the similarities and the differences but this is not usually done if such an argument is being deployed as it would be bound to weaken its impact. Suggesting that there is a need to "explain the existence of a digital computer in the cell" is straightforward question-begging since you have not established that the contents of a biological cell function in any meaningful way as a digital computer.Seversky_{March 10, 2009
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Mr Kellogg: A footnote: eh longstanding cultural situaiton of arranged marriages, and the associated dowry system, are NOT to be equated to prostitution, much less child prostitution. In fact, my profs from India often noted on how arranged Indian marriages were more stable and often more loving and mutually caring and trusting than western ones. In one case I knew fairly closely, that seemed to be a very real fact. Indeed, a somewhat simplified paraphrase of their argument relative to Americans was: they fall in love [a la Hollywood], they get married; they fall out of love; they divorce. We get married (as guided by parents who understand us better than we understand ourselves at that stage of life), then grow in love; and we stay married. Certainly, the likely stability of a marriage is enhanced by inputs from mature and wise close family and friends who know the parties and are objective in their counsel. 9Cf the record of the Catholic Programme, Engaged Encounter.) Your rhetorical behaviour of insisting on such tendentious and loaded equation in the teeth of longstanding correction comes across as grossly offensive in the worst village atheist traditions, ill-mannered and revealing of an intent to poison the atmosphere. marriages over the ages in societies that were far more vulnerable than ours, were normally carefully arranged. Such systems may have defects, but hey developed for a reason: on average, they worked and helped families survive. Further, one of the key principles of Civil law in the Bible, as exemplified by the divorce case, was that God's law respects our freedom of choice, even when this reflects the hardness of men's hearts. So God regulates to reduce the harmful side of what he does not approve. Malachi 2:16 is a classic, where God speaks: 'I hate divorce." And yet, OT law regulated it. Across time, the biblical solution strategy is reform and abolition as a critical mass builds up, not disruptive overthrow. (Look on the recent success of moral suasion on cigarette smoking.) Please, stop. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 10, 2009
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StephenB [310], I have consistently held that moral standards are shared and social, not merely individual. That does not make them objective: that merely makes them widespread. They can even be deeply and closely held. I assumed that you shared -- not my moral standard particularly -- but in general, the kind of perspective that would view accusing someone of supporting child prostitution because they do not use terms like "objective" an uncivilized tactic. Silly me. Apparently, such tactics are fine according to your morality. So, indeed, I'll be happy to stipulate: to me, your behavior was contemptible, but to you it is not a problem. I don't understand how you can behave that way. But there it is.David Kellogg_{March 10, 2009
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Kairosfocus @312
3] But how does Weasel work? GLF tries to make the cited cses from Watchmaker and From new3 Sdcientist fgo away by sayin g tha the examples are only apparent ones. Exhibit B time: Now, Dembski- Marks, have a forthcoming paper, on Conservation of info in searches, and on the cost of success. In this successfully peer-reviewed paper, on p. 5, they briefly revisit Dawkin’s Weasel, showing the key strategy used in the targetted search used: . . . Five new letters are found bringing the cumulative tally of discovered characters to {T,S,E,*,E,S,L}. All seven characters are ratcheted into place. Nineteen new letters are chosen and the process is repeated until the entire target phrase is found. Now, beyond reasonable dispute, making a test case of such a famous example would not have passed peer review if it had been a misrepresentation.
My previous comment is still awaiting moderation (if a moderator could explain why I would appreciate the candor), but this is addressed by Wesley Elsberry. He has informed Dr. Dembski of the error, so hopefully it won't make it into the published paper. JJJayM_{March 10, 2009
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----mullerpr: "You (George) were so funny the first time you tried to convince me that there is something objectively wrong with the things that you, at this moment, consider subjectively wrong. Now you are just boring and I can find no objective moral obligation to entertain you anymore." That is a nice way of putting it.StephenB_{March 10, 2009
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PS: Following up further: 1] Weasel word wars Weasel words are often strategically chosen and placed qualifying words that allow an evasive, deflective response when the main force of a point is challenged. (They do not affect significantly the persuasive force of the argument in the main; that's why they are used.) As a classical instance, it is aid that when he was on trial, Socrates pointed out how it was usual to plead fro pity by parading one's family before the court. he then described his wife and children and said how he would not parade them before the court. But, subtly -- and skirting the rules of the Areopagus -- that is just what he did. So, we must always beware of this subtlety when qualifying words are used in a context of debates. For, you can bet your bottom dollar that experienced debaters will not waste time on a point that is not adding to the persuasive force of their case. So, even from the target sentence, we should be on our guard with Mr Dawkins' Weasel example. (Remember, he thinks that if you disagree with his evolutionary materialism, especially if you believe the God of the Bible might have had something to do with origins, you are ignorant, stupid, insane or wicked. He it is, too, who has proposed that atheists call themselves "brights.") 2] The rhetorical effect of a "simple" "teaching" example Now, I note that my original point was that Weasel is a targetted search example, i.e active information based. However, thanks to the attempted distractions above [and to underscore how selective hyperskepticism works], my onward point is that Weasel is in the context of a book, entitled Blind Watchmaker. This is another alert: note the allusion to Paley's inference to design from stumbling across a watch in a field [we have now stumbled across a computer in the cell]; thence to the claimed dis-analogy between watches and biosystems. (Observe onlookers, no-one is able above to cogently or plausibly explain the existence of a digital computer in the cell starting with first life, on chance + necessity. As for computers, we know their routinely observed cause: design. But, a distraction is a very effective rhetorical substitute for an explanation. [And note; Weasel runs on -- a computer.]) Now, the book plainly sets out to make plausible to the public the notion that chance (i.e. undirected, stochastically contingent) variation plus natural selection "credibly" accounts for the appearance of design in life and its diversity of forms. So,the Weasel example in that wider context, beyond reasonable dispute serves to promote that thesis, regardless of qualifying words that may be prudently put in around it. Similarly -- and as I have already noted -- when Darwin proposed his precis of his case for evolution by RV + NS in 1859, he used artificial selection [animal breeding] and how this allegedly functioned to support the thesis of origination of species by descent with modification, by the claimed analogy between artificial and natural selection. Darwin circa 1859, Blythe notwithstanding, had an excuse for using targetted search in such a context. But, Dawkins, writing in 1986 by which time the limits of natural selection and the constraint of functionality on chance variation have long been studied in light of the information-based algorithmic processes of the cell, does not. 3] But how does Weasel work? GLF tries to make the cited cses from Watchmaker and From new3 Sdcientist fgo away by sayin g tha the examples are only apparent ones. Exhibit B time: Now, Dembski- Marks, have a forthcoming paper, on Conservation of info in searches, and on the cost of success. In this successfully peer-reviewed paper, on p. 5, they briefly revisit Dawkin's Weasel, showing the key strategy used in the targetted search used:
E. Partitioned Search Partitioned search [12] is a “divide and conquer” procedure best introduced by example. Consider the L = 28 character phrase METHINKS*IT*IS*LIKE*A*WEASEL (19) Suppose the result of our ?rst query of L = 28 characters is SCITAMROFNI*YRANOITULOVE*SAM (20) Two of the letters, {E,S}, are in the correct position. They are shown in a bold font. In partitioned search, our search for these letters is ?nished. For the incorrect letters, we select 26 new letters and obtain OOT*DENGISEDESEHT*ERA*NETSIL (21) Five new letters are found bringing the cumulative tally of discovered characters to {T,S,E,*,E,S,L}. All seven characters are ratcheted into place. Nineteen new letters are chosen and the process is repeated until the entire target phrase is found.
Now, beyond reasonable dispute, making a test case of such a famous example would not have passed peer review if it had been a misrepresentation. So, we can safely take it that the appearance of successive selection of letters for spaces occurs because it is real, not just coincidence or misrepresentation. 4] What would a more realistic example look like? Suppose we had the same length of phrase, 28 letters and spaces. Suppose we then allowed a random generation of characters. but, until a full word appears, we would not allow freezing of the characters in that word. [The rest would be "junk," and could continue.] then, we iterate until more words appear, freezing such words. then we shuffle the words. How many iterations would you expect before we get a full set of words,and would they then quickly form a coherent sentence or phrase in English? We intuitively know the answer: a lot longer in the first instance, with a bias towards very short words. then it would be hard to get a coherent sentence. (In fact if we freeze letters such as a and i -- legitimate words -- it might never be able to get to a coherent sentence.) 5] Moving on: a more serious approach Dembski and Mark sgo on to more modern, more sophisticated search strategies, but only to show that they work better than random search by feeding in active information:
Abstract—Conservation of information theorems indicate that any search algorithm performs on average as well as random search without replacement unless it takes advantage of problem- speci?c information about the search target or the search-space structure. Combinatorics shows that even a moderately sized search requires problem-speci?c information to be suc-cessful. Computers, despite their speed in performing queries, are completely inadequate for resolving even moderately sized search problems without accurate information to guide them. We propose three measures to characterize the information required for successful search: (1) endogenous information, which measures the dif?culty of ?nding a target using random search; (2) exogenous information, which measures the dif?culty that remains in ?nding a target once a search takes advantage of problem-speci?c information; and (3) active information, which, as the difference between endogenous and exogenous information, measures the contribution of problem-speci?c information for successfully ?nding a target. This paper develops a methodology based on these information measures to gauge the effectiveness with which problem-speci?c information facilitates successful search. It then applies this methodology to various search tools widely used in evolutionary search.
So, we see how the selective hyperskepticism distracts from the track of truth, leads away to strawmen, and too often then resorts to ad hominem tactics. And, all along, we may be left with the highly misleading impression that a case that after 150 years is still sadly wanting in warrant, is far more credible than it is on the merits. For the objective of selective hyperskepticism is to create suspicion to the objected to case and its proponents, all the while promoting a naive trust in the favoured "consensus" case by the "experts." So, let us apply Darwin's own stated solution in the introduction to Origin, cf. 167 above:
A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question . . .
GEM ot TKIkairosfocus_{March 10, 2009
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----David Kellogg: "I have not appealed to objective justice. Your only response is to insist that I do appeal to objective justice when I have not." You said my behavior was "contemptible." That is proof that you believe that we are both bound by the same standard of justice. That is what objective means, it means something that transcends your personal morality and my personal morality. Moral relativism, which is your position, allows each of us his own personal standard. Therefore, since I violated only your standard and not my standard, you cannot, as a moral relativist, say that I violated a universal standard. But you didn't say that my behavior SEEMED contemptile to you, you said it WAS contemptible--period. By doing that, you contradicted your own world view. You should have said, "to me, your behavior was contemptible, but for you it was not a problem, therefore there is no problem because I recognize that your morality is different than mine." You do not recognize your self contradictory position.StephenB_{March 10, 2009
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"jerry [289], magic books taught as sacred truths? Are you really going to go there? " I didn't go there, George went there.jerry_{March 10, 2009
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George, Are you related to Zachriel? I ask because every time I ask Zach for a reference he too references "evolution". "Evolution" is NOT being debated. The debate is about the mechanisms- Are organisms designed to evolve or did they evolve via an accumulation of genetic accidents?Joseph_{March 10, 2009
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I will get on my soap box just to let you know that the Skeptics on their soap boxes has now officially became boring beyond my limits and I will therefore get of my soap box and go build my wife a cupboard so she can store all her nice designs. It is far more interesting than rehashing the obvious... Humans are self aware and can understand and predict things. Best of all, there will always be something new to find and understand, EXCEPT if you are a skeptic, then you inevitably become boring, because the skeptic wastes so much time to reaffirm the "subjective" notion that today's logic is the same as yesterday's. P.S George, the objective truth about corporal punishment is that it is subject to other overarching objective principles. "NOT to cause ANY pain to others", can never be an overarching objective principle because it is logically impossible to achieve. Pain happens! Therefore there are other overarching principles to guide things like corporal punishment, like the ones proposed throughout the entire Bible, some very specific to socio-cultural settings. You were so funny the first time you tried to convince me that there is something objectively wrong with the things that you, at this moment, consider subjectively wrong. Now you are just boring and I can find no objective moral obligation to entertain you anymore.mullerpr_{March 10, 2009
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Seversky, The Weasel program has a target sequence that the program wants to reach. The "offspring" that more closely match that target are kept and left to "breed".Joseph_{March 10, 2009
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Hermagorus- David, The magic os all yours. YOUR position requires Magical Mystery Mutations. Magical because they do magical things- unobserved things. Mystery because they still elude us. For example: How did the mammalian vision system evolve? Magical mystery mutations is the only answer because no one even knows what is responsible for the mammalian vision system.Joseph_{March 10, 2009
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I should confess, at this point, that I too had assumed that Dawkins's WEASEL program locked in each correct character as it was identified. Looking back, it was a combination of not paying sufficiently close attention to the detail of how the program worked and being misled by Hollywood. For some reason, when I was trying to 'picture' how the program ran, it called to mind a scene from the John Badham movie War Games. Towards the end, the "WOPR" supercomputer is trying to obtain missile launch codes. This is illustrated by a display of a line of rapidly-changing characters which lock in place one-by-one as the computer 'guesses' correctly. That image seemed to make sense and lodged itself in my memory. I simply didn't notice the discrepancy until it was pointed out upthread. Even worse, I only just realised the movie scene makes no sense. It seems highly-unlikely that the launch code computer would be so obliging as to signal to the "WOPR" each time it scored a hit on one of the launch code characters - "Congratulations! You have just discovered character 5. Would you like to try for character 6?"Seversky_{March 10, 2009
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It is very wrong to ask ID to have the answers when your position doesn’t answer anything and it has more resources available to find the answers.
I can give you the answers to those questions. –Is all life designed, just some of it or what?
All life is designed via evolution.
Evolution is a result. Natural selection is also a result. –How do you tell teh difference?
As all life is designed via evolution there is no difference as no life has been designed other then by evolution or humanity. Life designed by humanity (or altered) shows in the fact that the nested hierarchy has been violated (i.e jellyfish DNA in a rabbit).
Evolution is a result and therefor doesn't design anything. And nested hierarchy is not an expected result of any evolutionary process. IOW if the theory of evolution were true we wouldn't expect to see nested hierarchies. –Can you give me an example of a designed and a non-designed organism?
As all life is designed by evolution there are no examples
True there aren't any examples of a result designing anything. However the debate is about evolution by DESIGN vs evolution by accumulated genetic accidents. –Are only IC structures designed, or is that just one way to tell?
IC structures are in fact a prediction of evolution, many years before it became part of the ID movement.
Again "evolution" is not being debated. And if "evolution" predicts IC it is only because it "predicts" anything and everything.
Evolution can make IC structures, in the same way that arches are constructed by humans.
But evolution is a result! IOW it appears that you don't understand evolution. And to refute/ falsify ID all YOU have to do is to demonstrate that an accumulation of genetic accidents can bring forth living organisms from non-living matter OR at least demonstrate that a flagellum can “evolve” via an accumulation of genetic accidents from a population that never had one.
I think you’ll find it’s the other way round.
But it isn't the other way around. THAT is exactly how science operates.
Unless ID can prove itself then you’ll be stuck here forever.
Science is not in the proving business.
You don’t win simply by not being disproved.
I never said nor implied otherwise. I was just telling you how to make ID go away- via scientific investigation. On another note it is the people who think our existence is due to an accumulation of genetic accidents who should be locked-up. In that scenario there aren’t any morals and anything goes.
And yet the vast majority of scientists working in the life sciences believe that and I understand rates of murder and other immoral behaviour are average.
I am not so sure of that alleged "vast majority" and it would appear that the vast number pof people don't believe those scientists.
How do you explaint that Joseph? Or is that just another fact to be ignored, like so very many others?
I explained it- people do NOT follow scientists especially when those scientists are not conducting science but instead spew philosophic nonsense.
Joseph_{March 10, 2009
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jerry [289], magic books taught as sacred truths? Are you really going to go there? See, I know lots of people who believe in a magic book. They even have big meetings (usually on the weekends) where they talk to the magic book's invisible author. They meet in special buildings. You may have some magic-book-discussion-buildings near you.David Kellogg_{March 10, 2009
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David Kellogg @297
I don’t want to interfere with the GLF/KF debate. But as I understand it, KF said the letters were fixed once correct. The letters are not fixed once correct. If that is the case, KF is wrong. Are the letters fixed when correct?
No. A quick Google search turns up several pages that discuss Dawkin's algorithm, including: VLab Austringer SPE and even Creation Ministries If you review the descriptions of the algorithm at each of these sites, all recognize that every letter in the string, including those that match the target, are subject to mutation in subsequent generations. JJJayM_{March 10, 2009
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mullerpr [292], I can only respond in the words of Alvy Singer, Woody Allen's character in Annie Hall:
Right. Well, I have to - I have to go now, Duane, because I, I'm due back on the planet Earth.
David Kellogg_{March 10, 2009
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For example George, please show us the peer-reviewed paper that demonstrates that E. coli’s flagellum “evolved” via an accumulation of genetic accidents. http://scholar.google.co.uk/sc.....tnG=Search
Which one would you like to start with?
Start with the first one. I didn't read anything about an accumulation of genetic accidents. Not one thing. Ya see George "evolution" is not being debated.Joseph_{March 10, 2009
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StephenB [290], you have proven nothing -- not that objective right and wrong exist, and not that I "believe it in spite of [my] protests." You have simply provided a worldview which is broadly compatible with strongly held moral views. However, other worldviews are also compatible. So what? Contra 291, I have not appealed to objective justice. Your only response is to insist that I do appeal to objective justice when I have not.David Kellogg_{March 10, 2009
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Name them.
Life came about from organic compounds that happened to obtain the ability to self replicate.
But life is much more than self-replication. Much, much more.
Life came about from an unknown unknowable entity called “the designer”
OK that's ID.
A space dog from the year 10,000 went back in time and seeded the planet with magic “earth buttons” that became life
Still ID.
A tri-top-top fromt the far side of the universe invented a tp-t-tp machine which happened to create a self-replicator on this side of the universe.
Still ID.
An old man in the sky did it.
Still ID. All you have done is to prove my point. Thank you.Joseph_{March 10, 2009
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I don't want to interfere with the GLF/KF debate. But as I understand it, KF said the letters were fixed once correct. The letters are not fixed once correct. If that is the case, KF is wrong. Are the letters fixed when correct?David Kellogg_{March 10, 2009
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Onlookers: Sadly, GLF predictably will not see the import of the tables, or the well-known characteristics of the Weasel program. And, BTW, the link as I just checked, works for me. Perhaps there is something odd about the browser setting GLF has. Here is the URL: http://creation.com/weasel-words-creation-magazine-critique-of-dawkins Onlookers will easily enough see there: _________________ Example 1. Provided in: Dawkins, R., The Blind Watchmaker, Penguin Books, London, 1986; p. 48. [Table follows, will not reproduce cleanly here] [ . . . . ] Example 2. Provided in: Dawkins, R., New Scientist, 34, Sept. 25, 1986; p. 34. [Table follows, will not reproduce cleanly] ____________________ Onlookers will easily enough see that the tables are cited from Dawkins, in two published contexts. Further, the sequece of iterations will show that non-functional configs are rewarded on a warmer/colder oracular basis [as GLF is forced to half-concede]. this is of course a signature behaviour of targetted search that uses warmer/ colder oracles, without a requirement of functionality at each step. (And, I repeat, reasonable estimartes for first life DNA scope is 600 k bits or so of information. 1 k bit is well beyond the reasonable search capacity of our observed universe.) So, unsurprisingly, we see, again the pattern of distraction and rhetorical objection joined to ad hominems, complete with inappropriate abusive cites of scriptures. (of course, the hollowness of he offers and challenges to pay to charities providing you cna prove X, or Y etc, is also plain for all to see.) Let us pray for this man, and for ourselves and our civilisition, that we will realise and escape the Plato's Cave bewitchment that has come upon us in the guise of selective hyperskepticism, often under the false colours of a "scientific" mindset. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 10, 2009
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Oh, I forgot to say, the link you gave http://creation.com/weasel-words-creation-magazine-critique-of-dawkins does not even work..... This is probably the one http://creationontheweb.com/content/view/801 Where they say
A simpler algorithm, which reproduces the guaranteed convergence behaviour, clarifies what Dawkins' algorithm actually shows: that change is only possible towards a pre-selected goal. Once a letter falls into place, Dawkin's program ensures it won't mutate away. This is shown in the two following examples:
Tables then follow. Yet, onlookers, the examples printed in the sources they were taken from were by nature limited in size. It just so happens that the letters appeared fixed, as the sequences shown do certanly appear to show this. However, that is due to the limitations of the printed page - should a full sequence be printed it could potentially take up a large amount of space. So, in the tables shown of course the letters appear fixed in place once found. If they did not the tables would be many times the size as it mutates towards the final value. Deliberate misrepresentation or ignorance? Who knows. Kariosfocus when you say
He is “illustrating” a mechanism of blind search with foresighted search, which s grossly misleading.
If you had read the surrounding material you would know that is also a lie. There is nothing misleading about the way in which Dawkins uses Weasel. The only grossly misleading aspect of it is the way in which people like you and creation.com misrepresent it. It's a toy teaching example that people like you have seized upon and claim it "grossly misleads" when in fact it's just a simple example designed to introduce the general concept. If you've read the book in which it appears you would know that. Furthermore, if you have the book at hand then you'll have no trouble providing a quote from it showing that the letters are fixed once found. What would you expect the tables to show? Should they print a special double sized feature so the entire run would be shown in full? In fact, I can provide entire tables, should you desire. These will show that the letters do not remain fixed when found. Furthermore, you'll understand why only a section of them could be printed in any reasonable space in a magazine. Proverbs 6:16-19
"These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren."
George L Farquhar_{March 10, 2009
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Kairosfocus, I repeat
If you care to substantiate this with a quote from Mr Dawkins (book or otherwise, if book page number and issue is required) my offer of $100,000 to a charity of your choice stands.
You said
But in fact, on any reasonable reading, GLF now owes CMI/AiG US$ 50 k [Send to Mr Ken Ham for his Creation Museum, and give him my greetings], and the Evo Informatics Lab US$ 50 k [Send Dr Dembski my greetings]. (Those are my obvious charities of choice and since it is a joint win, let’s split.)
Yet I see no quote from Dawkins and that is what I've clearly asked for. Therefore you get nothing. It's quite a simple challenge. Why don't you simply go to the link you gave me http://creation.com/weasel-words-creation-magazine-critique-of-dawkins and copy and paste a relevant Dawkins quote, with page references that can be checked, and I'll be happy to send the money.
At 270 GLF pretty directly implies that I am a liar.
Once you have been told the facts of the matter (that each letter is not fixed as it is found) but continue to repeat what you now know to be wrong (that it is fixed) then what better word then "lie" is there?
Namely, he starts with the right number of letters, and then randomly changes the letters in the initial case [save for any that happen to be the right letter in the right place].
Yet again you repeat what you know to be a lie. Provide a quote for me that shows that Dawkins did it that way or stop repeating that lie Don't you have the humility to accept you might be wrong? All I require is a quote from Dawkins himself. If you can't provide such I expect an apology
distractive red herrings are being dragged across the track of unwelcome truth, leading out to convenient, oil of ad hominem soaked strawmen, ignited to distract through the spectacle, and poisoning and clouding the atmosphere for discussion through blinding noxious smoke of stirred up hostility and confusion.
For if I am right and you are wrong (and you are) then your strawman talk applies to you, not me. If you can't even represent your adversaries position honestly then, well, this conversation is over. I await either a quote from Dawkins or an apology. You can write another 100,000 words if you like but without that quote it won't turn into $100,000.George L Farquhar_{March 10, 2009
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Onlookers (and GLF): At 248 above, I took up GLF (in response to his 2nd US$ 100k challenge at 236) on a practical (and thus also, spiritual . . . ) test of his truth-orientation, morality and sense of justice, as well as his ability to think with a clear, logical and open, unbiased mind on a matter of fact. I invite you to follow the link in 248 to the rebuttal to Weasel hosted by CMI, over the names Royal Trueman and Werner Gitt. Should you do so, you will see that: a --> through citations of acrtual tables from Mr Dawkins' Blind Watchmaker, and from a 1986 article in NewScientist [references given], Dawkins' method is plain enough. b --> Namely, he starts with the right number of letters, and then randomly changes the letters in the initial case [save for any that happen to be the right letter in the right place]. c --> After the random shifts, he tests for hits again, rewarding a "warmer" -- but non-functional -- configuration [ by preserving its successful letters. d --> He repeats, and so we can see the strings moving ever closer to the target string, finally reaching it in 40+ or 60+ runs. e --> Plainly, we see (from Dawkins!) strings that are not functional as English text being rewarded for being "warmer" and corrected for being "colder." [Note the also linked deeper discussions by Dembski and Marks et al.] f --> Actually, Mr Dawkins' procedure is a little less than optimal. A straight run through the alphabet and a space character would solve the puzzle in 27 runs. That is, randomising the search for the corrective character reduces efficiency, probably as wrong characters may repeat (in any given case there are 26 wrong ones and 1 right one). g --> Now, of course, Mr Dawkins' context -- Blind Watchmaker and New Scientist is "didactic"/ rhetorical. But that is the precise point. He is "illustrating" a mechanism of blind search with foresighted search, which s grossly misleading. (And BTW, when Darwin drew out inferences from ARTIFICIAL selection of animal breeders, to infer to proposed natural selection, he was similarly making a questionable step from the foresighted to the blind; but at least he was kind enough to clearly signpost his book as an initial and tentative case in partial absence of key evidence that is to be looked for. By 1986, that was not the case.) h --> And, for the more general/ serious case, in 248, I also linked the two forthcoming papers on active information and cost of search, as they not only deal with toy examples, but with more current and serious cases [such as Avida et al], showing the oracular search issue, and the role of intelligently built-in active information in efficiency gain of searches; duly measured in bits. i --> What, then, is my "reward" for so justifying an earlier statement that Weasel is targeted, oracular search; not blind search [cf citation at 236]? At 270 GLF pretty directly implies that I am a liar. j --> But in fact, on any reasonable reading, GLF now owes CMI/AiG US$ 50 k [Send to Mr Ken Ham for his Creation Museum, and give him my greetings], and the Evo Informatics Lab US$ 50 k [Send Dr Dembski my greetings]. (Those are my obvious charities of choice and since it is a joint win, let's split.) k --> but on track record, I hardly expect any acknowledgment. For wha tis going on is as Stephen b highlights; distractive red herrings are being dragged across the track of unwelcome truth, leading out to convenient, oil of ad hominem soaked strawmen, ignited to distract through the spectacle, and poisoning and clouding the atmosphere for discussion through blinding noxious smoke of stirred up hostility and confusion. l --> In that context, and since there has been much scripture-twisting above, a few pointed, scalpel-like scriptures are now all too plainly relevant. hopefully, they will help us lance and excise the cancerous, gangrenous abscess on the mind, before the disease of selective hyperskepticism becomes fatal:
John 3: 19This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. 21But ,b>whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God." Eph 4: 17 . . . I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. 19Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more. Rom 2:5 . . . because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. 6God "will give to each person according to what he has done."[a] 7To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. 8But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger.
By God's grace, let us heed these warnings; before it is too late for us, for those we care for, and for our civilisation. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 10, 2009
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David, I quickly answer #283: There is a vast difference in "concealed and cryptic" and "that God goes out of his way not to be understood by man". Not to be understood in my mind implies that God makes it impossible to be understood. If I can explain the difference in information terms. If God wanted NOT to be understood then he would have "scrambled the code beyond any possible human comprehension", but if he wanted humans to know Him in a very particular way, he would have used an encryption that can be decrypted in such a way as to reveal everything we need to know in order to understand Him and our environment. In that sense your all references actually supported my view. Maybe because I have already decrypted the messages your referred to. Can you see the mistake being made by skeptics who claim that God is unknowable and using that as vindication for their skepticism.mullerpr_{March 9, 2009
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David, the demonstration that I provided did not prove that the natural law exist, because that cannot be done. I proved that you believe it in spite of your protests. The demonstration was in your appeal to objective justice and your claim that my behavior was “contemptible.” That proved that you believe in a universal standard of justice even though you claim that moral principles such as justice are not objective.StephenB_{March 9, 2009
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----David: "if your 15 minutes are not up, could you do me the favor of linking to your proof of the truth of objective morality? The philosophical world and I thank you in advance." I can do a quick lighting round. The natural moral law is founded in our nature and revealed to us by our faculty of reason. From an epistemological standpoint, it is written on the human heart. We cannot reason our way to it, in other words, logic cannot take us to it. So, it cannot be proven through demonstration. We do not reason our way toward it so much as we reason our way from it, meaning that we can come to a more sophisticated knowledge of it through study and reflection. In the most general sense, it can be expressed as “do good and avoid evil." One can learn more about it by investigating the Tao.StephenB_{March 9, 2009
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If I were to suggest that between Berkeley and Harvard there is a magic book with research results so conclusive on macro evolution and that this book shuttles from coast to coast in the possession of a research wizard, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the book is almost identical to every other book of research results except for the interpretation of the research wizard. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt such a book exists, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a book were affirmed in all textbooks, taught as the sacred truth every semester, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.jerry_{March 9, 2009
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