Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD  Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/24/2006 at 20:32 |
Nocquote:I wasn't using the study to argue in favor of evolution.
No, but where you were using it, it was misused. Your one- or two-sentence explanation of the result is misleading. You seem to be rather intellectually honest; I just wanted to right your direction for future arguments where you might be tempted to pull out this fantastic result-that-isn't-really-what-you-say-it-is.
Nocquote: I included a link detailing his academic background. Dinozoa (more or less) claimed that people who were surprised didn't know their shit. I proposed that this guy isn't an idiot. His academic background, in my opinion, supports my assertion.
Sorry, I glossed over the link on first reading. I thought your emphasis was simply on "Ralf Wessel, Ph.D..
Vasquote:The quality and reliability of what's being blindly accepted may serve as some consolation.
Of course, if I'm the one determining the quality and reliability.
vasquoteYou're probably not taking into account the 49 billion other planets that had a shot at being habitable but were too close or too far from the Sun, or too small for gravity to hold an atmosphere, or etc. It's no coincidence at all that the only planet for trillions of light-years in any direction that managed to evolve life is the one containing people wondering about where they came from.
The Earth is so startlingly "just right" because all the other ones that weren't perfectly just right never got around to being much of anything.
Tangent: Does anyone know the term for this type of argument/analysis? Where it boils down to basically: a whole shitload of things are possible, but only one of those things is detectable, and so it's not that miraculous, given enough tries, that we find that one result and no others? Or, put another way, the ability to perform some act A, necessarily requires some precursor B, which is in and of itself pretty unlikely. Here comes numbnutz C, able to perform act A, who says "Gee isn't it amazing that I'm B?"
e.g.
"Aren't I lucky to have been born on Earth?"
"Think about how many organisms there are on Earth -- isn't it so supercool and amazing and fortunate that I am a person instead of, say, an E. coli?"
Just curiousity. It can be such a difficult concept for some...
HerpequoteII've probably missed your point entirely, though...
Indeed you have, and I haven't the patience to hold the hand of someone so willfully ignorant. I have a good idea where that hand has been, and I'm profoundly uninterested in contacting it.
If you have any real interest, re-read vas explanation and think about it before your vomitus obscures any more of the thread.
Edit: There should be a "preview post" option or something
On 2006-04-24 at 15:33:55, Pchimp praised Jejus
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD  Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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4/24/2006 at 23:42 |
vasudeva:
Your initial post in this thread was a fat dose of ye olde bomb diggity, but now we're down to splitting hairs and picking nits. I don't know if you only had the one major load to blow, but for my part, I've reiterated the same argument like three times now and I'm starting to get tired of watching me post it.
Yeah, I know. Is bomb diggity a good thing or bad? I hope it's good.
My major load to blow was that people were bringing the anti-creationist arguments really weak, and then, inspired by the lack of discension, started to get excited about other really weak ideas, like entropy being some magical force or god being a fractal or what have you.
The last thing I'll say on the subject is: Nocal, whatever your god is, or Bohme's, no matter what it looks like, if you can't set up experiments to prove or disprove its existence, then it's not scientific. If you're ok with that, then that's cool.
I think a good thread to start would be comparing science to religion in terms of ethical systems, as in, can you have a non-religious ethos?
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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4/24/2006 at 23:49 |
Pchimp:
Tangent: Does anyone know the term for this type of argument/analysis? Where it boils down to basically: a whole shitload of things are possible, but only one of those things is detectable, and so it's not that miraculous, given enough tries, that we find that one result and no others? Or, put another way, the ability to perform some act A, necessarily requires some precursor B, which is in and of itself pretty unlikely. Here comes numbnutz C, able to perform act A, who says "Gee isn't it amazing that I'm B?"
e.g.
"Aren't I lucky to have been born on Earth?"
"Think about how many organisms there are on Earth -- isn't it so supercool and amazing and fortunate that I am a person instead of, say, an E. coli?"
Just curiousity. It can be such a difficult concept for some...
I think the word you're looking for is 'anthropic' as in, "pchimp just outlined the anthropic principle."
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Mofo
dont give a shit   SSHOLEPosts: 423 Registered: 2/8/2004 Offline
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4/24/2006 at 23:53 |
Inducing an ordered behaviour from chaotic coupled oscillators by adding disordered inputs is interesting, but it's been shown multiple times over the last couple decades, in Newtonian systems (like here), quantum oscillators, and chaotically driven lasers.
Research on the role of disorder in complex systems is quite new and not well understood.
Quick survey: Anyone else have a ph.D in physics? In science? At all?
It went from evolution to "Are these three dudes with ph.Ds fucktards or not?" |
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 00:27 |
Mofo: Inducing an ordered behaviour from chaotic coupled oscillators by adding disordered inputs is interesting, but it's been shown multiple times over the last couple decades, in Newtonian systems (like here), quantum oscillators, and chaotically driven lasers.
Research on the role of disorder in complex systems is quite new and not well understood.
My claims come directly from articles cited by the article in question. They have made an incremental finding -- which is what the vast majority of science is. It doesn't mean it's worthless; simply that it's not groundbreaking -- which the authors are quick to say themselves.
Quick survey: Anyone else have a ph.D in physics? In science? At all?
Will quite soon, yes. But that ante is not really necessary at this table.
It went from evolution to "Are these three dudes with ph.Ds fucktards or not?"
Just for clarification, that's two PhD's and a student who did the work, and I don't think anyone is seriously implying that they're fucktards. Point taken, though -- it's off topic.
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I think the word you're looking for is 'anthropic' as in, "pchimp just outlined the anthropic principle."
Excellent! Thank you -- interesting reading now that I have a term to search on.
On 2006-04-24 at 20:05:09, Pchimp praised Jejus
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nocal
It's insane, this guy's taint  SSHOLEPosts: 811 Registered: 8/25/2004 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 01:31 |
The last thing I'll say on the subject is: Nocal, whatever your god is, or Bohme's, no matter what it looks like, if you can't set up experiments to prove or disprove its existence, then it's not scientific. If you're ok with that, then that's cool.
I would never suggest such a thing. Faith is not science.
SO this fucking thread is off the tracks. I googled "evolution myths," looking for some kind of list that I could refer to to see if maybe I missed something that I had originally wanted to talk about. One of the links that I found is THIS one, which purports to be about how evolution is a myth.
The guy is not too bright, so I thought I would have an imaginary argument with a disembodied voice on the internet (that can't reply) in order to prove myself smarter.
According to Darwin, nature acts like a breeder, overseeing biological change.
Right off the bat, I hate him. Nature doesn't "act" or "breed." Nature exists. You fuck.
Given enough time, organisms may change so radically that they bear almost no resemblance to their original ancestor.
"Enough time"? It sounds like he thinks that Darwin looked at animals and assumed they'd be different after he had his tea.
What paleontologists discovered was not gradual change, but stability and sudden appearance. It seems that most fossil species appear all at once, fully formed, and change very little throughout their existence.
Which brings us to punctuated equilibrium. Not to mention that we have a pretty good fossil record.
Large evolutionary jumps are anathema to good Darwinists because the changes look too much like miracles. Reptiles simply don't hatch birds.
What? I can't imagine a Darwinist who looks at anything and goes, "Golly! Must be a miracle!" But I do imagine that the author imagines that scene and gets a fat boner. And his argument "Reptiles simply don't hatch birds." Where does that even come from? "Darwinists are idiots, because we all know: elephants simply don't masturbate on my face. No matter how many peanuts I offer."
The phylum that contains human beings, for instance, also contains elephants, squirrels, canaries, lizards, guppies, and frogs. It includes every animal with a backbone - and then some. If the differences within a phylum are vast, the differences between phyla are far greater. As much as a chimpanzee may differ from a fish, it differs even more radically from a sea urchin. The two are built on entirely different architectural themes.
BLARGH. So what you're trying to say are chordates? Notice how he slips in the "built on architectural themes."
That's why the Cambrian Explosion remains so troubling for Darwinists.
Oh really?
Wikipedia sez:
From the modern point of view, the apparently explosive radiation from obscure beginnings was partly an artefact of disregarding microfossils, which were scarcely detectable with 19th-century technology, and concentrating solely on the hard-shelled macrofossils that defined the phyla well established by 19th-century biologists, all of which were multiple-celled metazoa. Apparently abruptly, many kinds of fossils appearing in the Burgess Shale were seen showing obvious skeletal body features, whereas the traces of the hard-to-analyze "small shelly fauna" of Cambrian beginnings were ignored.
Not to mention that that period was 30 MILLION YEARS LONG.
According to Dembski, we recognize design in events or objects that are too improbable to happen by chance. Stones don't turn into arrowheads by natural erosion. Writing doesn't appear in sand by the action of waves. Ah unaltered coin doesn't come up heads a hundred times in a row. Such results point to some intelligent cause.
Not only does he not understand evolution, he doesn't understand basic statistics.
"Our coin-flipping friend who claims to have flipped 100 heads in a row is in the same boat as a lottery manager whose relatives all win the jackpot or an election commissioner whose own political party repeatedly gets the first ballot line," Dembski says. "In each instance public opinion rightly draws a design inference and regards them guilty of fraud."
Now what's scary is this Dembski character has a Ph.D. in mathematics AND in philosophy (so let's beat home that earlier point that not anyone with a Ph.D. is necessarily smart...). He's arguing for design because, essentially, humans are stupid. We would assume that 100 heads in a row is some how less likely than getting heads, tails, tails, heads, etc. Therefore, because we see a pattern where there is no statistical pattern...God exists. Because, like, what are the chances????
For Michael Behe, a Catholic biochemist at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., the complexity is too extreme for Darwinism to be plausible. He argues that many systems in living organisms are irreducibly complex. They consist of several parts, all of which must be present for the system to work.
"It's like a mousetrap," Behe says. "A standard household mousetrap has five parts, all of which must be present for the trap to work. If you take away any of those five parts, you don't have a functioning mousetrap. You can add the parts one by one, but until you get to the full five parts, you have no function. It's an all-or-nothing kind of thing."
WHERE IS HE GETTING THESE IDIOTS. This man is a liar. Take the human brain. Eliminate a few neurons. Nothing will happen. Eliminate, at random, a few hundred neurons. You won't see much happen. Eliminate a few thousand neurons, a few hundred at a time. You will see a GRADUAL decline in the operation of the brain. It's not some bullshit threshhold, where you eliminate neuron #65 and the brain shuts down. Apply that to almost anything.
Essentially, he either straw mans us some sweet bullshit Darwinism or ignores what he doesn't like or recruits some Ph.D. wielding doosh (how they graduated, I can't even begin to understand). Not to mention he is struggling his pansy ass off to refute DARWINISM. Not modern knowledge, nothing like that. Strict Darwinism, right out of Origin of the Species. In hundreds of years, we've gained more proof, but this guy argues with a dead man's book. K dude. |
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Mofo
dont give a shit SSHOLEPosts: 423 Registered: 2/8/2004 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 02:06 |
Will quite soon, yes. But that ante is not really necessary at this table.
Perhaps, but I've become quite annoyed with people who barely passed highschool chemistry or physics quickly writting off science. Imagine trying to debate someone who majored in filmography that claims to know more than scientists with multiple degrees, and you'll see where I'm going from.
If we all plan on expelling copious amounts of spittle over tha validity of the tests,
http://www.thetriplehelix.org/news/446
On 2006-04-24 at 21:12:08, Mofo praised Jejus |
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jwalker
Token Discordian  SSHOLEPosts: 946 Registered: 8/6/2005 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 03:34 |
It's hard to argue with crazy people.
A while back I was reading about this bible-thumper who'd cited Onyate Man (a fossil discovered in NM of a homonid getting eaten by a dinosaur) on one of his lecture tours. Later, the perpetrators of the hoax had some fun with him, challenging him to a written debate, which he refused to do.
The web site www.darwindisproved.com no longer exists, but the prank is still there.
On 2006-04-24 at 22:35:46, jwalker praised Jejus
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IMBOLCPunxsutawneyPhil
SENATOR BABYHEAD  Posts: 244 Registered: 3/17/2005 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 04:16 |
So maybe we can talk about social evolutionary stuff...
what causes the rise of religions?
There is still that tangent that brings mirth--somwhere somebody likes to belive in a godhead--a good many people have creation myths and other explainations that existed long before science and are based on oral history and other jibba jabba...
I think all the arguments these people come up with are tethered to a fundamental theme of pleasurable ignorance and outright refutation of that which causes discomfort in "contemplation". It is called belief and that serves a purpose in most socieites as a binding agent for social constructs and other "needs" of a group of people. [principles]
Nobody dwells on the disruptive artifacts of reality that disprove your Noah's ark, or your Adam and Eve or your fallacious concepts about the world around you. That which brings congnitive dissonance is readily stamped out either by inquisitions, exercises in religious power [Fatwah, Missive, Encylcical, &c] or, amazingly enough: the self-induced short circuiting of the human brain!!
Look at this tool box for contemplating reality and tell me how you would arise with different ouctomes:
--Fear of the unknown/unknowable
--Incompatibility with contradictory information
--Emotional attachment [Safety] to pre-concieved ideas
--Inability to question authority
--social and peer group pressures to be part of the "group"
Where does science fit in without challenging at any level any of those factors that, for lack of kindess, indicates STUPID FUCKS? Will stupid fucks really go through the trouble and challenge their own beliefs or PROTECT their notions? [side note: scientists will, it's their job]
It's only human to protect and maintain your cognitive stability--and by proxy your belief system exists for the sole purpose to elaborate on any details you may have missed. And if that system is tied to a social structure with a hierarchy and other orderly systems that _all make sense_, how could anything begin to approach to upset that apple cart? [summary: belief in religion makes the questioning of faith untenable in a social setting]
I believe that middle-eastern religions are a social disease that prey upon people's inability to conflict within themselves and guard them from external pressures that force them any realization that contradicts thier simplistic view of reality. [I am also willing to challenge that belief, so there]
It makes them happy to be ignorant and this my fine readers is the nature of the debate against evolution. Within evolution and amoungst the studies and groups there are parallel refutations and cliques of scientists, philosophers and other humans who are also beholden to the rules of their nature--but the real reason people don't believe in evolution is because it doesn't agree with that which tethers them to the fantasy that orders their universe.
So what if they came about the notions and concepts of the world from a different angle, are they not compatible for the human mind which seeks safety and order? I would argue that the smart minds understand and accept a level of contradiction as healthy--the dumb ones cannot.
[metaphorical tangent that will lose 70%+ of this readership...]
Aren't you aware that your girlfriend/wife/husband/boyfriend/fucktoy has very likely had sex/ love/ kisses/ icky-feelings for someone else? Do you think about it?
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 17:18 |
Right off the bat, I hate him. Nature doesn't "act" or "breed." Nature exists. You fuck.
I may fuck as well, then, because I do often talk that way. Sure, it's anthropomorphic; but it's a convenient shorthand way of describing a variety of driving forces, generally without obfuscation.
One might even go so far as to say those treasured motivations, desires, etc. that you find so singular are just downstream affections of similar driving forces; and that talking about a gene's "desire" for self-propagation or oppositely charged ion's "attraction" for one another is just as valid as describing a human machine's desires, as long as they are kept in context. Yeah, it assumes suitable understanding of the context from the audience... But I digress.
WHERE IS HE GETTING THESE IDIOTS. This man is a liar. Take the human brain. Eliminate a few neurons. Nothing will happen. Eliminate, at random, a few hundred neurons. You won't see much happen. Eliminate a few thousand neurons, a few hundred at a time. You will see a GRADUAL decline in the operation of the brain. It's not some bullshit threshhold, where you eliminate neuron #65 and the brain shuts down. Apply that to almost anything.
Now, now -- don't get too full of yourself. Irreducible complexity is not so easily brushed off. The human brain is a terrible example -- a straw man, if you will. Your argument is similar to someone trying to argue against fundamental particles by cleaving his pot roast in half, repeating several times, and concluding that he could do this forever without it losing its pot roastiness. Nobody with a functioning brain uses it as an example of irreducible complexity. In fact, I'll point out that in the nervous systems of lesser organisms you can produce quite profound, even fatal, effects by targeting one particular neuron. Take nematodes, for example -- c. elegans. Thanks to a hard working student about a century ago, we know precisely where every single cell is supposed to be, from zygote to mature organism. It has exactly one motoneuron responsible for curling backwards, exactly one neuron for sensing how much oxygen is around it, and exactly one neuron responsible for many other critical functions. Even so, it's not a candidate for irreducible complexity. If you find that the system would function well enough by removal of some parts, you are either looking at a system where this doesn't hold (only one system anywhere in biology has to be truly irreducibly complex to cast significant doubt on evolution), or you just havent reduced the system far enough. This is not cheating or disingenuous -- it's the fundamental nature of the principle of irreducible complexity.
So what is a good example of irreducible complexity? Well, there are a few that are commonly presented by ID'ers. E. coli flagella are the best they've got, I think. Bacterial flagella are whip-like tails that many bacteria use to move around. It spins around on the "tail" of the bacteria, reminiscent of an outboard motor. It has a chemomechanical motor that converts energy from hydrogen atoms passing across a membrane to mechanical work, spinning a rotary motor protein complex. Here's a cartoon.
The whole thing is composed of roughly 40 proteins. Take away almost any one of them, and its function is totally compromised -- it doesn't just work poorly; it doesn't work at all (as a flagellum). Even replacing most any single amino acid in the primary constituent protein, flagellin, leads to similar catastrophic failure. If you operate under the naive assumption that if this system (whose function is to move the bacteria around) evolved, then it must have developed from some simpler motility-generating system; then it is irreducibly complex. "Motors" that are just a little bit simpler do not work.
The assumption is wrong, of course. It didn't need to evolve from another motility-producing system. Evolution, as has been noted, is not linear; it doesn't follow a logical design pathway. It turns out that bacteria use this complex machinery to perform other functions, such as secreting enzymes, convection currents to draw nutrients close, or to tether themselves to a nutrient-rich surface. These functions do not catastrophically fail when altered slightly -- they are not irreducibly complex. Flagella could have evolved from one of these systems which have a seemingly unrelated function.
Nature is robust -- amazingly so -- but it does have bottlenecks. There are many "parts" which are critical for an organism's survival or, at least, for a particular function.
Not coincidentally, these also tend to be the most well-conserved evolutionarily. Nature got it right somehow, and variations on the theme die off quickly. Answering how nature developed those solution in the first place when minor variations yield catastrophic results is not entirely trivial. Rational explanations don't require invocation of the supernatural, but they do require a good deal of cleverness.
[fingerwaggle] You seem to approach these arguments working from the assumption that evolution is the undeniable truth, and any argument that opposes that truth is laughable on it's face. As I think is obvious from reading these creationist screeds, this is often true. And yes, evolution is supported by mountains of evidence; but there are inconsistencies and likely flaws in our understanding. Evolutionary theory is at a state where we can say yes, our understanding of evolution is not totally complete and consistent, but the basics are almost undeniably correct; we're working out the details. No other consistent and credible alternative has been posited. But this don't mean that we should dismiss all anti-evolution arguments out of hand. Some deserve a look, and a more rigorous refutation, else you risk appearing no more than a "true believer" yourself.
By misrepresenting those few ID's arguments that have some apparent merit to reasonably intelligent people, so as to make them appear foolish, you just throw fuel on the fire. How many times have in this thread alone have you cried that they just don't understand evolutionary theory or it's supporting evidence? [/fingerwaggle]
I'm well aware that this kind of cautiousness and fair-mindedness hinders sciency types on the shouting stage of public discourse... Maybe you should ignore me -- go forth and be hyperbolic.
This is serious stuff, you know. After all, the eyes of the world are on LS. The fate of humanity hinges on the collective decisions of our own inner loop.
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As I was drafting this post in gmail, one of their targetted ads was this gem. I just skimmed some portions. I normally find such bullshit funny, much akin to timecube guy, but I've had my fill of feces for the day, feasibly for the fortnight. I'll let this guy speak for himself. See if you can find the logical inconsistency in this creationist's argument. He is explaining about how evolution has a hard time explaining whales, because some land animal, a cow for instance, would have to undergo a lot of changes all at once to suddenly become sea-faring. Fine. Hideously wrong-headed, but let's let it slide -- he's about to trump himself:
The evolutionists argue the following, "We know that there is no evidence for a mammal turning into a semi-fish" argues evolution, "but we do have whales and we do know that evolution is the best explanation. Therefore, evolution must have produced whales. We know it may sound a little strange, but no other explanation is acceptable to us ... and we alone are competent to decide."
This argument is similar to the purple spider theory.
The purple spider theory holds that snow is caused by a large numbers of purple spiders that live on the tops of clouds and spin snowflakes. We have never seen these spiders and we cannot explain how they make snowflakes, but we do know that without purple spiders we cannot explain how snow falls unless we resort to unreasonable alternative explanations. So, the purple spiders explain it. We are all very scientific and we want you to take our word for it. Moreover, without purple spiders, nothing in our biology makes much sense.
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Dumbskull
I'm assuming the position!  SSHOLEPosts: 1896 Registered: 4/22/2004 Offline
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4/25/2006 at 22:56 |
I have been taking an Invertebrate Paleontology class this semester. Tough class but we did have a lot of cool VERY OLD fossils to toss around. Since this thread is all about EVOLUTION I might as well jump in with a few words of my own.
The greatest mass extinction event in all of earth’s history occurred at the end of the Permian 250 million years ago. After this mass extinction it is estimated that between 90 – 95% of the species on Earth went extinct. GONE!
Nothing explains the theory of evolution like extinctions.
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nocal
It's insane, this guy's taint SSHOLEPosts: 811 Registered: 8/25/2004 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 01:16 |
Yeah, it assumes suitable understanding of the context from the audience... But I digress
I happen to think that it assumes too much. Generally it is a "dumbing down" of science that is often harmful. Perhaps I'm not the shining example of an exceedingly smart scientist, but I think that high school science classes lead to legions of creationists.
Irreducible complexity is not so easily brushed off. The human brain is a terrible example -- a straw man, if you will. Your argument is similar to someone trying to argue against fundamental particles by cleaving his pot roast in half, repeating several times, and concluding that he could do this forever without it losing its pot roastiness.
It sounds like we're both dealing in straw men (although, I still don't believe that I am).
Essentially you're arguing that I just presented something too complex. I think that the linear function of the brain is a good example of why something so complex as the human brain could have arisen through evolution. But hey, why argue that the human brain is designed when you can argue that flagella are designed. (I get it: you aren't arguing that. You don't believe in irreducible complexity. So here I'm not really arguing with your viewpoint, just one that seems to be Behe's.)
By misrepresenting those few ID's arguments that have some apparent merit to reasonably intelligent people, so as to make them appear foolish, you just throw fuel on the fire.
It has merit to idiots. This is why:
Furthermore, the concept of irreducible complexity is ignored or rejected by the majority of the scientific community. This rejection stems from the following: the concept utilises an argument from ignorance, Behe fails to provide a testable hypothesis, and there is a lack of evidence in support of the concept. As such, irreducible complexity is seen by the supporters of evolutionary theory as an example of creationist pseudoscience, amounting to a God of the gaps argument.
[...]
They claim that Behe overestimated the significance of irreducible complexity because his simple, linear view of biochemical reactions results in his taking snapshots of selective features of biological systems, structures and processes, while ignoring the redundant complexity of the context in which those features are naturally embedded and an over-reliance of overly simplistic metaphors such as his mousetrap.
It appeals to idiots because it's an argument from ignorance.
I'm well aware that this kind of cautiousness and fair-mindedness hinders sciency types on the shouting stage of public discourse... Maybe you should ignore me -- go forth and be hyperbolic.
I'm fair-minded, but arguing that, essentially, "We didn't see it happen, so...God!" is not only a poor logical argument, it's unscientific and deserves no scientific consideration.
HIS VERY PREMISE IS NOT FALSIFIABLE.
Essentially, I think you have a lot to add to this discussion, most likely you have a lot more to add than I do. But there's no reason to be a prick.
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 03:20 |
there's no reason to be a prick.
You're right. Love and care bears and hugs and my little ponies all around!
Seriously, though,I wasn't trying to be a prick. Not to you, anyway. I just think you are unintentionally distorting the irreducible complexity issue. Of course it's still misguided in the end, but I think it's somewhat important to understand why it's misguided.
First, let me clear this up: if irreducible complexity or any other argument is disingenuously put forth simply as a method to bootstrap a place for a Christian God as creator, then the game is over. You are right -- they are liars, fools, or ignorant. There is no need to go further, as one party is working from the conclusion and backfilling their justifications in whatever jumbled mess they can come up with. When they are so incapacitated that they see God's black box as emminently more believable than any other explanation, then there are other issues that need to be straightened out before you address rational (if unscientific) arguments. So when I put forth any arguments for ID, as devil's advocate of course, it does not assume God. If the conclusion of a line of reasoning is that evolution can not explain something, then that is all the conclusion is -- that some other, heretofore unilluminated explanation must be sought. I am making the overly generous allowance that "So GOD!!" does not immediately follow. I have never met an ID'er who did not jump immediately to God, but for the sake of argument let's assume they exist.
HIS VERY PREMISE IS NOT FALSIFIABLE.
Let me paint an exotic scenario. Billions of years ago, intelligent life evolved elsewhere in the universe. It evolved more-or-less as we understand life on earth to have developed, but it did not have any steps which could appear to be irreducibly complex. An intelligent race evolved, and developed a new form of life based on DNA and polypeptide chains and flagellar motors, which they subsequently seeded on Earth. Those building blocks of life, those purportedly irreducibly complex systems, were designed. Evolution proceeded afterwards just as we understand it now. This is intelligent design, and it would be conceivably testable.
More reasonably, though, the reason that it is important to address irreducible complexity head on is that if we can not conceive of a way that a system could have evolved based on current theory, then it is evidence against that current state of the theory, and something that needs to be considered/corrected for.
There is a basic, qualitative difference between pointing to the brain as an irreducibly complex system and something more basic, like a flagella or the blood clotting cascade. The irreducible complexity argument does not state that complex systems cannot evolve. It is based on an (mistaken) observation that for some biological systems, any minor perterbation of the constituents results in a system that could not be selected for. This does not claim to apply to all systems, and doesn't need to. You can't point to a system with no apparent irreducible complexity to argue against the principle. The ball is in their court -- if they can show that a system is irreducible, then you have to address that system, or else you have simply evaded the argument.
Those misguided statistics links that you mentioned before -- many of them were misrepresented quotes from prominent pro-evolution scientists explaining why complex systems statistically could not reasonably be believed to spontaneously assemble from suitably simple components. This is correct. There (generally) has to be a gradual drift. Evolution cannot explain 40 proteins which previously did not exist in the context of a flagellum, all evolving at the same time to form one. There have to be precursor structures which were themselves selected for. The flagellar example is attractive to ID'ers because there is/was a significant body of work that showed that all reasonable perterbations of the flagellar system resulted in a system that could not perform the same function at all.
Yes, irreducible complexity is ignored by scientists when they interpret their work, but it doesn't mean they whistle dixie when a creationist shoves it in their face in a debate. In almost any other forum I would belittle it as well. In fact, there is a quote above my bench that guides my thoughts: "Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution." (Theodosius Dobzhansky) The only reason I am not at the moment is because I don't think you've presented the actual argument. You obviously think it's so self-evidently silly that it doesn't need to be seriously addressed. Eh... I would say it depends on the audience. At any rate, there are good, well-reasoned arguments and tested hypotheses that condemn irreducible complexity to the crapyard of pretend science.
Ultimately, you're right that it has no scientific merit because it's not testable; but that does not mean that it couldn't be true. And the great majority of people do not define their world-views based upon the falsifiability of their conceptions. And that majority is not exclusively populated by idiots. Most people you argue with will not see the value of falsifiability. They're immune to that particular bomb, but there are others with which to populate your arsenal.
It has merit to idiots.
Who are you talking to then? Or, rather, who are you sharpening your skills to debate? You and your pal Dawkins seems to think that anybody who doesn't already accept evolution is an idiot. Aren't these the people you want to convince?
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nocal
It's insane, this guy's taint SSHOLEPosts: 811 Registered: 8/25/2004 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 04:07 |
Seriously, though,I wasn't trying to be a prick.
Maybe I'm just being too senstive. HUGS!
The ball is in their court -- if they can show that a system is irreducible, then you have to address that system, or else you have simply evaded the argument.
Bah! I guess I just don't understand. Evolution is itself unscientific at times. Explaining why language arose, etc etc. We don't really know. But shit, it does a pretty damn good job of explaining. And it uses as a base lots of info that we already know. I guess you know that.
Who are you talking to then? Or, rather, who are you sharpening your skills to debate?
Well in this case, I said that because it is an appeal to ignorance, which is inevitably the short and stupid route.
I don't actually believe that I can change anyone's mind on this issue. First let me make the distinction between arguments and discussions: arguments almost never change anyone's mind, while discussions are people talking in hopes of expanding their knowledge. I'd like to think we're having a discussion right now, becuase I think you raise plenty of very good points that I accept and acknowledge.
I think it's a good discussion for rational human beings to have, but faith is irrational. I can never convince someone that God doesn't exist. I can never convince someone that God didn't make the universe. I can never convince a person that their firm beliefs are bullshit based on what we can see in the world. So I'm not actually trying to do that. It would be, in my opinion, a futile exercise.
So I'm just talking so that we can all learn, rather than trying to actually debate someone who has faith and/or is an idiot. |
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freakbass
SENATOR BABYHEAD  Posts: 128 Registered: 2/12/2006 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 05:00 |
I don't personally believe that faith itself is irrational. I believe that faith in what I deem to be stupid shit is irrational... like invisible men in the sky.
Lots of the scientific laws and 'truths' in my brain have not been empirically verified by me personally.
Even when I encounter some new piece of information and cross reference it to death, the act of choosing to believe in it without encountering the device/scientists/experience/telescopic view/etc personally is ultimately a small act of faith.
Would all of the 'truth' in your brain hold water in a court of law or at a PHD dissertation??
Not me... especially the stuff for which a proper 'ruler' has been developed.. like why the hell acupuncture made the scar tissue in my wrist disappear..
Would all of the 'truth' in your brain hold water in a court of law or at a PHD dissertation?? Got all the references handy in there too?
Not me... especially the stuff for which a proper 'ruler' has been developed.. like why the hell acupunture made the scar tissue in my wrist dissapear..
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 05:05 |
nocal:
Bah! I guess I just don't understand. Evolution is itself unscientific at times. Explaining why language arose, etc etc. We don't really know. But shit, it does a pretty damn good job of explaining. And it uses as a base lots of info that we already know. I guess you know that.
So I'm just talking so that we can all learn, rather than trying to actually debate someone who has faith and/or is an idiot.
As for the first part: why don't we know that language arose? Maybe you don't know. When I took introduction to anthropology, we discussed language as being a better communication mechanism than grunts and whistles, and talked about how chimpanzees have complicated communications systems (for animals) and why it's reasonable to believe that language is a result of the combination of greater human intelligence and the need for communication of abstract concepts like the possibility of a tiger attack or what have you. Is it unsciency to test these ideas with careful analysis of the noises chimps make in the jungle, combined with trying to teach chipms sign language and visual cue identification forms of communication? I feel like the study of evolution has been extremeley scientific. There are a lot of theories proposed, and a lot of theories shot down. It's ok to claim something that's preposterous if you don't keep claiming it when new observations disprove it.
Anyway, I don't think you can have any kind of good discussion without an opposing viewpoint to keep you honest.
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 05:05 |
Yeah, by this hour, I'm drunk, too.
edit: in response to freakbass' post. and in all seriousness -- I'm going to have to wait until tomorrow to decipher it.
On 2006-04-26 at 00:06:45, Pchimp praised Jejus
Tangent to Dinozoa's point about communication in chimps, I recently saw some show on PBS recounting the story of Koko, and was quite amazed at her ability to recount, through sign language, events that happened when she was a baby, long before she encountered humans or our language. It's pretty irrelevant here, but I find it immensely interesting.
On 2006-04-26 at 00:20:03, Pchimp praised Jejus
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freakbass
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 128 Registered: 2/12/2006 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 08:24 |
well.. though I do not feel what said was all that profound, the double paste was not intentional.
doh!
I really cannot ponder with equal depth as others right now as my company is ass deep in E3 crunching..
Fucking mummy sounds..
but this has caused me to ponder just exactly what such things as 'faith' 'science' 'truth' 'fact' etc really mean to me and on what they are truly based in my own brain..which is what led to my comment.
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 16:01 |
Okay, I think this niggled me a bit:
Would all of the 'truth' in your brain hold water in a court of law or at a PHD dissertation??
At first reading of your post, it sounded like a to a wholesale discounting of the methodology and conclusions of science if they don't jive with your own personal intuition; and a short prelude to another critique of the "religion" of science. I wasn't really in the mood for it, and really had to piss; I found your head a convenient spot to do so. I see now that my panties were constricting flow to my brain. Apologies, chief.
I think there are an exceedingly small number of people who actually try to live their lives based on the scientific method. The human brain did not evolve to naturally do so.
I'd say you are spot on here: though science is based on rational principles, not all rational ideas are based on science. In some cases, science just hasn't figured it out yet (like your acupuncture example), and in others science is just the wrong medium (like Loki's arguments for true capitalism).
If I were dying of cancer and the drugs just weren't helping, I'd be a fool not to try some alternative therapies which, though unproven, might help (as long as I could be reasonably sure they would also do no harm).
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 17:01 |
A related topic that came up at the lab the other week: evolutionary computation and artificial life
Where is the electronic life? SkyNET, HAL, Colossus, Roy Batty... Artificial intelligence is certainly not a new idea, and I know evolutionary coding, where the program modifies itself with each generation to heuristically find the most efficient algorithm for accomplishing a particular task, has been around for a while. Why hasn't it attained an analog to life? It seems like it would be fairly easy to set up code and an environment which is conducive to artificial natural selection. In fact, I'm sure hackers, researchers, and commercial software engineers must have been doing so for more than a decade.
It seems most of the basic requirements of an evolutionary system are there:
* Many of the hard parts of evolution have been given to them by design -- the code is a functional template. There's no need to evolve the most basic information storage (a la DNA) or basic effectors (a la proteins). These steps are free.
* We can design in analogs of all the possible mechanisms for genetic variation: point mutations, allele swapping, etc. You could even go a step further and allow them to incorporate sections of sections of working machine code that it finds in other applications already on the computer.
* Generations can be very, very fast compared with actual life. Significantly less than a second, conceivably. Let's say, for argument's sake that each generation is 30seconds. Over the last 10 years, that's more than 10 million generations. Should be long enough to evolve some creative solutions for survival.
* Environmental stresses create an environment suitable for natural selection. Some offspring will be corrupt, some will crash, some will be eaten by anti-virus software.
* The system is able to expand through network connections to a huge number of computers, giving a large playground in which to develop new strains.
I've got some thoughts on why this approach to generating synthetic life analogous to our own is flawed; but I'd like to hear other's thoughts on it first.
Or, maybe it's not that flawed and it already exists, squirming around undected on your desktop right now, evolving, and it's only a matter of time before they develop intelligence.
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freakbass
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 128 Registered: 2/12/2006 Offline
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4/26/2006 at 19:41 |
yes, well, though I may be wrong, I have smelled duality within this thread and though I am not claiming to exist beyond such a monkey_brain interpretation of reality, I think it will ultimately be abandoned for a broader view of the force, Anakin. I appreciate your words as I feel there needs to be acknowledgment of the areas in between faith and science and/or of them both.. There are examples of phenomenon which could only be speculation until the tools evolved to verify. One such example is Bell's Theorem proving 'Non-Locality' within Quantum Theory. Bell's Theorem speculated, theorized that such things as entangled particles were linked beyond space and even time.. if the mathematics of Quantum Theory were correct.
But it wasn't until devices were created which could properly perform the experiments that it was actually VERIFIED scientifically.. For example: in the 80's when Alain Aspec shot two entangled/linked particles different directions through a section of pipe, then tweaked the spin of one. The spin of the other CHANGED.
Anyway, the point being, up until that point the devices did not exist to accurately measure the spin of a particle within billionths of a second so the experiment could literally not be performed yet.
I see this as an example of 'speculation', 'faith in truth' without
'verification' becoming TRUTH/FACT over time.
I envision a future where other such illumination transpires regarding things like Jung's archetypal 'collective unconscious', Bohm's 'implicate order', the machinery of non-locality, and yes, 'the meridian system' of acupuncture! :-)
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Lefen
I think Clavis wins my heart <3  SSHOLEPosts: 896 Registered: 9/16/2003 Offline
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4/27/2006 at 18:08 |
TESTIFY
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vasudeva
Bad Taste in your Mouth  SSHOLEPosts: 4415 Registered: 3/8/2002 Offline
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4/27/2006 at 18:14 |
Lefen: TESTIFY
That's more of an argument for symbiosis in evolution than for God.
If God's such a fuking smartypants and gave us perfectly edible bananas, why aren't all natural foodstuffs so "perfectly" form-fitted? For that matter, why don't all sticks come with nice cushioned grips, and why don't rainwater drops conveniently stick together so you can walk around and pick up large gelatinous cubes of it at your leisure?
What's up, God? You only want us eating bananas, and not doing anything else?
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Wrecker
Misanthrope  SSHOLEPosts: 452 Registered: 1/25/2006 Offline
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4/27/2006 at 18:51 |
All that video proves is that God has an outstanding sense of humor.
God: "So check this out, I have made this thing I'm going to call a 'banana'. Now in an effort to prove I exist, asshat Christian fundamentalist will actually take this on TV and make complete fools of themselves and end up looking gay in the process. It'll be friggin awesome!!!"
Angel: "Good one boss. Another winner, just like that Platypus. Those idiots are still trying to figure that one out."
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Pchimp
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 159 Registered: 6/18/2003 Offline
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4/28/2006 at 04:04 |
The evils of evolution: bad science based on lies
Including such favorites as:
Columbine
Nazism
Communism
Humanism
New World Order
Vietnam War
Unthinking Students
Scientific Hindrance
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dinozoa
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 319 Registered: 7/18/2004 Offline
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4/28/2006 at 04:48 |
Wait wait wait. Regarding bananas, they are definitely domesticated fruits, carefully bred and cultivated by us humans to be really really appealing. There're a ton of other bananas out there that we don't eat. We eat the Gran Michel because it was a good candidate before breeding, and after breeding it is excellent.
Furthermore, there was a linkswarm thing awhile back about how there was an even BETTER banana (no! YES!) before the Gran Michel that went extinct because it was overbred to have uniform genetics throughout the world population, and an unfortunate viral strain exposed the same genetic weakness in every banana, and wiped them all out.
Ah yes, here is the link
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/5a4d4c3ee4d05010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
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freakbass
SENATOR BABYHEAD Posts: 128 Registered: 2/12/2006 Offline
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4/28/2006 at 06:16 |
Bananas are only good on video.
Fuck bananas. It's like eating a giant booger.
My friend's teacher/doctor here, who runs the acupuncture college/clinic says that bananas can exacerbate flemminess, sniffles and conditions of 'dampness' from a traditional chinese medicine standpoint.
She refers to bananas as 'dampness in a tube' and does not recommend them for anything.
If anyone wants to try a great fruit chock full of vitamins and antioxidants, give ACAI a try. For those who want to eat a stale boogery fruit that conservatives use to prove Creationism, eat a banana.
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LORDKAHUNA
Don't make me fuk your moustache  SSHOLEPosts: 1611 Registered: 8/5/2003 Offline
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4/28/2006 at 11:05 |
freakbass: My friend's teacher/doctor here, who runs the acupuncture college/clinic says that bananas can exacerbate flemminess, sniffles and conditions of 'dampness' from a traditional chinese medicine standpoint.
WELL, THARS YR EXPERT BANANNA OPINION RIGHT THAR!
Seriously, credible acupuncturist nutritional info?
(This probably needs a new thread)
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mundhra
dread pirate neckbeard  SSHOLEPosts: 1620 Registered: 3/25/2002 Offline
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4/28/2006 at 11:20 |
sigh.
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Wrecker
Misanthrope SSHOLEPosts: 452 Registered: 1/25/2006 Offline
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4/28/2006 at 12:26 |
freakbass: For those who want to eat a stale boogery fruit that conservatives use to prove Creationism, eat a banana.
Please refrain from lumping all conservatives with religious fundamentalists. While it is common for a person to be a member of both groups, this does not mean that they automatically belong to both.
When you make such sweeping assumptions you look like a fool with an agenda, which makes you no better than the groups you are attempting to denigrate.
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