Intelligent Design

[tonyrey]

And do you have any thoughts on why 99.9% of designs fail if God is the brains behind them? How does God fail? Or do we put that down to: ‘who can know the mind of God’.

Where do you obtain your statistic that 99.9% of “designs” fail? If it were correct it would simply increase the improbability that life has originated as the result of random combinations of molecules, let alone developed to the stage where it has become aware that it has originated as the result of random combinations of molecules…

“Something is rotten in the state of Denmark…” - Hamlet

 

[PRmerger]

And that is, you need to trust that the person or persons who have written it can themselves be trusted.

What is that called again?

Is that called empiricism? Or is that called faith?

 

[Peter_Plato]

I fully agree. And I find it sad that an atheist (no disrespect Bradski) has to tell us what we Catholics should have accepted long time ago.

The Catholic Church has fully accepted the theory of evolution and rejects ID as a scientific theory. I don’t know what this discussion is all about. Are you guys telling our Pope that he is wrong when he says that the Catholic Church has no problems with the theory of evolution?

Having “no problems” with the theory of evolution is somewhat of a misstatement of the position of the Church. Neither does having “no problems” entail the Church fully endorses or proclaims it as the correct view.

What “accepting” means, in this instance, is the Church accepts that the theory of evolution COULD be correct given certain qualifications - the most important being that there can be no denial that God, ultimately, is and must be the Creator of the universe. As soon as the theory of evolution begins to be expressed as a “no God is necessary” proposition, that is when the Church will and must object. I suppose you missed the connection between Bradski being an atheist and his contention that the theory of evolution, at least on his view, means, precisely that no God is needed to bring about life.

Yes, I understand theistic evolution pushes the necessity for God a bit further back in time, and Bradski is quite happy to affirm that move BECAUSE he views it as another instance of the “god of the gaps” retreat. The bluff being played is that Darwinian evolution fully explains life, I would challenge that merely on the grounds that it neither logically nor sufficiently explains life as we know it. I don’t need to be an ID proponent to see that, nor to point it out.

Now, if you can find a statement by the Church that it views evolution - in the full Darwinian sense of blind and unguided - is sufficient to explain all forms of life on Earth, including human beings, then post it. Otherwise, stop making claims that the Church’s acceptance of evolution means it has categorically rejected all alternative explanations. It hasn’t.

What “acceptance” means in this instance is that the Church has NOT categorically denied that the theory of evolution could be correct, within certain parameters, but that is not a full and unmitigated rejection of ID that you seem to be claiming. Your view on this is not the Church’s view and you ought to be challenged on this point because it simply misrepresents the Church’s actual position.

 

[Peter_Plato]

That’s right. In science there is always improvement based on new evidence. Nothing is cast in concrete. Very different to religion.

Religion doesn’t make claims that are cast in concrete. They are founded on the nature of God which is neither cast in concrete.

Science, too, has its own grounding principles. These may appear, at first glance, to be less intrusive into our day to day affairs, but I would suggest that appearances are deceiving.

In other words, science is about contingent things, whereas religion is not.

Are you suggesting that God, like the object of science, is contingent, should be considered that way or that he has no final say in human affairs?

 

[Peter_Plato]

Maybe lots of impressive looking science looks good to anyone who doesn’t make the connection or doesn’t know the history of these clowns.

Perhaps clowning is only a sideline.

How would you know that their science is only “impressive LOOKING” unless you actually LOOK into it?

Yes, I know, you don’t read anything written by clowns. Traumatic experience at the circus when young, perhaps?

Got any more…?

Apparently, one was sufficient, since it, of its own accord, moved you to desperately trot out the array of circumstantial ad hominems and utter well-practiced words of incantation to ward off evil clowns.

 

[buffalo]

You’re not paying attention. I’m not working the who. I’m arguing the why.

Nobody has suggested any such thing. But thanks for pointing it out.

A piece of wood with bits of metal is as relevant to this discussion as a chocolate teapot, Charles. And about as much use. Inanimate objects are, well, inanimate. They don’t evolve (I can’t believe I’m having to type this). How about you try something that has evolved to do such a thing? You seem to think it can’t be done.

And do you have any thoughts on why 99.9% of designs fail if God is the brains behind them? How does God fail? Or do we put that down to: ‘who can know the mind of God’.

The why? Why write papers on evolution?

 

[buffalo]

I said earlier how fractured the sciences have become. You need an excellent schooling and a good number of years in uni just to get a decent degree before you even start thinking about the area in which you are going to specialise. So add a few more years study and then an indeterminate amount of work before you can be considered expert in your field.

Unless you have done a good number of years studying molecular biology and how it pertains to evolution then you are in the same position as I am when you read papers such as the one to which you linked.

And that is, you need to trust that the person or persons who have written it can themselves be trusted. That they don’t have an agenda. That they have approached their work with open minds. That they are not associated in any way with anyone who would prefer a particular result.

But your guys work for an organisation that is not simply associated with a tent full of clowns and charlatans and liars whose aim is not just to peddle their risible beliefs. Their stated aim is to change the education system so that my children and their children will be forced to sit in classrooms and listen to their farcical, iron age, fundamentalist crud being taught as fact. No siree. They work for an organisation who actually funds their work!

So if you want to call that appraisal of their credentials as an ad hominem, then be my guest…

Who in mainstream academia dares write an anti-evolution paper? They are called former employees.

 

[buffalo]

Flytraps have evolved. They are irreducibly complex by Behe’s definition and they evolved. The Venus Flytrap evolved.

We can even see how they evolved, and by a route which avoids Behe’s problem with a direct evolutionary route to IC systems. They evolved from a more complex, non-IC system and lost a part. Only after the loss of a part was the system IC.

Behe’s idea was correct in that IC systems cannot evolve by direct routes. He was wrong to say that they cannot evolve by indirect routes. IC systems can and do evolve by indirect routes.

rossum

Adapted is a better word.

Scaffolding?

 

[rossum]

Have all IC systems evolved by the loss of a part?

No. There are three indirect routes of evolution listed by Thornhill and Ussery (2000), alongside the direct route. The four are: serial direct evolution, parallel direct evolution, elimination of functional redundancy, and adoption from a different function. IC systems cannot evolve by the serial direct route. They can evolve by the other three.

If not it needs to be explained how purposeless phenomena succeeded in accidentally becoming purposeful…

Purpose is not an intrinsic property, it is an extrinsic property. The store keeper’s purpose for a hammer is to make a profit on its sale. The purchaser’s purpose for the hammer is to drive in nails. The purposes are different, the hammer is the same. The purposes are not intrinsic to the hammer.

rossum

 

[rossum]

The transition from one (or some) to **all **is not convincing nor does possibility amount to probability…

If an assertion of universal non-existence, “There are no routes by which …” is made then a single counter-example is all that is required to show that the assertion is false. “No black swans exist,” can be refuted by a single counter example.

Behe initially asserted that there were no routes by which an IC system could evolve. That assertion was incorrect, and to his credit, Behe acknowledged that and corrected himself. Some of his readers have not made the same correction.

Has our power of insight emerged from insightless processes?

You are reifying insight. Insight is an emergent property; it appears when all the necessary conditions are present.

rossum

 

[rossum]

Scaffolding?

Scaffolding is one of the indirect routes. More formally, Thornhill and Ussery call it “elimination of functional redundancy”.

An arch is IC, but it can easily be built if you use scaffolding to support the incomplete arch during construction, and then remove the scaffolding once the arch is completed. That is how natural processes form natural arches in rock – part of the original rock is the arch and part is the scaffolding. Erosion removes the scaffolding, leaving the arch.

rossum

 

[buffalo]

Scaffolding is one of the indirect routes. More formally, Thornhill and Ussery call it “elimination of functional redundancy”.

An arch is IC, but it can easily be built if you use scaffolding to support the incomplete arch during construction, and then remove the scaffolding once the arch is completed. That is how natural processes form natural arches in rock – part of the original rock is the arch and part is the scaffolding. Erosion removes the scaffolding, leaving the arch.

rossum

Erecting a scaffold requires foresight.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

A piece of wood with bits of metal is as relevant to this discussion as a chocolate teapot, Charles. And about as much use. Inanimate objects are, well, inanimate. They don’t evolve (I can’t believe I’m having to type this). How about you try something that has evolved to do such a thing? You seem to think it can’t be done.

And do you have any thoughts on why 99.9% of designs fail if God is the brains behind them? How does God fail? Or do we put that down to: ‘who can know the mind of God’.

At last you get it! Inanimate objects do not evolve into animate objects.

Which 99.9 percent of designs failed?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

1. A Venus Flytrap is Irreducibly Complex, like a mousetrap.

You really need to bone up on your biology.

A Venus Flytrap is organic. A mouse trap is not.

No mouse trap could ever evolve into a Venus Flytrap.

No mouse trap ever evolved period except as an intelligently designed concept in somebody’s head.

 

[rossum]

Erecting a scaffold requires foresight.

How much foresight does it require to make a lump of rock? What do you think that this arch started as?

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

rossum

 

[buffalo]

How much foresight does it require to make a lump of rock? What do you think that this arch started as?

http://www.naturalarches.org/gallery_files/Indonesia-BaliSeaArch.jpg

rossum

A stone cutter starts with a solid block a chips away until he forms an arch.

 

[rossum]

You really need to bone up on your biology.

A Venus Flytrap is organic. A mouse trap is not.

No mouse trap could ever evolve into a Venus Flytrap.

No mouse trap ever evolved period except as an intelligently designed concept in somebody’s head.

We are discussing IC systems. Behe used a mousetrap as one example of an IC system. A Venus Flytrap is another example of an IC system. Some IC systems are organic, like the bacterial flagellum – another of Behe’s examples. Some IC systems are inorganic (if we except the wood in the base of the mousetrap.)

The organic/inorganic difference is unimportant here. The IC/non-IC difference is important, and whether organic IC systems can evolve. They can, as Behe himself later recognised. He moved from his initial “IC systems cannot evolve” to “IC systems* are unlikely to* evolve.”

rossum

 

[buffalo]

We are discussing IC systems. Behe used a mousetrap as one example of an IC system. A Venus Flytrap is another example of an IC system. Some IC systems are organic, like the bacterial flagellum – another of Behe’s examples. Some IC systems are inorganic (if we except the wood in the base of the mousetrap.)

The organic/inorganic difference is unimportant here. The IC/non-IC difference is important, and whether organic IC systems can evolve. They can, as Behe himself later recognised. He moved from his initial “IC systems cannot evolve” to “IC systems* are unlikely to* evolve.”

rossum

Intelligent Design is focusing on odds. Beyond a certain threshold chance begins to exert less influence and design exerts more influence. (UPB)

Functional Complex Specificity is key here. In th case of the mousetrap certain pre-existing items were sought and gathered to produce a functional grouping. The odds of this happening by chance give way to purpose and design.

In biology we see these building blocks being used over and over. ID claims it is by design.

 

[DrTaffy]

Logic is not a “lower standard of evidence” than science.

I didn’t say that it was. I said that you were demanding lower standards of evidence for your explanation of the origin of life than you demanded for ours, by classifying yours as ‘philosophy’ rather than ‘science’. So you are the one asserting that philosophy requires a lower standard of proof than science.

And, again, as regards your first demand that we have seen mindless things produce intelligent beings, we have answered that. You still whine that it is ‘unreasonable’ to expect you to meet the same standard, your own standard! That you demanded of us and that we met!

 

[rossum]

At last you get it! Inanimate objects do not evolve into animate objects.

You are correct. Abiogenesis is a chemical process, not an evolutionary process. Abiogenesis is the chemistry required to get the first living organism started. Evolution is the process by which that first single just-about-alive organism diversifies into the great variety of living organisms we see today.

rossum