Universal Probabilty Bound?

[Alberti_Devoveo]

Dembski simply says that for any event for which is the probability is less than 10[sup]-150[/sup] it is rational to assume an intelligent source and it is irrational to assume random chance.

I would like to point out that this line of yours Serious completely refutes all that you have written about the 208 cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, are the intelligent source of the event, the particular order of the shuffled cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, took an organized set of cards (presumably, but it does not have to be organized) and disorganized them into a particular order when you stopped shuffling. Thus, Dembski’s argument seems to hold true.

 

[buffalo]

Because there is no sign of a designer. There is a common error by the ID proponents, they assume that ORDER equals DESIGN which is definitely not true. There is order in the universe, that cannot be denied. But order does not lead to design.

Order and patterns do show up in nature. In the big picture that is exactly what Catholics believed and why science progressed. Ancients thought the universe to be random and not worthy of study.

Design is based on patterns, symbols and codes. Patterns do not include symbols or codes.

 

[buffalo]

I’m no math perfessor but think everyone might be over-complicating this by talking about trials.

The main argument from Mark Chu-Carroll (the blogger in the OP) is along different lines. Basically, cup some sand between your palms and according to Dembski’s definition of the upb, the exact layout and orientation of the grains must have been designed. According to Dembski every possible configuration must be designed since it has a “degree of improbability below which a specified event of that probability cannot reasonably be attributed to chance regardless of whatever probabilitistic resources from the known universe are factored in”.

The contention is that the whole concept of the upb is darn silly, since whatever the value chosen, it will always admit more false positives than true positives.

No - the sand would layout in a specified manner. Or if one of the grains was marked, on the very first try you would blindly pick it.

 

[buffalo]

I would like to point out that this line of yours Serious completely refutes all that you have written about the 208 cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, are the intelligent source of the event, the particular order of the shuffled cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, took an organized set of cards (presumably, but it does not have to be organized) and disorganized them into a particular order when you stopped shuffling. Thus, Dembski’s argument seems to hold true.

Right. I think they are approaching this from the wrong angle.

The card scenario is designed.

 

[Serious]

I think you’re misquoting the example.

That is not what he says, that is what he does, and denies it. You cannot show a white wall, an arrow and a circle, and exclaim that the circle was there first, and the arrow was shot later - because you will not be believed. You show the wall, draw a circle, and then get the bow and arrow. If you manage to hit the mini-circle that is an evidence of the design, though does not prove it (the archer still could have gotten lucky).

Yet again, though, you make an a priori assertion: the archer has shot and then the circle was drawn. That’s not part of the example. In fact, if there was an observer to the event, there’d be no question: it’d be clear what, in fact, had happened. The observer, however, comes upon the scene after the drawing and the shooting, and doesn’t know which happened first. What’s in play isn’t what the archer does, it’s what the observer subsequently observes. The question he seems to be asking is whether there’s a point at which one may begin to posit ‘design’ over ‘astronomically small chance’.

Then we are back at the card-genie. Every hand is incredibly unlikely, and it still happens. And every hand shows regularity. So what remains? Nothing.

 

[inocente]

No - the sand would layout in a specified manner. Or if one of the grains was marked, on the very first try you would blindly pick it.

Irrelevant. According to its definition, the upb says that every possible outcome shows evidence of design. It also would indicate, for example, that every position of the snowflakes in a blizzard shows evidence of design. Every non-trivial case is, according to the upb, designed.

Describe a methodology where it could be used as a practical measure for helping to discern putative design. I’ll think you’ll find that it’s neither use nor ornament even as a course filter.

 

[Gorgias]

I would like to point out that this line of yours Serious completely refutes all that you have written about the 208 cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, are the intelligent source of the event, the particular order of the shuffled cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, took an organized set of cards (presumably, but it does not have to be organized) and disorganized them into a particular order when you stopped shuffling.

I don’t think that this line of argumentation holds.

In the blackjack example, we posit only the existence of a shoe containing four decks. We make no assertions about “shuffling”; by virtue of the existence of the cards, they must present themselves in a certain order. The whole point of the thought experiment is to reach some insight on how they reached that certain order. Serious posits that it’s sufficient to presume no moral agent caused the order, while Dembski asserts that the presence of a particular order implies a moral agent.

Maybe the problem here is trying to reach an understanding about ‘patterns’. Serious makes a good point in mentioning that **any **arrangement of items can technically be called a ‘pattern’. The question here, though, is what we mean by ‘pattern’ in this case? Is there any room to look at any arrangement of items, and assert anything objectively about that pattern? Or is it all subjective?

Does this determination have to do with the set of observers? That is, if only one observer ‘sees’ the pattern and others don’t, does that make it somehow ‘less’ of a pattern? If all observers are able to characterize the pattern, does that somehow substantiate the pattern beyond a simple characterization of ‘arbitrary arrangement’?

It seems that this is the heart of the discussion (at least, as I’m perceiving it at the moment)…

 

[inocente]

I would like to point out that this line of yours Serious completely refutes all that you have written about the 208 cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, are the intelligent source of the event, the particular order of the shuffled cards. You, the card dealer/shuffler, took an organized set of cards (presumably, but it does not have to be organized) and disorganized them into a particular order when you stopped shuffling. Thus, Dembski’s argument seems to hold true.

Didn’t understand your point. Suppose instead of shuffling, we get a robot to throw all the cards in the air then switch on a blower that wafts them to a funnel where the robot collects them. Doing that just once would lose any evidence of their previous order, but to be on the safe side, let’s do it a thousand times. Are you saying that as intelligent agents we’re paranormally influencing the outcome?

 

[inocente]

Maybe the problem here is trying to reach an understanding about ‘patterns’. Serious makes a good point in mentioning that **any **arrangement of items can technically be called a ‘pattern’. The question here, though, is what we mean by ‘pattern’ in this case? Is there any room to look at any arrangement of items, and assert anything objectively about that pattern? Or is it all subjective?

Good question. Patterns are basically about repetition, so yes they can be recognized objectively. But, for instance, every snowflake is symmetrical and probably has a unique shape, yet is produced without any intelligence. The issue then is finding criteria to distinguish patterns in nature which supposedly require an intelligent designer from those which supposedly don’t, and I’d guess that’s bound to be subjective.

 

[buffalo]

Irrelevant. According to its definition, the upb says that every possible outcome shows evidence of design.

Source?

 

[danserr]

Good question. Patterns are basically about repetition, so yes they can be recognized objectively. But, for instance, every snowflake is symmetrical and probably has a unique shape, yet is produced without any intelligence. The issue then is finding criteria to distinguish patterns in nature which supposedly require an intelligent designer from those which supposedly don’t, and I’d guess that’s bound to be subjective.

Maybe at least one difference from the snowflake is there there are so many of them that it is not surprising when many possible combinations occur.

Another difference from here: (the notion of a “tidy” explanation.

Still, one might wonder why we should focus on intelligent life as the pattern with which we’re concerned. Why not the pattern required for the existence of, say, crystals? Here I think John Leslie’s notion of a tidy explanation may be helpful. For Leslie, “tidy explanation” is a technical term: it is an explanation which, in explaining some phenomenon, reveals that there is something to be explained. Leslie gives a great many charming examples of tidy explanations. For instance, you are shopping in the bazaar, and the silk merchant is displaying for you a drape of silk. His thumb just happens to be covering the moth hole in the cloth. Now of course his thumb has to be somewhere, and any location on the drape is equally improbable; nevertheless—! That he is hoodwinking you provides a tidy explanation of why his thumb happens to be where it is. Or again, Bob, who was born on August 23, 1982, receives a car for his birthday from his wife with the license plate BOB 82382. That this plate number is the result of intelligent design is a tidy explanation of it. In light of the fact that it is Bob’s birthday which is being celebrated, one is not being “Bob chauvinistic” in singling out his name and birth date as a significant pattern crying out for explanation. The presence of a tidy explanation of the initial conditions of the universe could similarly justify us in focusing on the conditions requisite for intelligent life as a phenomenon crying out for explanation.

Read more: reasonablefaith.org/fine-tuning-argument#ixzz1syZvIVwX

 

[Alberti_Devoveo]

Didn’t understand your point. Suppose instead of shuffling, we get a robot to throw all the cards in the air then switch on a blower that wafts them to a funnel where the robot collects them. Doing that just once would lose any evidence of their previous order, but to be on the safe side, let’s do it a thousand times. Are you saying that as intelligent agents we’re paranormally influencing the outcome?

Paranormally, no. Physically, yes: we made the robots.

As far as I can tell, Dembski’s argument is about naturally occurring events, not designed scenarios (the latter being what has been pointlessly discussed thus far). As far as I can tell, Serious is trying to refute an argument about nature by using design

 

[Serious]

As far as I can tell, Serious is trying to refute an argument about nature by using design

No, I am showing that the “design” is imposed by us, it is not inherent property. When drawing numbers for the lottery it is of utmost importance that the numbers are as random as possible. Yet, when we get those 5 specific numbers, we can always create a function of F(x), which will give the actually drawn numbers, when substituting 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 into the function.

The significance of this procedure should be obvious. But I will spell it out.

On one hand we know that the numbers a random. On the other hand we have an exact, mathematical formula, which will indicate a “pattern” - and thus according to Dembski, it indicates a “design”. Therefore the assumption of “design” will always give a false positive, it will always indicate a designer, even when we know that the process was random.

I don’t think it can be explained any simpler.

 

[yppop]

No, I am showing that the “design” is imposed by us, it is not inherent property. When drawing numbers for the lottery it is of utmost importance that the numbers are as random as possible. Yet, when we get those 5 specific numbers, we can always create a function of F(x), which will give the actually drawn numbers, when substituting 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 into the function.

The significance of this procedure should be obvious. But I will spell it out.

On one hand we know that the numbers a random. On the other hand we have an exact, mathematical formula, which will indicate a “pattern” - and thus according to Dembski, it indicates a “design”. Therefore the assumption of “design” will always give a false positive, it will always indicate a designer, even when we know that the process was random.

I don’t think it can be explained any simpler.

Serious,
Are you serious about your ability to “create” a function that describes any sequence of numbers “no matter which sequence comes out of the lottery”? If so, please give a function for the following sequence: 7, 23, 11, 42, 3.
Yppop

 

[Alberti_Devoveo]

No, I am showing that the “design” is imposed by us, it is not inherent property.

Fair enough

When drawing numbers for the lottery it is of utmost importance that the numbers are as random as possible. Yet, when we get those 5 specific numbers, we can always create a function of F(x), which will give the actually drawn numbers, when substituting 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 into the function.

What is the function for the 5 specific numbers 39, 17, 2, 91, 15? Or are you forcing it such that it must be in an ascending order? In which case, you are adding an extra layer of complexity to your argument.
Further, is it possible to prove that any 5 integers can be described by a function F(x)? I do not believe that it can be done when you consider large deviations in a set (i.e., having 5, 12500, 760, 15,…), but I am not sure of this one way or the other.

The significance of this procedure should be obvious. But I will spell it out.

On one hand we know that the numbers a random. On the other hand we have an exact, mathematical formula, which will indicate a “pattern” - and thus according to Dembski, it indicates a “design”. Therefore the assumption of “design” will always give a false positive, it will always indicate a designer, even when we know that the process was random.

I don’t think it can be explained any simpler.

Last I checked, random is defined as “without aim, direction or rule.” If there is a pattern (i.e., formula) to something that is random, then it is, by definition, not random. If it is not random, then it is designed, no?

 

[Serious]

Serious,
Are you serious about your ability to “create” a function that describes any sequence of numbers “no matter which sequence comes out of the lottery”? If so, please give a function for the following sequence: 7, 23, 11, 42, 3.
Yppop

I will do better than that. I will teach you how to do it, and then next time you don’t have to ask, you can simply do it.

The function is F(x) = ax[sup]5[/sup] + bx[sup]4[/sup] + cx[sup]3[/sup] + dx[sup]2[/sup] + ex + f
where a, b, c, d, e and f need to be resolved. We know that
F(1) = 7
F(2) = 23
F(3) = 11
F(4) = 42
F(5) = 3
because that is what you wanted. Now, substitute 1 into x and you will get
a + b + c + d + e + f = 7
Now substitute 2 into x and you will get
32a + 16b + 8c + 4d + 2e + f = 23
… keep on substituting the values of 3, 4 and 5. You will get 5 linear equations with 6 variables, so you will get infinitely many solutions. Easy as a breeze. Finish it at your leisure. I hope you can solve a set of linear equations. If you cannot, get an HP calculator to do it.

 

[Serious]

What is the function for the 5 specific numbers 39, 17, 2, 91, 15? Or are you forcing it such that it must be in an ascending order? In which case, you are adding an extra layer of complexity to your argument.
Further, is it possible to prove that any 5 integers can be described by a function F(x)? I do not believe that it can be done when you consider large deviations in a set (i.e., having 5, 12500, 760, 15,…), but I am not sure of this one way or the other.

Yppop asked the same question, and I presented the method how to do it. And, no it does not have to be in ascending order and it does not have to be integer either. See the post directly above. It does not have to be just 5 numbers. It could be 10 numbers or a 100, or 10million. It does not matter. Of course the calculation would be very tedious, but elementary.

Last I checked, random is defined as “without aim, direction or rule.” If there is a pattern (i.e., formula) to something that is random, then it is, by definition, not random. If it is not random, then it is designed, no?

No. The numbers were created by a random number generator (not an easy task, but can be done). When we get the result, we “cheat” and create a formula, which would give the same result. But we can do this only AFTER we recieved the result, and “design” would demand that we do it BEFORE the result is presented.

 

[Gorgias]

What is the function for the 5 specific numbers 39, 17, 2, 91, 15?

Plot the points, using whatever order you want: you can then construct a formula which gives these results when you plug in the x values (1, 2… 5).

If you’re having a difficult time conceptualizing it, then think about a simpler example: if you gave me two numbers (y[sub]1[/sub] and y[sub]2[/sub]), I could create a function by drawing a line between (1, y[sub]1[/sub]) and (2, y[sub]2[/sub]) and using the slope-intercept formula. Piece of cake.

For a function of n variables, then, we just construct an n[sup]th[/sup] order function. So, it’s possible, without much sweat.

(The real question, though, is whether there’s meaning ascribed to this function. As Serious points out, the notion of meaning seems to be located in the observer, not the subject. I’m thinking my way through this one – on the face of it, this doesn’t seem to present a problem: from a philosophical perspective, observer-driven meaning is OK – the fact that meaning rises out of the phenomenon does not invalidate the notion of ‘meaning.’ Requiring that meaning proceed out of the thing observed, itself, seems like it’s not necessarily reasonable (at least in the context of 19th-20th century philosophical insight…)! I don’t have a conclusive assertion ready on this one; i’m still working this idea out…)

 

[Serious]

For a function of n variables, then, we just construct an n[sup]th[/sup] order function. So, it’s possible, without much sweat.

I gave the actual method to yppop.

(The real question, though, is whether there’s meaning ascribed to this function. As Serious points out, the notion of meaning seems to be located in the observer, not the subject.

You are cooking with gas. It is a pleasure to talk to you. What you said is almost what I have in mind. The “meaning” is a nifty subject. If I would present a sentence in a language which you do not happen to speak or understand, it would be total gobbledegook, even if it was perfectly clear to someone who speaks the language.

Communication happens between two entiteis using a communication channel. One of the entities sends a message through the channel, and the other one receives it. If the internal state of the recipient is congruent with the internal state of the sender, then we have a successful communication, and the meaning of the message is understood by the two entities.

The meaning emerges during the commucation. If I would choose a brand new word to express “love” (for example) and used it consistently in many exchanges, eventually you would figure out what I “mean”. From then on we would have a “private code”, which would be junk for others.

We create the meaning of the words, we, the ones who communicate. There is no intrinsic meaning of words or sentences.

 

[inocente]

Source?

The link in the OP cites the definition at iscid.org/encyclopedia/Universal_Probability_Bound - the “about” page on that site lists Dembski as its Executive Director.