OldAndSlow>But in the last decade or two, biologists have identified lots of intermediate forms from light sensitive spots on up.
It can still be effectively argued by ID that the distance between each 'version' of eye is so vast that the principal of irreducible complexity still applies.
OldAndSlow>The ID proponents have abandoned the eye example and retreated to the truely silly, and more difficult to falsify. The two examples of ID that I have heard most recently are 1) how could something as complex as cillia on bacteria have evolved, and 2) how could certain complex biochemical reaction chains have evolved. Note that these are both obscure and hard to identify intermediate forms, even if they once existed.
What appears to be a retreat to some may actually be an improvement in strategy to others. If ID is trying to influence a world that rejects their idea, it makes a lot of sense for them to start using examples that give evolutionists even more trouble to explain.
OldAndSlow>The strongest, for me, argument against ID is that it argues that because I don't undestand something, God must have done it. I don't find professions of ignorance and surrender to be compelling arguments.
And yet we constantly hear things from professionals like this: "Given an infinite amount of time, space, and matter, anything can happen no matter how unlikely you believe it may be, even evolution." Or examples like this: "It has been discovered that on the quantum mechanical level, a particle can teleport itself anywhere in the universe at any moment, though unlikely there is a non-zero chance. Therefore unlikely things like evolution can happen as a quantum mechanical possibility given an infinite amount of time." It appears that space, time, matter, and quantum mechanics has become the "God" of evolutionists that can explain everything no matter how unlikely it is. In both cases with creation and evolution, nobody was there to see it. Both are matters of faith.
OldAndSlow> The next strongest argument against ID is that it seems to me to argue that God is weak. God could not possibly have set the universe in motion in such a way that humans would arise without periodic intervention.
Except for those ID theorists that happen to believe God did it instantly without gradual or periodic intervention.
OldAndSlow> ID seems to demand a God who needs mid-course corrections, and who is comprehensible to human minds. Neither condition matches my concept of God.
Again, not if the ID theorist believes God created humans instantly. Also, the religion of many ID theorists agrees with you that God is not comprehensible to human minds although God can be known and communicated with.
Evolution is hard science if you refer to natural selection only. The difference between natural selection and the evolution that the debate is about is much more than many people realize.
Natural selection only explains the diversity of characteristics found in creatures. The great evolution debate is about the origin of those characteristics. Natural selection doesn't actually create new genetic information. Natural selection only changes the frequency of genetic information already present throughout the population of creatures.
New genetic information can come about randomly through mutations. That is where the ID debate becomes interesting. ID theorists don't argue against the fact that mutations create genetic information either. The argument they propose is that mutations don't create any useful genetic information. This is because of a principal called 'irreducible complexity'.
A system (like the brain, the heart, and digestion) is irreducibly complex when any missing component prevents the system from working properly. When evolution tries to gradually evolve it into existance with a mutation here and there every so often, natural selection selects against it because the system is useless and doesn't work at first. So natural selection prevents the system from evolving gradually at all.
What's the solution? Maybe somehow all of the components of the system came together all at once in one generation of the creature. A random coincidence that rapidly produces all working parts simultaneously is like thousands of dominos falling out of an airplane and landing in the exact configuration to form a palace. Even if such a coincidence could happen once in the history of the earth, it would have to happen hundreds of billions of times over and over to produce all the life we have here.
That's the basic argument. There are more levels to the argument and it can get rather complicated. Different ideas about evolutionary scaffolding might be able to explain away irreducible complexity, but these ideas have not been shown to work yet with hard science, certainly not enough to explain the origin of everything. So we are left with a mystery about how evolution is able to overcome irreducible complexity.
if what you are looking for is a step-by-step computer simulation of an evolving system that develops the same thing, then yes, you have a good point. Until such time saying such systems did evolve is educated speculation. Hardly groundless, but not solid science.
Yes, that is what I am talking about. A feasibility study that withstands the test of aggressive statistics where the proposed step by step example of evolution doesn't violate the laws of nature and can take place within evolutionary time parameters and is probable enough to fit within the estimated size and age of the universe. They can invent the hypothetical missing genes if they must with the essential beneficial natural selective properties neccessary for scaffolding. Show me biochemical pathways, show me the genetic mutations that create the evolutionary scaffolds. But most of all, answer this basic question with absolute certainty, "Is nature capable of doing this?"
I want hard core examples and demonstrations. No more arguments like "evolutionary scaffolding could solve the problem of irreducible complexity, therefore this is what must have happened". That's not an example of investigative science in action, that's sitting in a lawn chair and using the imagination.
Thank you for understanding where I am coming from.
Kazoo the Clown> "irreducability" suggests that the only way a structure can exist is by being "built up" from something less complex. In fact, structures can also exist through the reduction of other structures via the loss of characteristics. For example, the construction of an arch often involves a scaffolding, which after the arch is constructed is removed. The resultant arch, it could be argued, is irreducibly complex as you can't take one brick away and have a viable structure. However, removing one brick is not the only way to incrementally backtrack the construction of the structure, and in fact has no connection to how the structure was actually constructed. Further it is concievable that a "natural" arch could arise from a rock avalanche falling on a mound of dirt that is later eroded away-- no defying of physics is required.
In principal I don't really disagree with what you say here. However, the burdon is still on evolutionists to provide solid step by step examples of this happening in a real world situation (millions of years of observation notwithstanding). If evolutionists can point to a few 'irreducibly complex' biological systems and draw the diagrams and perform the successful feasibility studies that withstand the scrutiny of statistics while not violating the laws of nature within reasonable evolutionary time parameters, then I would agree that the evolutionary scaffold successfully explains irreducible complexity. Until then, stictly naturalistic evolution is not a proven scientific fact but is instead a position of faith in science being able to someday somehow figure this out.
Kazoo the Clown> There's also a tacit assumption that the "intelligence" in "intelligent design" is necessarily self-aware.
I agree with you about what you say here in much of this, awesome points. From a strictly investigative standpoint it is wrong to assume intelligent design means that the intelligence is self-aware. This is where religious people hijack a perfectly legitimate objection to naturalistic evolution and turn it into a religious issue. Put religion aside, however, and the discussion can still continue.
Kazoo the Clown> Consequently, the term "intelligent design" is a misnomer, as evolution itself can be said to be a) a design process and b) intelligent. The true difference between evolution as an intelligent design process and ID, is one characteristic the ID proponents always leave out of their arguments-- self awareness.
Having already addressed my understanding and agreeing with you, let us imagine an atheist who doesn't believe in a self-aware intelligent designer. This atheist can still be an ID advocate on the basis that irreducible complexity precludes what we know about natural law being capable of creating life via evolution. So you see, even if ID supporters have a hidden 'self-aware' agenda for what they believe about the designer, at the core of ID is irreducible complexity which is still a valid challenge to evolution without the religious agenda.
Kazoo the Clown> As has already been stated, evolution is an explanation for many many known facts in biology, genetics, geology and I'm sure several other sciences I'm too tired to think of at the moment.
It is fair for me to insist that we stick to one issue at a time. Too many fields of science all at once will not give me enough time to eat or sleep. The topic at hand is ID.
Kazoo the Clown> that is why ID proponents must take their argument to the high schools where the less science literate can be buffooned into the bogus "fair play" argument that ID should have equal time
Don't forget that I have an extremely open mind to honest points of view. I see a lot of people around here assuming ideas that they don't fully understand. That should give any true educator ample reason to expose all students to this issue, starting at the high school level. With a proper fair, honest, and thorough explanation of the issue, educators should have no worries introducing students to 'ridiculous' ideas. Or are they not so confident that the ideas will be perceived as ridiculous?
To clear up a major misunderstanding, Intelligent Design theorists accept everything about hard genetics and natural selection. The problem Intelligent Design theorists have is how the genetics originated in the first place.
For example, dogs can be bred to have different sizes and colors of every body part in every combination imaginable. This is because the genetics for each of these characteristics exists within the universal gene pool of dogs throughout the whole breeding process from start to finish. No new genetic information is added to the system, merely a change in the frequency of genetic characteristics that already exist to begin with. Natural selection does not add new genetic information, it merely selects among traits that already exist within the population as a whole. The beef that ID has is not the changes in frequency of genetic information throughout the population, their beef is with the origin of this genetic information.
The details can now be investigated in more detail after having established a more proper basis of understanding the issue.
Yes, but you need to remember that this more sophisticated protocol of simulating evolution would require a more complicated environment to create these steps. There would need to be a mechanism in place to measure the natural selection benefits of each stage of the watch. This is still a strange example as I cannot even imagine that a half-working watch would be selected for at all by natural selection. And if it is, then what exactly would measure the fitness of these watch stages? Robots and computers? No no, that can't be because that would require even more complexity and design to begin with.
I am thinking that the watch thing is not a good example no matter how you look at it.
To be perfectly honest, finding that could also mean that creatures originally created perfectly became damaged over time as the gene pool deteriorated.
You see, both sides of the issue have an answer for everything. Hard science is the only thing we should study to find conclusions about this stuff and hard science is the one thing everyone on slashdot and other forums (including myself) seems too lazy to talk about. In the meantime I'll sit back and smirk at everyone defending their conclusions based upon too little information to know anything reasonably well at all.
Try taking a working pocket watch and jiggle it an infinite number of times. You aren't going to be left with a working pocket watch. It would follow that a broken pocket watch would become even more broken. Finally, it would be expected that pocket watch pieces would become even more damaged. Evolution makes people believe amazing things. I guess I just don't have enough faith.;D
Has it occurred to anyone else that evolution causes people to believe that shaking legos together long enough will produce a castle like this: http://www.end.com/~jynx/castle/trim.jpg
No offense or anything, but that's a terrible example of evolution. More shaking will destroy the castle walls.;D
The issue of irriducible complexity and evolution is more complicated than this and involves many other things like natural selection. If we want to be scientific rather than philosophical we need to use a real world example of evolution. Step by step changes in biochemical pathways and evolutionary 'scaffolding' needs to be shown to solve the problem of irreducible complexity and make evolution something that no longer requires faith.
I wasn't disputing the knowledge we have about quantum mechanics. All I was saying is that this cannot be used to prove evolution because it is non-falsifiable. Quantum mechanics becomes God in a sense. That's what I meant by it "sounds" religious.
Retric>But if your going with an idea because it sounds good then clearly you're the one going on faith.
This is clearly taking what I said out of context. I never said that I accepted anything because it 'sounds' good. Irrational interpretations of clearly written text may mean you were emotionally disturbed by my use of the word "religion" in referece to something that you said. I never mean to insult anyone. My apologies.:)
DavidPesta>In other cases we find complicated systems with no possible reduced version conceivable or in the biological record. Follier>I don't think I've ever seen such a system.
Well now, are we talking about different versions of systems that exist within a divergent evolutionary tree or a convergent evolutionary tree? You see, convergent evolution doesn't count because the same structures independently 'evolved'. So one version cannot have led to the other. (Assuming the evolutionary trees are correct in the first place, that's a whole different question. I've written articles about that.)
DavidPesta>Instead you added an entire factory of pre-designed molds and shafts with complicated machanisms that can assemble metal furnature. Follier>That's right, I did:) The question ID folk ask is: how can you go from the four universal forces to Human Beings? A very valid question.. and the answer is you can't. Humans are indeed very complex, but this is not so strange when you consider that our systems are built on systems built on systems (etc etc) that are built on the forces. For example, a star can form much easier than a human being. They're very simple things. But after the gravity (that made our infamous table) builds energy into mass, we get the beginnings of complexity: matter.
Complicated things are composed of other complicated things, yes. The factory you introduced has nothing to do with what the complicated furniture is composed of. The factory you introduced is a mechanism outside of the furniture itself and it created this furniture. Since the factory is much more complicated than the furniture, we are forced to ask, 'who built the factory?' To go way off course from my original point in previous posts with this, if nature itself has laws configured in such a way to bring about such extreme complexity, then what does that say about the laws of nature? It means the laws of nature are even more complicated than the machines that it produces. So what does that say about Intelligent Design? Probably a lot to many people.;D
So you see, saying 'nature did it' doesn't really solve the problem. It actually shifts the problem somewhere else. Again, this was completely besides my original point.
Follier>It simply makes claims that it cannot support or disprove (that no one can support or disprove)
Yes, ID does make the claim that a designer did it. But 'Irreducible Complexity' does not, IC rather challenges a claim.
Follier>and "challenges" non-ID evolutionists to do the impossible.
But that is the very point I try to make the whole time, as long as evolutionists cannot prove evolution, it remains an unproven idea accepted by faith. Yet people unknowingly go around claiming that evolution is a fully demonstrated provable fact. And they do this without opposition from evolutionists who know better.
Agreed, no book could be written as an exhaustive explanation of IC and hold the general public's attention. Behe doesn't complete his IC objections to evolution in just one book, but merely introduces the problem.
It is speculated that a scaffolding series of evolutionary breakthroughs could make C, D, and E come into place on top of A and B which previously existed but later disappeared. In fact, in most cases the matter is much more complicated, with much more than just A, B, C, D, and E involved. The point is, unless this scaffolding process of evolution can be demonstrated or worked out exactly step by step on paper (or computer, whatever), evolutionists have a problem to work out. I am personally very interested in one such example where biologists can trace step by step the process of an evolving biological structure with more than just 5 components. (A, B, C, D, and E is not enough to show the evolution of a truly impressive biological structure.) Were not talking about actual science until the scaffolding speculation is actually demonstrated (or shown step by step) via laws that govern natural selection.
Before anyone responds with angry criticism, try to remember that science normally welcomes the challenge and burdon of proof.
Okay, you read more into what I said than what I intended.:)
I guess you can interpret what I said that way. But in all honesty, when I said "Only faith can say one way or another at this time" what I meant was "we don't know well enough at the time to come to any solid conclusions either way, therefore all either side can do is have faith in their point of view."
but that if they were really interested in challenging anything they wouldn't be doing it in a high-school level science class. The fact they want to present high school students with material that is relevant in advanced-undergraduate or graduate classes does seem to show some insincerity on their part.
Good point, you're probably right about a lot of them. I think some of their concerns and motives are a little different though. Some of them genuinely believe that they are being disenfranchised by school systems and the scientific mainstream. They are honestly trying to make sure their children (and their neighbors children) are not being unfairly misguided. The same would be true of you if the government imposed creationism to the exclusion of evolution in science. What students learn early shapes their worldview as they approach graduate levels and affects what sort of ideas they are open to. Right or wrong about their paradigm about origins, they aren't neccessarily trying to dodge the harder graduate forums.
As for the other things you brought up, I understand what you are saying. Just read the book to see better what I am talking about.
>PS: metal furniture can self assemble see Quantum Mechanics. Now the odds of that happening are hard to comprehend but it's still possible and given sufficient time highly probable. Based on QM saying something can't happen is meaningless but some things are unlikely over a reasonable timeframe so if you want to try and demonstrate that something is extremely unlikely to ever occur on any planet anywhere in the solar system over billions of years that's one thing but saying can't is meaningless.
I thought this was an interesting comment because it sounds just as religious as any other religous point of view. (No insult intended.) Based upon what we know and how fast what we know continues to change over the last hundred years, it is amazing to see so many people absolutely certain that 'infinite' time, space, and energy can explain the origin of everything. Is anyone else uncomfortable about that? Just like any religious explanation that involves God or the supernatural, it is not falsifiable. (I'm not saying this was your point of view, you didn't make that clear. I was generalizing.)
Well, ID theorists typically don't have a problem with natural selection or any of the hard science of genetics. Just the origin of those genetics. Consequently, natural diversity is easy to understand for everyone on all sides. (Unless I misunderstand the question.)
DavidPesta>we literally observe information systems throughout nature which the laws of nature as we understand them to work cannot explain Follier>-- no we really don't. People often bring up one complex human organ or another as an example of "irreducible complexity"... but of course they could find reduced versions of everything all over nature if they cared to look. Which, of course, they don't.
It can be argued that you overplay the significance of finding reduced versions of highly developed and sophisticated organs and biological structures. In many cases there are so many levels of complexity in between a 'reduced' version and the version with the next level of complexity that the same 'irreducible complexity' argument still applies. In other cases we find complicated systems with no possible reduced version conceivable or in the biological record. To substantiate these claims, one needs to study them on a case by case basis.
DavidPesta>As a poor analogy, metal furniture layed out in the open will never assemble itself by the force of gravity. Follier>I don't get it... what does gravity making furniture have to do with evolution? Now if gravity was pulling molten metal through various molds down a shaft that randomly connected, and whereby everything that didn't stand on four legs would fall over into a pool of molten metal, then yes.. eventually you'll end up with something resembling a metal table. That's a much better analogy.
I expected a misunderstanding from someone about this analogy as I was trying to communicate a different point entirely. In fact, I expected someone to introduce new laws of nature like earthquakes and tornadoes to explain the crude analogy, which again would miss the point I was trying to make. Instead you added an entire factory of pre-designed molds and shafts with complicated machanisms that can assemble metal furnature. In case you didn't notice, the factory needed to do such a thing would be even more complicated than the assembled furniture itself, which is suggestive of even more intelligent design. In other words, your contribution to the analogy would mean that the forces of nature are even more complicated and suggestive of intelligent design than the complexities of life itself. (An entirely new thread could start on this philosophical point, but that is completely different than the point I was trying to make.)
All my crude analogy was trying to show was that given the natural forces which we know are present, physical and mathematical impossibilities spring up all over the place when trying to figure out the origin of many biochemical systems--according to ID. As far as the crude analogy is concerned, earthquakes, tornadoes, and furnature self-assembly factories do not exist in the universe. That is simply where the crude analogy breaks down. Inside the universe of the imperfect analogy, gravity is the only force that exists. In the real world where the analogy applies, you cannot invent new laws of physics to explain physical mysteries. Using all the laws of nature that we know of, problems are encountered much like the problem described inside the universe of the imperfect analogy. Analogies are not something to be 'read into', they are devices meant to bring clarity to understanding. Don't judge the entire argument on an imperfect analogy meant to bring clarity.
Follier>A theory in science is a system that explains facts. What you're thinking of is a hypothesis. Don't feel bad, everyone gets those mixed up, since in regular speech thats how we use the word theory.
Lousy definitions getting in the way of what I mean.;D No problem, hypothesis is the better word.
Follier>but a gap in scientific knowledge is not a green light to insert whatever fantasy happens to appeal to you.. especially if the specific gap is itself a fanciful construction (eg irreducible
I encourage you to read the other thread of responses that droptone and I have been having. You will understand what I am trying to say better. (It may not have been clear from my first post about it.)
> Science doesn't have limits - science is a process.
There are plenty of limitations to science. For example, science cannot count the number of hairs on George Washington's head on the morning of his 25th birthday. Assuming this was a practical area of scientific study, science is unable to investigate this.
> Just because we don't understand something now, does not mean it is outside the perview of science to explain it.
I agree with you here. The miscommunication we have is that we don't know whether something is outside of the ability of science to explain it. To assume that there is an explanation waiting for us to find is 'faith' in science as I explained in more detail in the other thread with droptone. I see you have much faith in science.:)
Going back to my original post about falsifying Intelligent Design, we literally observe information systems throughout nature which the laws of nature as we understand them to work cannot explain. This is a mathematical phenomenon that evolutionists have not been able to solve even though the laws of nature are clearly understood in those areas.
As a poor analogy, metal furnature layed out in the open will never assemble itself by the force of gravity. One of many complications is that gravity doesn't produce the torque needed to fasten nuts and bolts. Gravity is well understood and the engineering of metal furnature is well understood. The self-assembly of that furnature by gravity is not well understood and is extremely mysterious--defying all mathematics and physics. This was a crude analogy. But it shows the kind of mystery that 'irriducible complexity' points out: We understand the mechanism of the structures of certain living systems, we understand the forces of nature, what the heck could have made this particular mechanism of life come into being given these forces of nature? It defies all physics and mathematics.
From what I learned in my earliest years in science, as long as science cannot explain something it remains a theory and not a fact. It is therefore equally wrong to throw your hands up in the air and assume the missing explanation. It is wrong to deny that we have 'faith' in the future of science to come up with an explanation and pretend that our science has nothing to do with 'faith'. Until things are fully explained by science, there is a level of faith in science. Ultimately this is the point I try to make about this issue.
Read the book, you will understand where the other side is coming from. It is not a religious issue for everybody but a strictly philosophical and scientific one. The reason people are so angry against ID is because religious people have hijacked a perfectly legitimate scientific challenge to evolution.
The principal of 'irreducible complexity' is something that many scientists didn't spend much time thinking about until Michael Behe came along and wrote "Darwin's Black Box". This effectively started the popular debate about Intelligent Design. It wouldn't surprise me if the idea existed long before Behe, but Behe defined the issue very well, enough to provide an effective platform for investigation.
'Intelligent Design' is the observation of 'information systems' found in nature that cannot be explained as having their origin in currently known natural forces. ID can be falsified when these natural forces are identified and these information systems can be explained by strictly material processes. Evolutionists are working to solve that problem.
The premise of Intelligent Design doesn't 'disprove' evolution, it merely challenges evolution in a new way to see if it can satisfy the objections set forth in ID theory.
So far nobody knows for sure in a strict scientific sense whether evolutionists will be able to explain all of it and satisfy the ID objections. Everyone agrees that science does have its limitations, so even if science ultimately fails to come up with a perfectly natural explanation, it still doesn't mean evolution doesn't explain it somehow outside the capacity of scientific investigation. Only faith can say one way or another at this time. This last statement will cause people to close their minds and begin shooting profanities at me. I welcome intelligent comments instead, thank you.
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OldAndSlow>But in the last decade or two, biologists have identified lots of intermediate forms from light sensitive spots on up.
It can still be effectively argued by ID that the distance between each 'version' of eye is so vast that the principal of irreducible complexity still applies.
OldAndSlow>The ID proponents have abandoned the eye example and retreated to the truely silly, and more difficult to falsify. The two examples of ID that I have heard most recently are 1) how could something as complex as cillia on bacteria have evolved, and 2) how could certain complex biochemical reaction chains have evolved. Note that these are both obscure and hard to identify intermediate forms, even if they once existed.
What appears to be a retreat to some may actually be an improvement in strategy to others. If ID is trying to influence a world that rejects their idea, it makes a lot of sense for them to start using examples that give evolutionists even more trouble to explain.
OldAndSlow>The strongest, for me, argument against ID is that it argues that because I don't undestand something, God must have done it. I don't find professions of ignorance and surrender to be compelling arguments.
And yet we constantly hear things from professionals like this: "Given an infinite amount of time, space, and matter, anything can happen no matter how unlikely you believe it may be, even evolution." Or examples like this: "It has been discovered that on the quantum mechanical level, a particle can teleport itself anywhere in the universe at any moment, though unlikely there is a non-zero chance. Therefore unlikely things like evolution can happen as a quantum mechanical possibility given an infinite amount of time." It appears that space, time, matter, and quantum mechanics has become the "God" of evolutionists that can explain everything no matter how unlikely it is. In both cases with creation and evolution, nobody was there to see it. Both are matters of faith.
OldAndSlow> The next strongest argument against ID is that it seems to me to argue that God is weak. God could not possibly have set the universe in motion in such a way that humans would arise without periodic intervention.
Except for those ID theorists that happen to believe God did it instantly without gradual or periodic intervention.
OldAndSlow> ID seems to demand a God who needs mid-course corrections, and who is comprehensible to human minds. Neither condition matches my concept of God.
Again, not if the ID theorist believes God created humans instantly. Also, the religion of many ID theorists agrees with you that God is not comprehensible to human minds although God can be known and communicated with.
Evolution is hard science if you refer to natural selection only. The difference between natural selection and the evolution that the debate is about is much more than many people realize.
Natural selection only explains the diversity of characteristics found in creatures. The great evolution debate is about the origin of those characteristics. Natural selection doesn't actually create new genetic information. Natural selection only changes the frequency of genetic information already present throughout the population of creatures.
New genetic information can come about randomly through mutations. That is where the ID debate becomes interesting. ID theorists don't argue against the fact that mutations create genetic information either. The argument they propose is that mutations don't create any useful genetic information. This is because of a principal called 'irreducible complexity'.
A system (like the brain, the heart, and digestion) is irreducibly complex when any missing component prevents the system from working properly. When evolution tries to gradually evolve it into existance with a mutation here and there every so often, natural selection selects against it because the system is useless and doesn't work at first. So natural selection prevents the system from evolving gradually at all.
What's the solution? Maybe somehow all of the components of the system came together all at once in one generation of the creature. A random coincidence that rapidly produces all working parts simultaneously is like thousands of dominos falling out of an airplane and landing in the exact configuration to form a palace. Even if such a coincidence could happen once in the history of the earth, it would have to happen hundreds of billions of times over and over to produce all the life we have here.
That's the basic argument. There are more levels to the argument and it can get rather complicated. Different ideas about evolutionary scaffolding might be able to explain away irreducible complexity, but these ideas have not been shown to work yet with hard science, certainly not enough to explain the origin of everything. So we are left with a mystery about how evolution is able to overcome irreducible complexity.
if what you are looking for is a step-by-step computer simulation of an evolving system that develops the same thing, then yes, you have a good point. Until such time saying such systems did evolve is educated speculation. Hardly groundless, but not solid science.
Yes, that is what I am talking about. A feasibility study that withstands the test of aggressive statistics where the proposed step by step example of evolution doesn't violate the laws of nature and can take place within evolutionary time parameters and is probable enough to fit within the estimated size and age of the universe. They can invent the hypothetical missing genes if they must with the essential beneficial natural selective properties neccessary for scaffolding. Show me biochemical pathways, show me the genetic mutations that create the evolutionary scaffolds. But most of all, answer this basic question with absolute certainty, "Is nature capable of doing this?"
I want hard core examples and demonstrations. No more arguments like "evolutionary scaffolding could solve the problem of irreducible complexity, therefore this is what must have happened". That's not an example of investigative science in action, that's sitting in a lawn chair and using the imagination.
Thank you for understanding where I am coming from.
Kazoo the Clown> "irreducability" suggests that the only way a structure can exist is by being "built up" from something less complex. In fact, structures can also exist through the reduction of other structures via the loss of characteristics. For example, the construction of an arch often involves a scaffolding, which after the arch is constructed is removed. The resultant arch, it could be argued, is irreducibly complex as you can't take one brick away and have a viable structure. However, removing one brick is not the only way to incrementally backtrack the construction of the structure, and in fact has no connection to how the structure was actually constructed. Further it is concievable that a "natural" arch could arise from a rock avalanche falling on a mound of dirt that is later eroded away-- no defying of physics is required.
In principal I don't really disagree with what you say here. However, the burdon is still on evolutionists to provide solid step by step examples of this happening in a real world situation (millions of years of observation notwithstanding). If evolutionists can point to a few 'irreducibly complex' biological systems and draw the diagrams and perform the successful feasibility studies that withstand the scrutiny of statistics while not violating the laws of nature within reasonable evolutionary time parameters, then I would agree that the evolutionary scaffold successfully explains irreducible complexity. Until then, stictly naturalistic evolution is not a proven scientific fact but is instead a position of faith in science being able to someday somehow figure this out.
Kazoo the Clown> There's also a tacit assumption that the "intelligence" in "intelligent design" is necessarily self-aware.
I agree with you about what you say here in much of this, awesome points. From a strictly investigative standpoint it is wrong to assume intelligent design means that the intelligence is self-aware. This is where religious people hijack a perfectly legitimate objection to naturalistic evolution and turn it into a religious issue. Put religion aside, however, and the discussion can still continue.
Kazoo the Clown> Consequently, the term "intelligent design" is a misnomer, as evolution itself can be said to be a) a design process and b) intelligent. The true difference between evolution as an intelligent design process and ID, is one characteristic the ID proponents always leave out of their arguments-- self awareness.
Having already addressed my understanding and agreeing with you, let us imagine an atheist who doesn't believe in a self-aware intelligent designer. This atheist can still be an ID advocate on the basis that irreducible complexity precludes what we know about natural law being capable of creating life via evolution. So you see, even if ID supporters have a hidden 'self-aware' agenda for what they believe about the designer, at the core of ID is irreducible complexity which is still a valid challenge to evolution without the religious agenda.
Kazoo the Clown> As has already been stated, evolution is an explanation for many many known facts in biology, genetics, geology and I'm sure several other sciences I'm too tired to think of at the moment.
It is fair for me to insist that we stick to one issue at a time. Too many fields of science all at once will not give me enough time to eat or sleep. The topic at hand is ID.
Kazoo the Clown> that is why ID proponents must take their argument to the high schools where the less science literate can be buffooned into the bogus "fair play" argument that ID should have equal time
Don't forget that I have an extremely open mind to honest points of view. I see a lot of people around here assuming ideas that they don't fully understand. That should give any true educator ample reason to expose all students to this issue, starting at the high school level. With a proper fair, honest, and thorough explanation of the issue, educators should have no worries introducing students to 'ridiculous' ideas. Or are they not so confident that the ideas will be perceived as ridiculous?
To clear up a major misunderstanding, Intelligent Design theorists accept everything about hard genetics and natural selection. The problem Intelligent Design theorists have is how the genetics originated in the first place.
For example, dogs can be bred to have different sizes and colors of every body part in every combination imaginable. This is because the genetics for each of these characteristics exists within the universal gene pool of dogs throughout the whole breeding process from start to finish. No new genetic information is added to the system, merely a change in the frequency of genetic characteristics that already exist to begin with. Natural selection does not add new genetic information, it merely selects among traits that already exist within the population as a whole. The beef that ID has is not the changes in frequency of genetic information throughout the population, their beef is with the origin of this genetic information.
The details can now be investigated in more detail after having established a more proper basis of understanding the issue.
Yes, but you need to remember that this more sophisticated protocol of simulating evolution would require a more complicated environment to create these steps. There would need to be a mechanism in place to measure the natural selection benefits of each stage of the watch. This is still a strange example as I cannot even imagine that a half-working watch would be selected for at all by natural selection. And if it is, then what exactly would measure the fitness of these watch stages? Robots and computers? No no, that can't be because that would require even more complexity and design to begin with.
I am thinking that the watch thing is not a good example no matter how you look at it.
You hit the nail square on the head. That is exactly where I am trying to come from with this. My hat goes off to you as well for seeing this.
To be perfectly honest, finding that could also mean that creatures originally created perfectly became damaged over time as the gene pool deteriorated.
You see, both sides of the issue have an answer for everything. Hard science is the only thing we should study to find conclusions about this stuff and hard science is the one thing everyone on slashdot and other forums (including myself) seems too lazy to talk about. In the meantime I'll sit back and smirk at everyone defending their conclusions based upon too little information to know anything reasonably well at all.
Try taking a working pocket watch and jiggle it an infinite number of times. You aren't going to be left with a working pocket watch. It would follow that a broken pocket watch would become even more broken. Finally, it would be expected that pocket watch pieces would become even more damaged. Evolution makes people believe amazing things. I guess I just don't have enough faith. ;D
More shaking will destroy the castle walls. ;D
To put it more precisely, shaking will destroy the castle walls before they have a chance to become walls in the first place.
Has it occurred to anyone else that evolution causes people to believe that shaking legos together long enough will produce a castle like this: http://www.end.com/~jynx/castle/trim.jpg
;D
No offense or anything, but that's a terrible example of evolution. More shaking will destroy the castle walls.
The issue of irriducible complexity and evolution is more complicated than this and involves many other things like natural selection. If we want to be scientific rather than philosophical we need to use a real world example of evolution. Step by step changes in biochemical pathways and evolutionary 'scaffolding' needs to be shown to solve the problem of irreducible complexity and make evolution something that no longer requires faith.
I wasn't disputing the knowledge we have about quantum mechanics. All I was saying is that this cannot be used to prove evolution because it is non-falsifiable. Quantum mechanics becomes God in a sense. That's what I meant by it "sounds" religious.
:)
Retric>But if your going with an idea because it sounds good then clearly you're the one going on faith.
This is clearly taking what I said out of context. I never said that I accepted anything because it 'sounds' good. Irrational interpretations of clearly written text may mean you were emotionally disturbed by my use of the word "religion" in referece to something that you said. I never mean to insult anyone. My apologies.
I love your comments, you are fun to spar with. :)
:) The question ID folk ask is: how can you go from the four universal forces to Human Beings? A very valid question.. and the answer is you can't. Humans are indeed very complex, but this is not so strange when you consider that our systems are built on systems built on systems (etc etc) that are built on the forces. For example, a star can form much easier than a human being. They're very simple things. But after the gravity (that made our infamous table) builds energy into mass, we get the beginnings of complexity: matter.
;D
DavidPesta>In other cases we find complicated systems with no possible reduced version conceivable or in the biological record.
Follier>I don't think I've ever seen such a system.
Well now, are we talking about different versions of systems that exist within a divergent evolutionary tree or a convergent evolutionary tree? You see, convergent evolution doesn't count because the same structures independently 'evolved'. So one version cannot have led to the other. (Assuming the evolutionary trees are correct in the first place, that's a whole different question. I've written articles about that.)
DavidPesta>Instead you added an entire factory of pre-designed molds and shafts with complicated machanisms that can assemble metal furnature.
Follier>That's right, I did
Complicated things are composed of other complicated things, yes. The factory you introduced has nothing to do with what the complicated furniture is composed of. The factory you introduced is a mechanism outside of the furniture itself and it created this furniture. Since the factory is much more complicated than the furniture, we are forced to ask, 'who built the factory?' To go way off course from my original point in previous posts with this, if nature itself has laws configured in such a way to bring about such extreme complexity, then what does that say about the laws of nature? It means the laws of nature are even more complicated than the machines that it produces. So what does that say about Intelligent Design? Probably a lot to many people.
So you see, saying 'nature did it' doesn't really solve the problem. It actually shifts the problem somewhere else. Again, this was completely besides my original point.
Follier>It simply makes claims that it cannot support or disprove (that no one can support or disprove)
Yes, ID does make the claim that a designer did it. But 'Irreducible Complexity' does not, IC rather challenges a claim.
Follier>and "challenges" non-ID evolutionists to do the impossible.
But that is the very point I try to make the whole time, as long as evolutionists cannot prove evolution, it remains an unproven idea accepted by faith. Yet people unknowingly go around claiming that evolution is a fully demonstrated provable fact. And they do this without opposition from evolutionists who know better.
Agreed, no book could be written as an exhaustive explanation of IC and hold the general public's attention. Behe doesn't complete his IC objections to evolution in just one book, but merely introduces the problem.
It is speculated that a scaffolding series of evolutionary breakthroughs could make C, D, and E come into place on top of A and B which previously existed but later disappeared. In fact, in most cases the matter is much more complicated, with much more than just A, B, C, D, and E involved. The point is, unless this scaffolding process of evolution can be demonstrated or worked out exactly step by step on paper (or computer, whatever), evolutionists have a problem to work out. I am personally very interested in one such example where biologists can trace step by step the process of an evolving biological structure with more than just 5 components. (A, B, C, D, and E is not enough to show the evolution of a truly impressive biological structure.) Were not talking about actual science until the scaffolding speculation is actually demonstrated (or shown step by step) via laws that govern natural selection.
Before anyone responds with angry criticism, try to remember that science normally welcomes the challenge and burdon of proof.
Okay, you read more into what I said than what I intended. :)
I guess you can interpret what I said that way. But in all honesty, when I said "Only faith can say one way or another at this time" what I meant was "we don't know well enough at the time to come to any solid conclusions either way, therefore all either side can do is have faith in their point of view."
but that if they were really interested in challenging anything they wouldn't be doing it in a high-school level science class. The fact they want to present high school students with material that is relevant in advanced-undergraduate or graduate classes does seem to show some insincerity on their part.
Good point, you're probably right about a lot of them. I think some of their concerns and motives are a little different though. Some of them genuinely believe that they are being disenfranchised by school systems and the scientific mainstream. They are honestly trying to make sure their children (and their neighbors children) are not being unfairly misguided. The same would be true of you if the government imposed creationism to the exclusion of evolution in science. What students learn early shapes their worldview as they approach graduate levels and affects what sort of ideas they are open to. Right or wrong about their paradigm about origins, they aren't neccessarily trying to dodge the harder graduate forums.
As for the other things you brought up, I understand what you are saying. Just read the book to see better what I am talking about.
>PS: metal furniture can self assemble see Quantum Mechanics. Now the odds of that happening are hard to comprehend but it's still possible and given sufficient time highly probable. Based on QM saying something can't happen is meaningless but some things are unlikely over a reasonable timeframe so if you want to try and demonstrate that something is extremely unlikely to ever occur on any planet anywhere in the solar system over billions of years that's one thing but saying can't is meaningless.
I thought this was an interesting comment because it sounds just as religious as any other religous point of view. (No insult intended.) Based upon what we know and how fast what we know continues to change over the last hundred years, it is amazing to see so many people absolutely certain that 'infinite' time, space, and energy can explain the origin of everything. Is anyone else uncomfortable about that? Just like any religious explanation that involves God or the supernatural, it is not falsifiable. (I'm not saying this was your point of view, you didn't make that clear. I was generalizing.)
Well, ID theorists typically don't have a problem with natural selection or any of the hard science of genetics. Just the origin of those genetics. Consequently, natural diversity is easy to understand for everyone on all sides. (Unless I misunderstand the question.)
DavidPesta>we literally observe information systems throughout nature which the laws of nature as we understand them to work cannot explain
;D No problem, hypothesis is the better word.
Follier>-- no we really don't. People often bring up one complex human organ or another as an example of "irreducible complexity"... but of course they could find reduced versions of everything all over nature if they cared to look. Which, of course, they don't.
It can be argued that you overplay the significance of finding reduced versions of highly developed and sophisticated organs and biological structures. In many cases there are so many levels of complexity in between a 'reduced' version and the version with the next level of complexity that the same 'irreducible complexity' argument still applies. In other cases we find complicated systems with no possible reduced version conceivable or in the biological record. To substantiate these claims, one needs to study them on a case by case basis.
DavidPesta>As a poor analogy, metal furniture layed out in the open will never assemble itself by the force of gravity.
Follier>I don't get it... what does gravity making furniture have to do with evolution? Now if gravity was pulling molten metal through various molds down a shaft that randomly connected, and whereby everything that didn't stand on four legs would fall over into a pool of molten metal, then yes.. eventually you'll end up with something resembling a metal table. That's a much better analogy.
I expected a misunderstanding from someone about this analogy as I was trying to communicate a different point entirely. In fact, I expected someone to introduce new laws of nature like earthquakes and tornadoes to explain the crude analogy, which again would miss the point I was trying to make. Instead you added an entire factory of pre-designed molds and shafts with complicated machanisms that can assemble metal furnature. In case you didn't notice, the factory needed to do such a thing would be even more complicated than the assembled furniture itself, which is suggestive of even more intelligent design. In other words, your contribution to the analogy would mean that the forces of nature are even more complicated and suggestive of intelligent design than the complexities of life itself. (An entirely new thread could start on this philosophical point, but that is completely different than the point I was trying to make.)
All my crude analogy was trying to show was that given the natural forces which we know are present, physical and mathematical impossibilities spring up all over the place when trying to figure out the origin of many biochemical systems--according to ID. As far as the crude analogy is concerned, earthquakes, tornadoes, and furnature self-assembly factories do not exist in the universe. That is simply where the crude analogy breaks down. Inside the universe of the imperfect analogy, gravity is the only force that exists. In the real world where the analogy applies, you cannot invent new laws of physics to explain physical mysteries. Using all the laws of nature that we know of, problems are encountered much like the problem described inside the universe of the imperfect analogy. Analogies are not something to be 'read into', they are devices meant to bring clarity to understanding. Don't judge the entire argument on an imperfect analogy meant to bring clarity.
Follier>A theory in science is a system that explains facts. What you're thinking of is a hypothesis. Don't feel bad, everyone gets those mixed up, since in regular speech thats how we use the word theory.
Lousy definitions getting in the way of what I mean.
Follier>but a gap in scientific knowledge is not a green light to insert whatever fantasy happens to appeal to you.. especially if the specific gap is itself a fanciful construction (eg irreducible
I encourage you to read the other thread of responses that droptone and I have been having. You will understand what I am trying to say better. (It may not have been clear from my first post about it.)
:)
> Science doesn't have limits - science is a process.
There are plenty of limitations to science. For example, science cannot count the number of hairs on George Washington's head on the morning of his 25th birthday. Assuming this was a practical area of scientific study, science is unable to investigate this.
> Just because we don't understand something now, does not mean it is outside the perview of science to explain it.
I agree with you here. The miscommunication we have is that we don't know whether something is outside of the ability of science to explain it. To assume that there is an explanation waiting for us to find is 'faith' in science as I explained in more detail in the other thread with droptone. I see you have much faith in science.
You're pardoned. :)
Going back to my original post about falsifying Intelligent Design, we literally observe information systems throughout nature which the laws of nature as we understand them to work cannot explain. This is a mathematical phenomenon that evolutionists have not been able to solve even though the laws of nature are clearly understood in those areas.
As a poor analogy, metal furnature layed out in the open will never assemble itself by the force of gravity. One of many complications is that gravity doesn't produce the torque needed to fasten nuts and bolts. Gravity is well understood and the engineering of metal furnature is well understood. The self-assembly of that furnature by gravity is not well understood and is extremely mysterious--defying all mathematics and physics. This was a crude analogy. But it shows the kind of mystery that 'irriducible complexity' points out: We understand the mechanism of the structures of certain living systems, we understand the forces of nature, what the heck could have made this particular mechanism of life come into being given these forces of nature? It defies all physics and mathematics.
From what I learned in my earliest years in science, as long as science cannot explain something it remains a theory and not a fact. It is therefore equally wrong to throw your hands up in the air and assume the missing explanation. It is wrong to deny that we have 'faith' in the future of science to come up with an explanation and pretend that our science has nothing to do with 'faith'. Until things are fully explained by science, there is a level of faith in science. Ultimately this is the point I try to make about this issue.
Read the book, you will understand where the other side is coming from. It is not a religious issue for everybody but a strictly philosophical and scientific one. The reason people are so angry against ID is because religious people have hijacked a perfectly legitimate scientific challenge to evolution.
How does ID challenge evolution in "a new way"?
4 834936/qid=1123177825/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_sbs_1/002- 3505381-9068014?v=glance&s=books&n=507846
The principal of 'irreducible complexity' is something that many scientists didn't spend much time thinking about until Michael Behe came along and wrote "Darwin's Black Box". This effectively started the popular debate about Intelligent Design. It wouldn't surprise me if the idea existed long before Behe, but Behe defined the issue very well, enough to provide an effective platform for investigation.
If you haven't read it, I would recommend it. You will see it is much more than incoherent shouting. Here is the Amazon link to the paperback:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/068
'Intelligent Design' is the observation of 'information systems' found in nature that cannot be explained as having their origin in currently known natural forces. ID can be falsified when these natural forces are identified and these information systems can be explained by strictly material processes. Evolutionists are working to solve that problem.
The premise of Intelligent Design doesn't 'disprove' evolution, it merely challenges evolution in a new way to see if it can satisfy the objections set forth in ID theory.
So far nobody knows for sure in a strict scientific sense whether evolutionists will be able to explain all of it and satisfy the ID objections. Everyone agrees that science does have its limitations, so even if science ultimately fails to come up with a perfectly natural explanation, it still doesn't mean evolution doesn't explain it somehow outside the capacity of scientific investigation. Only faith can say one way or another at this time. This last statement will cause people to close their minds and begin shooting profanities at me. I welcome intelligent comments instead, thank you.
Begging the question / Circular argument
The problem with this is, astrophysicists insist that space and time are finite, NOT infinite.