Number 5) Even if a designed nature could be proved somehow - positing a god to "explain" it doesn't actually solve anything. The "god did it" theory holds no intellectual weight, because you still haven't explained how he did it. Further, surely something as complex and intricate as the Designer couldn't have come along by chance - so there must be a Super-Designer who designed the Designer! (And so on ad naseum). It seems like ID forgets where it starts! Take a look at the "theory":
Intelligent Design Contradiction 1) Things that are complex require a designer.
2) Nature is complex.
3) Therefore nature requires a (complex?) designer.
Instead of continuing the theory to include the obvious complexity of the designer, IDers stop there, having reached their goal.
Note that the counter argument is to say that the Designer is self-designed. This is silly however, because the laws of nature (which are much simpler than whatever mysterious Designer is being proposed, as they can be expressed in terms of mathematical equations) are simultaneously claimed to be designed, even though they are simpler! An IDer cannot consistently hold his position!
Final Number (I swear): All the previous problems aside, the very best ID could ever hope to accomplish is establish the existence of a Designer "force" that existed long in the past. Just like a clock can run after the clock maker dies, a "designed nature" (whatever that means) could run without the designer.
Number 1) A theory cannot be simply an "emphatic rejection" of another theory. That's an assertion, not a theory. Theories predict stuff. which leads me too...
Number 2) ID has no testable predictions. By saying "there is sound evidence that the incredible complexity of life is not the result of natural processes", it presumes you know all the natural processes. Otherwise, how could you make that assertion. Actual science, on the other hand, says "Based on what we've observed, this is the current best conclusion."
Number 3) ID is silly, because it presumes that which it is trying to prove. Objects that are designed are recognizable insomuch as their design CONTRASTS with nature. If we were on an alien planet, and found markings or some kind of ruins, we wouldn't look for a PURPOSE of those markings and then from that deduce that they must be designed. We would contrast those markings to what markings can occur naturally to determine design. Expanding the "design" concept to include all of nature is the fundamental flaw of the Intelligent Design Assertion. If we found a synthetic rock built by aliens, and by all measurable tests it was identical to all the natural rocks around it - we would conclude that it was natural!
Number 4) Even if ID could somehow be right, people using this "theory" to promote religion is crazy. Every evidence of "design" in nature is so much evidence against an omnipotent deity. Design implies that the designed has an efficacy of means that the designer does not - otherwise, why design? In plain words, you design something because you desire an end that you cannot get without the designed object. This is logically incompatible with something that is all-powerful. If all that was needed to effect an end was my word, then why bother designing? This is also the argument against god having any sort of purpose (unfulfilled goals) or desires (unfulfilled wants). If the Christian God (or any omnipotent deity, for that matter) "wants" me to be saved, or to love him, or to do anything, how can I - a lowly finite human speck on a huge rock in the middle of nowhere - possibly resist this all-powerful will? (hint: because it doesn't exist).
It should be noted that the counter-argument to this says that the world, with all the innocent victims, Hitlers, Stalins, natural disasters, and weeping children, is exactly the way God wants it to be.
4) Acceptance of "micro-evolution" is acceptance of evolution. Period. The rate of change of micro-evolution is more than enough to account for the diversity of life. Evolution is just the biological equivalent of plate tectonics. No one has ever observed "macro-plate tectonics" (i.e. a mountain springing up) - but we can measure how fast they're moving now (inches per year) and do the math. Plate tectonics makes predictions (if the mountains weren't always here, then they should have things on them that don't belong on mountains, like fishbone fossils.) These predictions are equivalent to evolution's (if animals/humans weren't always here, they should have things on them that don't belong, like vestigial organs or "junk DNA"). Both of those predictions have been met numerous times with various mountains and animals, including humans. On a sidenote: How do useless body parts (like my appendix that is rotting in some landfill right now) work with a designed structure, in particular if the designer is assumed perfect?
I hope I have added something to this debate that cuts to the fundamental core. ID is a useless assertion, and is only an emotional reaction to finding out we're related to everything living. It was the same in Galileo's day when the church didn't like that we discovered we weren't the center of the universe. It removes that "privileged" feeling that religion strives for. Even though it is the same science that brings you plate tectonics and internal comustion, when it treads on how "special" humans should feel - religion finds a need to aggressively react.
I agree. I think Kerry spent way too much time to appeal to the swing voters. He never had a simple, clear answer for any controversial question.
I take exception to this. I think it Kerry's ability to see the gray areas of life WAS the difference between him and W. I'll agree that W's campaign of "Give thy people 7-second soundbytes" was better, but not on the merits of the GOP, rather on the lack of merit of the American public.
Life is far from black and white. I'd rather have a president that saw the grays than one who goes charging off into the abyss. Even if he gets some things right, I take exception to his method of determining right from wrong - and that's the far more important distinction I saw between him and Kerry (even though I disagreed with some of Kerry's ideas, at least I knew he would proceed with caution, giving consideration to opposing views).
Except that SS1 didn't go to orbit, and only gained probably a tenth of the energy of the shuttle. They didn't have re-entry problems because they weren't going 7 kilometers per second.
However, I agree with the gist of your post regardless. It's time to mordernize.
Well... That's a stretch. Saying SS1 represents the United States in space is like saying a bunch of missionaries represent the United States in Uganda.
While SS1's achievements are quite impressive, SS1 didn't achieve orbit, and isn't government-funded, so it represents neither true spaceflight (as in, you turn off all your engines and you remain in space), nor does it represent the United States (because they are a private company).
This is the first actual manned spaceflight by the US Govt since Columbia.
First come the ads, then comes a combination with online shopping. Your credit card is already stored, right? Picture this:
After dispatching another terrorist with your awesome aim and a Colt M4 Carbine, you take cover behind an aisle in de_walmart. It's the gun equipment aisle. A text message appears, "Would you like to purchase a Remington High-Powered Rifle, on sale now for $1999.95! 1) Yes
2) No"
You notice your magazine is almost empty, so you think "sure" and hit "1". You expect a new gun to appear in your hand, but instead you see a message:
"Thank you for your purchase! Your credit card has been charged $1999.95!"
In your moment of confusion, a 12-yr-old girl named D/\rK_F^|rY kills you, and gloats "HAHAHAHahaha N000B!!!!111!1"
You clearly do not understand that a rocket engine requires no air to operate. It throws propellant out the back at high speed and the transfer of momentum is given to the rest of the spacecraft. Their hybrid engine would work just as well in a vacuum, as all rockets can. Further, it's more efficient to do a continous burn (rather than starting and stopping) because you don't have to carry all the fuel with you as you coast to the "nether region," as you put it.
I've seen a lot of posts that alternate between "NASA/Gov't sucks and could never do this on such a shoestring budget" and "SpaceShipOne didn't even come close to accomplishing what NASA has done." That's all well and good, but you have to consider a few things...
The truth lies somewhere in the middle.
First off, let's get the technical issues straight. SS1 did not achieve orbit of any sort, and would require MASSIVE modifications to do so. It is not comparable with the Shuttle program or anything larger (lunar missions, planetary missions, etc.). While it does use a pretty slick hybrid engine, it's still a chemical engine at heart, and thus is not this raving new technology that will send us to the stars.
Technical issues aside, let's give credit where credit is due. The most comparable thing that NASA has done is X-15, which was designed for hypersonic research, and still to this very moment holds the suborbital speed record. To be more explicit, X-15 was designed for speed 40 years ago, and SS1 was designed for height. Both now hold their respective records. Further, while the costs were high, let's not compare them without taking into account the real differences here. This page says that X-15 cost about $300 M total, which divides to about $600 k per flight. As of right now, SS1 has had 5 rocket flights for roughly $30 M total, which means that, until they fly some more, SS1 costs $600k per flight, the same as X-15. At best it is on par with NASA, except that NASA did this stuff 40 YEARS ago, without standing on the shoulders of any prior research.
Moreover, it is wrong to denigrate the contributions of the very skilled engineers and very brave test pilots of X-15 just because they were government. They lived and died paving the way for private industry to follow. It would be equally wrong, for example, if something went wrong today and Brian Benni died, for NASA to mock the SS1 team and say "See, stupid private industry, you can't do what we do."
Now, for the flipside, SS1 deserves a LOT of credit for finally picking up the ball and possibly bringing the space industry to private citizens. I imagine a lot of people are doing cost/benefit/risk calculations to see if this business is a worthy venture, and that's good. If a suborbital "big roller coaster" industry develops it'll be good for everyone. (Maybe those darn flat-earthers will finally go away). While NASA's achievements are profoundly great, they do not cascade down in a visible way to everyday people. In this sense, SS1 has succeeded greatly where NASA has failed. Further, if it proves to be profitable, SS1 will have marked the beginning of the suborbital tourism industry.
However, the ORBITAL tourism industry is a BIG difference, and while it might have started us on the path, SS1 has not directly contributed to that in any way (no new technologies regarding propulsion or reentry, etc.) Further and finally, it is important to realize that SS1 is a marketing achievement, not a technological one. If NASA had wanted to start a space tourism industry a long time ago, it could have.
Bottom line, give credit where credit is due (to both SS1 and NASA), and don't denigrate the contributions of either. Both have very brave pilots and skilled engineers, and both are necessary to conquer space travel. You need one side that's willing to forge ahead by dumping money in without regard to expected profits, and you need the other to turn that research into something we can all use. Cheers for both.
As I mentioned in another post - this rocket does not go orbital. It's a completely different beast to go orbital and be reusable. The SS1 design would have to be modified greatly. Further, there is already a carry-and-drop rocket that puts satellites into orbit: it's called Pegasus.
That would be true, if this were an orbital vehicle - it is not. There is a big common misconception about space. People think that once you're in space, gravity stops and you float. This is 100% not true. If I built a supertall tower 100km high and stood on the top of it, I'd weigh only a little bit less than what I weigh now. I'd be able to walk around the platform and everything. If SpaceShipOne came flying up to me, I'd see it come up and then drop back down, just like as if a ball had been thrown from the ground up to me. The gravity-free sensation comes from free-falling, not from just being there. If Mike threw a satellite part out the window at 100km, it would fall back to the Earth just like he did. Getting to orbit and getting to 100km height are two *very* different beasts, and it's important not to make cost comparisons between the two without taking that into account.
It's important to note that currently there is a regulatory void concerning passengers. No passengers are legally allowed on any commercial spacecraft because of this void, and the FAA's Office of Commercial Space does not have the authority to fix regulations to allow it (it's not covered in our statute). Congress would first have to give us authority AND then we would have to write regulations before any passengers could be legally allowed. I'm sure it'll happen sooner or later, but the congressional side of things tends to move slow (they're too concerned with the war and other things to get space stuff on the table).
Wow. There were a lot of links in that post! That took me a while to get through. Thank you for the wealth of information.
Again, I must respectfully disagree. However, because this is somewhat offtopic, I will restrict my disagreement to only your first point (concerning evolution), and if you wish to pick up the discussion, we can do so via email. (Unless the/. community doesn't really mind)
Ok. You said:
Now, we're talking about the equivalent of 6 billion bits. I don't care how many billions of years you give for things to evolve, you can't get to 2^6,000,000,000. The complexity simply exceeds the abilities of our brains to grasp.
Note that the assumption that things will just evolve on their own is a charitable one. If my '66 Wagoneer had done any evolving in the 40 years it's been around, it might get better gas mileage and put out less harmful emissions than it does. But only more newly designed vehicles have those features.
I agree with you that an organism needs to be designed to their environment to be able to produce the 6 billion bits, but I think you misunderstand evolutionary theory, because that's exactly what it advocates. Evolution is design, not randomness, as it is commonly misunderstood. Mutations and/or adaptations introduce new variants, and the pressures of the environment naturally select (i.e., design) the animal most fit for survival.
Let me give an example that shows how the mathmatics of cryptography do not apply to evolution. The analogy is admittedly oversimplified, so please don't take it beyond the point which I'm trying to make.
Ok. Say you've got 20 quarters - they represent the genes of a certain animal we're going to speed-evolve. Heads are good genes, tails are bad genes. According to probability, if you were to flip all the coins at once, you would have B^N (2^20) different possible combinations (about a million). Likewise, your chances of getting all heads (a.k.a., a designed animal), would be (50%)^20, or 1 in a million. It would take a lot of flips to get that gene combination!
However, that's not the way evolution works! Natural selection takes the "right" genes of a population and passes them on genetically to the next. If we wanted to "evolve" this quarter-gene-species, we would do the following:
1. Flip them all at once (1st generation).
2. Find all the heads, those genes are good and get passed on to the next generation, so they get moved aside (nautrally selected).
3. Re-flip all the remaining coins (next generation), and go back to Step 2.
You can easily see that it'll only take a few "generations" to get a completely designed gene structure!
That is a simplified analogy to evolution, but it is easily extendable. If you had 6 billion 4-sided dice (A,C,F,G), and you could roll all of them, and then select and pass on the ones that were "right", it wouldn't take you very long to come up with a perfectly constructed 6-billion-bit gene sequence.
Though I don't presume to be any judge of God's ways, what better way for the Creator to deliver a message about himself than to offer a part of him as a widely predicted and historically recorded sacrifice for his created humanity?
As a quick nod to your second point, I believe a better way to reveal oneself would be to not have any contradictions, bad science, absurdities, and cruelty in the same document as the good stuff. And if we were truly designed from the s
Your argument is fairly decent so long as you ignore 2 things:
1. The "creative intelligence" you speak of could just as easily be the blind process of natural selection. Just add a couple DNA pairs every 50 million years or so and you've got more than enough time to come up with a 6 billion-bit quaternary code, more or less optimized for the present, with a nice long "history of our evolution" message attached to it. This process requires no supernatural forces.
2. Depending on how you define God, it would seem exceedingly unfair for him/her to reveal themself through sub-microscopic code. There are millions of people living today who have no clue what DNA is, and BILLIONS of people who lived in ages past before DNA was even discovered. While the argument you post may hold true for some weird alien race or unthinking/uncaring God, it definately cannot be extended to any worshippable, caring, and fair Creator of sorts, having excluded the vast majority of humanity thus far with the choice of how to deliver the message.
To me, the idea that any kind of supernatural forces are in a dramatic ballet with mankind is the epitome of aristocentrism.
Slashdot Mirror
One last thing...I almost forgot:
Number 5) Even if a designed nature could be proved somehow - positing a god to "explain" it doesn't actually solve anything. The "god did it" theory holds no intellectual weight, because you still haven't explained how he did it. Further, surely something as complex and intricate as the Designer couldn't have come along by chance - so there must be a Super-Designer who designed the Designer! (And so on ad naseum). It seems like ID forgets where it starts! Take a look at the "theory":
Intelligent Design Contradiction
1) Things that are complex require a designer.
2) Nature is complex.
3) Therefore nature requires a (complex?) designer.
Instead of continuing the theory to include the obvious complexity of the designer, IDers stop there, having reached their goal.
Note that the counter argument is to say that the Designer is self-designed. This is silly however, because the laws of nature (which are much simpler than whatever mysterious Designer is being proposed, as they can be expressed in terms of mathematical equations) are simultaneously claimed to be designed, even though they are simpler! An IDer cannot consistently hold his position!
Final Number (I swear): All the previous problems aside, the very best ID could ever hope to accomplish is establish the existence of a Designer "force" that existed long in the past. Just like a clock can run after the clock maker dies, a "designed nature" (whatever that means) could run without the designer.
This is silly, for a number of reasons:
Number 1) A theory cannot be simply an "emphatic rejection" of another theory. That's an assertion, not a theory. Theories predict stuff. which leads me too...
Number 2) ID has no testable predictions. By saying "there is sound evidence that the incredible complexity of life is not the result of natural processes", it presumes you know all the natural processes. Otherwise, how could you make that assertion. Actual science, on the other hand, says "Based on what we've observed, this is the current best conclusion."
Number 3) ID is silly, because it presumes that which it is trying to prove. Objects that are designed are recognizable insomuch as their design CONTRASTS with nature. If we were on an alien planet, and found markings or some kind of ruins, we wouldn't look for a PURPOSE of those markings and then from that deduce that they must be designed. We would contrast those markings to what markings can occur naturally to determine design. Expanding the "design" concept to include all of nature is the fundamental flaw of the Intelligent Design Assertion. If we found a synthetic rock built by aliens, and by all measurable tests it was identical to all the natural rocks around it - we would conclude that it was natural!
Number 4) Even if ID could somehow be right, people using this "theory" to promote religion is crazy. Every evidence of "design" in nature is so much evidence against an omnipotent deity. Design implies that the designed has an efficacy of means that the designer does not - otherwise, why design? In plain words, you design something because you desire an end that you cannot get without the designed object. This is logically incompatible with something that is all-powerful. If all that was needed to effect an end was my word, then why bother designing? This is also the argument against god having any sort of purpose (unfulfilled goals) or desires (unfulfilled wants). If the Christian God (or any omnipotent deity, for that matter) "wants" me to be saved, or to love him, or to do anything, how can I - a lowly finite human speck on a huge rock in the middle of nowhere - possibly resist this all-powerful will? (hint: because it doesn't exist).
It should be noted that the counter-argument to this says that the world, with all the innocent victims, Hitlers, Stalins, natural disasters, and weeping children, is exactly the way God wants it to be.
4) Acceptance of "micro-evolution" is acceptance of evolution. Period. The rate of change of micro-evolution is more than enough to account for the diversity of life. Evolution is just the biological equivalent of plate tectonics. No one has ever observed "macro-plate tectonics" (i.e. a mountain springing up) - but we can measure how fast they're moving now (inches per year) and do the math. Plate tectonics makes predictions (if the mountains weren't always here, then they should have things on them that don't belong on mountains, like fishbone fossils.) These predictions are equivalent to evolution's (if animals/humans weren't always here, they should have things on them that don't belong, like vestigial organs or "junk DNA"). Both of those predictions have been met numerous times with various mountains and animals, including humans. On a sidenote: How do useless body parts (like my appendix that is rotting in some landfill right now) work with a designed structure, in particular if the designer is assumed perfect?
I hope I have added something to this debate that cuts to the fundamental core. ID is a useless assertion, and is only an emotional reaction to finding out we're related to everything living. It was the same in Galileo's day when the church didn't like that we discovered we weren't the center of the universe. It removes that "privileged" feeling that religion strives for. Even though it is the same science that brings you plate tectonics and internal comustion, when it treads on how "special" humans should feel - religion finds a need to aggressively react.
Get over it.
I take exception to this. I think it Kerry's ability to see the gray areas of life WAS the difference between him and W. I'll agree that W's campaign of "Give thy people 7-second soundbytes" was better, but not on the merits of the GOP, rather on the lack of merit of the American public.
Life is far from black and white. I'd rather have a president that saw the grays than one who goes charging off into the abyss. Even if he gets some things right, I take exception to his method of determining right from wrong - and that's the far more important distinction I saw between him and Kerry (even though I disagreed with some of Kerry's ideas, at least I knew he would proceed with caution, giving consideration to opposing views).
You probably get a T-shirt though.
Except that SS1 didn't go to orbit, and only gained probably a tenth of the energy of the shuttle. They didn't have re-entry problems because they weren't going 7 kilometers per second. However, I agree with the gist of your post regardless. It's time to mordernize.
Well... That's a stretch. Saying SS1 represents the United States in space is like saying a bunch of missionaries represent the United States in Uganda.
While SS1's achievements are quite impressive, SS1 didn't achieve orbit, and isn't government-funded, so it represents neither true spaceflight (as in, you turn off all your engines and you remain in space), nor does it represent the United States (because they are a private company).
This is the first actual manned spaceflight by the US Govt since Columbia.
First come the ads, then comes a combination with online shopping. Your credit card is already stored, right? Picture this:
After dispatching another terrorist with your awesome aim and a Colt M4 Carbine, you take cover behind an aisle in de_walmart. It's the gun equipment aisle. A text message appears,
"Would you like to purchase a Remington High-Powered Rifle, on sale now for $1999.95!
1) Yes
2) No"
You notice your magazine is almost empty, so you think "sure" and hit "1". You expect a new gun to appear in your hand, but instead you see a message:
"Thank you for your purchase! Your credit card has been charged $1999.95!"
In your moment of confusion, a 12-yr-old girl named D/\rK_F^|rY kills you, and gloats "HAHAHAHahaha N000B!!!!111!1"
Your shame is complete.
You clearly do not understand that a rocket engine requires no air to operate. It throws propellant out the back at high speed and the transfer of momentum is given to the rest of the spacecraft. Their hybrid engine would work just as well in a vacuum, as all rockets can. Further, it's more efficient to do a continous burn (rather than starting and stopping) because you don't have to carry all the fuel with you as you coast to the "nether region," as you put it.
Take Rocketry 101 and then try again.
I've seen a lot of posts that alternate between "NASA/Gov't sucks and could never do this on such a shoestring budget" and "SpaceShipOne didn't even come close to accomplishing what NASA has done." That's all well and good, but you have to consider a few things...
The truth lies somewhere in the middle.
First off, let's get the technical issues straight. SS1 did not achieve orbit of any sort, and would require MASSIVE modifications to do so. It is not comparable with the Shuttle program or anything larger (lunar missions, planetary missions, etc.). While it does use a pretty slick hybrid engine, it's still a chemical engine at heart, and thus is not this raving new technology that will send us to the stars.
Technical issues aside, let's give credit where credit is due. The most comparable thing that NASA has done is X-15, which was designed for hypersonic research, and still to this very moment holds the suborbital speed record. To be more explicit, X-15 was designed for speed 40 years ago, and SS1 was designed for height. Both now hold their respective records. Further, while the costs were high, let's not compare them without taking into account the real differences here. This page says that X-15 cost about $300 M total, which divides to about $600 k per flight. As of right now, SS1 has had 5 rocket flights for roughly $30 M total, which means that, until they fly some more, SS1 costs $600k per flight, the same as X-15. At best it is on par with NASA, except that NASA did this stuff 40 YEARS ago, without standing on the shoulders of any prior research.
Moreover, it is wrong to denigrate the contributions of the very skilled engineers and very brave test pilots of X-15 just because they were government. They lived and died paving the way for private industry to follow. It would be equally wrong, for example, if something went wrong today and Brian Benni died, for NASA to mock the SS1 team and say "See, stupid private industry, you can't do what we do."
Now, for the flipside, SS1 deserves a LOT of credit for finally picking up the ball and possibly bringing the space industry to private citizens. I imagine a lot of people are doing cost/benefit/risk calculations to see if this business is a worthy venture, and that's good. If a suborbital "big roller coaster" industry develops it'll be good for everyone. (Maybe those darn flat-earthers will finally go away). While NASA's achievements are profoundly great, they do not cascade down in a visible way to everyday people. In this sense, SS1 has succeeded greatly where NASA has failed. Further, if it proves to be profitable, SS1 will have marked the beginning of the suborbital tourism industry.
However, the ORBITAL tourism industry is a BIG difference, and while it might have started us on the path, SS1 has not directly contributed to that in any way (no new technologies regarding propulsion or reentry, etc.) Further and finally, it is important to realize that SS1 is a marketing achievement, not a technological one. If NASA had wanted to start a space tourism industry a long time ago, it could have.
Bottom line, give credit where credit is due (to both SS1 and NASA), and don't denigrate the contributions of either. Both have very brave pilots and skilled engineers, and both are necessary to conquer space travel. You need one side that's willing to forge ahead by dumping money in without regard to expected profits, and you need the other to turn that research into something we can all use. Cheers for both.
Ah. Ok. I should perhaps learn to read then... :-p
My mistake.
As I mentioned in another post - this rocket does not go orbital. It's a completely different beast to go orbital and be reusable. The SS1 design would have to be modified greatly. Further, there is already a carry-and-drop rocket that puts satellites into orbit: it's called Pegasus.
That would be true, if this were an orbital vehicle - it is not. There is a big common misconception about space. People think that once you're in space, gravity stops and you float. This is 100% not true. If I built a supertall tower 100km high and stood on the top of it, I'd weigh only a little bit less than what I weigh now. I'd be able to walk around the platform and everything. If SpaceShipOne came flying up to me, I'd see it come up and then drop back down, just like as if a ball had been thrown from the ground up to me. The gravity-free sensation comes from free-falling, not from just being there. If Mike threw a satellite part out the window at 100km, it would fall back to the Earth just like he did. Getting to orbit and getting to 100km height are two *very* different beasts, and it's important not to make cost comparisons between the two without taking that into account.
It's important to note that currently there is a regulatory void concerning passengers. No passengers are legally allowed on any commercial spacecraft because of this void, and the FAA's Office of Commercial Space does not have the authority to fix regulations to allow it (it's not covered in our statute). Congress would first have to give us authority AND then we would have to write regulations before any passengers could be legally allowed. I'm sure it'll happen sooner or later, but the congressional side of things tends to move slow (they're too concerned with the war and other things to get space stuff on the table).
Again, I must respectfully disagree. However, because this is somewhat offtopic, I will restrict my disagreement to only your first point (concerning evolution), and if you wish to pick up the discussion, we can do so via email. (Unless the /. community doesn't really mind)
Ok. You said:
I agree with you that an organism needs to be designed to their environment to be able to produce the 6 billion bits, but I think you misunderstand evolutionary theory, because that's exactly what it advocates. Evolution is design, not randomness, as it is commonly misunderstood. Mutations and/or adaptations introduce new variants, and the pressures of the environment naturally select (i.e., design) the animal most fit for survival.
Let me give an example that shows how the mathmatics of cryptography do not apply to evolution. The analogy is admittedly oversimplified, so please don't take it beyond the point which I'm trying to make.
Ok. Say you've got 20 quarters - they represent the genes of a certain animal we're going to speed-evolve. Heads are good genes, tails are bad genes. According to probability, if you were to flip all the coins at once, you would have B^N (2^20) different possible combinations (about a million). Likewise, your chances of getting all heads (a.k.a., a designed animal), would be (50%)^20, or 1 in a million. It would take a lot of flips to get that gene combination!
However, that's not the way evolution works! Natural selection takes the "right" genes of a population and passes them on genetically to the next. If we wanted to "evolve" this quarter-gene-species, we would do the following:
You can easily see that it'll only take a few "generations" to get a completely designed gene structure!
That is a simplified analogy to evolution, but it is easily extendable. If you had 6 billion 4-sided dice (A,C,F,G), and you could roll all of them, and then select and pass on the ones that were "right", it wouldn't take you very long to come up with a perfectly constructed 6-billion-bit gene sequence.
As a quick nod to your second point, I believe a better way to reveal oneself would be to not have any contradictions, bad science, absurdities, and cruelty in the same document as the good stuff. And if we were truly designed from the s
1. The "creative intelligence" you speak of could just as easily be the blind process of natural selection. Just add a couple DNA pairs every 50 million years or so and you've got more than enough time to come up with a 6 billion-bit quaternary code, more or less optimized for the present, with a nice long "history of our evolution" message attached to it. This process requires no supernatural forces.
2. Depending on how you define God, it would seem exceedingly unfair for him/her to reveal themself through sub-microscopic code. There are millions of people living today who have no clue what DNA is, and BILLIONS of people who lived in ages past before DNA was even discovered. While the argument you post may hold true for some weird alien race or unthinking/uncaring God, it definately cannot be extended to any worshippable, caring, and fair Creator of sorts, having excluded the vast majority of humanity thus far with the choice of how to deliver the message.
To me, the idea that any kind of supernatural forces are in a dramatic ballet with mankind is the epitome of aristocentrism.