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cosmicfingerprints.com...

  • 31-03-2008 3:08pm
    #1
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭


    Hello all,

    I just came across the above site and found it quite interesting. See the links at the end of the page. I've never been entirely satisfied with evolution/abiogenesis. Perry Marshall argues that DNA is essentially just information and mutation results in a loss of information just like noise in a communications system. I enjoyed it anyway.

    http://www.cosmicfingerprints.com/ifyoucanreadthis.htm

    God bless,
    Noel.


Comments

  • #2
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,420 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Perry Marshall argues that DNA is essentially just information and mutation results in a loss of information just like noise in a communications system.
    This is a common creationist argument, but it is flawed since beneficial mutations have been seen and recorded in nature many times.

    Depending on how you define the terms and ask the question, research indicates that between one in fifty and one in one-hundred-and-fifty mutations are 'beneficial' mutations in some sense.


  • #3
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Perry Marshall argues that DNA is essentially just information and mutation results in a loss of information just like noise in a communications system. I enjoyed it anyway.

    He is wrong, but at least you enjoyed it :)
    Marshall wrote:
    (1) DNA is not merely a molecule with a pattern; it is a code, a language, and an information storage mechanism.
    All of that is true
    Marshall wrote:
    (2) All codes we know the origin of are created by a conscious mind.
    Not true, but even if it was it would be rather irrelevant (see "all swans are white" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability#Na.C3.AFve_falsification)
    Marshall wrote:
    (3) Therefore DNA was designed by a mind, and language and information are proof of the existence of a Superintelligence.
    Doesn't hold because of 2
    Marshall wrote:
    1) Humans designed DNA
    2) Aliens designed DNA
    3) DNA occurred randomly and spontaneously
    4) There must be some undiscovered law of physics that creates information
    5) DNA was Designed by a Superintelligence, i.e. God.
    or

    6) DNA developed through the non-random process of Darwinian biological evolution

    Once again we seem to have a Creationist who doesn't understand how evolution works.
    Marshall wrote:
    Natural Selection is perfectly valid and has been proven time and time again. But most people will be very surprised to discover that no one has ever actually demonstrated that random mutation can create new information.

    Either his knowledge on the subject is 70 years out of date or he is lying here. Mutation can and has been observed to create new information. Creationists sometimes get around this by redefining the term "information", which needless to say isn't that convincing an argument.
    Marshall wrote:
    Random Mutation is exactly the same as noise, and noise always destroys the signal, never enhances it.

    Noise doesn't always destroy the signal, it alters the signal. In communication this means the message is altered, which means the meaning is often changed or lost from its original setting, but that doesn't apply to DNA because DNA isn't a message with meaning.


  • #4
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    Marshall wrote:
    Random Mutation is exactly the same as noise, and noise always destroys the signal, never enhances it.

    This is blatantly untrue.

    Imagine if we were to take a picture and compress it into a common image format known as JPEG. If you look at the JPEG standard, you'll discover that JPEG is a lossy format - it produces an approximation of the original image rather than a perfect replica. Excessive compression (i.e. excessive "lossiness" leads to features such as screen-artefacts, where what should be smooth edges appear blocky etc.

    Marshall is arguing that were we to have such a lossy image, it would be absolutely impossible to get closer to the original, perfect image, simply by randomly changing pixels in the image. We can trivially show this to be false. Imagine if we had a 10x10 pixel image, with each pixel containing one of 10 possible colours. Due to our lossy algorithm, one of those pixels has the wrong colour.

    Now...we introduce sufficient noise to change the colour of one pixel. One of the 100 pixels could be randomly assigned a new colour. Marshall is saying that of these 100 possibilities, it is absolutely imnpossible for a random process to pick the one which results in a net improvement!!! That, in fact, of the 1000 possibilities, only 999 can actually occur.

    I'm sure, were he here, Marshall would ask that we start with the original, perfect picture, and ask that we improve that. This, of course, would be disingenuous, because [pi]neither[/i] the scientific nor the religious standpoint would argue that man - or any other biological entity - is a perfect design, incapable of being improved on.

    Lets take this a bit further....

    Let us assume that we have a way of "grading" pictures...that given an image, we can assign some sort of "fitness" to it. Lets randomly generate a "population" from random noise which we will turn into pictures, and then grade according to our fitness. We can then take that population, and taking data from two "parent" images, we can create a "child" image. Just randomly take a chunk from one parent, and the rest from the other. This is analagous to procreation...lets call it crossover, though, cause we're not dealing with life here.

    So, from any given generation, we can derive a new "child" generation. Lets go mad, and say that for any given generation, the "parents" with a higher fitness are slightly more likely to be picked to generate children. Lets go even madder and allow that for some generations, there is a small chance of a grandparent rather than a parent being involved. Lets play a bit more and say that once every so often, we'll just randomly change a bit of information in a child....flip a 0 to a 1. Lets call that one 'mutation'.

    We now have a process fed entirely by random generation, random crossover-selection, and random mutation. By Marshall's argument, we cannot end up with an increase in fitness. As a mathematician who did his degree on exactly the system I've described above (commonly known as Genetic Algorithms), I can tell you that Marshall is wrong.


  • #5
    Soul Winner
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,534 ✭✭✭Soul Winner


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Hello all,

    I just came across the above site and found it quite interesting. See the links at the end of the page. I've never been entirely satisfied with evolution/abiogenesis. Perry Marshall argues that DNA is essentially just information and mutation results in a loss of information just like noise in a communications system. I enjoyed it anyway.

    http://www.cosmicfingerprints.com/ifyoucanreadthis.htm

    God bless,
    Noel.

    Thanks for the link Noel. Really enjoyed that. Especially his closing remarks.


  • #6
    2Scoops
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,845 ✭✭✭2Scoops


    kelly1 wrote: »
    I've never been entirely satisfied with evolution/abiogenesis.

    Why not? You could try learning a little more about what they involve and reach new levels of satisfaction. Of course, full elucidation may not be available - that is what drives new science! :pac:


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  • #7
    santing
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 671 ✭✭✭santing


    bonkey wrote: »
    This is blatantly untrue.

    Imagine if we were to take a picture ... <<Cut>>
    We now have a process fed entirely by random generation, random crossover-selection, and random mutation. By Marshall's argument, we cannot end up with an increase in fitness. As a mathematician who did his degree on exactly the system I've described above (commonly known as Genetic Algorithms), I can tell you that Marshall is wrong.

    I think it sounds fantastic, but you need a lot of we involvement in your description! It doesn't leave scope for complex changes where say a thosand changes are required before any benefit is seen by the species - and this is the more common requirement!

    Even if this process were supposedly working (which I doubt it will) I think during our observations (i.e. during the last two centuries) have we seen any species that acquired any intelligence, and if so why did we not adjust the first and second law of thermodynamics?


  • #8
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    Wicknight wrote: »
    Originally Posted by Marshall
    (2) All codes we know the origin of are created by a conscious mind.
    Not true, but even if it was it would be rather irrelevant (see "all swans are white" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability#Na.C3.AFve_falsification)
    Why irrelevant? Because there is no proof that codes don't occur naturally?

    Wicknight wrote: »
    6) DNA developed through the non-random process of Darwinian biological evolution

    Once again we seem to have a Creationist who doesn't understand how evolution works.
    Don't we have only theories as to how DNA came about? So why are you so sure that it came through evolution?
    Wicknight wrote: »
    Either his knowledge on the subject is 70 years out of date or he is lying here. Mutation can and has been observed to create new information. Creationists sometimes get around this by redefining the term "information", which needless to say isn't that convincing an argument.
    How does random mutation produce new information? The mutation is random isn't it? Otherwise there would have to be intent behind the changes.
    Wicknight wrote: »
    Noise doesn't always destroy the signal, it alters the signal. In communication this means the message is altered, which means the meaning is often changed or lost from its original setting, but that doesn't apply to DNA because DNA isn't a message with meaning.
    True noise doesn't completely destroy a signal but it always degrades it and causes loss of information. I'm not sure what meaning has to do with it, I'm talking about information.

    BTW, doesn't DNA have built-in error correction making mutation less likely?


  • #9
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    bonkey wrote: »
    This is blatantly untrue.

    Imagine if we were to take a picture and compress it into a common image format known as JPEG. If you look at the JPEG standard, you'll discover that JPEG is a lossy format - it produces an approximation of the original image rather than a perfect replica. Excessive compression (i.e. excessive "lossiness" leads to features such as screen-artefacts, where what should be smooth edges appear blocky etc.

    Marshall is arguing that were we to have such a lossy image, it would be absolutely impossible to get closer to the original, perfect image, simply by randomly changing pixels in the image. We can trivially show this to be false. Imagine if we had a 10x10 pixel image, with each pixel containing one of 10 possible colours. Due to our lossy algorithm, one of those pixels has the wrong colour.

    Now...we introduce sufficient noise to change the colour of one pixel. One of the 100 pixels could be randomly assigned a new colour. Marshall is saying that of these 100 possibilities, it is absolutely imnpossible for a random process to pick the one which results in a net improvement!!! That, in fact, of the 1000 possibilities, only 999 can actually occur.
    Every pixel change produces a loss of information doesn't it? And the more changes you have, the less likely it is that a change will bring you back to the original. Of course it's not impossible but the probability of getting back to the original reduces as more changes are introduced.
    bonkey wrote: »
    I'm sure, were he here, Marshall would ask that we start with the original, perfect picture, and ask that we improve that. This, of course, would be disingenuous, because [pi]neither[/i] the scientific nor the religious standpoint would argue that man - or any other biological entity - is a perfect design, incapable of being improved on.
    What evolutionists seem to be claiming is that random changes filtered by natural selection, change a picture of an antelope into a giraffe.
    bonkey wrote: »
    Let us assume that we have a way of "grading" pictures...that given an image, we can assign some sort of "fitness" to it. Lets randomly generate a "population" from random noise which we will turn into pictures, and then grade according to our fitness. We can then take that population, and taking data from two "parent" images, we can create a "child" image. Just randomly take a chunk from one parent, and the rest from the other. This is analagous to procreation...lets call it crossover, though, cause we're not dealing with life here.
    Sorry, I'm not with you. How do you turn random noise into pictures and what does the grading and what standard does it use?


  • #10
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    santing wrote: »
    I think it sounds fantastic, but you need a lot of we involvement in your description!

    Marshall's comments are to the effect that random noise introducing increases in information is impossible. They do not say that they are only possible in certain systems, created under certain restrictions.

    I've outlined a system where increases in information, caused by random noise is most certainly not impossible. Thus, Marshall is wrong.
    It doesn't leave scope for complex changes where say a thosand changes are required before any benefit is seen by the species - and this is the more common requirement!
    I was addressing the comment that random noise cannot result in an increase of information.

    What you are now retreating to is the argument that even if it can, you don't accept that it can result in enough of an increase.
    Even if this process were supposedly working (which I doubt it will) I think during our observations (i.e. during the last two centuries) have we seen any species that acquired any intelligence,
    I think you do not appreciate the timescales involved.

    Modern man has been around for approximately a half a million years. Thats 2 and a half thousand times the timespan you're talking about.

    Life has been around on earth for an estimated 4.6 billion years. This is 9.2 thousand times longer than modern man has been around, or 23 million times the timeframe that you're talking about.

    So are you really surprised that in 200 years, we haven't seen any massive changes?


  • #11
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    bonkey wrote: »
    I've outlined a system where increases in information, caused by random noise is most certainly not impossible.
    I'm not sure that you have. What increase of information have you demonstrated? Doesn't increased information mean increased complexity?


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  • #12
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Every pixel change produces a loss of information doesn't it?

    Only if you posit that the original encoding is some "perfect" template.

    From such a perspective, the origins of life - the very first sub-cellular complex hydrocarbon or whatever it was - was the "perfect" template. We - human beings - are nothing like, and thus, we represent a loss of information in your terms.

    Of course, how a human being can represent a loss of information from something that is a simplified version of an internal part of something as complex as a cell is beyond me...it's like saying that a brick house represents a loss of information over a grain of sand....even though the glass and bricks all contain sand.
    And the more changes you have, the less likely it is that a change will bring you back to the original.
    But no-one is talking about getting back to "the original".

    Evolution is not a drive towards anything. There is no pre-defined goal that evolution is striving to reach.

    Evolution, if anything, is a drive away from where we started. If it was bringing us back there, it would be devolution.
    Of course it's not impossible but the probability of getting back to the original reduces as more changes are introduced.
    But again...who is talking about getting back to the original? Supporters of evolution certainly aren't.

    Imagine you have a design of something, which does some job imperfectly. Random changes can result in a net improvement at that job. Sufficient changes can even mean that what you have is now suited to an entirely different task then what it was originally an imperfect design for. With multiple different somethings around the place, you may find that two of them somehow connect together, and can perform a new task that neither of the two original somethings were able to. Sure...you get further and further away from what you originally had, but that is what evolution is. This only represents a loss of information if you define information strictly as "what I started with".

    Is that what you undertstand information to be? If you, for example, read a book and learn something new, do you consider that a loss of information, as you now know a different amount of stuff than you did before you started? You've moved away from the sum of knowledge you started with.....so have you lost information?

    If not, then I would suggest that you need to reconsider what you undertstand by gaining or losing information, and how you are applying it to the case of evolution.
    What evolutionists seem to be claiming is that random changes filtered by natural selection, change a picture of an antelope into a giraffe.
    Lets say that you're right, and this is what supporters of evolution are claiming*

    Is the giraffe a more perfect antelope then the antelope was?

    If not, then why have you been talking about "getting further away from the original" as being a reason why the whole random-change-increasing information argument is false?

    In your example, evolution wouldn't have aimed to create a giraffe. Evolution isn't a sentience who decided that an antelope was a badly flawed giraffe, and set about getting "back to the original".
    Sorry, I'm not with you.
    Oh, thats ok. I don't expect everyone to grasp genetic algorithms straight off. Its like expecting people to understand evolution.
    How do you turn random noise into pictures
    Mostly, the "magic" of it all is the fitness algorithm - the method by which you decide which pictures are "better" than others - and how that feeds back into the creation of new generations. The evolutionary parallel is the whole notion of "survival of the fittest"

    You'll find that there are Christians who argue that evolution exists, is real, but is somehow guided by God. These are the Christians who have gone beyond arguing that evolution cannot happen (that noise cannot add information) and accept that it can happen but only in the presence of an appropriate fitness algorithm....which is where they then attribute God's intervention.

    The problem for some/many Christians is that they simply cannot (or will not) accept the implications of evolution being a reality....that we are close relatives to apes, and that we share a common ancestor, and that mankind will continue evolving beyond its current form if we survive as a species, to pick 3 common sore points. So, they require that evolution be false, rather than that evolution be a tool of God.



    * As an aside....do you refer to supporters of evolution as Evolutionists because you genuinely believe it is not based in scientific theory, but is an ideology? Or have you some other reason for using the term? Personally, I find it somewhat insulting, which is why I ask.


  • #13
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,420 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    kelly1 wrote: »
    How does random mutation produce new information? The mutation is random isn't it? Otherwise there would have to be intent behind the changes.
    Two things:

    1. Don't think about DNA in terms of information, as it's a confusing topic and easy to make category errors like this. Instead, imagine a bagful of scrabble letters and you picking out (for example) three letters at a time, randomly. From time to time, you will pick out an three-letter English word.

    2. Things can have the appearance of "intent", without the reality of it. With the example above, you'll have chosen a proper three-letter word without actually "intending" to.


  • #14
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    kelly1 wrote:
    What increase of information have you demonstrated? Doesn't increased information mean increased complexity?
    A few posts ago, you were arguing that because we got further from where we started, we could only be losing information. From this position, its impossible to gain information.

    Now, you're saying that increased information is increased complexity....despite that this, too, is taking you away from where you started.

    I have used genetic algorithms (GAs) to generate Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) to solve problems. The starting ANNs were randomly generated. The changes were randomly generated. I did not define any restrictions on the ANNs at the start of the process. They could be defined with no inputs, no outputs, too many inputs, too many outputs...whatever.

    The result of the experiment was an ANN which was (typically) a close-to-optimal or optimal design for the problem being evaluated.

    I started with randomly generated ANNs which may or may not have been functional, let alone suited to the problem I was dealing with. I ended up with an ANN which was a close-to-optimal or optimal solution for the problem I was dealing with.

    You apparently want me, and others reading here, to believe that this does not represent an increase in information or complexity...that something which doesn't do anything is more complex and contains more information then something which is a highly optimised solution for a specific task.


  • #15
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    OK, let me go off and learn more about evolution and then come back to this debate.


  • #16
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    santing wrote: »
    I think it sounds fantastic, but you need a lot of we involvement in your description! It doesn't leave scope for complex changes where say a thosand changes are required before any benefit is seen by the species - and this is the more common requirement!

    Even if this process were supposedly working (which I doubt it will) I think during our observations (i.e. during the last two centuries) have we seen any species that acquired any intelligence, and if so why did we not adjust the first and second law of thermodynamics?

    What?

    What has the second law of thermodynamics got to do with a species developing intelligence?


  • #17
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Why irrelevant? Because there is no proof that codes don't occur naturally?
    No, because it does not demonstrate that codes do not occur naturally.

    The "All Swans are White" example explains this. If you have only ever seen white swans you can say "All swans I've seen have been white". What is illogical to say is that "All swans are white", because you haven't see all swans, and in fact there are black swans.

    The fact that the author has never seen a naturally occurring code does not demonstrate that codes cannot occur naturally.
    kelly1 wrote: »
    Don't we have only theories as to how DNA came about? So why are you so sure that it came through evolution?

    Because evolution is a well tested theory that can explain how DNA came about. It doesn't mean certainly is how DNA came about, but if you have a good solid working theory it seems rather peculiar to start guessing about other things.
    kelly1 wrote: »
    How does random mutation produce new information? The mutation is random isn't it? Otherwise there would have to be intent behind the changes.
    By producing new parts of the DNA.

    If you have ATAGGA and a mutation produces ATATAGGA, that is new information. That new blue print will be used to do something different from the ATAGGA blue print.
    kelly1 wrote: »
    True noise doesn't completely destroy a signal but it always degrades it
    No it doesn't, as Bonkey demonstrated.
    kelly1 wrote: »
    and causes loss of information. I'm not sure what meaning has to do with it, I'm talking about information.

    Noise only causes loss of information if the information has meaning, ie the arrangement of the information is important to its value.

    For example the sentence

    "I saw a brown hat lying on the ground"

    Introduce noise to the sentence

    "I aaw a brow1 hat ly8ing on the grhund"

    Now if one takes the number of letters as the information held in this sentence as the amount of information then the sentence has exactly the same amount of information as before, it has simply been altered.

    The information is only degraded if the arrangements of letters can only have a limited specific meaning and to maintain the information that arrangement must be maintained.

    DNA doesn't have specific meaning. Any arrangement of the DNA will do something.
    kelly1 wrote: »
    BTW, doesn't DNA have built-in error correction making mutation less likely?

    Sort of.


  • #18
    Soul Winner
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,534 ✭✭✭Soul Winner


    robindch wrote: »
    Two things:

    1. Don't think about DNA in terms of information, as it's a confusing topic and easy to make category errors like this.


    Also discussed here:

    This is what Dr Richard Dawkins himself says at 5 mins 03 secs to 6 mins 25 secs on clip 5/5 in relation to DNA:

    The Blind Watchmaker (unavailable now)
    Professor Richard Dawkins wrote:
    “This is really the subject of this program. A long and very common chemical polymer called DNA. The sequence of molecules in its double spiral, exactly analogues to the binary digits of some computer code. It’s the computer recipe for life itself, unravelling like a reel of magnetic tape on some giant computer. The only truly remarkable thing about it is its immortality, because it can copy itself, and to make sure there are no mistakes it has an error correction mechanism, without it the recipe would be reduced to rubbish. But nothing’s perfect, chance intervenes, mistakes occur and occasionally they are preserved. The recipe is altered, Evolution has begun! All DNA ever needed to do was make perfect copies of itself, left to it’s own devices all that would exist on this planet would be little naked molecules of DNA. We are nothing more than the accumulation of its mistakes, generated randomly and guided by natural selection. Without the blind watch maker, there’d be no chromosomes, no embryos, no eyes, no stick insects, fish, you or me and dinosaurs would never have existed.”

    If Richard Dawkins concedes that DNA was around before biological evolution began then how did this complex ‘computer code’ as he calls it get here with its error correction mechanism and immortality intact? The answers I got in the above thread are nothing more than mere speculation and conjecture.

    robindch wrote: »
    Instead, imagine a bagful of scrabble letters and you picking out (for example) three letters at a time, randomly. From time to time, you will pick out an three-letter English word.

    But not the works of Shakespear. And assuming it could pick out the works of Shakespear, can you explain where the actually letters came from in order that they be available to be picked.


  • #19
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,420 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Soul Winner wrote: »
    DNA was around before biological evolution began then how did this complex ‘computer code’ as he calls it get here with its error correction mechanism and immortality intact?
    Nobody currently knows the answer to this question, though research into abiogenesis is ongoing and may produce an answer at some point in the future. The wiki page on The Origin of Life has more info.

    However, that's unrelated to what Mr. CosmicFingerPrints was claiming, which is -- to continue my analogy -- that it is impossible for somebody picking letters randomly out of a bag to choose letters that can be rearranged to make a word. This is patently false, as I trust you'll agree.


  • #20
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    Soul Winner wrote: »
    If Richard Dawkins concedes that DNA was around before biological evolution began then how did this complex ‘computer code’ as he calls it get here with its error correction mechanism and immortality intact?

    As was explained the first time that quote was mentioned, you are mistaking what Dawkins is saying here.

    Think of it like a Formula 1 race. The race starts when the flag is dropped. But that event is simply the start of this particular race. It wasn't the start of racing in general.

    Evolution starts every time there is a mutation in DNA. Evolution as a large process is like talking about F1 racing as a large process, but it is made up of trillions of start, stop, start, stop, start, stop movements. Evolution begins again every time there is a mutation in DNA, in the same way that racing begins every time the flag is dropped


  • #21
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    Soul Winner wrote: »
    But not the works of Shakespear.
    The point being addressed was that no (useful/coherent) information could be randomly generated.
    Now that you'be been given an example of where (useful/coherent) information can be randomly generated, you've criticised it on the grounds that there's limits to the information which can be generated.

    Thats moving the goalposts....which is fine, as long as you allow that teh argument which says that no information can be generated from random processes is invalid.

    Do you?
    And assuming it could pick out the works of Shakespear, can you explain where the actually letters came from in order that they be available to be picked.
    This is now heading in the direction of what I mentioned earlier...Christians who accept that evolution is the process which led to the creation of man, but who either argue that evolution is somehow "guided", or that at the very least, God is responsible for creating the framework (i.e. the universe) within which evolution operates.

    In terms of evolution being "guided", all science can say is that the process is indistinguishable from one which is not guided. You can choose to believe in this guidance if you like....you just can't show that there's anything which requires it which an unguided process cannot also provide.

    In terms of God having created the universe, and thus the 'framework' within which evolution operates...ultimately this is heading in the "God of the Gaps" direction. No matter how detailed an explanation science can give, there will always be some starting point which the faithful can look at and say "...and God created that".

    To be honest, if we got that far, though, then we'd be far further than we are today. First, we need to get people to agree that evolution is possible, is happening, and is (almost certainly) how we got here.


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  • #22
    santing
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 671 ✭✭✭santing


    Wicknight wrote: »
    What?

    What has the second law of thermodynamics got to do with a species developing intelligence?

    Everything! Second law of thermodynamics: "The entropy of an isolated system not in equilibrium will tend to increase over time, approaching a maximum value at equilibrium." Meaning that if we leave a system on tis own, random mutations will increase chaos (increase equilibrium) rather than information.
    bonkey wrote: »
    Marshall's comments are to the effect that random noise introducing increases in information is impossible. They do not say that they are only possible in certain systems, created under certain restrictions.

    I've outlined a system where increases in information, caused by random noise is most certainly not impossible. Thus, Marshall is wrong.

    I was addressing the comment that random noise cannot result in an increase of information.

    What you are now retreating to is the argument that even if it can, you don't accept that it can result in enough of an increase.

    I think you do not appreciate the timescales involved.

    Modern man has been around for approximately a half a million years. Thats 2 and a half thousand times the timespan you're talking about.

    Life has been around on earth for an estimated 4.6 billion years. This is 9.2 thousand times longer than modern man has been around, or 23 million times the timeframe that you're talking about.

    So are you really surprised that in 200 years, we haven't seen any massive changes?

    Bonkey, yes, I am surprised! Given that we have spend zillions on research on this, with thousands of the best of scientists trying to force the hand of evolution ... it is surprsing it never worked. So are we saying that science insist on something that it hasn't observed yet? (I thought that was called faith - not science!)

    Or quoting one of these scientist "we have studied and manipulated the fruitfly for hundreds of generations. We have exposed it to high doses of radiation, chemicals etc. and created fruitflies with 3 eyes, or no eyes, or no wings or extra wings ... but it always was a mutilated fruitfly. Never another type of fly!"


  • #23
    iUseVi
    Registered Users Posts: 1,435 ✭✭✭iUseVi


    santing wrote: »

    Or quoting one of these scientist "we have studied and manipulated the fruitfly for hundreds of generations. We have exposed it to high doses of radiation, chemicals etc. and created fruitflies with 3 eyes, or no eyes, or no wings or extra wings ... but it always was a mutilated fruitfly. Never another type of fly!"

    Go to any sheep farm during lambing season and look at the lambs born with two heads and the ones born without heads. Also other combinations of extra legs, etc.


  • #24
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,420 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    santing wrote: »
    "The entropy isolated system not in equilibrium will tend to increase over time, approaching a maximum value at equilibrium." Meaning that if we leave a system on tis own, random mutations will increase chaos (increase equilibrium) rather than information.
    It means no such thing -- have you ever studied this in university or are you only familiar with what creationists write on the topic?

    The earth receives energy from the sun, so it is not a closed system. In any case, the Second Law doesn't stop subsystems from going "uphill", in entropic terms, while the overall system goes "downhill".

    And, I'm curious about this. Why do you accept the Second Law while rejecting Evolution. Surely, if you reject science, you should reject both, or at least, not try to use one to "disprove" the other?
    santing wrote: »
    we have studied and manipulated the fruitfly for hundreds of generations. We have exposed it to high doses of radiation, chemicals etc. and created fruitflies with 3 eyes, or no eyes, or no wings or extra wings ... but it always was a mutilated fruitfly. Never another type of fly!"
    I haven't googled to find out who said this, but it's quite false. Fruitflies have evolved a variety of bits and pieces in lab experiments, even as far back, AFAIR, as the 1930's.


  • #25
    PDN
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,686 ✭✭✭✭PDN


    Can anyone suggest to me why this deserves a separate thread and should not be carried on under the existing monster thread devoted to creationism & evolution?


  • #26
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    I haven't looked at the other thread but this discussion is specifically around information and DNA. Science as yet has no real explanation for the origin of DNA and given that it is a code which respresents something other than itself, it's not unlikely that it points to evidence for God at work.


  • #27
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    Just to rephrase an earlier point, nobody has ever discovered a naturally occuring code apart from DNA. Is that a fair point to make?


  • #28
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Just to rephrase an earlier point, nobody has ever discovered a naturally occuring code apart from DNA. Is that a fair point to make?

    You are aware that some forms of life don't have DNA?


  • #29
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    bonkey wrote: »
    You are aware that some forms of life don't have DNA?
    No I wasn't aware of that but it did cross my mind that this could be the case. Could you give me an example/examples? I imagine they must be very primitive.


  • #30
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Just to rephrase an earlier point, nobody has ever discovered a naturally occuring code apart from DNA. Is that a fair point to make?

    Yes loads, in fact your friend has gone to the trouble of compiling a long list

    http://www.cosmicfingerprints.com/naturallyoccurringcode.htm

    which he then, rather unconvincingly, attempts to debunk.

    I like though how he calls everyone "infidels", very professional :pac:


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  • #31
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    santing wrote: »
    So are we saying that science insist on something that it hasn't observed yet?
    Firstly, science doesn't insist on anything.

    Secondly...Gravity has never been observed, only its effects. Are you saying that you do not accept that science has any meaningful to say regarding gravity? Maybe "intelligent falling" is just as valid a concept...maybe God knows where things hsould go, and makes them go there, and it just looks like this thing we've called gravity to us infidels because we refuse to really look at the details?
    (I thought that was called faith - not science!)
    It would seem that your understanding of what science is...is flawed.
    Or quoting one of these scientist "we have studied and manipulated the fruitfly for hundreds of generations. We have exposed it to high doses of radiation, chemicals etc. and created fruitflies with 3 eyes, or no eyes, or no wings or extra wings ... but it always was a mutilated fruitfly. Never another type of fly!"
    Hundreds of generations, eh? Why...that would be the equivalent of tracking a family line back...oh....maybe, say 30,000 years....less than 10% of the time since modern man emerged.

    Of course, with humans, we've had a population of millions growing to billions running parallel in that time, with untold numbers of permutations and combinations of environmental factors.

    How far would we have to go back before we'd have something thats not another type of human? Hmmm...that depends on how you define "type", I guess. I'm going to go wild here, and guess that if presented with one species of fly which evolved from other species of fly, the criticism would be that they're "just different types of fly"....so if presented with one species of hominid that evolved from another, the criticism would be that they're "just different types of hominid", so for humans, we'd be looking at a time period of at least 7 million years (age of the oldest known hominid skeleton) and probably a lot longer.


    But hey...if you want to equate 200 years, with tiny populations, a limited range of evolutionary "pressures" and money to millions of years, vast populations, untold combinations of evolutionary "pressures".....you go right ahead. I predict that while you do so, you will continue to be surprised that the former does not produce the same results as the latter.


  • #32
    PDN
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,686 ✭✭✭✭PDN


    Wicknight wrote: »
    I like though how he calls everyone "infidels", very professional :pac:

    You seem to want to have your cake and eat it. On the A&A Board you argue that faith is not involved in science, but now you take exception to someone who appears to agree with you.
    dictionary.com wrote:
    in·fi·del –noun
    1. Religion.
    a. a person who does not accept a particular faith, esp. Christianity.
    b. (in Christian use) an unbeliever, esp. a Muslim.
    c. (in Muslim use) a person who does not accept the Islamic faith; kaffir.
    2. a person who has no religious faith; unbeliever.
    3. (loosely) a person who disbelieves or doubts a particular theory, belief, creed, etc.; skeptic.
    –adjective
    4. not accepting a particular faith, esp. Christianity or Islam; heathen.
    5. without religious faith.
    6. due to or manifesting unbelief: infidel ideas.
    7. rejecting the Christian religion while accepting no other; not believing in the Bible or any Christian divine revelation.


  • #33
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    PDN wrote: »
    You seem to want to have your cake and eat it. On the A&A Board you argue that faith is not involved in science, but now you take exception to someone who appears to agree with you.

    Please explain how (you think) this guy agrees with me :rolleyes:


  • #34
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    santing wrote: »
    Everything! Second law of thermodynamics: "The entropy of an isolated system not in equilibrium will tend to increase over time, approaching a maximum value at equilibrium." Meaning that if we leave a system on tis own, random mutations will increase chaos (increase equilibrium) rather than information.

    Wow, there isn't any part of that second sentence that actually relates to the first you quoted.

    Firstly, if you had actually read that wikipedia article you quote to under "Entropy" you would know that entropy is the "measure of the unavailability of a system’s energy to do work" It is in the first line, so you have no excuse.

    What the Second Law of Thermodynamic says is that in a closed system energy will change from a usable (can do work) state to an unusable (unable to do work) state. Because of the first law energy in a closed system cannot be created or destroyed. So what happens to the energy that is used up is that it doesn't disappear but is transferred from one state to another as it does work, transferred into a form that is unworkable, and the amount of this unworkable energy is called the entropy.

    This has NOTHING to do with "information", DNA or evolution or anything like that.

    But even if it was (let me repeat, it isn't), the Earth isn't a closed system. We get more than enough external energy from the Sun to fuel all the chemical reactions required for life for billions of years.
    santing wrote: »
    Bonkey, yes, I am surprised! Given that we have spend zillions on research on this, with thousands of the best of scientists trying to force the hand of evolution ... it is surprsing it never worked.

    What is "it" that has never worked?
    santing wrote: »
    So are we saying that science insist on something that it hasn't observed yet? (I thought that was called faith - not science!)
    Evolution, including the dramatic change of a species due to mutation and NS, and including the change from one species to another, has been observed.

    Is that the "it" you are talking about?
    santing wrote: »
    Or quoting one of these scientist "we have studied and manipulated the fruitfly for hundreds of generations. We have exposed it to high doses of radiation, chemicals etc. and created fruitflies with 3 eyes, or no eyes, or no wings or extra wings ... but it always was a mutilated fruitfly. Never another type of fly!"

    Why would they get another type of fly after only hundreds of generations?

    Accumulative mutation resulting in such a set of changes that your finishing fly is a different species to your starting fly would require thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of generations.

    Its like saying we disproved night time by waiting around for 20 minutes at 4.30pm for night to happen, it didn't, so we show night time is a myth :rolleyes:


  • #35
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    kelly1 wrote: »
    No I wasn't aware of that but it did cross my mind that this could be the case. Could you give me an example/examples? I imagine they must be very primitive.

    I'll admit that I was being slightly disingenuous (but only slightly), in that all known lifeforms without DNA have RNA. Ultimately, the same encoding is used in both. Additionally , our definition of what constitutes life requires the existence of DNA or RNA. It would be worth reading up on protobionts, prokaryotes, and eucaryotes, even in something like Wikipedia to see where the distinctions at this level are.

    Your comment about primitivity may be accurate, but I would ask what relevance that has. It strikes me as being the same type of comment that was made earlier regarding the drawing of letters from a scrabble bag not being able to produce the works of Shakespeare, in that its moving the goalposts. We started from someone arguing a position that life is too complex to have evolved without some sort of divine intervention. We've now more-or-less abandoned that, and are discussing whether or not abiogenesis could occur without divine intervention. Its no longer a question of whether or not evolution can occur, but whether or not the mechanism which is essential to evolution could occur naturally.

    The tack being taken is that DNA is simply too complex...and when its pointed out that not all life contains DNA, the response is to suggest that non-DNA-containing life must be primitive! Its almost as though you're lining up the next avenue of retreat...that if it could be shown that primitive, non-DNA-based life is possible, you've got the next "but" all lined up..."but DNA-based life is so much more complex...how can we seriously believe it has the same origins. How did we get from one to the other".

    I'm curious as to whether the entire argument about DNA being the only non-man-made code thus far identified is really relevant. If we can show other codes, what does that establish? If they are less complex, DNA can be argued to be so much more complex that it still couldn't have non-divine origins. If, on the other hand, we show there are more codes of equal or greater complexity...well, then we'll be told that the odds of all of these occurring naturally are so much greater than the odds of one of them occurring naturally, that again it points to the divine.

    It ultimately strikes me as a pointless line of discussion, as the Christian-based perspective is non-falsifiable. Its impossible to prove that something doesn't have a creator....but the Christian-based argument has been carefully built up over time to require just that.

    Now, lest I be misunderstood...I have no problem whatsoever with people holding the position that abiogenesis must have required divine intervention. If and when abiogenesis has a solid scientific model backing it, I expect many of those people to retreat to some precondition for abiogenesis being so precisely tuned that it required divine intervention....just as they've retreated to abiogenesis from evolution. Their position would poerhaps be best described as "God started it", without worrying about where, exactly the "it" lies....because almost every time someone has decided where "it" is, science has eventually shown that "it" isn't there.

    This whole discussion on codes, though, reminded me of something I was reading a while ago. Anyone even vaguely familiar with mathematics (or, indeed, Star Trek: Next Generation) may have heard of Fermat's Last Theorem...a solution for which was finally identified in 1995 by Andrew Wiles, which Fermat wrote about in 1637. Ask yourself this...was Fermat's theorem true before Wiles solved it? Was it true before Fermat wrote about it? The answer is (or should be) unquestionably that yes, it was, although we couldn't show it to be so. Thus...we can ask the same of codes. Do we really invent codes? Or do the codes exist, and we merely happen to discover them? If the latter, than are any codes really man-made?

    That, though, is perhaps a question for the Philosophy forum.


  • #36
    kelly1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    Good post bonkey and thanks for taking the time to write it.

    As I said before my knowledge of evolution is scant. So I'm wondering what is the biggest gap in evolution science? Is it abiogenesis or DNA or something else?


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  • #37
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,420 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    kelly1 wrote: »
    What is the biggest gap in evolution science? Is it abiogenesis or DNA or something else?
    Before I head off for the weekend, for me, the biggest unknowns in the trail from big bang to big mac are:
    1. How planets formed from interstellar dust (the models say that you can get to a certain size without much bother, but run into problems when the average particle size is, AFAIR, around 0.1mm diameter; they're ok again when things get somewhat larger)
    2. How to get from having amino acids (it's known how these can arise naturally) to the self-replicating chemical machinery of DNA (cool, but a complete mystery as to how it arose)
    3. How certain features evolved (esp, self-awareness and language)


  • #38
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    kelly1 wrote: »
    As I said before my knowledge of evolution is scant. So I'm wondering what is the biggest gap in evolution science? Is it abiogenesis or DNA or something else?

    The biggest cap is probably where there is so little direct evidence, in the period approx 4 to 2 billion years ago as life was evolving from very simple self-replicating molecules into simple cell structures.


  • #39
    bonkey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,443 ✭✭✭✭bonkey


    PDN wrote: »
    You seem to want to have your cake and eat it. On the A&A Board you argue that faith is not involved in science, but now you take exception to someone who appears to agree with you.

    I'm not sure the two things are the same.

    To say that faith is not involved in science surely suggests that science is independant of faith, not that it excludes it.

    If someone were to say that the colour of an apple's skin is not involved in its flavour, does this mean that apples with flavour do not have any colour?

    The author of the piece is equating "believe in evolution" with "rejection of faith". Arguably, given the author's particular faith, it may be true that the two are mutually exclusive, but it would equally suggest that any Christian who believes in evolution would also be an infidel in the author's eyes. There are Christians who have posted in this forum saying that they do not see that evolution and Christianity are mutually exclusive. If memory serves, you yourself have made comments to that effect. Would you feel that it is appropriate that a fellow Christian refers to you as an infidel as a result?


  • #40
    PDN
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,686 ✭✭✭✭PDN


    bonkey wrote: »
    I'm not sure the two things are the same.

    To say that faith is not involved in science surely suggests that science is independant of faith, not that it excludes it.

    If someone were to say that the colour of an apple's skin is not involved in its flavour, does this mean that apples with flavour do not have any colour?

    The author of the piece is equating "believe in evolution" with "rejection of faith". Arguably, given the author's particular faith, it may be true that the two are mutually exclusive, but it would equally suggest that any Christian who believes in evolution would also be an infidel in the author's eyes. There are Christians who have posted in this forum saying that they do not see that evolution and Christianity are mutually exclusive. If memory serves, you yourself have made comments to that effect. Would you feel that it is appropriate that a fellow Christian refers to you as an infidel as a result?

    Agreed. Good point & well put.


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