Creationist argument about DNA and information

Son of Inigo · Mar 10, 2016

marplots said:
It's also tough deciding where the choice happens. As far as I know, I was the product of some lucky sperm among millions of competitors. Was I somehow chosen to be here whereas those others weren't?

Very strange when you consider all the babies, of all the different species, being born/hatched every minute of every day.

But if I allow chance to intrude in this single step (among so many other chancy steps) then doesn't the whole recipe fall apart, tainted by the intrusion of random? What an odd sort of design that I am just as good as any other place-holder-person in a game with frequent dice rolls meant to remove the design from the design.

What are we to make of a design that relies on no design at all? Surely the purpose of designing something is to get some preferred outcome rather than a less preferred one. Am I then "preferred?" Very strange.

Can I perhaps recommend some books? I read each of these in the past year. (in the order that I read them)

Why Is Sex Fun?: The Evolution Of Human Sexuality (Science Masters) by Jared Diamond

Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters by Matt Ridley

The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature by Matt Ridley

Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors: A Search for Who We Are by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan

The Selfish Gene: 30th Anniversary edition by Richard Dawkins

All but the Sagan/Druyan one were E-library books. Any decent county library should have them in their ebook collection.

I learned a lot from those books. Recommend them all.

steenkh · Mar 10, 2016

So, on one hand we have the ToE with lots and lots of evidence for it, and on the other hand Danielscience with only sophistry, quote-mining, and logical fallacies on its side.

I know which one I would support. I really wonder why Daniel keeps going when his techniques have exposed so ruthlessly here. Even if he believed in his case at the start, some of the replies here should have made him rethink his position.

Could the case be that he just keeps his mind firmly closed to any ideas not conforming to his closed world view?

I am truly amazed that the lack of traction does not make him stop. He stopped replying to me when I asked him to prove that there is an intelligence behind DNA. It is easy to invent new definitions of "information" and "code", and infer from these definitions that some god must be behind it all. It is far more difficult to get actual evidence to back it up.

MikeG · Mar 10, 2016

Son of Inigo said:
Can I perhaps recommend some books? I read each of these in the past year. (in the order that I read them).........

Have a little look at the Seven Daughters of Eve by Prof Bryan Sykes, too......but the classic, for my money anyway, is River out of Eden by Richard Dawkins. The latter is so simply written, and so deeply thoughtful, that I have never known anyone who didn't find it quite profound.

Perpetual Student · Mar 10, 2016

Shalamar said:
STILL doing fallacies from Ignorance and Incredulity? Because that is your entire post.

After dozens of pages, Daniel has offered nothing more than personal incredulity and personal ignorance. He has not attempted to engage in a honest discourse with anyone here. You cannot find a singe example of an honest exchange with all the people that have engaged him in these threads.
Evolution? What evolution?
Selection? What selection?
Genes?What genes?
Information? What information?

MY offering:

GOD? WHAT GOD?

Son of Inigo · Mar 10, 2016

MikeG said:
Have a little look at the Seven Daughters of Eve by Prof Bryan Sykes, too......but the classic, for my money anyway, is River out of Eden by Richard Dawkins. The latter is so simply written, and so deeply thoughtful, that I have never known anyone who didn't find it quite profound.

Thank you for those recommendations! I will keep an eye out for both of them.

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel: A delusion that abiogenesis is an "INVALID Scientific Inquiry"

Daniel said:
1. You can't have a "Scientific" Theory for an Unobserved Past Event sir, ..

1. That is abysmally ignorant, sir.
There is a theory that the Sun rises every morning supported by the observed orbits. No human beings witnessed the rising of the Sun on 1 January 10,000,00 BCE. However no one would be stupid enough to state that the Sun did not rise that morning. No one would be deluded enough to state that the Sun only rose ever since human beings were around to observe it rising :jaw-dropp

!
Where did not Moon come from, sir?
How did the Solar System form, sir?
What happened to the dinosaurs, sir?
How were the Giza pyramids built, sir?
A cell divided in my body yesterday and no one observed it - how did that happen, sir?

2. Begging the question for what - the hundredth time

!
There good scientific theories about how Functional Proteins formed that do not need an stupid, lying designer (look at the design!).

11 March 2016 Daniel: A delusion that abiogenesis is an "INVALID Scientific Inquiry" - we observe that abiogenesis happened and try to explain it :jaw-dropp

!
10 March 2016 Daniel: Please cite the scientific literature that shows that RNA Polymerase has a mind that KNOWS facts

.

Sideroxylon · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel said:
If the ancestry is not assumed from similarities, then there is no correlation between similarities and ancestry; ergo, to make the argument you need to make that "assumption".

All you have is a TEXTBOOK.....Affirming The Consequent (Formal Fallacy)--- http://www.logicalfa...the-consequent/

If P then Q.
Q.
Therefore P.

The logical fallacy is that P doesn't necessarily follow from Q.

1. IF Evolution is true: Then Insert any "Darwinian Grab-Bag" Post Hoc Observations (Fossils/Homology/Similarity/Genetic Variation et al)
2. We observe (Post Hoc Observation)
3. Therefore, Evolution is true.

Or

If Common Ancestry is True we will Observe Similarities.
We Observe Similarities.
Therefore, Common Ancestry is True.

1) If I had just eaten a whole pizza, I would feel very full;
2) I feel very full;
3.) Therefore: I have just eaten a whole pizza.

Couldn't I have eaten a 20 ounce Ribeye with Fries?

The "Licence" to "Speculate" has be revoked due to it's Fallacious character.

regards

Many people people looking at relationships between living creatures pondered about common ancestry. Particularly of interest was the nested hierarchies of forms we see when you start to catagorise the organisms. These are things noticed by pagans, Muslims and Chrisitians making inductive hypotheses.

Variation in offspring is an observed fact. We don't observe completely random creatures spawn from the parents. It is a fair induction to think that domestic dogs, coyotes, dingos and wolves have a common ancestor. And indeed the Bible talks of kinds.

Do you believe all dogs have a common ancestor? How many representatives of the genus canidae got off the ark in the Middle East and repopulated the earth?

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel: A creationist lie that evidence for common ancestry assumes common ancestry

Daniel said:
If the ancestry is not assumed from similarities, then there is no correlation between similarities and ancestry; ergo, to make the argument you need to make that "assumption".

Creationists may lie about making that assumption, Daniel, but once again biologists do not make that assumption :jaw-dropp

!
11 March 2016 Daniel: It is a creationist lie that evidence for common ancestry assumes common ancestry so do not repeat it.

Instead read and learn about the science:29+ Evidences for Macroevolution The Scientific Case for Common Descent

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel: Learn what natural selection is before making up fairy stories

Daniel said:
Natural Selection, eh?? Is a Contradiction in Terms. To be able to "SELECT" you must have the ability to REASON; Sentience and Intelligence...is "Nature" Alive??

Ignorance and begging the question, Daniel.
11 March 2016 Daniel: Learn what natural selection is before making up fairy stories
Natural selection is the selection of the "fittest" for an environment without any fantasies about aliens or goblins doing the selections

!

An example for other people:
There exists an island that has a variety of vegetation with seeds of various hardness. The vegetation tends to have a lot of soft seeds. On this island there are birds that eat the seeds. We will call them finches. Observations show that the beak strength of the finches vary (chicks are not clones of their parents!).
Let there be a climate change so that the vegetation now tends to have a lot of hard seeds. Natural selection is the less likelihood of finches with weak beak strength to breed because they do not get as much food as other birds.
If there is climate change back to B]soft[/B] seeds then there is natural selection for weaker beak strength (less obvious since this is more about the cost of growing strong beaks).

Sideroxylon · Mar 10, 2016

Personally I don't care what you call attempts to understand the past by looking at remaining evidence, effects of current phenomena in the field and in the lab. Whether you give it the lofty title of science or not it is just plain useful.

You walk outside of the cinema and find the ground is wet you may induce rain. Murders are solved, causes of disasters uncovered, ancient ruins explored and the mundane understood daily by such simple induction.

Watch a few episodes of Air Accident Investigation to see how we can come up with reliable ideas about the unobserved past. Direct observations of a wide range of phenomena inform the first hypotheses about the acident. Did the plane breakup in the air or before impacting with the ground? What was the angle and speed of the impact? Were the engines operating? What flight control surfaces were active? There are so many simple and reliable inductions that can be made. Various hypotheses are floated and eliminated or confirmed by observation of the evidence. You want lab experiments... Look at the Comet crash mystery.

Daniel · Mar 10, 2016

steenkh said:
So, on one hand we have the ToE

Where...?

Please post the "Scientific" Version 'Officially'...?

I am truly amazed that the lack of traction does not make him stop. He stopped replying to me when I asked him to prove that there is an intelligence behind DNA.

Yes, it's tantamount to proving the Declaration of Independence was Intelligently Designed and not wickered together by: Wind/Waves/Erosion/Gravity.

It is easy to invent new definitions of "information" and "code"

Norbert Wiener Professor Mathematics MIT...

“Information is information, neither matter nor energy.”
Wiener, N., Cybernetics, or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine, Hermann et Cie, The Technology Press, Paris, 1948.

CODES:
"We repeatedly consider the following scenario: a sender (say, A) wants to communicate or transmit some information to a receiver (say, B). The information to be transmitted is an element from some set X . It will be communicated by sending a
binary string, called the message. When B receives the message, he can decode it again and (hopefully) reconstruct the element of X that was sent. To achieve this, A and B NEED TO AGREE on a code or description method BEFORE communicating." {emphasis mine]
Grunwald, P., Vitanyi, P ; Algorithmic Information Theory; p. 10, 14 Sept 2005
http://www.illc.uva.nl/HPI/Algorithmic_Complexity.pdf

and infer from these definitions that some god must be behind it all. It is far more difficult to get actual evidence to back it up.

Yes when you walk into a restaurant, open up the Menu and read "Peking Duck with Roasted Garlic $28.95" ---- INFORMATION; then conclude, that until you see the Specific Intelligent Agent that wrote it.... that there's an Equal Chance that the Ink/Paper/Glue Molecules that make up the menu are responsible for the: Construction, Arrangement of the Letters, and the Message Thereof !!!!! for cryin out loud. * This is the ENTIRE Foundation of your World-View, for goodness sakes.

DNA contains INFORMATION: Algorithms "Programs" within "Programs" in Sub-Folders of "Programs". It has enough Functionally Specific Complex Information (1/1000th of which would make Einstein Blush) in a teaspoon to fill a stack of Books from here to the Moon 500 Times!!! Your conclusion: Absent the Specific Intelligent Agent...... Ribose, Nucleo-Bases, and Activated Phosphates (The Ink/Paper/Glue Molecules) wrote The "Programs".....Genetic CODE !!!!!

regards

Peregrinus · Mar 10, 2016

Deduction, not induction.

Daniel · Mar 10, 2016

Sideroxylon said:
Personally I don't care what you call attempts to understand the past by looking at remaining evidence

Just don't call it "Science". mmm K?

You walk outside of the cinema and find the ground is wet you may induce rain. Murders are solved, causes of disasters uncovered, ancient ruins explored and the mundane understood daily by such simple induction.

They're not Science either.

Watch a few episodes of Air Accident Investigation to see how we can come up with reliable ideas about the unobserved past.

"No phenomenon is a phenomenon unless it is an observed phenomenon."
Niels Bohr (Nobel Prize, Physics), as quoted in; Science and Ultimate Reality. Quantum Theory, Cosmology and Complexity: Cambridge University Press, p. 209

Perhaps you (and many, many others) are in the wrong forum, try: Political "science", Myths, Cake Decorating, Who's Favorite Color is the Best threads et al.

regards

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel: William Provine is a historian complaining about language and creationists

Daniel said:
"NATURAL SELECTION DOES NOTHING...Having"

Hint of a creationist lie by quote mining with those "..." but The Origin of Theoretical Population Genetics (University of Chicago Press, 1971), reissued in 2001 by William Provine:

Natural selection does not act on anything, nor does it select (for or against), force, maximize, create, modify, shape, operate, drive, favor, maintain, push, or adjust. Natural selection does nothing….Having natural selection select is nifty because it excuses the necessity of talking about the actual causation of natural selection. Such talk was excusable for Charles Darwin, but inexcusable for evolutionists now. Creationists have discovered our empty “natural selection” language, and the “actions” of natural selection make huge, vulnerable targets. (pp. 199-200)

William Provine

William Ball "Will" Provine (February 19, 1942 – September 1, 2015) was an American historian of science and of evolutionary biology and population genetics.

(my emphasis added)
This is a historian complaining about language of an existing natural selection :jaw-dropp

!
11 March 2016 Daniel: William Provine is a historian complaining about the language used about natural selection and the corruption of it by creationists.

turingtest · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel said:
Just don't call it "Science". mmm K?

They're not Science either.

"No phenomenon is a phenomenon unless it is an observed phenomenon."Niels Bohr (Nobel Prize, Physics), as quoted in; Science and Ultimate Reality. Quantum Theory, Cosmology and Complexity: Cambridge University Press, p. 209

Perhaps you (and many, many others) are in the wrong forum, try: Political "science", Myths, Cake Decorating, Who's Favorite Color is the Best threads et al.

regards

Well,there goes god then, eh? And, no- I know you want to blather on about DNA, etc., being only ever, ever, ever sourced by an intelligent agency you label god; but that's only effects you're ascribing to one, not a direct observation of it. Our advantage is that we see these effects and call them "nature," the way things work inseparable from the way things are, and don't need any more than WYSIWYG. You, OTOH, need more- you need your deity to be observable on his own, separate from the effect. So...don't call what you're doing "science," mmmmkay? Try Religion and Philosophy, that's the proper place for fanfic that explains nothing but the fiction.

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel: An irrelevant without merit Provine quote from a conference presentation

Daniel said:
"Natural selection does not shape an adaptation or cause a gene to spread over a population or really do anything at all. It is instead the result of specific causes: hereditary changes, developmental causes, ecological causes, and demography. Natural Selection is the result of these causes, not a cause that is by itself. It is not a mechanism."
Shermer, M., The Woodstock of Evolution (The World Summit on Evolution); Scientific American, 27 June 2005

A lie by quote mining, Daniel.
This is Provine stating an opinion and what you cut out is the response to the opinion:
Michael Shermer quotes William Provine from a 2005 conference.
Woodstock of Evolution

Since this is all beyond my pay scale, and since no one challenged him or even had a question in the discussion session, I privately canvassed the evolutionary theorists present for their opinion. With the exception of Lynn Margulis — who said she thinks that Provine is basically right even if he doesn’t communicate it clearly — no one else present thought that there was any merit to Provine’s challenges to modern evolutionary theory.

11 March 2016 Daniel: An irrelevant "without merit" Provine quote from a 2005 conference presentation!

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel said:
Where...?

An abysmally ignorant question, Daniel, since you have been pointed to sources on the ToE many times. But then we have:
4 March 2016 Daniel: It is a lie to state that the scientific theory of evolution does not exist since textbooks on TOE exist, etc.!

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel said:
There isn't a Scientific Theory of evolution;

4 March 2016 Daniel: It is a lie to state that the scientific theory of evolution does not exist since textbooks on TOE exist, etc.!

Reality Check · Mar 10, 2016

MikeG said:
You can say this until you are blue in the face Daniel. You only make yourself look silly.

It looks like Daniel has an increasing number of people on ignore so maybe someone can quote this so that he can appreciate how long he has held his breath just in tis thread

!
4 March 2016 Daniel: It is a lie to state that the scientific theory of evolution does not exist since textbooks on TOE exist, etc.!
A week and he is still in denial of Darwin's On The Origin Of Species, etc. !

Son of Inigo · Mar 10, 2016

Daniel said:
Just don't call it "Science". mmm K?

They're not Science either.

"No phenomenon is a phenomenon unless it is an observed phenomenon."
Niels Bohr (Nobel Prize, Physics), as quoted in; Science and Ultimate Reality. Quantum Theory, Cosmology and Complexity: Cambridge University Press, p. 209

Perhaps you (and many, many others) are in the wrong forum, try: Political "science", Myths, Cake Decorating, Who's Favorite Color is the Best threads et al.

regards

Lets read the Niels Bohr quote in context: from further up the page

https://books.google.com/books?id=K_OfC0Pte_8C&q=209#v=snippet&q=209&f=false

In any case this experiment, besides being a manifestation of Wheeler's delayed-choice proposal, can also be viewed as supporting Niels Bohr's famous dictum, "No phenomenon is a phenomenon unless it is an observed phenomenon". Here it means that we are not allowed to talk about photon 2 as a particle or as a wave, even at a time when it has been registered already, unless the respective experiment has actually been carried out by also registering photon 1.

So the quote by Niels Bohr was being used by someone else, to illustrate that both particles had to be registered for either of them to be observed.

Niels Bohr did not contribute to the book in question. He is only quoted in it.

Here are the editors, and all contributors to the book:

EDITORS:John D. Barrow, University of CambridgePaul C. W. Davies, Macquarie University, SydneyCharles L. Harper, Jr, John Templeton FoundationPaul C. W. Davies, Jaroslav Pelikan, Lucien Hardy, Freeman J. Dyson, David Deutsch, H. Dieter Zeh, Wojciech H. Zurek, Juan Pablo Paz, Juan M. Maldacena, Bryce S. DeWitt, Anton Zeilinger, Aephraim M. Steinberg, Raymond Y. Chiao, Serge Haroche, Paul G. Kwiat, Berthold-Georg Englert, Hideo Mabuchi, Christopher R. Monroe, Andreas Albrecht, John D. Barrow, Andrei Linde, Max Tegmark, Lee Smolin, Joao Magueijo, Fotini G. Markopoulou, Lisa Randall, Philip D. Clayton, George F. R. Ellis, Marcelo Gleiser, Stuart A. Kauffman, Shou-Cheng Zhang

http://www.cambridge.org/us/academi...y-and-complexity?format=HB&isbn=9780521831130

Here is who the John Templeton Foundation is:

The John Templeton Foundation serves as a philanthropic catalyst for discoveries relating to the Big Questions of human purpose and ultimate reality. We support research on subjects ranging from complexity, evolution, and infinity to creativity, forgiveness, love, and free will. We encourage civil, informed dialogue among scientists, philosophers, and theologians and between such experts and the public at large, for the purposes of definitional clarity and new insights.

Our vision is derived from the late Sir John Templeton's optimism about the possibility of acquiring “new spiritual information” and from his commitment to rigorous scientific research and related scholarship. The Foundation's motto, "How little we know, how eager to learn," exemplifies our support for open-minded inquiry and our hope for advancing human progress through breakthrough discoveries.

Quite a quote mine you got there. What does a decent dump truck run a mine owner now days?

I will look up the context of that exact Niels Bohr quote later.

Creationist argument about DNA and information

Thinker

Philosopher

Now. Do it now.

Illuminator

Thinker

Penultimate Amazing

Featherless biped

Penultimate Amazing

Penultimate Amazing

Featherless biped

Muse

Graduate Poster

Muse

Penultimate Amazing

Mistral, mistral wind...

Penultimate Amazing

Penultimate Amazing

Penultimate Amazing

Penultimate Amazing

Thinker