Annoying creationists

[Dr Adequate]

G=1000, mutation rate = 1 mutation per 1000 bases per generation, gamma = 16, binding site width = 6:
Population \ generation for convergence
2 \ failed to converge
4 , 66547
8 , 15916
16 , 17257
32 , 16416
64 , 9082
128 , 9378
256 , 4078
512 , 3685
1024 , 2793
2048 , 2080
4096 , 2565
6000 , 1541
8192 , 1798
16384 , 1001
32768 , 743
65536 , 633
131072 , 483
262144 , 702
524288 , 642
1048576 , 438

ev demonstrates decreasing rates of convergence with increasing population.

No comment is necessary.



Joobz, add this one to your list, it's priceless.

 

[Dr Adequate]

PLUS, I have a wicked fondness for provoking the hubris-encumbered. I know it isn't nice--but damn they are so cute when they get all sanctimonious, don't you think?

I guess that's why I still look at this thread now and then.

He's mostly a bore, 'cos he keeps reciting the same lies over and over, but when he comes out with a new lie, his self-righteous self-importance does make it funny.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

No comment is necessary.

I'll comment anyway, just to recap. Here is the data I've collected, which includes multiple experiments at p=4096 and above. The last three points are Kleinman's.

genome size 1024
16 sites
1 mutation per genome

population, generations
4, 95600
8, 43400
16, 22000
32, 14800
64, 18000
128, 4400
256, 4000
512, 3900
1024, 2700
2048, 1800
4096, 1770
8192, 1641
16384, 1144
23100, 1275
32768, 1288
46200, 1709
65536, 922
92680, 718
110000, 856
262000, 702
524000, 642
1048000, 438

Taken all together, the data fits 57686p^-.37. Starting with p=1024, it fits 13173p^-.24. Starting with p=8192, it fits 18595p^-.26. Starting with p=32768, it fits 31572p^-.31. Starting with p=110000, it fits 13072p^-.24.

So there doesn't appear to be a decreasing rate of convergence after p=1024. I'll see if the faster rate at the low population end is due to the lack of multiple experiments.

Edited to add: Starting with p=64, it fits 25793p^-.30. The faster decline in rate occurs only in the smallest populations.

~~ Paul

 

[John Hewitt]

I'm claiming credit for anything that was investigated scientifically, whether by rabid atheists or religious zealots. And the point is precisely that it doesn't matter what sort of arrogant ass Galileo might have been. Science is about process and long-term understanding, about many people working on the same problems, not about individual personalities. This goes a long way to washing out faith, although it doesn't preclude lots of mistakes along the way.

I agree with you that science should be about process and debate but my point is that it isn't. What one sees is people taking sides and saying "my side, right or wrong."

Surely you're not suggesting I do that experiment in this thread?

~~ Paul

Yes, I am absolutely suggesting that you read some of these postings as if you hadn't made up your mind on the issue. It would be a worthwhile exercise anyway and might be something to do in your role as moderator.

For example, I know of no evidence that would or could possibly justify calling one member of this thread "a half-witted sociopath." My theory, right or wrong, and it does not matter what I do to the other side.

It seems to me that this line of thought might lead, ultimately, to the building of additional facilities in Guantanamo Bay.

 

[John Hewitt]

If you want to know what is true and what works--you go for the evidence.

I do, and the evidence is that scientific knowledge is socially constructed.

Where did you get your above claim. Perhaps you and Interesting Ian share a common source. Or maybe your intelligent designer let you in on a little secret than isn't supported by evidence.

No I get it from observational reports, try for example, Mitroff, "The Subjective Side of Science." [/quote]

Faith is not particularly amenable to reason because the faithful believe that "believing" itself is something noble or good. Science doesn't really work by playing that game--it's just, well useless, extremely prone to error and confirmation bias and absolutely centers around concepts that can not be distinguished from the imaginary or delusional.

I don't advocate faith but I do advocate replying to the other side. Some postings on this thread have done so (including those by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos) but I do not think that is true of the field as a whole. The social posturing of leading "evolutionary theorists" is to refuse to share a platform with the creationists who disagree with them.

In other words they, quite as much their opponents, are intent on socially constructing this part of science.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I agree with you that science should be about process and debate but my point is that it isn't. What one sees is people taking sides and saying "my side, right or wrong."

But my point is that it doesn't matter if individuals do that, because the process will wash it out in the long run. The same cannot be said for faith-based initiatives, because there is no process.

For example, I know of no evidence that would or could possibly justify calling one member of this thread "a half-witted sociopath." My theory, right or wrong, and it does not matter what I do to the other side.

And Kleinman is doing precisely the same thing. So when I review the thread, I will wash out the name-calling and come to the same conclusion, based on the facts of the matter.

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I don't advocate faith but I do advocate replying to the other side. Some postings on this thread have done so (including those by Paul C. Anagnostopoulos) but I do not think that is true of the field as a whole. The social posturing of leading "evolutionary theorists" is to refuse to share a platform with the creationists who disagree with them.

In other words they, quite as much their opponents, are intent on socially constructing this part of science.

I guess we have a different definition of social construction. You appear to think that social interactions between scientists and nonscientists constitute social construction of science.

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Here are a couple of clues about what is going on with the small populations in the above experiment.

A population of 2 never converges.

I watched the convergence of population 4. The number of mistakes decreases for awhile, then jumps back up a bit, then decreases, and so on, eventually reaching 0.

My guess is that very low populations don't sustain enough genetic diversity to allow smooth convergence. So increases in population at low population counts make a big difference.

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Interesting commentary about formal debates with creationists:

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/274/5295/1993b

Paul R. Gross (Letters, 6 Sept., p. 1321), Michael J. Erpino (Letters, 8 Nov., p. 904), and David Edge (Letters, 8 Nov., p. 904) all take issue with my position against formal debates with creationists. I find the "duty to defend science" argument pales next to that of "above all else, do no harm."

Our goal in such debates is quite different from creationists' goal to inspire their adherents to proselytize teachers about how evolution is a "theory in crisis" and how it would be great if we could introduce this new "science" of creationism into our schools. More people will come to a debate than to a lecture in a church basement so, of course, creationists will try to get a scientist to oppose them. After the debate, citizens influenced by the creationist position proceed to write letters to the editor, talk to their kids' teachers, and so forth. This intimidates many teachers, who then may be tempted to "skip evolution this year." Hardly our side's goal.

My position is not to ignore creation science, but to confront these ideas in the proper forum, which is not a formal debate.

I have had many productive exchanges with creationists on radio, television, or panels, where it is possible to stop my opponent and correct errors before they pile up uncontrollably. This accomplishes Erpino's goal of educating the general public in science and evolution, but a formal debate does not. The vast, vast majority of formal debates decrease public support for evolution, which discourages teachers from teaching it. I suggest that we put our egos aside and, above else, do no harm.


Eugenie C. Scott
Executive Director,
National Center for Science Education

~~ Paul

 

[Mr. Scott]

Why did The Designer design life?

Dr. Kleinman, do you believe that an intelligent creator designed the AIDS virus to punish homosexuals?

No.

Dr. Kleinman, you've said you believe in the Bible, and I understand believers in the Bible believe it answers all the big questions.

My question is, why did God design life? Why did He design the AIDS virus, the tube worms surrounding the underwater volcanic vents, the apes that look just like relatives of humans, the hippos that now look like relatives of whales, and the mudskipper fish that walk on all fours on land? If the answer is in the Bible, please cite chapter and verse. I will read it.

Thanks!

 

[kleinman]

Annoying Creationists

Unfortunately, the fact is that scientific debate tends to be far from the dispassionate model you seem to be claiming here. You may believe that faith is a mindless act of self-deception and immune to reason but that describes science almost as well as it does religion.

That is a common belief of the faithful, but it's untrue. We don't fly on airplanes built on faith--we don't go to doctors whose medicine is based on faith …

You obviously have no experience with the placebo and nocebo effect. Why do you think medical research studies are double blinded?

No comment is necessary.

I'll comment anyway, just to recap. Here is the data I've collected, which includes multiple experiments at p=4096 and above. The last three points are Kleinman's.

Surprise me; produce some data from ev that contradicts my assertions. Make any progress on the p=2 meg case?

I'm claiming credit for anything that was investigated scientifically, whether by rabid atheists or religious zealots. And the point is precisely that it doesn't matter what sort of arrogant ass Galileo might have been. Science is about process and long-term understanding, about many people working on the same problems, not about individual personalities. This goes a long way to washing out faith, although it doesn't preclude lots of mistakes along the way.

I agree with you that science should be about process and debate but my point is that it isn't. What one sees is people taking sides and saying "my side, right or wrong."

Paul, you never investigated ev before I raised these issues. You saw something that fit in with your belief system and took it on face value. You did not bother to run the numbers or as you have put it “attend to the details” with ev and now you find yourself trying to defend Dr Schneider’s speculations. Paul, you have your own set of beliefs and doctrines and try to cloak them with the title “science”. You and the other evolutionarians who post on this forum are proving yourselves to be pseudo-intellectual snobs who have gotten so used to bullying anyone who doesn’t agree with you that you have lost the ability to do good scientific research. I’m not afraid of your bullying; I will continue to shove the data from your own computer program right in to your face which shows how foolish your theory is. Let scatequate throw whatever he finds in his diaper. I will not stop until you acknowledge what your computer program shows.

My question is, why did God design life? Why did He design the AIDS virus, the tube worms surrounding the underwater volcanic vents, the apes that look just like relatives of humans, the hippos that now look like relatives of whales, and the mudskipper fish that walk on all fours on land? If the answer is in the Bible, please cite chapter and verse. I will read it.

Why not ask; why did God design gravity because of it we can fall? If you want a biblical answer to your first question, try John 3:16. For the rest of your questions, read the Bible yourself and seek your answers.

 

[fishbob]

I agree with you that science should be about process and debate but my point is that it isn't. What one sees is people taking sides and saying "my side, right or wrong."

Sometimes, but the process of science works in spite of that, not because of it.

 

[fishbob]

You obviously have no experience with the placebo and nocebo effect. Why do you think medical research studies are double blinded?

To evaluate actual effectiveness of treatments.
You obviously have no experience separating fact from wackazoolian nonsense.

 

[joobz]

To evaluate actual effectiveness of treatments.
You obviously have no experience separating fact from wackazoolian nonsense.

I have a new word to add to my insultilexicon wackazoolian! great word!

 

[kleinman]

Annoying Creationists

You obviously have no experience with the placebo and nocebo effect. Why do you think medical research studies are double blinded?

To evaluate actual effectiveness of treatments.

You obviously have no experience separating fact from wackazoolian nonsense.

That’s the point of doing a double blind study. For example, you want to test the effectiveness of a new antidepressant and you do it with a double blind study. However you find that the placebo has helped some of the participants. Was the placebo effective?

I do have experience separating fact from wackazoolian nonsense, that is what I am doing with the ev computer model. I post the data from the model and evolutionarians say that I am abusing the model because I am using realistic input parameters. If you look back at all of my posts, not once have I had to use censorship to make my case. This is how weak your case has become.

Again, I tell you the gooey soft theory of evolution started out without a mathematical basis and remains that way. When evolutionarians try to apply mathematics to the theory, it contradicts the theory. The auditors are looking at the evolutionarian books and they don’t balance. Yes fishbbob, I am getting it both ways.

By the way, congratulations, you have added a word to joozb vast grammatically challenged vocabulary. To bad joozb can’t tell us how ribose was formed in the primordial world, I guess he is spending his time turning lead into gold.

 

[Mr. Scott]

Our Loving Intelligent Designer

Why not ask; why did God design gravity because of it we can fall? If you want a biblical answer to your first question, try John 3:16. For the rest of your questions, read the Bible yourself and seek your answers.

I'm not asking about gravity because this thread is a discussion about evolution.

By citing John 3:16* you seem to be saying that God designed life because he loved the world. If you please, characterize His love just before He designed life, and describe the lifeless world He loved so much that He designed life for it.

The time-honored evasion "read it yourself" says to me you have no idea what the Bible has to say in answer to any of my other questions about life on Earth. God loved the world so much that He designed AIDS and the myriad other parasites that torment the innocent? Doesn't sound like love to me.

You claim to be an intellectual, but your thinking is child-like. I've noticed that people who were taught religious dogma as tiny children still think about religion, as grown adults, like tiny children, though they may have mature intelligence in most other matters. Have you considered examining the Bible from an adult, intellectual perspective, the way you think about civil engineering projects, or modern medicine?

* "For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." - John 3:16

PS: Here's another question I hope the Bible answers: Why did God create dinosaurs? Why, later, flying dinosaurs? Why, still later, flying dinosaurs with feathers? Why today's birds, for which all the physical evidence points to their being descended from dinosaurs (clickable photo of dino-bird fossil below for article)? Why did God do these things?

 

[kleinman]

Annoying Creationists

Why not ask; why did God design gravity because of it we can fall? If you want a biblical answer to your first question, try John 3:16. For the rest of your questions, read the Bible yourself and seek your answers.

I'm not asking about gravity because this thread is a discussion about evolution.

Then why did you ask the following?

Why did He design the AIDS virus …

Is that a question about evolution?

By citing John 3:16* you seem to be saying that God designed life because he loved the world. If you please, characterize His love just before He designed life, and describe the lifeless world He loved so much that He designed life for it.

God’s love is eternal and unchanging. It is the same now as it was before He created the world.

The time-honored evasion "read it yourself" says to me you have no idea what the Bible has to say in answer to any of my other questions about life on Earth. God loved the world so much that He designed AIDS and the myriad other parasites that torment the innocent? Doesn't sound like love to me.

Is this why you believe in the theory of evolution? You think if God were truly loving there would be no suffering in this world?

You claim to be an intellectual, but your thinking is child-like. I've noticed that people who were taught religious dogma as tiny children still think about religion, as grown adults, like tiny children, though they may have mature intelligence in most other matters. Have you considered examining the Bible from an adult, intellectual perspective, the way you think about civil engineering projects, or modern medicine?

I don’t recall ever claiming to be an intellectual. The only thing I have claimed (aside from my academic credentials) is that I am the annoying creationist. I do examine the Bible from an adult perspective. It is by far the most important book ever written. I am not doing this as an evasion, read the book and find out why it is so important.

PS: Here's another question I hope the Bible answers: Why did God create dinosaurs? Why, later, flying dinosaurs? Why, still later, flying dinosaurs with feathers? Why today's birds, for which all the physical evidence points to their being descended from dinosaurs (clickable photo of dino-bird fossil below for article)? Why did God do these things?

The Bible does have reference to creatures such as leviathan and behemoth but I don’t think you will get the kind of answers for these questions you are looking for from the Bible. You need to understand that the creation story occupies 2 chapters in the book of Genesis while the story of Joseph takes about 14 chapters in that book. Your priorities and God’s priorities do not seem to coincide.

There are many creatures that have gone extinct. The issues I have raised here about the ev program is that your contention that these creatures are evolving from one to the next does not have a mathematical basis. You are extrapolating the similarities of animals to your concept of evolution. If you are correct about the theory of evolution, you must have some mechanism(s) that allow the transformation of genomes from one species to the next. Ev shows that the process of random point mutation and natural selection is profoundly slow, too slow to account for these changes. Hard science requires this type of accounting and it doesn’t appear that the theory of evolution can pass this type of test.

 

[kjkent1]

There are many creatures that have gone extinct. The issues I have raised here about the ev program is that your contention that these creatures are evolving from one to the next does not have a mathematical basis. You are extrapolating the similarities of animals to your concept of evolution. If you are correct about the theory of evolution, you must have some mechanism(s) that allow the transformation of genomes from one species to the next. Ev shows that the process of random point mutation and natural selection is profoundly slow, too slow to account for these changes. Hard science requires this type of accounting and it doesn’t appear that the theory of evolution can pass this type of test.

If not by evolution, then by what process which satisfies the rigorous mathematical basis which you apparently require, have the myriad of past and present lifeforms come to exist on Earth?

State your hypothesis and supporting mathematics.

 

[cyborg]

Is this why you believe in the theory of evolution?

No, it's why I believe Zeus is playing a big game of chess with me and making me slay mythical beasts and shagging my mother in the form of a goat.

You think if God were truly loving there would be no suffering in this world?

That's pretty much how it works.

Proceed with ******** about how great a gift free-will because the greatest thing to do with the gift of free-will is to obey a higher force's will.

read the book and find out why it is so important.

It is a nice set of writings about the crazy ideas people came up with before science.

Damn right it's important. Wouldn't want to go back to believing in talking snakes and building people from dust - how silly right?

Your priorities and God’s priorities do not seem to coincide.

"IT'S A MYSTERY YOU SILLY SKEPTIC!"

 

[fishbob]

Again, I tell you the gooey soft theory of evolution started out without a mathematical basis and remains that way. When evolutionarians try to apply mathematics to the theory, it contradicts the theory. The auditors are looking at the evolutionarian books and they don’t balance. Yes fishbbob, I am getting it both ways.

That is a violation of something or other - the 2nd Law of Thermo-Dianetics, I think.