Intelligent Evolution?

[cyborg]

As I said before, Evolutionary Algorithms are a great demonstration of the power of the "evolutionary approach", it is just that to work in engineering the selection criteria are chosen so as to direct the "evolution" of the design towards meeting the specifications. This direction is not the same as in real evolution where there are many different "solutions" to the problem of "reproduce".

Ugh, jimbob - evolutionary algorithms are used precisely for this reason - the solution space is large and optimal solution calculation is of NP complexity.

And you still haven't responded to the simple fact that anyone can arbitrarily frame the problem to increase the number of possible solutions.

In designing a lift, one would not randomly select cable thicknesses, but a calculation plus safety margin would determine the type of cable thickness.

Oh, so you magically know what this calculation should be do you?

That is not any way akin to random variation as occurs in Darwinian Eolution.

Random variation is irrelevant to Darwinian Evolution.

 

[Belz...]

The "How" is about hte mechanism.

If it is not about the "How" just the results of evolution, then it doesn't matter that we evolved from hominids and not are not descended from adam.

What is left in a discussion of the process of evolution if you don't care about the mechanism?

Jim, if yo uhad paid attention you'd have noticed that it was said, quite clearly, that information USES intelligence as a tool to get itself copied. That this tool manages to do something with the failures speaks only for the usefulness of the tool, not the process itself.

 

[Belz...]

Got it.

Making yogurt and making wine are essentially the same process because they are both fermentation processes.

If the point of your analogy is the fermentation process, then yes.

Now you should be able to make yogurt and wine.

I never claimed you could make a giraffe. But thanks for admitting that the analogy works, finally.

 

[Herzblut]

Would it happen to be the ability to reach otherwise unattainable critical food supplies in times of scarcity, thereby ensuring survival, by any chance?!

I'm not much interested in what would happen to be the ability. I'd like to know what is.

 

[mijopaalmc]

If the point of your analogy is the fermentation process, then yes.

I never claimed you could make a giraffe. But thanks for admitting that the analogy works, finally.

I guessed I should have known that you would completely miss the point, Belz. The point was that, by the scheme with which the analogy in the OP is created, one can take any common property that two objects have and declare them analogs no matter how many differences there actually are between the two processes. In other words, analogy based on one common property gives that false impression that the two supposed analog more similar than they really are.

 

[six7s]

In other words, analogy based on one common property gives that false impression that the two supposed analog more similar than they really are.

Gives that false impression to whom?

I ask cos I sincerely wonder if your apparent concern (that the analogy does/will fuel IDiocy, etc) is grounded in (any) evidence-based reality

 

[mijopaalmc]

Gives that false impression to whom?

I ask cos I sincerely wonder if your apparent concern (that the analogy does/will fuel IDiocy, etc) is grounded in (any) evidence-based reality

If you had spent your time actually reading the thread, you would have seen that jimbob has twice presented examples of intelligent design proponents making their own analogy to technological development and emphasizing the presence of intelligence in that process (#532, #730).

 

[jimbob]

Gives that false impression to whom?

I ask cos I sincerely wonder if your apparent concern (that the analogy does/will fuel IDiocy, etc) is grounded in (any) evidence-based reality

Like this?
Creationsafaris: Can Humans use evolution

Evolution is being used. A press release from University of Wisconsin-Madison was titled, “Using evolution, UW team creates a template for many new therapeutic agents.” How does one use evolution? It continued, “By guiding an enzyme down a new evolutionary pathway, a team of University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers has created a new form of an enzyme capable of producing a range of potential new therapeutic agents with anticancer and antibiotic properties.”
We must keep up the heat on evolutionists till they become too embarrassed to say such things. You cannot “use” evolution. The moment you use it, you are doing intelligent design.

or this?
"“Intelligent Evolution” — If the courts rule against ID …" by William Dembski (He's a bit of a poster boy for the IDers)

I therefore offer the following proposal if ID gets outlawed from our public schools: retitle it Intelligent Evolution (IE). The evolution here would be reconceived not as blind evolution but as technological evolution. Nor would it be committed to Darwin’s idea of descent with modification. But, hey, it would still be evolution, and evolution can be taught in schools. In fact, I think I’ll title my next book Intelligent Evolution: The Mindful Deviation of Evolutionary Pathways. Perhaps this book has already been written.

 

[jimbob]

Don't bacteria exchange genetic material on a regular basis ? Doesn't this kinda show that "failures" CAN be passed on ?

Er Belz, The unit of evolution is the gene, if the gene is passed on, how is it a "failure"?

If a gene fails to reproduce, then it is a reproductive failure.

 

[jimbob]

The difference is that with self-replication there is naturally selection for the best replicator, this is natural selection. Without self-replication, the selection criteria have to be defined, so there is an explicit or an implicit "goal", which is lacking in biological evolution. The giraffe doesn't have a long neck in order to eat the highest leaves, itr has a long neck because proto-giraffes with longer necks reproduced, whilst those with shorter necks didn't. Do you see the subtle difference?

Uh, jimbob - the implicit goal of the proto-giraffe is to have longer necks.

Not because they are trying to achieve that goal but because when that implicit goal is achieved the proto-giraffe is more successful.

But then none of the abstract entities in a genetic algorithm are "trying" to achieve the goal either - even though it could be quite precisely defined.

Self-replicating organisms evolve and the optimisation is towards self-replication, everyhing else is incidental.

Gnetic Algorithms in engineering use a set of requirements, and convert them into selection criteria. In defining the selection reqquirements, you define what the final result will do, but neither how it will do this nor the form.

Self-replicating organisms will evolve to self-replicate, and given a billion years or so, the variety of "solutions" are astounding.

I am arguing that every evolutionary algorithm in engineering requires a goal or set of specification criteria to work, this goal is not needed in biological evolution.

You can claim what you like jimbob but it's just wrong - I don't need to specify a "goal", I can just define a world. I know because I've written those sorts of artificial life simulations before.

I didn't have to specify my "predator/prey" simulation to have a goal of "equilibrium," "extinction" or "dominance" for those consequences to arise.

Why you don't seem to get this is beyond me. It's ****ing simple.

How were the simulated organisms selected to reproduce? There had to be some form of selection, as random variation without selection produces dross.

In what way did these simulated organisms not imperfectly self-replicate within the simulated environment?

 

[six7s]

Like this?
Creationsafaris: Can Humans use evolution


or this?
"“Intelligent Evolution” — If the courts rule against ID …" by William Dembski (He's a bit of a poster boy for the IDers)

Thank you

So... in your view jimbob, what is the relative significance of 'concern for how IDiots might spin things' in your quest to dismiss the OP analogy (or whatever it is you hope to achieve by posting to this thread)?

 

[mijopaalmc]

Thank you

So... in your view jimbob, what is the relative significance of 'concern for how IDiots might spin things' in your quest to dismiss the OP analogy (or whatever it is you hope to achieve by posting to this thread)?

Regardless how intelligent design will try spin the analogy in the OP, it simply doesn't work because it takes one, single property and overemphasizes its importance to the detriment of getting even the most general sketch of the supposedly analogous processes.

Would you seriously say that making wine or beer is essentially the same as making yogurt simply because they both involve fermentation? Or that soccer is essentially the same as snooker because they are both played with balls?

 

[jimbob]

I don't liike it, because as well as being popular amongst IDers, it is also subtly* wrong, and misleading.

Even people who are not IDers often seem to think of evolution as being somehow lamarkian: "The gibbon evolved to live in trees" or, "humanity evolved to be intelligent", when that gives an image of "predestination" that isnt really there in evolution.

Or even some of lightcreatedlife's early posts that seemed to suggest that "the goal of all evolution was the emergence of intelligence"

Ecological niches will get filled, but how is a different matter, and the filling of some niches will close others.

*Subtly wrong, yet superficially attractive - a bad metophor isn't one that is obviously wrong, but one that seems plausible, yet lends itself to the analogy being stretched too far.

 

[six7s]

Would you seriously say that making wine or beer is essentially the same as making yogurt simply because they both involve fermentation? Or that soccer is essentially the same as snooker because they are both played with balls?

Would you seriously say that The Wizard of Oz is essentially the same as your contribution to this thread simply because they both involve strawmen?

 

[mijopaalmc]

Would you seriously say that The Wizard of Oz is essentially the same as your contribution to this thread simply because they both involve strawmen?

Would you seriously say that a raven is essentially the same as a writing desk simply because they both have quills?

Not only is your question based on equivocation, it is not straw man to pint out that at the proper level of abstraction anything can be made to look like anything else. Thus, saying that you have "abstracted away" the differences that are inconvenient to your analogy does not justify it. When you start removing essential differences between the two analogs, you have destroyed the usefulness of the analogy.

 

[six7s]

I don't liike it, because as well as being popular amongst IDers, it is also subtly* wrong, and misleading

Fairy Nuff... if that's what you think, then that's what you think

I don't.

I think IDiots will (and do) spin anything - be it an analogy or cold, hard, indisputable facts - to suit their own ridiculous agenda

Aided by coherent explanations from cyborg, articulett et al, I recognise a nett positive value of the analogy (for non-biologists and aspiring critical thinkers like me) who want to raise their understanding of the ToE from negligible to the point where more advanced aspects start to make sense...

In contrast, the objections you have raised haven't taught me anything memorable

 

[six7s]

...saying that you have "abstracted away" the differences that are inconvenient to your analogy does not justify it. When you start removing essential differences between the two analogs, you have destroyed the usefulness of the analogy.

You're so cute when you're angry

If you ever calm down long enough to think, re-read your post and note that the you that you allude to above is not me, it's not cyborg, it's not Southwind17, it's not articulett, it's not Belz, it's not fishkr, it's not ambnp, it's you and your straw friends

----------
ETA
Oh... and you're wrong too

 

[cyborg]

Self-replicating organisms evolve and the optimisation is towards self-replication, everyhing else is incidental.

It seems to me that, as far as optimal replication goes, the pinnacle of evolution was achieved millions of years ago with viruses.

Human replication, for example, is far from optimal. It's pretty damn hazardous actually.

you define what the final result will do

AND IF I DO NOT DEFINE WHAT THE FINAL RESULT WILL DO?

How were the simulated organisms selected to reproduce? There had to be some form of selection, as random variation without selection produces dross.

There is no randomness (and it seems I have to remind you YET AGAIN of the irrelevance of randomness). There is no variation. The simulation is not an evolutionary one. It merely counters your assertion that:

you define what the final result will do

Since I did not specify any goal whatsoever. What is so hard to understand here?

Another model I used had some very rough attempts at defining something that could have evolutionary traits. As before you either get extinction, dominance or equilibrium. Not a hell of a lot of difference really other than that there is a wider variation of types floating about in the tank rather than just two hard-coded ones. The basic mechanism was to trade-off abilities for extra energy requirements and then have them randomly appear in the populations to see which would take hold.

In neither case did I ever have to specifically select a damn thing - the simulation runs and the consequences occur. Organisms either survive or they do not.

The hardest thing is making a rich enough world model that is computationally feasible - but then I don't have a parallel computer on the scale of the Earth so I had to make do with consumer PCs.

In what way did these simulated organisms not imperfectly self-replicate within the simulated environment?

Well, from your perspective since the abstract entities I created are in fact only representations formulated by switching logic gates there was no self or replication to speak of.

 

[mijopaalmc]

You're so cute when you're angry

If you ever calm down long enough to think, re-read your post and note that the you that you allude to above is not me, it's not cyborg, it's not Southwind17, it's not articulett, it's not Belz, it's not fishkr, it's not ambnp, it's you and your straw friends

----------
ETA
Oh... and you're wrong too

That's not anything near the truth.

Here's a little something to get you started:

ID I really feel you are not getting the concept of abstraction here so please tell me:

Why can't I take the concepts of 'heritable' 'trait' and 'change' and pull them away from their biological expressions and synthesise a new system using them?

Or, put another way, are simulations of evolution evolution? If you say, "well duh, of course they are," then your objections to my reasoning is total bizarre because a computer simulating evolution doesn't have any physical similarities to biology at all.

If you don't think they're evolution then there is nothing more to talk about.

No. I've always been consistent ID. And yes, I am being general - that's the whole damn point of abstraction!

Now, let's go slow.

If I have no knowledge about the mechanics of the universe how do I, as a supposedly intelligent actor, design a flying machine?

 

[six7s]

That's not anything near the truth

Maybe not in your little whirled

Here's a little something to get you started:

Here's a little something that, if you weren't so hard of thinking, would get you started

... you are not getting the concept of abstraction ...

...that's the whole damn point of abstraction!

Although it seems that you can use the search feature to locate key words, your effort was a waste of bandwidth considering that you do not understand context

Vis:

...saying that you have "abstracted away" the differences that are inconvenient ...

Note that YOU are the one abstracting, obfuscating, flailing and failing to grasp the analogy, English, and even your own warped words

Compare this with cyborg, who - although abstracting is not abstracting away anything... simply because there is no need and to do so would be counter-productive

You do know what counter-productive means don't you?