Creationist argument about DNA and information

[fuelair]

Creationist argument about DNA and information is not worth the toilet paper it is scrawled upon by a finger dipped in feces.

 

[Reality Check]

Daniel: Repeats a lie abut the theory of evolution not being defined or tested

1. "evolution", what's that? Post the Scientific Theory of evolution....?

A determined effort to remain ignorant about evolution despite the repeated links to definitions of evolution over the last couple of months only makes creationists seem crazier than they already are, Daniel!

An Attending who has an education should laugh at anyone callous enough to ask them about evolution while their child is in an ICU. The parent should be worried about their child, not their religious beliefs.

Repeating lies does not make them true, Daniel. The theory of evolution is defined. The theory of evolution is tested against the evidence of evolution - including the information in DNA .
Lies by quote mining; some actual lies; cherry picking; ignorance; unsupported assertions; and begging the question is all we have from Daniel since he started posting. 68 items in the list !
27 April 2016 Daniel: A fantasy of abiogenesis = cancer biology where Daniel highlights the biology part of Paul Davies CV.
27 April 2016 Daniel: Cherry picks Paul Davies (again!) stating his opinion that artificial life can be created - just not by the bottom-up approach of organic chemistry.
8 March 2016: Tolls points out the actual subject of the Paul Davies article to Daniel which is a proposal to create life from the top-down.

28 April 2016 Daniel: Repeats a lie abut the theory of evolution not being defined or tested when he has been supplied with the definition and evidence many times in several threads.

28 April 2016 Daniel: Links to a deluded web site rather than science - the use of "Darwinism" is a hint!
That idiot thinks that funding for and conferences on advances in the theory of evolution somehow makes the theory of evolution "under siege".

28 April 2016 Daniel: An implied lie by linking to "First News" which has reposted a blog entry from an intelligent design idiot, thus hiding the ignorance behind the link.

 

[RussDill]

A determined effort to remain ignorant about evolution despite the repeated links to definitions of evolution over the last couple of months only makes creationists seem crazier than they already are, Daniel!

http://evolutionfairytale.com/forum...-the-scientific-theory-of-evolution/?p=126781

It's OK, he already knows what it is. He's known for months.

 

[Perpetual Student]

A determined effort to remain ignorant about evolution despite the repeated links to definitions of evolution over the last couple of months only makes creationists seem crazier than they already are, Daniel!

An Attending who has an education should laugh at anyone callous enough to ask them about evolution while their child is in an ICU. The parent should be worried about their child, not their religious beliefs.

Repeating lies does not make them true, Daniel. The theory of evolution is defined. The theory of evolution is tested against the evidence of evolution - including the information in DNA .
Lies by quote mining; some actual lies; cherry picking; ignorance; unsupported assertions; and begging the question is all we have from Daniel since he started posting. 68 items in the list !
27 April 2016 Daniel: A fantasy of abiogenesis = cancer biology where Daniel highlights the biology part of Paul Davies CV.
27 April 2016 Daniel: Cherry picks Paul Davies (again!) stating his opinion that artificial life can be created - just not by the bottom-up approach of organic chemistry.
8 March 2016: Tolls points out the actual subject of the Paul Davies article to Daniel which is a proposal to create life from the top-down.

28 April 2016 Daniel: Repeats a lie abut the theory of evolution not being defined or tested when he has been supplied with the definition and evidence many times in several threads.

28 April 2016 Daniel: Links to a deluded web site rather than science - the use of "Darwinism" is a hint!
That idiot thinks that funding for and conferences on advances in the theory of evolution somehow makes the theory of evolution "under siege".

28 April 2016 Daniel: An implied lie by linking to "First News" which has reposted a blog entry from an intelligent design idiot, thus hiding the ignorance behind the link.

 

[Reality Check]

http://evolutionfairytale.com/forum...-the-scientific-theory-of-evolution/?p=126781

It's OK, he already knows what it is. He's known for months.

It is interesting that a forum with the title "Evolution Fairytale Forum" has some knowledgeable and rational posts.
People pointing out Enoch 2021's use of scare quotes n the thread title so that "It didn't come across as a sincere question, but perhaps I'm wrong".
18 September 2015 You can provide Enoch with textbook and/or dictionary definitions and he'll argue with them. - how true! Enoch's reply is to insult the poster's education and link to some of his other posts insulting the poster !
That Ernst Mayr quote and demand for a scientific theory of evolution dates earlier, e.g."What's the "Real Version" of evolution....?" from 28 September 2014.

Missing from the list of lies by quote mining:
9 March 2016 Daniel: A lie by quote mining Mayr 1988: 162 (he provides his definition of evolution in the next sentence that you mined out)

ETA: In case no one has noticed, Enoch 2021 describes themselves as a "Young Earth Creationist".

 

[annnnoid]

Why? Explain the logic of this implication.

Take a few moments and look at just a fraction of what are known as the laws of physics.

…look…! (spend 30 seconds here…just for example: http://www.alcyone.com/max/physics/laws/ )

Then tell me that ‘something’ besides ‘intelligence’ could even begin to create that! I’m not interested in how…nobody has a clue how we do it (or what ‘it’ even is) so ‘how’ is academic. It is simply what is called a normative fact. The l.o.p. are a paradigm of incomprehensible complexity. Nobody with even a gram of ‘intelligence’ would even begin to suggest that anything besides ‘intelligence’ could possibly be responsible for such a ‘thing’.

…but you fail to see the connection. Why is that?

I truly have to wonder how many times I am going to have to point out what are, to any practicing psychologist, psychiatrist, sociologist, linguist, etc. etc. very elementary facts.

Why don’t we just confine ourselves to a simple example. E=mc2. Whatever ‘intelligence’ may actually be…there is no argument but that Einstein was a stellar example of it. We use the word ‘intelligence’ in a normative sense to describe something that we (human beings) are. There does not exist an empirical definition for this word…any more than there exists empirical definitions for countless words that human beings use.

Does that mean that the word ‘intelligence’ has no meaning…or that its meaning is questionable? IOW…would any of you be stupid enough to argue that Einstein was NOT an example of ‘intelligence’….or that ‘intelligence’ was NOT a prerequisite for the creation of the statement: E=mc2

…so why is it that I have to repeat this over and over and over and over?

‘Intelligence’ is a normative paradigm. There may certainly be area’s of activity where its application may be blurred. Where the meaning of ‘intelligence’ may be vague and uncertain…
….
…….but, if ever there were a incontrovertible place for the word ‘intelligence’…it is that which is responsible for science, and in particular, mathematics and the laws of physics. IOW…nobody with half a brain would every dispute that, without intelligence, science DOES NOT HAPPEN!

….by…definition! If any of you are so stupid as to think that it does, then you have your definitions wrong. Period.

But I have no doubt that you will find some way to dispute this conclusion…if for no other reason than to accept it (as Marplots found it so obvious to do) would be to FINALLY acknowledge the blindingly obvious…

…which, as I’ve frequently pointed out, is ideologically anathema to you folks. So, your brain will simply not allow you to admit what, by any measure of reason, is unquestionable.

As far as I understood his explanation when I asked the same, it boils down to:

Because the laws of nature are universal, unbreakable, unambiguous and unchangeable in time they are the same as laws made by intelligent beings (us being the only example) which happen to have none of these properties.

And no, even though a LOT of words were used, I did not understand the logic how the laws of nature are like normal laws despite having the opposite traits.

Cognitive dissonance on display!

The argument is very simple. There APPEAR to be laws of nature. This conclusion is falsified trillions of times every day. Why is this conclusion so robust? Because our own l.o.p. work so damn well….and our l.o.p. are directly derived from, modeled after, and constantly predict…the l.o.n.

This is not some trivial academic metaphor. You…and billions of other people…EVERY SINGLE DAY…entrust your very lives to this conclusion. IOW…if this conclusion were wrong, you would be dead. That does not empirically validate the conclusion, but it is very convincing circumstantial evidence.

…as I have said…about ten million times now. There is LOTS of evidence. And ALL the evidence generates the exact SAME conclusion:

Something equivalent to the l.o.p. seems to exist in nature (see above). The ONLY thing we know of with the capacity to even remotely generate something with that degree of complexity is what we refer to as ‘intelligence’.

…NOTHING…ELSE!

You folks just can’t seem to see the forest for the trees! It doesn’t matter a damn what we call them or whether or not they’re perfect. What matters is that these things seem to exist in a form sufficiently differentiated that they occupy a singular amount of human meaning. Like many similar occurrences, they are not empirically understood.

…but they still exist as normative phenomena. VERY robust normative phenomena. Your constant arguments that this is not the case are almost embarrassing!

I thought the argument was that we call them laws, and we all know that laws are made by people, then the laws of nature are logically also made by people. But because this sounds stupid, we correct "people" to "an intelligence". This sounds much cleverer.

My pet goldfish could come up with a better argument than this.

While I agree that both Lukraak_Sisser and steenkh have accurately summarized at least part of annnnoid's argument, and some of its illogicality, I think there's a piece missing. One that appears only sometimes in annnnoid's posts, but is at least important to the argument (the extent to which it is logical is left as an exercise to the reader).

It's the role of consciousness: the l.o.n. - whatever they may be - give rise to entities (us) which declare that consciousness exists. Such conscious entities can - consciously - observe nature and note regularities and patterns. After some time, these get distilled to l.o.p. (laws of physics). A full application of those l.o.p.'s can 'explain' consciousness. As consciousness is essential for there to be l.o.p.'s, so intelligence is essential for there to be l.o.n.'s.

No, it makes no sense to me, and I've gotten nowhere in asking annnnoid to clarify.

Quite impressive the degree to which you misunderstand the most elementary facts. I would attempt to clarify your summary but I’ve never made any such statements so there is no point.

Are you talking about Bohm's implicate order? Yeah, that does go along with how I think things really are but I don't think you can define it as intelligence, it's the essence of being.

I’m not defining anything as intelligence. I’m just pointing out the blindingly obvious. Facts that…as I’ve said…are fundamentally anathema to the atheist / skeptic gospel. Not surprisingly…I expect most of those here would prefer to eat scorpions than admit this.

You always sidestep ration discussion with pedantic diversions into the definitions of words.

A very accurate description of the inane response to my argument.

 

[Jodie]

I can't imagine a doctor laughing at the thought of evolution. It gets brought up in grand rounds often enough when discussing antibiotic resistance. The topic also affects our C/S rates in that women with failure to progress who would have previously died in childbirth that now survive making it more likely that the C/S rate will increase despite our best efforts to reduce that rate. Genetic screening and testing indirectly addresses evolution looking for risk factors for hereditary traits. I'm not certain how you could miss the environmental pressures that continue to shape us, especially where cancer research is concerned, if you are truly in that field. If you ignore the possibility that evolution is real then you've created your own research bias.

How do you think we've managed to develop different breeds of dogs, cats, cows, horses, etc.....before anyone knew what DNA was? There was a concept there for evolutionary change. I really don't understand why you find the theory of evolution so impossible or repugnant, I'm not really certain what your issue is with the theory.

 

[Reality Check]

Take a few moments and look at just a fraction of what are known as the laws of physics.

Sorry, annnnoid, but a post full of argument from incredibility is not good.

The laws of physics themselves are an product of intelligence - ours ! To use your example of E=mc² the human being who derived that law was called Einstein.

What the laws of physics tells us is that this universe behaves in a way that can be modeled using mathematics and nothing about any little green men determining how the universe behaves.

There is the the creationist (not you, annnnoid) idiocy of assuming that only "intelligence" does X and thus that "intelligence" (i.e. God) exists. X can be "create a universe", "put information in DNA (this thread)", "govern how our universe behaves (thus physical laws)", "create mathematics", "invent sliced bread", etc.

Laws of physics

A physical law or scientific law "is a theoretical statement inferred from particular facts, applicable to a defined group or class of phenomena, and expressible by the statement that a particular phenomenon always occurs if certain conditions be present."[1] Physical laws are typically conclusions based on repeated scientific experiments and observations over many years and which have become accepted universally within the scientific community. The production of a summary description of our environment in the form of such laws is a fundamental aim of science. These terms are not used the same way by all authors.

The distinction between natural law in the political-legal sense and law of nature or physical law in the scientific sense is a modern one, both concepts being equally derived from physis, the Greek word (translated into Latin as natura) for nature.[2]

 

[steenkh]

I thought the argument was that we call them laws, and we all know that laws are made by people, then the laws of nature are logically also made by people. But because this sounds stupid, we correct "people" to "an intelligence". This sounds much cleverer.

My pet goldfish could come up with a better argument than this.

Indeed. It is so much more surprising that we see this type of argument used over and over in this thread.

 

[annnnoid]

Sorry, annnnoid, but a post full of argument from incredibility is not good.

The laws of physics themselves are an product of intelligence - ours ! To use your example of E=mc² the human being who derived that law was called Einstein.

What the laws of physics tells us is that this universe behaves in a way that can be modeled using mathematics and nothing about any little green men determining how the universe behaves.

There is the the creationist (not you, annnnoid) idiocy of assuming that only "intelligence" does X and thus that "intelligence" (i.e. God) exists. X can be "create a universe", "put information in DNA (this thread)", "govern how our universe behaves (thus physical laws)", "create mathematics", "invent sliced bread", etc.

Laws of physics

Apparently you fail to comprehend that you and billions of others put your very lives...every single day... into the hands of what you dismiss as nothing more than an argument from incredulity.

…do you realize what that means? It means you don’t understand your own argument!

My argument is falsified trillions of times every day. That’s trillions…with a T. (and that's likely a vast understatement)

Billions literally entrust their very lives to the credibility of my argument. You included. So perhaps you could explain how you find it possible to dismiss something you entrust your life to as irrelevant?

Laws of physics

You just don’t get it do you.

The…definitions…do…not…matter!

Call them the friggletwops of physics if it will make you happy. It is irrelevant. What is relevant is what they are, how they are created, and what they do.

Indeed. It is so much more surprising that we see this type of argument used over and over in this thread.

Oh I get it...if you can't beat em, join em. Gotcha.

 

[Donn]

The argument is very simple. There APPEAR to be laws of nature. This conclusion is falsified trillions of times every day.

I really don't know what annnnoid means by "falsified" here. (Any hoarse-whisperers around to translate?)

If "intelligence" handed the laws down to one such as Einstein, I guess that subtracts his intelligence. Really it simply cores out the meaning of the word and stuffs ear-wax into the corpse.

 

[Dancing David]

Calling something a 'law' is a human label applied to events in the apparent universe. Cultural, social and personal connotations and associations of 'law' will generally have various levels of validity when mapped onto the events in the apparent universe.

An idiomatic self referencing set of symbols exchanged between communicants will have various levels of validity when applied to the external event.

The consistency of events may imply a structure that the events occur in, however it does not imply any other connotations or 'law', ie law giver. law enforcement, intent, purpose and the like.

 

[JeanTate]

Thanks annnnoid, your idea is, I think, becoming clearer. Let me try to play it back, in my own words.

Lots of people successfully rely upon their GPSs, but they know nothing about GR, one of the l.o.p.s it relies on. Ditto planes, to get them from one continent to another. The design and operation of those planes relies, in part, on a different l.o.p., Newton's law of gravity (for now, we need not consider how that is related to GR). And certainly some designs pre-dated 1915.

Similarly, to be a successful soccer player, one must know how hard to kick the ball, and at what angle, to get it past the goalie and into the net. Players do not need to solve GR equations in their heads to be able to do this, and the l.o.p. they rely in part on, intuitively, may be summarized as "heavy things fall faster than lighter ones", which is similar to something Archimedes is reported to have said.

Einstein, Newton, and Archimedes were all intelligent. So too those who understood the l.o.p.s they authored well enough to design GPSs, planes, and soccer balls. But those who use these, while certainly intelligent, do not need to understand the l.o.p.s.

Animals we may consider to be our ancestors and cousins certainly knew the "heavy things fall" l.o.p., and in teaching their young may well have used some similar description, re how to hit dinner with a thrown rock. We do not deny them the quality of intelligence, not least because they used language to do the describing and explaining. Although we lack knowledge of the, likely many hundred, who independently created/discovered the "heavy things fall" l.o.p.

You see where I'm going with this? A l.o.p., however poorly, or well, expressed, however exactly it matches all relevant observations or not, is the creation of something which 'has intelligence'. But all l.o.p.s can be characterized as descriptions of perceived patterns; the more concise the better, the bigger the scope the better.

Here's where it starts to get grey, and interesting: can there be a l.o.p. without it being expressed in words, in a language? Must a l.o.p. be explained, at some level, to "someone" else for it to be a l.o.p.? Are at least some monkeys and dolphins intelligent enough to have discovered/created a l.o.p. (or perhaps a l.o.c., chemistry, or ...), and "explained/taught" it to other monkeys or dolphins?

What say you, annnnoid?

 

[abaddon]

Better are they operant or do they need a torq?

Dammit, man, now I gonna have to read those again.

 

[abaddon]

I can't imagine a doctor laughing at the thought of evolution. It gets brought up in grand rounds often enough when discussing antibiotic resistance. The topic also affects our C/S rates in that women with failure to progress who would have previously died in childbirth that now survive making it more likely that the C/S rate will increase despite our best efforts to reduce that rate. Genetic screening and testing indirectly addresses evolution looking for risk factors for hereditary traits. I'm not certain how you could miss the environmental pressures that continue to shape us, especially where cancer research is concerned, if you are truly in that field. If you ignore the possibility that evolution is real then you've created your own research bias.

How do you think we've managed to develop different breeds of dogs, cats, cows, horses, etc.....before anyone knew what DNA was? There was a concept there for evolutionary change. I really don't understand why you find the theory of evolution so impossible or repugnant, I'm not really certain what your issue is with the theory.

The issue is that evolution requires far more time than the 6,000-8,000 years a YEC is willing to allow.

 

[hecd2]

Apparently you fail to comprehend that you and billions of others put your very lives...every single day... into the hands of what you dismiss as nothing more than an argument from incredulity.

…do you realize what that means? It means you don’t understand your own argument!

My argument is falsified trillions of times every day. That’s trillions…with a T. (and that's likely a vast understatement)

Billions literally entrust their very lives to the credibility of my argument. You included. So perhaps you could explain how you find it possible to dismiss something you entrust your life to as irrelevant?




You just don’t get it do you.

The…definitions…do…not…matter!

Call them the friggletwops of physics if it will make you happy. It is irrelevant. What is relevant is what they are, how they are created, and what they do.




Oh I get it...if you can't beat em, join em. Gotcha.

Your entire argument from beginning to end is based on a simple conflation of two meanings of the word "law". The laws of physics that you find in textbooks are indeed the product of intelligence but they are strictly descriptive and not prescriptive. Your error is based on a deliberate or accidental category error. Simple as that.

 

[Donn]

Your entire argument from beginning to end is based on a simple conflation of two meanings of the word "law". The laws of physics that you find in textbooks are indeed the product of intelligence but their strictly descriptive and not prescriptive. Your error is based on a deliberate or accidental category error. Simple as that.

His is the Law'd.

 

[hecd2]

Another interpretation of Annnoid's claims is that since the universe does not behave in an inherently unpredictable and chaotic fashion then its behaviour must be prescribed by intelligence. Even if the premise is true (and it seems to be, at least above the quantum scale) then the conclusion does not follow. It is a non-sequitur.

 

[Reality Check]

Apparently you fail to comprehend ....

I can comprehend an incoherent, slightly insulting, irrelevant rant, annnnoid.
The real world is easy to understand.
Human beings write the laws of physics according to what the universe reveals to us.
Definitions do matter to people who want to use the definitions. For example the word law has multiple definitions but no rational person would think that in a science thread it is the legal definition (a rule for people!). It is the word law as used in science - a behavior of the universe that has overwhelming evidence to support it.

 

[jimbob]

I can comprehend an incoherent, slightly insulting, irrelevant rant, annnnoid.
The real world is easy to understand.
Human beings write the laws of physics according to what the universe reveals to us.
Definitions do matter to people who want to use the definitions. For example the word law has multiple definitions but no rational person would think that in a science thread it is the legal definition (a rule for people!). It is the word law as used in science - a behavior of the universe that has overwhelming evidence to support it.

Alternatively:

If Daniel were an Indian or an ancient Greek, I have no doubt he'd be arguing for one of the two. Annnnoid...I dunno. I read his stuff, and for some reason, all I can think is "party on, Garth!"

ETA: