Peter wrote
> Let me tell you my experience. I became a Christian at age 21, after
> having been taught evolution. No problem: so God used evolution in
> creation. 6 years later, I came into contact with Christian
> anti-evolutionists (I can't remember coming across any dating criticisms
> at that time). So I started studying evolutionist primary literature,
> always with the idea "God did it, but how?" in the back of my mind. The
> conclusion grew that there is NO incontrovertible evidence for evolution
> (apart from microevolution),
My problem with this standard, is that there is no incontrovertible evidence
that the Holocust happened, or that George Washington existed or that Man
went to the moon, or that Caesar existed. Anyone who doubts those things is
crazy. But there isn't any 'incontrovertable evidence'. If there were, there
wouldn't be people denying all those things (well, I don't know of anyone
denying George or Caesar but they could.
Demanding a high level of absolute certainty can only be expected in
mathematics (and even then there are places where uncertainty prevails.)
Yet this is the expectation of young-earth creationists who demand absolute
proof that a radioactive date can't be wrong, demand that we get in a time
machine before we accept evolution or demand that we travel to the stars
with a tape measure before we accept that they are far away.
The entire epistemological basis of this type of approach is guarenteed to
give one the ability to believe whatever he wants.
as perfectly valid alternative explanations
> can be found - unless there is NO intelligent designer: similarities may
> reflect similar requirements, similar cladistics may reflect similar
> interdependencies, punctuations between equilibria are necessarily
> virtually devoid of fossils, macroevolution by random-walk emergence of
> information in a DNA-based organism is unbelievable, and, of course,
> there is no plausible theory about the origin of life.
And it is not always the case that fossil groups are separated by by gaps
devoid of fossils. Check out http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/transit.htm
http://home.flash.net/~mortongr/cambevol.htm
Later, I started
> studying more closely what the Bible says about creation. First, I came
> to the conclusion that the Bible is NOT opposed to evolution, even for
> humankind. Then, slowly, the conviction grew that a close attention to
> the Hebrew of the creation story, as well as the personality and freedom
> God has given humans, require evolution. That the creation story
> requires an old earth became clear to me at that time. I had always
> accepted that science proves an old earth, but after studying a popular
> German YEC book and following up on all its references, as well as some
> relevant scientific material, I was fully convinced that YEC is false. I
> believe God is as active in "natural" events as he is in special
> "miracles", and he has plenty of scientifically undetectable means of
> guiding the outcome of "natural" random-walk processes, thus providing
> all information needed.
If the means are undetectable, then it isn't science and can't be used in
any meaningful way. I might say that undetectable leprechauns move electrons
around. How are you to show me the error of my ways? Can you possibly show
via data that it isn't leprechauns but God? That is the problem with using
God in the fashion we christians seem insistent upon following. If you can
show that God, not the leprechauns are moving the electrons around, then
please demonstrate it. WHat you have is faith, but it can't be science.
> As a basis for discussion, I repeat the definition of the 5 different
> cases:
> > > (a) search for a meaningful letter sequence among random ones,
> > > (b) artificial selection of a functional ribozyme from a collection of
> > > random RNA sequences,
> > > (c) evolution of a functional ribozyme in RNA world organisms,
> > > (d) evolution of a protein by mutation of the DNA and natural
> selection
> > > of the protein,
> > > (e) a random DNA mutational walk finding a minimally active protein.
>
> The problem we keep running into is that you assume that (a) and (b) are
> representative for (d) and (e), which I contest. I group the points
> discussed under different headings, A **** etc.:
No, I am only using the letters to illustrate what happens with the
ribozymes in the test tubes. Apologists like Thaxton, Gange, and others are
perfectly willing to use it when it suits their purposes, but no one can use
it against them? Interesting philosophy of debate--heads I win, tails you
lose.
necessary to distinguish (a) and (b) from (d) and (e)?
>
> > I raised that only as a response to your contention that
> proteins wouldn't
> > behave as does an RNA. I think the evidence says that they do.
>
> They don't: a nucleotide is worth 2 bits, an amino acid about 4.3 bits
> which can only be selected as a whole.
THat is not what I was meaning. Please pay attention to what I said. I said
that randomly generated proteins appear to find useful proteins, just as
randomly generated RNA's find useful RNAs. I wasn't talking about the
information content, just the usefulness.
Peter, Please read the part set out in *** and tell me where I mentioned
anything about folds. Your response, below, is responding to things I didn't
say. It is frustrating to write something and then get a response that acts
like I wrote something else.
******************
> > Now, here is how I view that the probability argument will
> > eventually be defeated. A protein that engages in Function X
> has this broad
> > structure--
> > variable amino acids-invariant amino acids-variable amino acids.
> > (and no I don't believe that they have to be segregated but use
> that as a
> > diagram). Now. I think eventually for function X we will find
> > variable amino acids-invariant amino acids A-variable amino acids
> > variable amino acids-invariant amino acids B-variable amino acids
> > etc.
> > This is exactly as the case of the two sentences:
> > Picking noses begets warts
> > fingers in the nares creates hypertrophy of the corim
> > All these sentences convey the same idea without using any of the same
> > invariant sequences. They consist of a separate family of solutions for
> > conveying this idea. One family has the invariant word warts.
> Another has the
> > invariant word corium, a third has the invariant bugers. I can
> create hundreds
> > of thousands of sequences for EACH of these families. I think
> eventually we
> > will find the same thing in proteins, and we have found it in RNAs. The
> > solution that life uses, which seems so limiting, is merely the
> solution that
> > life chose early in its evolution.
************************
And you replied to the above with:
> That different sequences of the same protein family (having recognizable
> sequence similarities) often have the same function (but in different
> organisms or environments!) is clear. The experimental evidence for
> different folds having the same function, however, is very meager if
> they occur at all (I don't know of any example, although it might be
> feasible occasionally).
Since I didn't mention the word 'fold' in what you are responding to, what
is the point? Please read what I write, not what you think I am writing.
>
> > > This is what Yockey did. To find a lower limit, we may
> estimate how much
> > > semantic (specified) information can be generated in a random walk and
> > > how much time this would take. And that's exactly what I tried to
> > > present for discussion in my first post. But you dismissed my
> > > (tentative) conclusion out of hand, without discussing it, by
> referring
> > > to cases (a) and (b), which cannot be compared with it at all.
> >
> > It ignores the possibility I discuss above about different families of
> > solutions. With the RNA experiments, we have already seen the
> same experiment
> > run twice yeilding totally different sequences that perform the
> same function
> > exactly as I illustrated in the sentences above.
>
> RNAs aren't proteins, although both can be specified by DNA. And
> sentences can be compared even less with proteins. They are analogous
> because sentences, RNA, and proteins all may contain coded information,
> but an analogy may not be used to transfer ALL details. Christ being a
> vine doesn't mean he is literally rooted in the ground.
This certainly appears non-responsive to me. Everyone knows that RNAs aren't
proteins. Where was I supposed to make that assertion? I also said nothing
in the above about information theory.
Tell you what, this is so frustrating that you can have the last word in
this thread. I prefer to dialogue with people who respond to what I say.
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