From: Darryl Maddox (dpmaddox@arn.net)
Date: Mon Aug 04 2003 - 09:24:10 EDT
Hello Glenn, Geoge, and others reading this and the related postings.
I don't know whether or not a sieve is a formula for generating a sequence,
seems different in procedure to me but am willing to let each have his own
definition, at least they are ways of determning which numbers are and which
are not members of a sequence but it seems to me the real issue of
"created" vs "natural" is the ability to unambiguously determine, by a
specified and objective methodolgy which "things" were "created" and which
are the result of a natural process and I think this is what Glenn (and
possibly others) has been trying to say. Perhaps two examples will make
this more clear to those who (like myself) don't speak mathematics as a
primary or even secondary language.
1) When I was at geology field camp the students were forever picking up
pieces of flint thinking they had found a piece of an arrow head or some
other artifact. The problem was no one could come up with a way to tell the
real, but less easily identifiable artifacts such as scrapers from regular
pieces of flint. As Dr. Harris said, "either most of these are natural or
there were a lot of indians here for a long time and they weren't very good
at making stuff". Last year I found a piece of flint and thought it was
just that and nothing more - until last week when I happened to pick it up
in such a way that it fit naturally and comfortably into my right hand and
the lower front edge was round and sharp, there was a small indention on the
left side for my thumb (I am right handed) and small flat plane on the top
front part for my index finger - a scraper? I don't know but it would be a
good one whether natural or not (and I suspect not because of the lack of
very small chip marks around the front lower edge).
2) When I did my masters thesis in which I developed a new technique, my
advisor made me do two additional tests of the technique to be sure there
was no subjective bias in interpreting the "data" or operating the
equipment. In both tests I showed a 3rd party how to operate the equipment
and what to look for on the readout. Then I had two samples for which I
alone knew the answer but the answer was known from field data, not a lab
test and certainly not from using my technique or equipment. I wrote the
answers on pieces of paper and gave each to a third party who was not
allowed to be in the same part of the building with me and the people who
were going to run the tests. Then I used a 3rd sample to teach the people
how to use the equipment and after they had demonstrated some proficiency
with it I gave them the real sample (but did not put it on the equipment or
do the equipment adjustments that had to be done each time a new sample was
put on it) and left the room. The first of the 3rd parties was actually two
people, my thesis and another committee memenber, and they took their
sample, put it on the equipment, made the adjustments, took their readings,
and wrote their concensus answer on a piece of paper and came out of the
room. By this time I had gone and gotten the person (another geology major)
who had the piece of paper on which I had written the answer they should
have obtained if the technique was valid and returned. When the two pieces
of paper were compared the committe members agreed their answer matched the
field data answer within the normal variation for data of that type. For
the second 3rd party trial a journalism student was shown how to use the
equipment and the same procedure followed but with another sample for which
the answer was known from field data.
When this was all finished the committee members agreed the procedure was
objective and the technique was valid and the equipment set up was adequate
to obtain answers of the required accuracy and precision.
Thus we have two examples: in the first there was either no objective
criteria or insufficient data to determine a concensus answer and in the
second there was a specified procedure, anyone could learn it, the theory
was sound, and the data conclusive. That is what Glenn is calling science.
Whether we call the other science or not I don't know. But then neither do
I know if psychology, psychiatry, economics, sociology or many other things
(including sometimes my own field of geology) are really science as opposed
to educated guessing. Differentiating seems to get difficult when we go
from the deductive, calculating procedures which dominate some sciences to
the inductive procedures which dominate others, but even in these, there is
at least in principle a way to know if the inferences made from a set of
data and by a set of logical rules are correct, there is eventually an
objective answer. Those who are or have been in natural resource
exploration know that eventually the hole gets drilled (or the mining
prospect evalutated) and then you know, by objective means what the answer
is, though you may have thought the odds were good enough to risk your money
on that answer when all you had was a lot of things that indicated the odds
were good enough to take the chance. Does anyone remember N-rays? If not
look it up. You will learn something about subjective interpretations of
data.
Darryl
----- Original Message -----
From: "Glenn Morton" <glennmorton@entouch.net>
To: "George Murphy" <gmurphy@raex.com>
Cc: <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Sunday, August 03, 2003 4:19 PM
Subject: RE: loose ends
> George wrote:
>
> > Simplicity isn't the issue. There isn't even a complicated
> >formula or
> >prescription for generating primes. The formula for the Bernoulli
> >numbers, e.g., is a
> >good deal more involved than that for the Fibonacci sequence
> >(Bn = (2n)!Z(2n)/2^(2n-1)*pi^2n, where Z is the zeta function) but
> >it's a formula into
> >which you (or a computer) can plug n = 1,2, 3 .. and generate as
> >many as you wish.
> >The sieve doesn't work that way. What you're doing with it is
> >seeing if n is prime by
> >checking multiples of all the integers up to n-1 & if none of them
> >is n then n is prime.
> >
>
> At the risk of pedantry, why isn't the seive a 'prescription' for
generating
> primes? It may not be very elegant, or even efficient, it may take a long
> time, but it is a prescription, isn't it?
>
> I would suggest this: we have different definitions of 'formula' and
> 'prescription'. Within the confines our our individual definitions, we
are
> both right. The seive is a formula or prescription in the sense that it is
> "a set of algebraic symbols expressing a mathematical fact, principle,
rule,
> etc;" or a recursivly applied prescription. But we are getting to the
point
> of pedantry here. I would argue that the seive is a recursive formula
> every bit as much as is the recursive formula for Fibonacci.
>
> I think our definition debate is a side show. The more important issue is
> below:
>
> In the context of ID, is there really any difference in specifying the
seive
> as a generator of specificity rather than specifying Fibonacci's formula
in
> your sense of the word? If Dembski received a message from Mars which
> counted in the Fibonacci sequence, doesn't that have structure? Can't that
> be the intended message?
>
> As for what is an isn't a formula, you can have the last word. But I am
> interested in why Fibonacci wouldn't be a specifiable message.
>
>
>
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