On Mon, 16 Jun 1997 10:04:18 -0400, Pim van Meurs wrote:
[continued]
>PM>I still do not understand specified complexity? You are looking
>backwards from the end result and claiming that this was somehow
>specified beforehand?
>SJ>Yes.
PM>That is a poor method based upon the idea of design which has
>already been shown circular. You observe complexity and assume it
>has to be specified and therefore it requires a designer. Highly
>circular.
No. I "observe" *specified* "complexity and assume it...requires a
designer". It really is "specified", in the sense that the genetic
code in DNA specifies via RNA to cellular protein-enzyme systems to
make a specific amino acid:
"Further, contemporary organisms carry their genetic information in
nucleic acids-RNA and DNA-and use essentially the same genetic code.
This code specifies the amino acid sequences of all the proteins each
organism needs. More precisely, the instructions take the form of
specific sequences of nucleotides, the building blocks of nucleic
acids. These nucleotides consist of a sugar (deoxyribose in DNA, and
ribose in RNA), a phosphate group and one of four different
nitrogen-containing bases. In DNA, the bases are adenine (A),
guanine (G), cytosine (C) and thymine (T). In RNA, uracil (U)
substitutes for thymine. The bases constitute the alphabet, and
triplets of bases form the words. As an example, the triplet CUU in
RNA instructs a cell to add the amino acid leucine to a growing
strand of protein." (Orgel L.E., "The Origin of Life on the Earth",
Scientific American, Vol. 271, No. 4, October 1994, p54)
[...]
>PM>I do not understand why this is required. The origin of life
>does not require any specification of blueprints but rather relies
>on adaptation to environmental pressures to reach one of the many
>blueprints.
>SJ>Sorry Pim, but "adaptation to environmental pressures" is a
>feature of *living systems*. Non-living chemicals do not "adapt to
>environmental pressures".
PM>But they do, they do.
Are you claiming that "Mon-living chemicals...adapt to environmental
pressures", using "adapt" *in the same sense* as "living systems"?
If so, please give examples or references.
[...]
>SJ>No. That is a different issue, which I might address later. The
>current question is "How then did specified complexity...arise from
>any amount of nonspecified complexity...?
PM>Presuming that it is specified complex ? But then it is circular.
See above. Crick, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA states
that "Living things...are specified in detail at the level of atoms
and molecules":
"The problem of the origin of life is, at bottom, a problem in
organic chemistry the chemistry of carbon compounds-but organic
chemistry within an unusual framework. Living things, as we shall
see, are specified in detail at the level of atoms and molecules,
with incredible delicacy and precision..." (Crick F., "Life Itself:
Its Origin and Nature", 1981, p37)
[...]
>SJ>No. Something with "order" (eg. snowflake) has little or no
>information content. Something with "specified complexity" (eg.
>DNA, human message) has little "order" but high information content.
PM>So please link information content to entropy. Or is your argument
>not based on entropy after all but some law of information? And how
>is information content established?
I suggest to read Thaxton, Bradley & Olsen's "The Mystery of Life's
Origin: Reassessing Current Theories, Lewis & Stanley: Dallas TX,
1992, which has an extensive discussion of the "link" between
"information content" and "entropy". Unfortunately much of it is
mathematical symbols which cannot be replicated easily in text. Here
is an excerpt under the heading "Information and Entropy":
"There is a general relationship between information and entropy.
This is fortunate because it allows an analysis to be developed in
the formalism of classical thermodynamics, giving us a powerful tool
for calculating the work to be done by energy flow through the system
to synthesize protein and DNA (if indeed energy flow is capable of
producing information). The information content in a given sequence
of units, be they digits in a number, letters in a sentence, or amino
acids in a polypeptide or protein, depends on the minimum number of
instructions needed to specify or describe the structure. Many
instructions are needed to specify a complex, information-bearing
structure such as DNA. Only a few instructions are needed to specify
an ordered structure such as a crystal. In this case we have a
description of the initial sequence or unit arrangement which is then
repeated ad infinitum according to the packing instructions. Orgel
illustrates the concept in the following way. To describe a crystal,
one would need only to specify the substance to be used and the way
in which the molecules were to be packed together. A couple of
sentences would suffice, followed by the instructions "and keep on
doing the same," since the packing sequence in a crystal is regular.
The description would be about as brief as specifying a DNA-like
polynucleotide with a random sequence. Here one would need only to
specify the proportions of the four nucleotides in the final product,
| along with instructions to assemble them randomly. The chemist
could then make the polymer with the proper composition but with a
random sequence. It would be quite impossible to produce a
correspondingly simple set of instructions that would enable a
chemist to synthesize the DNA of an E. coli bacterium. In this case
the sequence matters. Only by specifying the sequence
letter-by-letter (about 4,000,000 instructions) could we tell a
chemist what to make. Our instructions would occupy not a few short
sentences, but a large book instead!" (Thaxton C.B., Bradley W.L. &
Olsen R.L., "The Mystery of Life's Origin, 1992, p131)
>SJ>2. The order of information-bearing macromolecules like DNA is
>qualitatively different from that of crystals like snowflakes, since
>it does not arise solely from physical forces within matter:
>PM>It doesn't? what other forces are there?
>
>SJ>Mind!
PM>And there are observations showing that DNA order is different from
>snowflake order? Your hypothesis is founded on this unsupported assertion.
Pim, I have given kilobytes of "support" for my arguments, including
"that DNA order is different from snowflake order." It is *you* who
make virtually nothing but "unsupported assertions"! I cannot
remember the last time you gave a quote or even a reference to
support your positions.
>SJ>Through the application of information theory, it is now
>realized that there are actually two kinds of order. The first kind
>PM>And the information theory entropy has no relationship to the
>entropy as defined by thermodynamics.
>SJ>Someone better tell the author of my daughter's university physics
>textbook! As he points out, there is a "relationship" between
>"entropy as defined by thermodynamics" and "information theory":
PM>I disagree since there is not second law of information content.
Your claim was that "information theory entropy has no relationship
to the entropy as defined by thermodynamics". I responded with a
quote from a "university physics textbook" that there is a
"`relationship' between `entropy as defined by thermodynamics' and
`information theory' ". You replied with an "unsupported assertion"
that you "disagree since there is not second law of information
content." Please supply quotes or references to support yoour
psoition "that information theory entropy has no relationship to the
entropy as defined by thermodynamics."
>PM>So perhaps the argument is that evolution violates a 'law of
>information theory' but then you have to show the existance and
>validity of such a law.
>SJ>I do not claim that "evolution violates a 'law of information
>theory'" either!
PM>Hmm, so what do you claim then? You presume specified complexity so
>that you can or have to invoke a designer?
Pim, I have supplied kilobytes of "what" I "claim". I do not
"presume specified complexity". It is a scientific *fact* that there
*is* "specified complexity". I have cited statements from non-theist
scientists like Orgel, Dawkins and Crick, to that effect. You have
cited *no* references from the scientific literature that there is no
"specified complexity". I "invoke a designer" to explain that *fact*
of "specified complexity".
>PM>There is no such thing as specified in advance order.
>SJ>Oh? How do you think they sent a man to the moon? Just threw 30,000
>components together at random and hoped for the best!
PM>Aha, but now we have a designer. So your insistance on using specified
>complexity is obvious, it presumes a designer. Thank you for your frank
>response.
Pim, you said "There is no such thing as specified in advance order",
with no qualification. I gave an example of "specified in advance
order", namely sending "a man to the moon".
Now as to "using specified complexity" in discussing the origin of
living systems, I have pointed out that even non-theist biologists,
admit that "Living organisms are distinguished by their specified
complexity" (Orgel, 1973), in Thaxton, et. al. 1992, p130)
[...]
>PM>That is based on the fallacy that we see an end product and
>perceive this to have been specified in advance.
>SJ>Why is this a "fallacy"? This is our 100% uniform experience.
PM>Maybe yours but this is based on the idea that we can identify
>design and that apparant design needs a designer.
There can be no question that we "can identify design". The sciences
of archaeology and SETI depend on it:
"Today, we recognize that appeals to intelligent design may be
considered in science, as illustrated by the current NASA search for
extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI)...Archaeology has pioneered the
development of methods for distinguishing the effects of natural and
intelligent causes." (Davis P. & Kenyon D.H., "Of Pandas and
People", 1993, pp126-127)
And as for "apparant design needs a designer" clearly it doesn't.
But it is your naturalistic apriori assumption that the design
evident in living things (and indeed the whole cosmos) *is* "apparant
design". If it is *real* "design" then it goes without saying that
it "needs a designer".
>PM>Furthermore there is plenty of evidence of the formation of
>complexity and order at the chemical level (like DNA) which shows
>that such order and complexity can indeed form purely through
>naturalistic processes.
>SJ>There is no other "complexity and order at the chemical level (like
>DNA)", except RNA and human writing:
PM>Who claimed that there was other complexity and order?
See above. The "complexity and order" of "DNA...RNA and human
writing" is a *specified complexity* which is fundamentally different
from the non-specified "complexity" of all "other" things. I have
posted more than enough quotes supporting this from both non-theistic
and theistic sources. You have posted *no* references to the
contrary.
>SJ>"There exists a structural identity between the base sequences in a
>DNA message and the alphabetical letter sequences in a written
>message, and this assures us that the analogy is "very close and
PM>Nonsense. One is designed, the other has yet to be shown to be designed.
That "There exists a structural identity between the base sequences
in a DNA message and the alphabetical letter sequences in a written
message" is a *fact* Pim:
"In the following we will resort to illustrating our points by
reference to the properties of language. It is important to
understand that we are not reasoning by analogy. The sequence
hypothesis applies directly to the protein and the genetic text as
well as to written language and therefore the treatment is
mathematically identical." (Yockey H.P., "Self Organization Origin
of Life Scenarios and Information Theory", Journal of Theoretical
Biology, 91, 1981, p16)
[...]
>SJ>I did not say it is "proof that it cannot be done". I claim merely
>that it is accumulating *evidence* that life did arise from non-life
>purely naturalistically.
PM>And we agree. There is accumulating evidence that life did arise
>from non-life naturalistically.
No, we disagree. I made a typo. Here is my correction: "I claim merely
that (because "they have been trying for *84* years") "it is accumulating
evidence* that life did" not "arise from non-life purely naturalistically."
>SJ>Even if using the full weight of human intelligence, man succeeds in
>contriving unique circumstances where life spontaneously begins, that
>would be an analogy of *creation* by an Intelligent Designer, not the
>product of undirected physical forces:
PM>Poor logic. I guess this means that our experiments are useless in all
>sciences? Of course not.
I cannot follow your "logic". If there was an Intelligent Designer
who contrived a set unique circumstances where life spontaneously
began, and "using the full weight of human intelligence, man succeeds
in duplicating those those "unique circumstances" and "life" did then
"spontaneously begin", thereby making "an analogy of *creation* by an
Intelligent Designer, not the product of undirected physical forces",
why would that "mean that our experiments are useless in all
sciences"?
[...]
>SJ>What "such evidence of supernatural creation" would you accept, Pim?
>PM>Repeatable experimental evidence, predictions, falsifiability.
>SJ>Thanks at least for finally answering! But this is not "evidence",
>it is just demarcation criteria designed to rule out "evidence of
>supernatural creation". That makes your claim that "There is no
>such evidence of supernatural creation within a scientific arena"
>just a tautology.
PM>Indeed. So there is no scientific evidence of a supernatural event.
>So all we have is increasing amount of non-evidence....
I disagree that "there is no scientific evidence of a supernatural
event". If the origin of life can only be duplicated by "using the
full weight of human intelligence" by "man contriving unique
circumstances where life spontaneously begins", that would be
"repeatable experimental evidence" of "supernatural creation within a
scientific arena".
>SJ>Unfortunately, your demarcation criteria would rule out
>macroevolutionary events since these are not "repeatable":
PM>But they are repeatable as well certainly in principle.
I just quoted Dobzhansky, one of the founders of Neo-Darwinism who
said that macroevolutionary events are not "unique, unrepeatable, and
irreversible". You assert that they are "repeatable". Please state
your quotes or references.
>SJ>So, please post actual "evidence" that could be produced by a theist
>in this debate, that you would "accept" (at least in principle for
>the sake of argument), as "evidence of supernatural creation within
>a scientific arena".
PM>Perhaps you could give it a try?
It have been giving "it a try". You have confirmed my thesis that
there is no "evidence that could be produced by a theist...that you
would accept (at least in principle for the sake of argument), as
evidence of supernatural creation within a scientific arena".
>SJ>If that is the case, so are the other singularities, like the origin
>of life and life's major groups "outside the realm of science"
>because they, like the Big Bang, are unique, unobservable and
>unrepeatable:
>PM>Fine, if you want to argue this that is fine with me. At least
>we agree that creation has no place within science.
>SJ>No. It is *you* who "want to argue this"! By your own demarcation
>criteria, you have just ruled out "the Big Bang" as "science".
>No, I agreed with you for the sake of showing that we agree that creation
>has no place within science.
We don't "agree" at all. You seem to miss the point. On your
demarcation criteria, of excluding "creation" events as "outside the
realm of science", areas of legitimate scientific investigation into
"unique, unobservable and unrepeatable" events such as "the origin of
life and life's major groups" and "the Big Bang" would also be
"outside the realm of science".
Since these "unique, unobservable and unrepeatable" events are within
"the realm of science", you cannot consistently claim that "unique,
unobservable and unrepeatable" "creation" events, are outside of
science.
>SJ>There is a slight problem. The probability is not improved by
>trading one big jump for a lot of little ones, because then the
>little steps must be in the right animal, the right body-part
>and in the right sequence, as Milton points out:
>PM>That is incorrect on several counts. First of all it assumes
>that only one protein can have the required abilities.
>SJ>No. I said nothing about "only one protein". That was *your*
>example: "...a protein of length 500 for instance and getting the
>same protein....". But I fail to see how more than "only one
>protein" can help your claim that "Small steps can take place far
>more easier than one giant leap".
PM>Try climbing a mountain?
Not a good analogy - "climbing a mountain" is a purposeful activity
carried only out by intelligent living things (ie. animals and humans).
Non-living things do not "Try climbing a mountain".
>PM>Furthermore it assumes that there are only random forces at work
>in the formation of the proteins.
>SJ>Bradley and Kok examined the claimed non-"random" preference in
>proteins and found none:
PM>This is the bonding part but that is not the only factor. Availability of
>material, selection etc.
Please explain. Exactly "what Availability of material, selection
etc" qualify as non-"random forces at work in the formation of the
protein"
>PM>You are incorrectly assuming that the outcome as we observed now
>was the only possible outcome and that the 'evolution' of the
>protein was totally random in its steps.
>SJ>I am not "assuming" anything. I am testing your claim that: "Small
>steps can take place far more easier than one giant leap" and that
>there is a "difference between the probability of specifying one
>giant leap from a mix of amino acids to a protein of length 500 for
>instance and getting the same protein through intermediate steps."
PM>As I said, try climbing a mountain.
And as I said, non-living things don't "try climbing a mountain"!
Regards.
Steve
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