>FMAJ: Can you provide us with the steps involved in the evolution of an intelligently designed system?
DNAunion: Sure, but I suppose you mean a biolgoical IC system specifically. I can provide you with great detail - or point you to where there is great detail - of practically every step in the design and creation of a novel protein: that is step-be-step intelligent design of biological macromolecules. If you are interested, there is (or at least was) a journal called "Protein Engineering": it you can't find that, just do searches at www.ScienceMag.org or BMN (biomednet) etc.
>FMAJ: So we now have gradations of "intelligence" from non-intelligent to computer programs "some intelligence". The issue with the use of the term
intelligence is exactly that it is so poorly defined.
> DNAunion: The terms life, evolution, and species are also poorly defined. So I guess we should stop using them too, huh? That's it all you biologists - go home. Biology instructors, get a new job. We can no longer discuss biology because its terms are too poorly defined!
>FMAJ: Evolution is harldy that poorly defined.
DNAunion: So provide for us the single, accurate, and universally-accepted definition of evolution.
>FMAJ: Species are somewhat arbitrarily defined but that does not make these terms useless. They have very distinct definitions in various areas.
DNAunion: So does intelligence. What's your point?
>FMAJ: Does ID include natural selection as an intelligent designer as follows from the thesis?
DNAunion: As far as I know, that conclusion is Elsberry's only (with people like you just parroting it over and over ad nauseum): that conclusion has not been stated by Dembski and/or Behe, and it goes against Darwin's definition of NATURAL selection (if there truly is INTELLIGENCE and DESIGN involved).
> DNAunion: So, IDists are a bit wishy washy on a couple of terms. They might as well just throw in the towel, right? But wait, are viruses living or not?
I guess biologist are a bit wishy washy on their terms too, so they too might as well just throw in the towel!
>FMAJ: Non sequitor.
DNAunion: Yes, Mr. Stuck Record.
>FMAJ: They should not throw in the towel, they should define their terms to follow logically from their premises.
DNAunion: So why haven't biologists done so? Why does one group consider viruses as living by their definition, while another group does not. And if we follow the long cell theory as a defintion of life, then a self-sustaining, self-replicating molecule(s) that can evolve is not alive either. And if we consider reproduction to be a mandatory attribute of life, then mules (or is it donkeys) are no alive because they cannot reproduce. Fires on the other hand, can reproduce. And they can metabolize, grow, and move. Are fires then alive? (rhetorical question, obviously)
As I said, it seems a double standard to require modern ID (which is probably less than 10 years old) to have every one of its terms nailed down to a single universally-accepted definition, while allowing biology itself (which has thousands upon thousands or researchers working on it, and have been for many decades) to not even be able to meet that criteria for the single most important term in the study: LIFE.
>DNAunion: By the way, Darwin stated the term SPECIES was "wishy washy" (i.e., disputable). So shouldn't his theory of the origin of SPECIES - note the word - have been discarded immediately?
>FMAJ: Non sequitor.
DNAunion: Yes, Mr. Stuck Record.
>FMAJ: But just out of curiosity, what did Darwin say and where?
DNAunion: Find it yourself!
You asked me elsewhere to support what I said Darwin said about natural selection, I took 15 minutes or so finding the passage in the book where he discussed it, then another 10 or so typing and correcting typos in my text: and what did you do? Clipped it out, replaced it with something like [irrelevant] (or was it your new catch phrase, "non sequitor"?).
What I said about Darwin's statements (that the term species is ill-defined) it correct - it is in his book: you go find it.
>FMAJ: The steps needed to build a web are determined by strict rules and details that are followed. Such rules are also well captured in algorithms. Simple
algorithms can generate some quite intricate "designs".
For instance
http://home.wxs.nl/~gkorthof/kortho44.htm
" The Fibonacci series is a sequence of numbers where each number is the sum of the two previous numbers: 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,... It is called after the
thirteenth-century Florentine mathematician Leonardo Fibonacci who first defined it. A surprising fact is that the Fibonacci series can be found in the arrangement of leaves on the stem of higher plants. In the great majority of plants with spiral arrangement, the arrangement conforms to Fibonacci numbers [6]. Now this looks a perfect case of design [10]. Is it indeed a case of design according to Dembski's Explanatory Filter? Is it a contingent system? "
DNAunion: Where are the probability calcuations? He is referencing Dembski's EF right? For example, how long is the Fibonacci sequence followed in the arrangement of leaves - 1, 1, 2, 3 or is it 1, 1, 2, 3, 5 or does it go on for a total of 100 or 1000 numbers in the sequence? What is the probability of that sequence arising by purely random chance? Is there any REASON that the sequence MUST occur - are there vast many other "live" options that are excluded?
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Oct 06 2000 - 13:52:16 EDT