Lesson in Cladistics: Playing Cards

[metherion]

Okay. So, differences.

First we look at the cards. They're all cards, so we have no changes there.

Some have red and some have black. So we split them based on that difference.

Now, in the red and the black, some have horizontal symmetry (cut it in half from side to side and the top looks like the bottom), some don't. Usually evens vs odds and face cards (since the bottom of face cards are mirror images already, so they don't look the same folded over).

So now we have 4: red horizontally symmetrical (hereafter HS), red non HS, black HS, and black not HS.

Then, the face cards look different from the rest of the non HS, so we have red HS, red non HS, red face, black HS, black non HS, and black face cards.

Now, on the HS cards, some will have even and some will have odd numbers of symbols on each half (2/6/10 vs 4/8). So, now we have red even half HS, red odd half HS, red non HS, red face, black even half HS, black odd half HS, black non HS, and black face card sets.

And now we look at the face cards. Two are male, one is female. So, we split those.
So, now we have red even half HS, red odd half HS, red non HS, red male face, red female face, black even half HS, black odd half HS, black non HS, and black male face and black female face card sets.

And then we can split the colors down to suits.

So now we have : even half HS, odd half HS, non HS, male face, and female face for all four suits, just looking at differences.
SO, even half HS is the 4/8 of a suit.
Odd half HS is teh ace/2/6/10. (since the one dot on the ace splits to half a dot, it's not an even number of dots)
Non HS is the 3/5/7/9 of a suit.
Male face is the jack/kind.
Female face is the queen.

Done using only differences.

I'm assuming a general Hoyle-type deck where the cards are made like this example 10 of hearts:

Filelaying card heart 10.svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Is that more the type of thing you'd like, Loudmouth?

Metherion

 

[juvenissun]

I'm assuming a general Hoyle-type deck where the cards are made like this example 10 of hearts:

Filelaying card heart 10.svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Is that more the type of thing you'd like, Loudmouth?

Metherion

No. I think he is very confused on what he is trying to argue.

 

[Split Rock]

52 cards and 2 jokers.

The difference is 52 inanimate objects (viz., spades, hearts, diamonds & clubs) and 2 scientists.

Excuse me... two jokers blessed on mankind by God.

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

Okay. So, differences.

First we look at the cards. They're all cards, so we have no changes there.

Some have red and some have black. So we split them based on that difference.

Now, in the red and the black, some have horizontal symmetry (cut it in half from side to side and the top looks like the bottom), some don't. Usually evens vs odds and face cards (since the bottom of face cards are mirror images already, so they don't look the same folded over).

So now we have 4: red horizontally symmetrical (hereafter HS), red non HS, black HS, and black not HS.

Then, the face cards look different from the rest of the non HS, so we have red HS, red non HS, red face, black HS, black non HS, and black face cards.

Now, on the HS cards, some will have even and some will have odd numbers of symbols on each half (2/6/10 vs 4/8). So, now we have red even half HS, red odd half HS, red non HS, red face, black even half HS, black odd half HS, black non HS, and black face card sets.

And now we look at the face cards. Two are male, one is female. So, we split those.
So, now we have red even half HS, red odd half HS, red non HS, red male face, red female face, black even half HS, black odd half HS, black non HS, and black male face and black female face card sets.

And then we can split the colors down to suits.

So now we have : even half HS, odd half HS, non HS, male face, and female face for all four suits, just looking at differences.
SO, even half HS is the 4/8 of a suit.
Odd half HS is teh ace/2/6/10. (since the one dot on the ace splits to half a dot, it's not an even number of dots)
Non HS is the 3/5/7/9 of a suit.
Male face is the jack/kind.
Female face is the queen.

Done using only differences.

I'm assuming a general Hoyle-type deck where the cards are made like this example 10 of hearts:

Fileplaying card heart 10.svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Is that more the type of thing you'd like, Loudmouth?

Metherion

He must still be at church

That is much more information than I myself need

....

 

[Astridhere]

As an illustration of how cladistics works (or doesn't work in this case) I would like to challenge a creationist to put playing cards into categories based on the differences between the cards.

Any takers?

Who gets to draw the pictures on the cards? If it evolutionists then the cards would be useless to begin with.

 

[Astridhere]

Excuse me... two jokers blessed on mankind by God.

One of the jokers would be Darwin the other is likely Dawkins.

 

[Loudmouth]

Who gets to draw the pictures on the cards? If it evolutionists then the cards would be useless to begin with.

Obviously, the people at the factory get to draw the pictures on the cards.

So, can you show how to organize these cards into groups based on differences or not?

 

[Loudmouth]

Classification of anything is done based on a set of criteria. Those fit the criteria will be in one group and those don't will be in another group. So you are looking at neither similarity nor differences (you do not compare them). You are looking for the characters of each individual.

So you would disagree that one could put cards into groups using differences alone?

 

[Loudmouth]

Some have red and some have black. So we split them based on that difference.

No, you are using similarities to put red ones together and black ones together.

Now, in the red and the black, some have horizontal symmetry (cut it in half from side to side and the top looks like the bottom), some don't. Usually evens vs odds and face cards (since the bottom of face cards are mirror images already, so they don't look the same folded over).

So now we have 4: red horizontally symmetrical (hereafter HS), red non HS, black HS, and black not HS.

Here you are grouping based on shared symmetry, not based on differences.

Then, the face cards look different from the rest of the non HS, so we have red HS, red non HS, red face, black HS, black non HS, and black face cards.

You are grouping cards together as face cards based on similarities.

. . . and so the pattern continues throughout. At each step you are grouping based on similarities, which is actually how cladistics works. I was just showing that you can not group things together based on differences. If you did so, you would not have groups.

Done using only differences.

Let's go back to the very first step. How do you decide if a card goes in the red group or the black group? It is because of the similarities shared by those in that group, is it not?

 

[Loudmouth]

No. I think he is very confused on what he is trying to argue.

I am demonstrating that creationists don't understand what they are arguing when they claim that kinds are organized based on differences.

 

[metherion]

Actually, I wasn't trying to put red with red based on the fact that they are the same, I was putting all not-black separate from the black, and all not-red separate from the red. Thus, I got two piles: the not-red and the not-black. It just so happens that the not-red are all black, and the not-black are all red.

It will be necessary that piles whose main criteria is "not-X" will have some similarities, especially in something as un-varied as a deck.

I mean, cards only have two categories. If we took two categories of life, mammals and lizards (like two categories of cards, black and red cards), and separated them based on differences, all not-lizards would be mammals, and all non-mammals would be lizards as a starting point.

Metherion

 

[Astridhere]

Obviously, the people at the factory get to draw the pictures on the cards.

So, can you show how to organize these cards into groups based on differences or not?

Here is your lesson in cladistics

These results show that Theropoda as presently constituted may not be monophyletic and that the verificationist approach of the BMT literature may be producing misleading studies on the origin of birds.


http://www.bio.fsu.edu/James/Ornitho...phs%202009.pdf

The deeply nested conflict between phylogenetic hypotheses for Artiodactyla is shown very well by these two recent studies: for the major lineages shown, no clades are shared.

PLoS ONE: Relationships of Cetacea (Artiodactyla) Among Mammals: Increased Taxon Sampling Alters Interpretations of Key Fossils and Character Evolution

Loudmouth, seriously, these nested hierarchies mean nothing more than researchers like to mess around with algorithms. They have no credibility. They change like the wind. That's why your paradigms change with the finding of one fossil. eg human knuckle walking ancestry.

So which version of the whale clade would you demonstrate?

 

[juvenissun]

I am demonstrating that creationists don't understand what they are arguing when they claim that kinds are organized based on differences.

I am saying you are very confused on this idea.

Show me one example on how to classify by difference. I bet you don't know what you are talking about.

 

[Astridhere]

I am saying you are very confused on this idea.

Show me one example on how to classify by difference. I bet you don't know what you are talking about.

I agree with you. Evolutionists appear to have the knack for asking questions they themselves are unable to answer.

Evos themselves come up with where who goes in the zoo. They have already done most of the work to get life today into families by whatever complicated means they chose to do so. Rearranging or tweaking a few of these rankings according to creationist paradigms only requires the choice of another suite of traits. It is that simple. Evos choose to stir up storms in tea cups over it still.

Given that the nested hierarchies that are meant to tie kinds together eg dinos/birds, tetrapods/whales, have been shown to be fragile, unstable and contradictory they do not credibly establish much more than evolutionists like to muck around with algorithms.

 

[Loudmouth]

Here is your lesson in cladistics

We are using playing cards in this thread, or did you not notice?

 

[Loudmouth]

Actually, I wasn't trying to put red with red based on the fact that they are the same, I was putting all not-black separate from the black, and all not-red separate from the red.

Why did you pick those two colors? Why not green or purple?

You picked those colors because of the colors that are shared between cards, did you not?

I mean, cards only have two categories.

I would think that they have 52 categories since none of the cards are alike.

 

[Loudmouth]

Show me one example on how to classify by difference. I bet you don't know what you are talking about.

I am saying that there is no such example. That is what I am trying to illustrate with the cards.

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

Here is your lesson in cladistics

These results show that Theropoda as presently constituted may not be monophyletic and that the verificationist approach of the BMT literature may be producing misleading studies on the origin of birds.

We are using playing cards in this thread, or did you not notice?

Oh My!

 

[metherion]

Why did you pick those two colors? Why not green or purple?

You picked those colors because of the colors that are shared between cards, did you not?

Part of it has to be choosing sensible differences, though. If I chose to throw out all green cards, I'd have to throw out roughly zero cards. Same with purple. Same with orange-polka-dotted. Same with yellow. So after I throw out all the blank cards, the cards that contain exactly five colors and two suits on the same card, the cards that have personally been touched by Nietzsche while he was still alive, and all the specific cards from this exact deck that were rotoscoped into the laserdisc version of The Wizard, I still kind of have 52 cards left.

Also, I meant as a first division, color is one that makes sense. Suit makes sense, but that splits it into four right away, and I was trying to keep the typing and groups sown a bit so they could be followed.

Metherion

 

[Loudmouth]

Part of it has to be choosing sensible differences, though.

The sensible choice is to group cards by what they share, not by how they differ.

Also, I meant as a first division, color is one that makes sense.

Even if we go by shared features, there is no single feature that "makes sense" for playing cards. What features you pick end up being arbitrary for the most part. We could organize by suit or rank for the first division. Either makes as much sense as color. This is one of the features of designed things. You can group them based on shared features, but there is no single cladistic model that is better than another, and you can find many ways to organize separately designed things.

"Although it is trivial to classify anything subjectively in a hierarchical manner, only certain things can be classified objectively in a consistent, unique nested hierarchy. The difference drawn here between "subjective" and "objective" is crucial and requires some elaboration, and it is best illustrated by example. Different models of cars certainly could be classified hierarchically—perhaps one could classify cars first by color, then within each color by number of wheels, then within each wheel number by manufacturer, etc. However, another individual may classify the same cars first by manufacturer, then by size, then by year, then by color, etc. The particular classification scheme chosen for the cars is subjective. In contrast, human languages, which have common ancestors and are derived by descent with modification, generally can be classified in objective nested hierarchies (Pei 1949; Ringe 1999). Nobody would reasonably argue that Spanish should be categorized with German instead of with Portugese."
29+ Evidences for Macroevolution: Part 1