Natural selection v Intelligent design

[Foxhole87]

Do you believe that the origin of the first living cell can be explained purely by chemistry and physics?

Yes.

 

[Zlatanara]

Did self organization or natural law exist before the first living cell originated?

 

[Zlatanara]

Yes.

Did self organization or natural law exist before the first living cell originated?

 

[Foxhole87]

Did self organization or natural law exist before the first living cell originated?

Necessarily, yes to both.

 

[Zlatanara]

Necessarily, yes to both.

Can the origin of information or the system of communication which passes the gene be explained through chemistry and physics?

if so please give me a brief summary

 

[Foxhole87]

Can the origin of information or the system of communication which passes the gene be explained through chemistry and physics?

if so please give me a brief summary

What do you mean "origin of information"?

Your second question is what genetics is all about.

With regards to the "origin of information", this seems like a topic that the greatest minds are tackling, and they aren't throwing their hands up and taking the intellectual shortcut of "some grand designer did it".

 

[Chad Farwell]

What?

You must have EVERYTHING planned out and know the outcome to every possible scenario, reaction is based on action so unless you are God, or he is passing you cheat sheets to every advancing second, I am guessing your and anyone else's reaction has some guide lines (personality type) set to how you react to actions which are just reactions to actions (circle)

 

[Zlatanara]

What do you mean "origin of information"?

Your second question is what genetics is all about.

With regards to the "origin of information", this seems like a topic that the greatest minds are tackling, and they aren't throwing their hands up and taking the intellectual shortcut of "some grand designer did it".

What determines the base sequence of DNA? how did it originate?

i am not taking a side with God or natural selection, i am asking you a simple question because if you believe in something you need to impress others with it. Chemically explain to me what determines the base sequence of DNA. There is no doubt that the first living cell already had DNA because it had to pass its information in order to self organize or reproduce. How did the first Information system originate in the first living cell in your opinion.

if you don't know the answer, indeed you are free to not answer

 

[stevevw]

You're the one who presented Carson as an authority on such matters, not me. I'm simply gesturing toward all the signs showing that he shouldn't be considered an authority.

I actually qualified what I said by saying that he would know enough about the brain being a brain surgeon and enough about evolution having studied biology and chemistry at uni to have a reasonably qualified understanding of how evolution evolved the brain. He doesn't have to have an experts qualification as we have acknowledged on this forum with many who give views on the subject and are not experts. But you didn't even acknowledge that. Your refusal to even give him some credit for this and your stringent criteria shows you were judging him much harsher than most others.

You mean that you will mistake it for design because you assume that structure entails design and therefore a designer. I don't assume this.

This is that game atheists like to play. Its called the design you have when your not having design. If it looks like design , has all the hallmarks of design, acts like design and is mistaken for design then chances are its designed. A good example is the Mt Rushmore busks of your past American presidents. It took great skill to carve this sculptures and when people see them they are in awe from the great design. Yet we cant acknowledge the people who made them are their designers. Yet the people who designed those figures are so much more incredibly made and we cant acknowledge they had a designer. It seems nature can design better than our greatest designers from primarily a random process. You have to have created all the infrastructures that we see now first that you use as examples for how nature designs itself. Yet you can even begin to explain how this happened with including chance and random processes.

What design?

Its everywhere. You just deny it and try to explain it away as being something that nature can create itself. But as we have seen as time has gone by things have become far more complex and it would be a denial to try and explain it away as something that just happen to create itself. Everything about life has design written all over it and now that we are finding layer after layer after layer of this complexity with coded information, language, systems, algorithms, symmetry, systems with systems we cant deny that there is a level of design that goes beyond anything that can create itself. There is intelligence in nature just like we see in the designs that humans make but 100s of times more complex.

As time has gone by scientists have claimed that nature has more and more ability to design. At first they tried to make out life was simple or junk or poorly designed which was evidence for evolution. But now we see that life is far too complex and has design everywhere they claim that nature can design itself. If you look at what they are saying with things like life may have come here on a comet or aliens seeded life on earth or there are multi verses. These are all admissions that they cant explain the design and complexity in life coming from natural processes so they have to come up with far fetched ideas.

But specifically things such as the fine tuning of the universe for life. When you consider that over 122 physical constants that fall into a narrow parameter to make it just right for life. Some of these constants namely the cosmological constant are so fine tuned that it alone makes a strong case for design. The parameter is so small that the odds are 1 in more than all the atoms that exist in the universe to have ended up being so precise to be just right for the universe to exist the way it does.

Other evidence comes from how tests have shown that for random mutations to make just a couple of small changes in a protein would be very improbable. Even if it did manage to happen the time factor would exclude evolution from ever achieving this in the right time frame. In fact to evolve entire genomes would take more time than the earth has existed. The harmony of life and how it is orchestrated to work together is just to good to be the result of chance, random and naturalistic processes. As others have stated the odds for a naturalistic process self creating life would be like throwing a million letters in the air and them coming down to write a book on biology. I have already posted this evidence many times so please refer to the links.
[/quote]What design?[/quote]
DNA codes and information: formal structures and relational causes.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18465197
The Types: A Persistent Structuralist Challenge to Darwinian Pan-Selectionism
http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2013.3

As I recall, this was already debunked.

I cant recall any papers of links you presented. Your own word isn't sufficient evidence. But are you saying that snow flakes are not the end result of other complex reasons but just happen to form out of thin air.

How do they point to design? Once again, you are assuming, as you always do, that natural processes are intrinsically incapable of producing complex structure.

Like I said the level of structure, codes, language, systems with systems, algorithms is beyond a self creating natural process. How far will evolution go to try and claim the capabilities of nature. Its akin to saying that a person can throw 100 dice and land them from 1 to 100 a million times in a row. The odds are just to high. In that sense I do agree with Carson that its like a hurricane blowing through a junk yard and making a jumbo jet.

Complexity does not entail design.

We are not just talking about complexity though. Added to this is the level of info. Coded info, systems that depend on other systems, algorithms that are so complex that they would give a maths expert a headache. Now that they are sequencing our DNA they have found that its not mostly junk. Being able to say that 1.5% of our DNA is explainable through evolution is one thing. But now its going up all the time and eventually they will find that its mostly functional. This level of complexity is beyond explanation through natural processes.

We don't have to pretend at all!

Sometimes I wonder.

Who said they are a product of random chance? Once again, you are assuming a false dichotomy between design and random chance. I've addressed this on multiple occasions!

And so have I. You give it more ability than it has. You overlook the details and buy into the story of evolution. When it comes down to explaining how evolution can create such complexity it doesn't work. Natural selection has been shown to not be the reason that change happens. Change happens through non adaptive methods and I have posted this support as well. But mutations is the main way evolution claims that changes begins.

Natural selection can only act on what it is given. But to be able to find that beneficial mutation it has to go through a massive process of non beneficial mutations. Thats the random part which is impossible and has been shown false in tests. Mutation are a cost to fitness no matter if they are beneficial or not. Beneficial mutations are very very rare. Mutation's take info and fitness away rather than make better and fitter creatures. I have already posted support for this as well.

How does a designer explain this? Wouldn't a designer also be complex, in which case wouldn't you need to explain that complexity by invoking yet another designer?

In the end there has to be someone or something that has this complexity and info to be able to have it exist in the first place. The level of complexity and the variety of info we see all around us doesn't come from thin air. It cannot come from something that doesn't have it in the first place. Life cannot come from non life and more complex info cannot come from less complex info. So this being the case we have to evoke something that is beyond what we understand as cause and effect or how the physics works in our reality. Some scientists have said that there is more to life than what we see. Quantum physics indicates the same. So perhaps there is something that we dont understand that has created the complexity and info of life.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

I actually qualified what I said by saying that he would know enough about the brain being a brain surgeon and enough about evolution having studied biology and chemistry at uni to have a reasonably qualified understanding of how evolution evolved the brain.

And I showed you that that was not the case.

He doesn't have to have an experts qualification as we have acknowledged on this forum with many who give views on the subject and are not experts. But you didn't even acknowledge that. Your refusal to even give him some credit for this and your stringent criteria shows you were judging him much harsher than most others.

You depicted Carson as an authority in an area in which he lacks expertise. I judged him no harsher than anyone else who lacks the relevant expertise.

This is that game atheists like to play. Its called the design you have when your not having design. If it looks like design , has all the hallmarks of design, acts like design and is mistaken for design then chances are its designed.

The appearance of design can be misleading.

A good example is the Mt Rushmore busks of your past American presidents. It took great skill to carve this sculptures and when people see them they are in awe from the great design. Yet we cant acknowledge the people who made them are their designers. Yet the people who designed those figures are so much more incredibly made and we cant acknowledge they had a designer. It seems nature can design better than our greatest designers from primarily a random process. You have to have created all the infrastructures that we see now first that you use as examples for how nature designs itself. Yet you can even begin to explain how this happened with including chance and random processes.

I've addressed your misconceptions about natural processes and randomness repeatedly.

Its everywhere.

Then you should have no difficulty finding specific examples to consider.

You just deny it and try to explain it away as being something that nature can create itself. But as we have seen as time has gone by things have become far more complex and it would be a denial to try and explain it away as something that just happen to create itself. Everything about life has design written all over it and now that we are finding layer after layer after layer of this complexity with coded information, language, systems, algorithms, symmetry, systems with systems we cant deny that there is a level of design that goes beyond anything that can create itself. There is intelligence in nature just like we see in the designs that humans make but 100s of times more complex.

Again, complexity does not entail design.

As time has gone by scientists have claimed that nature has more and more ability to design.

You seem to be conflating "complexity" and "structure" with "design."

At first they tried to make out life was simple or junk or poorly designed which was evidence for evolution. But now we see that life is far too complex and has design everywhere they claim that nature can design itself. If you look at what they are saying with things like life may have come here on a comet or aliens seeded life on earth or there are multi verses. These are all admissions that they cant explain the design and complexity in life coming from natural processes so they have to come up with far fetched ideas.

How does ID explain it? I've asked you this repeatedly.

I cant recall any papers of links you presented. Your own word isn't sufficient evidence. But are you saying that snow flakes are not the end result of other complex reasons but just happen to form out of thin air.

No.

Like I said the level of structure, codes, language, systems with systems, algorithms is beyond a self creating natural process.

Complexity and structure don't entail design.

How far will evolution go to try and claim the capabilities of nature. Its akin to saying that a person can throw 100 dice and land them from 1 to 100 a million times in a row. The odds are just to high. In that sense I do agree with Carson that its like a hurricane blowing through a junk yard and making a jumbo jet.

Yeah, your understanding of it seems to be as bad as his.

We are not just talking about complexity though

Then why do you keep referring to it?

Added to this is the level of info. Coded info, systems that depend on other systems, algorithms that are so complex that they would give a maths expert a headache. Now that they are sequencing our DNA they have found that its not mostly junk. Being able to say that 1.5% of our DNA is explainable through evolution is one thing. But now its going up all the time and eventually they will find that its mostly functional. This level of complexity is beyond explanation through natural processes.

Says who?

Sometimes I wonder.

If only you listened.

And so have I. You give it more ability than it has. You overlook the details and buy into the story of evolution. When it comes down to explaining how evolution can create such complexity it doesn't work. Natural selection has been shown to not be the reason that change happens. Change happens through non adaptive methods and I have posted this support as well. But mutations is the main way evolution claims that changes begins.

This has already been addressed.

Natural selection can only act on what it is given. But to be able to find that beneficial mutation it has to go through a massive process of non beneficial mutations. Thats the random part which is impossible and has been shown false in tests. Mutation are a cost to fitness no matter if they are beneficial or not. Beneficial mutations are very very rare. Mutation's take info and fitness away rather than make better and fitter creatures. I have already posted support for this as well.

Others have already addressed this.

In the end there has to be someone or something that has this complexity and info to be able to have it exist in the first place.

Wouldn't the designer also be complex, in which case wouldn't the design require an explanation that appeals to another designer?

The level of complexity and the variety of info we see all around us doesn't come from thin air.

No one claimed it came from thin air.

 

[stevevw]

So you can't point me to something that is not designed.

All I can do is point you to how the experts would calculate what is design and what is not. I could say that the damage from a hurricane produces non design or a comet flying through space has non designed aspects. But I think everything has both aspects of design and non design. Going back to a snowflake its hexagonal shape reflects the design of water molecules. But part of the shape of snowflakes also comes from temperature. The differences in temp when they fall through the air can add to their shapes. So this part can be random as it will depend on what air currents they fall into and what the temp may by on any given day. There are a lot more variables in that part of their formation. But as far as their basic shape is concerned water molecules will always be the same and produce hexagonal shapes. Its not as if there is a possibility that other shapes can be made.

You mention a coin toss: the coin toss follows the same physical laws as everything else (such as a snowflake being formed).

No a snowflake has a definite pattern which will always produce the same basic shape. A coin toss can be heads or tails and subject to chance. There are two options for the coin. There is one basic option for snowflakes. But that is why its hard to measure probability because it depends on the situation and isn't as black and white. The more coin tosses the more it changes the odds. So there needs to be a lot of calculations and every situation is not the same. Thats why it needs expert levels of maths to assess what is design and what is not. I have posted some papers on this before.
The Coherence Of An Engineered World
http://www.witpress.com/elibrary/wit-transactions-on-ecology-and-the-environment/114/19279
Information And Entropy – Top-down Or Bottom-up Development In Living Systems?
http://www.witpress.com/elibrary/dne-volumes/4/4/420
DNA codes and information: formal structures and relational causes.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18465197

The mention an avalanche: the falling wave of snow follows the same physical laws as everything else (such as a snowflake being formed).

What physical low is that. I know there's gravity. But wouldn't there be many variables such as if there is things in the way which would redirect the course. Two different avalanches would act differently. That why I say there is a bit of both in most things. At one level there would be the same basic laws like gravity. But at other levels there is random circumstances like what may divert the course of the avalanche such as things blocking the paths which will be different for each avalanche.

Also, the bold is straight-up wrong. When quantum physics talks about "observation", it doesn't mean "a sentient being looking at this".

Well it does in a way. Because the only way we can truly determine what state a particle will take is only by a person looking to find out. The results in the double split experiment show that the particles acted like waves when they hit the wall. But when we observed them they became particles again. This doesn't make sense in the macro world so something is happening beyond the logic of our reality in the quantum world. Yet everything should really be the result of the quantum world. In fact tests have been done to prove that the observer can affect reality.
Experiment suggests that reality doesn't exist until it is measured
http://www.gizmag.com/quantum-theory-reality-anu/37866/

 

[Foxhole87]

All I can do is point you to how the experts would calculate what is design and what is not. I could say that the damage from a hurricane produces non design or a comet flying through space has non designed aspects.

How is the damaged non-designed? Are you saying that the damage from the madness in a hurricane is simply the result of objects following the basic laws of physics? Are you saying the trajectory of a comet is simply the result of an object following the basic laws of physics?

But I think everything has both aspects of design and non design.

That's where you don clown shoes and a squeaky red nose. "DERP EVERYTHING IS BOTH DESIGNED AND NOT DESIGNED". This is a nonsense answer and definitely indicative of what you've spend over five dozen pages in this thread doing.

Going back to a snowflake its hexagonal shape reflects the design of water molecules. But part of the shape of snowflakes also comes from temperature. The differences in temp when they fall through the air can add to their shapes.

Yes, and the snowflake is simply the result of objects following basic laws of physics.

So this part can be random as it will depend on what air currents they fall into and what the temp may by on any given day. There are a lot more variables in that part of their formation.

Let this be echoed loudly for you to understand: "complex" doesn't mean "random". Okay? This is the most important thing you seem to not understand either by ignorance or purposeful non-concession. Until you understand this, until you understand that a complex natural process doesn't make something "random", you will continue to believe the outright ridiculous garbage you do with regards to snowflakes and evolution and everything in between.

But as far as their basic shape is concerned water molecules will always be the same and produce hexagonal shapes.Its not as if there is a possibility that other shapes can be made.

Indeed they can; snowflakes that look nothing like a six-sided figure can arise, and that too is simply the result of objects following basic laws of physics.

No a snowflake has a definite pattern which will always produce the same basic shape.

First you said that the basic shape won't always be produced, and now you're saying the opposite. Yikes.

A coin toss can be heads or tails and subject to chance. There are two options for the coin. There is one basic option for snowflakes. But that is why its hard to measure probability because it depends on the situation and isn't as black and white.

And the basic physical laws that say there can only be two outcomes to a coin toss are the same ones that say a snowflake will have whatever shape it takes.

The more coin tosses the more it changes the odds. So there needs to be a lot of calculations and every situation is not the same.

AGAIN: Just because something is "complex" does not make an outcome "random".

Thats why it needs expert levels of maths to assess what is design and what is not. I have posted some papers on this before.

The Coherence Of An Engineered World
http://www.witpress.com/elibrary/wit-transactions-on-ecology-and-the-environment/114/19279
Information And Entropy – Top-down Or Bottom-up Development In Living Systems?
http://www.witpress.com/elibrary/dne-volumes/4/4/420

WIT is an irrelevant pseduo-rag of a "journal".

DNA codes and information: formal structures and relational causes.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18465197

There's nothing in this article which supports any claim you are making. You are illicitly trying to prop up your position by referring to articles which don't agree with your claim and hoping that you can dazzle the audience with obscurity. It isn't working.

What physical low is that. I know there's gravity. But wouldn't there be many variables such as if there is things in the way which would redirect the course.

Gravity, fluid dynamics.

Two different avalanches would act differently. That why I say there is a bit of both in most things. At one level there would be the same basic laws like gravity.

Why? Under what mechanisms?

But at other levels there is random circumstances like what may divert the course of the avalanche such as things blocking the paths which will be different for each avalanche.

No, if the two mountainsides are different, they aren't the same avalanche.

And again: COMPLEX DOES NOT MEAN RANDOM.

Well it does in a way. Because the only way we can truly determine what state a particle will take is only by a person looking to find out.

No, it is by any "measurement", whether that means something else in the universe counts on a certain thing to be either one way or another, or it is a mechanical device which records an outcome, or a human with his eye up against the glass; but the latter two don't matter because it is all base don the first.

The results in the double split experiment show that the particles acted like waves when they hit the wall. But when we observed them they became particles again. This doesn't make sense in the macro world so something is happening beyond the logic of our reality in the quantum world. Yet everything should really be the result of the quantum world. In fact tests have been done to prove that the observer can affect reality.
Experiment suggests that reality doesn't exist until it is measured
http://www.gizmag.com/quantum-theory-reality-anu/37866/

I hope you understand that the measurement doesn't mean "a person sees it", because nothing in the article nor the original source supports your claim.

 

[Foxhole87]

What determines the base sequence of DNA? how did it originate?

i am not taking a side with God or natural selection, i am asking you a simple question because if you believe in something you need to impress others with it. Chemically explain to me what determines the base sequence of DNA. There is no doubt that the first living cell already had DNA because it had to pass its information in order to self organize or reproduce. How did the first Information system originate in the first living cell in your opinion.

if you don't know the answer, indeed you are free to not answer

The first cells would have (likely) featured RNA rather than DNA.

Are you asking why the four bases of DNA are adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine, I don't know besides responding why "why is water made up of hydrogen and oxygen - and thus your answer".

Are you trying to have us do organic chemistry homework for you?

 

[Foxhole87]

You must have EVERYTHING planned out and know the outcome to every possible scenario, reaction is based on action so unless you are God, or he is passing you cheat sheets to every advancing second, I am guessing your and anyone else's reaction has some guide lines (personality type) set to how you react to actions which are just reactions to actions (circle)

I still have no idea what you're talking about. Could you start from the top?

 

[Zlatanara]

The first cells would have (likely) featured RNA rather than DNA.

Are you asking why the four bases of DNA are adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine, I don't know besides responding why "why is water made up of hydrogen and oxygen - and thus your answer".

Are you trying to have us do organic chemistry homework for you?

Even in the transfer-RNA molecule there is no direct chemical interaction between the amino acid and the nucleotide codon that specifies it.

properties of the chemical constituents of DNA do not determine its base sequences.

i did not ask you to name me the 4 bases of DNA (which anybody with google can do)

Chemically explain to me what determines the base sequence of DNA, Note that no chemical bonds link the nucleotide bases

in my opinion, its impossible to explain the Headlines in a Newspaper based on the chemical of its INK. How can chemical attraction promote information?

 

[Foxhole87]

Even in the transfer-RNA molecule there is no direct chemical interaction between the amino acid and the nucleotide codon that specifies it.

properties of the chemical constituents of DNA do not determine its base sequences.

i did not ask you to name me the 4 bases of DNA (which anybody with google can do)

Chemically explain to me what determines the base sequence of DNA, Note that no chemical bonds link the nucleotide bases

in my opinion, its impossible to explain the Headlines in a Newspaper based on the chemical of its INK. How can chemical attraction promote information?

I don't understand what you're getting at here and I'm not picking up what your analogy is saying.

What's your point?

 

[Zlatanara]

I don't understand what you're getting at here and I'm not picking up what your analogy is saying.

What's your point?

under which law of physics or chemistry would you be able to explain the exact arrangements of DNA/RNA? The Headlines of the news paper cannot be described by the Ink of the news paper, yet we know the sequence hypothesis and its specific arrangements.

Also Note that no chemical bonds link the nucleotide bases.

Natural selection in nature lacks foresight. It does not know where it is going. Selection cannot occur before new functional sequences arise. In simulation algorithms, they all use strategies to ensure the program will generate an information-rich sequence. For example Ev (computer simulation) is provided with a target sequence (sequence of nucleotide bases) that functions as a binding site. A program is devised that allows Ev to eventually converge on the target sequence. It makes use of information that gives the process a goal-directed foresight, that is not like natural selection, but rather is like human selection. “Ev exhibits the genius of its designer (computer simulations like Ev and Avida claim they can generate new information through sophisticated evolutionary algorithms. The problem with all these algorithms is no matter how sophisticated they need some kind of “forward looking memory”)

 

[Foxhole87]

under which law of physics or chemistry would you be able to explain the exact arrangements of DNA/RNA? The Headlines of the news paper cannot be described by the Ink of the news paper, yet we know the sequence hypothesis and its specific arrangements.

Also Note that no chemical bonds link the nucleotide bases.

Natural selection in nature lacks foresight. It does not know where it is going. Selection cannot occur before new functional sequences arise. In simulation algorithms, they all use strategies to ensure the program will generate an information-rich sequence. For example Ev (computer simulation) is provided with a target sequence (sequence of nucleotide bases) that functions as a binding site. A program is devised that allows Ev to eventually converge on the target sequence. It makes use of information that gives the process a goal-directed foresight, that is not like natural selection, but rather is like human selection. “Ev exhibits the genius of its designer (computer simulations like Ev and Avida claim they can generate new information through sophisticated evolutionary algorithms. The problem with all these algorithms is no matter how sophisticated they need some kind of “forward looking memory”)

I see sloppy plagiarism from Stephen Meyers' book "Signature in the Cell" and a misunderstanding of how evolution works.

 

[Zlatanara]

I see sloppy plagiarism from Stephen Meyers' book "Signature in the Cell" and a misunderstanding of how evolution works.

Yes indeed that's a great book, it is one of my favorite reads of all time

i did not know that every single post needs a citation requirement in this forum? if so i will do it in future

because i thought those were for high school only.

So are you going to ditch this bullet? which i am fine with though

you never explained how the DNA/RNA might have originated

 

[quatona]

Do you believe that the origin of the first living cell can be explained purely by chemistry and physics?

I wouldn´t know how else it could possibly be explained - seeing that a mere assertion doesn´t qualify as an explanation.
But I am open to learning about such an explanation.