Revealing the data behind the science of evolution

[Hoghead1]

Concrete example, please, on how an infinite number of theories are generated.

 

[juvenissun]

Hey you guys are the ones who insist that confirmations increase the probability that your theory is true! If you find 1,000 white swans, then it follows that all swans are probably white (according to you). What do you base that on? As far as I can tell, it's based on blind faith! However, if confirmations really do increase the probability that something is true, then here's simple logic for you.

The theory that Richard Dawkins does not exist is logically equivalent to the theory that every person who exists is not Richard Dawkins. Now I can easily walk out of my house and find thousands of people who exist and aren't Richard Dawkins. Do you agree that every person I meet increases the probability that Richard Dawkins doesn't exist? If not, then why not?

So, do you, or do you not believe that God (or Dawkins) exists?

You do not have to make decision on Dawkins. But can you afford not to make decision on God?

 

[The Cadet]

Each author describes God from differing viewpoints yet the over all results are amazingly consistent.

Beg your pardon? The god of the new testament seems to be a completely different beast from the god of the old testament in a number of substantial ways.

Perhaps a better question would be this: Why do you think that data are important? The answer to this will necessarily be that you are an empiricist. You believe that sense data are the key to understanding the world around us. How can you justify this claim?

...Okay, let me get this straight.

You're seriously questioning that sensory data is the key to understanding the world around us?

Okay, do me a favor. I want you to put on a blindfold, earmuffs, nose plugs, a ball gag, and find some way to effectively numb your hands, then, once you've done that, click this link, read it, and type what is stated there. Then, for an encore, see if you can can walk through a populated area like that without getting run over.

Or maybe I'm the exception, and you've found some way to access the outside world that doesn't rely on your senses.

I have explained previously on numerous occasions that the reason we privilege empiricism over other epistemologies is because empiricism demonstrably works (indeed, to the point where I have yet to discover any reliable epistemology not based on empiricism, despite numerous people, including you, claiming to have such an epistemology and my continuing demands to hear about it). But here, you seem to be outright rejecting sensory data as a key to the world around you. That's nonsensical in the extreme.

 

[Zosimus]

All I'm doing at this point is demonstrating how consilience works. Do you disagree that the consilience of the billion samples indicates a high probability that there are no blue marbles?

I do indeed disagree! The only reason your coinsilience appears to work is because there is a low number of marbles in the bag in comparison to the number of samples taken. For gravity, for example, there are believed to be approximately 10^80 atoms in the universe, each of which interacts with every other atom every second of every day. One billion samples may well be insufficient.

Does the consilience of the billion data points with the marbles give us useful information? Yes or no? Are you willing to admit that consilence, as a method of garnering information, has definitely not been refuted?

Useful in the sense that some theories can be eliminated. However, the remaining theories (an infinite number) are all equally likely given the principle of maximum entropy.

Why is it that evolution deniers always demand instant answers? I am taking my time. Why would I give you the numbers before you agree that consilience is useful? You'd just submit, incorrectly, that consilience has been refuted. I'm showing you that it has not.

Why do logic deniers always insist that data are important, conveniently ignoring the logical fallacies on which their refuted worldview is based? How do you resolve the problem of induction? Are you a Bayesian epistemologist? What about the tacking paradox? What about Hempel's Paradox? What about the New Riddle of Induction?

 

[Zosimus]

Concrete example, please, on how an infinite number of theories are generated.

There are various methods, but Gaussian Elimination is the most common. If the problem is underdetermined then an infinite number of solutions can be generated.

 

[Zosimus]

So, do you, or do you not believe that God (or Dawkins) exists?

You do not have to make decision on Dawkins. But can you afford not to make decision on God?

I'm agnostic.

 

[Zosimus]

...Okay, let me get this straight.

You're seriously questioning that sensory data is the key to understanding the world around us?

Okay, do me a favor. I want you to put on a blindfold, earmuffs, nose plugs, a ball gag, and find some way to effectively numb your hands, then, once you've done that, click this link, read it, and type what is stated there. Then, for an encore, see if you can can walk through a populated area like that without getting run over.

You have played right into my hands.

You see, you have made a rational argument that empiricism is necessary. In short, you think that logic tells us that empiricism is superior to logic. Do you seriously not see the contradiction in this claim? Rationalism can be rationally justified, but empiricism cannot justify itself. It must always resort to rationalism for a justification. Thus, empiricism must be subordinated to rationalism.

Or maybe I'm the exception, and you've found some way to access the outside world that doesn't rely on your senses.

I have explained previously on numerous occasions that the reason we privilege empiricism over other epistemologies is because empiricism demonstrably works (indeed, to the point where I have yet to discover any reliable epistemology not based on empiricism, despite numerous people, including you, claiming to have such an epistemology and my continuing demands to hear about it). But here, you seem to be outright rejecting sensory data as a key to the world around you. That's nonsensical in the extreme.

No, rationalism demonstrably works whereas empiricism is based on logical fallacies. The only way that sense data make any sense is when it is placed into a rational framework.

 

[46AND2]

I do indeed disagree! The only reason your coinsilience appears to work is because there is a low number of marbles in the bag in comparison to the number of samples taken. For gravity, for example, there are believed to be approximately 10^80 atoms in the universe, each of which interacts with every other atom every second of every day. One billion samples may well be insufficient.

Why do you keep trying to jump ahead and presume to know how I'm going to use consilience as it relates to evolution? Is it not more likely that there are no blue marbles after a billion samples than after one sample? Is it not more likely that there are no blue marbles after 100 samples than one?

Useful in the sense that some theories can be eliminated.

Ding! Ding! Ding!

However, the remaining theories (an infinite number) are all equally likely given the principle of maximum entropy.

Why do logic deniers always insist that data are important, conveniently ignoring the logical fallacies on which their refuted worldview is based? How do you resolve the problem of induction? Are you a Bayesian epistemologist? What about the tacking paradox? What about Hempel's Paradox? What about the New Riddle of Induction?

I have stated nothing about my worldview at this point. Nor have I even begun to address how consilience and nested hierarchies apply to evolution. Can you please stop jumping ahead, and follow along with the conversation?

 

[Zosimus]

Why do you keep trying to jump ahead and presume to know how I'm going to use consilience as it relates to evolution? Is it not more likely that there are no blue marbles after a billion samples than after one sample? Is it not more likely that there are no blue marbles after 100 samples than one?




Ding! Ding! Ding!



I have stated nothing about my worldview at this point. Nor have I even begun to address how consilience and nested hierarchies apply to evolution. Can you please stop jumping ahead, and follow along with the conversation?

Fine. As long as you and I agree that the data are irrelevant, you can present whatever data you'd like.

 

[46AND2]

Fine. As long as you and I agree that the data are irrelevant, you can present whatever data you'd like.

Irrelevant? You said yourself it can be useful for eliminating theories, right?

 

[Subduction Zone]

From Stanford University

The predicament Duhem here identifies is no rainy day puzzle for philosophers of science, but a methodological challenge that constantly arises in the course of scientific practice itself. It is simply not true that for practical purposes and in concrete contexts a single revision of our beliefs in response to disconfirming evidence is always obviously correct, or the most promising, or the only or even most sensible avenue to pursue. To cite a classic example, when Newton's celestial mechanics failed to correctly predict the orbit of Uranus, scientists at the time did not simply abandon the theory but protected it from refutation by instead challenging the background assumption that the solar system contained only seven planets. This strategy bore fruit, notwithstanding the falsity of Newton's theory: by calculating the location of a hypothetical eighth planet influencing the orbit of Uranus, the astronomers Adams and Leverrier were eventually led to discover Neptune in 1846. But the very same strategy failed when used to try to explain the advance of the perihelion in Mercury's orbit by postulating the existence of “Vulcan”, an additional planet located between Mercury and the sun, and this phenomenon would resist satisfactory explanation until the arrival of Einstein's theory of general relativity. So it seems that Duhem was right to suggest not only that hypotheses must be tested as a group or a collection, but also that it is by no means a foregone conclusion which member of such a collection should be abandoned or revised in response to a failed empirical test or false implication. Indeed, this very example illustrates why Duhem's own rather hopeful appeal to the ‘good sense’ of scientists themselves in deciding when a given hypothesis ought to be abandoned promises very little if any relief from the general predicament of holist underdetermination.

Maybe I should have been clearer. I asked for an example that used evolution for an example. Yes scientists make errors at times. You have failed to show any errors or even the application of your Raven's argument against the theory of evolution.

 

[Zosimus]

Irrelevant? You said yourself it can be useful for eliminating theories, right?

Sure. Data can reduce you from an infinite number of theories to an infinite number of theories. Some infinities are larger than others. What's your point?

 

[Zosimus]

Maybe I should have been clearer. I asked for an example that used evolution for an example. Yes scientists make errors at times. You have failed to show any errors or even the application of your Raven's argument against the theory of evolution.

I've already answered this on another thread.

 

[SkyWriting]

The idea is most certainly not refuted. And your example only serves to support it, not nullify it. When more data was discovered, the results were NOT consilient. When you have only two data points which agree, the probability is, in fact, increased, that the result is correct. However, when other conflicting data points are added, it proves that the original idea is incorrect.

It does not "Prove", it only adds additional data.

 

[SkyWriting]

Say you have a bag of 200 marbles. You are asked to pull one marble out of the bag, then return it, where it is shaken back into the mix. You do this 100 times. Let's say you pull 60 black and 40 red marbles. What can we infer from this? Not much. Could there be blue marbles in the bag? Yes. Could there be 75% red marbles? yes. All we have determined is that there are red and black marbles in the bag. Now, let's say you do it a second time, with the same bag. This time, you grab 50 of each color, black and red. What can we determine from this? Well, the probability that there are only red and black in the bag has increased, albeit marginally. The odds that there is less than 75% red marbles is also increased.
Now, you repeat the process 100 times.

Then you have proven you are a genius at swindling a paycheck from
the QC department because there was only 200 total marbles total and
you've wasted a day on this project.

 

[pat34lee]

The theory that Richard Dawkins does not exist is logically equivalent to the theory that every person who exists is not Richard Dawkins. Now I can easily walk out of my house and find thousands of people who exist and aren't Richard Dawkins. Do you agree that every person I meet increases the probability that Richard Dawkins doesn't exist? If not, then why not?

I see some potential problems here.
How can you prove anyone is Richard Dawkins?
What if the real one lies and claims to be someone else?
What if another person or persons claim to be him?
Which Richard Dawkins is real if several have the same name?

 

[pat34lee]

I have stated nothing about my worldview at this point. Nor have I even begun to address how consilience and nested hierarchies apply to evolution. Can you please stop jumping ahead, and follow along with the conversation?

I have the same problem sometimes when I try to show logical steps.
Someone always wants to jump straight to the conclusion, and it's
usually the wrong one.

 

[46AND2]

Zos,

I'm interested in hearing your views about philosophy as it is not an area I have spent a lot of time studying...however, what I object to, is your presumptions which do not, at present have relevance to the discussion. You assume that I am going to argue in the same manner as the countless other posters you have encountered before, and you jump the gun. Your arguments will have relevance later in the discussion, and I'd love to hear them then. For the time being, can we please just stick with the topics as they come up? For example you have said that my marbles scenario APPEARS to work because of sample size. Can you please elaborate on why you use the term "appears" rather than stating that what I have described so far works?

Sky Writing,

I apologize that things are going too slowly for you. But it is going to be more of the same, so maybe this isn't the thread for you. I'm doing this for my benefit as much as anybody else.

 

[SkyWriting]

Zosimus, I know that you love the Raven's Paradox, but it seems that you continually misapply towards the theory of evolution. Can you give a clear cut example of where and how it was applied by anyone here?

Were are not to refer to evolution.

 

[SkyWriting]

Sky Writing,
I apologize that things are going too slowly for you. But it is going to be more of the same, so maybe this isn't the thread for you. I'm doing this for my benefit as much as anybody else.

Odd, I don't have the thoughts you are apologizing for. But thanks for thinking of me.
I was just giving you a hard time for counting 200 marbles more than one time.