Parallel traits question.

pitabread said:

Perhaps because it's an interesting thing to do?

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I don't think God piddles around like that.

OldWiseGuy said:

I don't think God piddles around like that.

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Pretty sure an omnipotent supernatural entity could do what they want.

Speedwell said:

The way ID Proponents do it is to assume two different definitions of "design" in that sentence, making it an equivocation fallacy. "The way we observe intentional creation is to observe functional organisation." Do you see why that is problematic?

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I am trying to be consistent when I use the word "design". I believe that design is intentional organization. But as I stated previously, if there is no intentional designer behind natural complexity, how can one then claim that intentionality itself is a product of unintentional causes. I do not believe this myself, I simply want someone to ground intentionality in something that is not unintentionality.

But ID proponents do not. ID was originally created to discredit the theory of evolution in order to rehabilitate biblical creationism. They have no answer as to how the designer gets the design into the designed object and don't really care very much about it.

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I disagree that they do not care how the designer did it. It is an incredibly fascinating question, and though it remains unanswered it is not reasonable to reject the idea that design principles can be seen in nature. If you want to know how the designer did it, then try to find out, there is no reason for anyone to reject a legitimate area of research because there is a lack of data.

It works well enough that engineers use so-called "genetic algorithms" based on the same kind of randomly distributed variation and selection process as employed in evolution to let their computers autonomously design new complex semiconductor circuits.

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While I understand the comparison, even if computer simulations are accurately imitating an evolutionary process. Though I admit my ignorance when it comes to computer programing, the computers are simulating random permutations by design, in accordance with programmed limitations, in order to achieve an optimal outcome to a specified problem. Even if genetic algorithms accurately represent the evolutionary process, they required a designer.

Randomly distributed variation followed by selection can indeed produce biological complexity--the mathematics of stochastic process proves it to be possible, and the biosphere has enough information-processing capacity to do it. Purpose, intention, can only come from God.

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Even if mathematics can prove something to be possible, assuming it accounts for all the variables, it doesn't prove the actuality. Looking at the world through the lens of mathematics is a good way to assume that what could have happened is what did happen. I could counter claim by saying that our experiential knowledge of design best explains how organisms can be so functionally organized, but I guess I am not allowed to view things as if their is purpose and intention behind it.

It is unfalsifiable because you can claim that anything at all is intentional and I can't disprove it. In that sense I can say that the entire universe is "designed" (that is, intentionally created) including the fully naturalistic theory of evolution and you can't disprove my assertion. And, in fact, that is what I believe. I do not believe that God needs to tinker with genetic molecules in order to infuse all life with divine Telos.

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If that is what you believe, then you believe in an intelligence behind the universe in the same way intelligence is necessary to program computers to pose random solutions only to select and build upon for the purpose of achieving an optimized goal.

Evolution, by the way, has no goals or optimization, it simply selects against that which doesn't survive.

R.J. Aldridge said:

I am trying to be consistent when I use the word "design". I believe that design is intentional organization. But as I stated previously, if there is no intentional designer behind natural complexity, how can one then claim that intentionality itself is a product of unintentional causes. I do not believe this myself, I simply want someone to ground intentionality in something that is not unintentionality.

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That only seems necessary if you regard "intentionality" as a metaphysical entity.

I disagree that they do not care how the designer did it. It is an incredibly fascinating question, and though it remains unanswered it is not reasonable to reject the idea that design principles can be seen in nature. If you want to know how the designer did it, then try to find out, there is no reason for anyone to reject a legitimate area of research because there is a lack of data.

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I didn't say it isn't an interesting question. I said ID proponents don't care about it. ID as it is presently constituted is a creature of radical Calvinists with a political agenda, which is all they really care about.

While I understand the comparison, even if computer simulations are accurately imitating an evolutionary process. Though I admit my ignorance when it comes to computer programing, the computers are simulating random permutations by design, in accordance with programmed limitations, in order to achieve an optimal outcome to a specified problem. Even if genetic algorithms accurately represent the evolutionary process, they required a designer.

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I only brought forth the example to make sure we were on the same page about "random" which it appears that we were not. When creatures reproduce, they reproduce with variation in their heritable traits. These variations are randomly distributed (think "bell curve") which is the meaning of "random" in "random variation and natural selection."

Even if mathematics can prove something to be possible, assuming it accounts for all the variables, it doesn't prove the actuality.

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In this case it means random variation and selection algorithms are at least theoretically capable of producing complexity. The ID argument is not that evolution did not produce complexity but that it is inherently incapable of producing complexity, so the resort to a mathematical argument is a sufficient refutation.

Looking at the world through the lens of mathematics is a good way to assume that what could have happened is what did happen.

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You appear not to have much faith in the intelligence of scientists.

I could counter claim by saying that our experiential knowledge of design best explains how organisms can be so functionally organized, but I guess I am not allowed to view things as if their is purpose and intention behind it.

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Who doesn't allow you to?

Evolution, by the way, has no goals or optimization, it simply selects against that which doesn't survive.

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Correct.

Speedwell said:

That only seems necessary if you regard "intentionality" as a metaphysical entity.

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I agree that intentionality is not an entity, but the jury is still out on whether it can be grounded apart from the metaphysical, in the sense that it can be understood through objective studies of material reality.

I didn't say it isn't an interesting question. I said ID proponents don't care about it. ID as it is presently constituted is a creature of radical Calvinists with a political agenda, which is all they really care about.

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If you are thinking of ID as an institution where the idea is tied to the agenda of its messengers, I would put many scientific/political ideas in the same camp. For the sake of discussion, can we separate the ideas from the people who promote them so that we can examine them based upon their own merit?

I only brought forth the example to make sure we were on the same page about "random" which it appears that we were not. When creatures reproduce, they reproduce with variation in their heritable traits. These variations are randomly distributed (think "bell curve") which is the meaning of "random" in "random variation and natural selection."

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I understand what you are saying, but the randomness you are speaking of has limitations. Genetic traits may be "randomly" distributed as you say, but the genetics of the parents represent a limited set of possibilities, and the inherent order of the DNA insures that traits involving eye or hair color, for example, correspond to the eyes and hair(it would be strange if green eyes were randomly expressed, in a random location), therefore reducing the amount of randomness.

In this case it means random variation and selection algorithms are at least theoretically capable of producing complexity. The ID argument is not that evolution did not produce complexity but that it is inherently incapable of producing complexity, so the resort to a mathematical argument is a sufficient refutation.

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Selection algorithms are a representation of how intelligent designers can design a specific conceived mechanism through bottom up programming. You can say that they theoretically give us an understanding of complexity arising from random variation, but the limitations of such models can be used as evidence for ID as well, all they have to do is explain how selection algorithms represent randomness by design.

Sanoy said:

All 3 components are the unique products of intentional beings. Only by the knowledge of these 3 components can it be deduced that something is in fact designed.

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And I say you are 'the intentional being' making that claim!

If you disagree, then cite the objective test which decouples your mind, as speaker of the claim, from the claim itself. What you mean by 'semantic content, a semantic paradigm, and an intention', 'deduce' and 'knowledge' demonstrates your mind in action in coming up with that meaning. 'Semantics', by definition, has meaning only to human minds, for goodness sake!
All these distinctions do, is provide evidence of your own mind in action .. and nothing independent from it!

R.J. Aldridge said:

I agree that intentionality is not an entity, but the jury is still out on whether it can be grounded apart from the metaphysical, in the sense that it can be understood through objective studies of material reality.

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Good luck in trying that particular method .. 'Understanding' (of thorough objective studies) requires what precisely?
A human mind, eh?
All that avenue of research will do is re-inforce the notion of the human mind at play .. and no evidence of anything independent from it.

R.J. Aldridge said:

I agree that intentionality is not an entity, but the jury is still out on whether it can be grounded apart from the metaphysical, in the sense that it can be understood through objective studies of material reality.

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May I take it, then, that you are a Dualist?

If you are thinking of ID as an institution where the idea is tied to the agenda of its messengers, I would put many scientific/political ideas in the same camp. For the sake of discussion, can we separate the ideas from the people who promote them so that we can examine them based upon their own merit?

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I have never seen it done, nor am I aware of any ID proponent who argues anything but the incapacity of evolution.

I understand what you are saying, but the randomness you are speaking of has limitations. Genetic traits may be "randomly" distributed as you say, but the genetics of the parents represent a limited set of possibilities, and the inherent order of the DNA insures that traits involving eye or hair color, for example, correspond to the eyes and hair(it would be strange if green eyes were randomly expressed, in a random location), therefore reducing the amount of randomness.

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Even discrete variables can assume a Normal distribution. If anything is reduced it would be the standard deviation of the distribution.

Selection algorithms are a representation of how intelligent designers can design a specific conceived mechanism through bottom up programming. You can say that they theoretically give us an understanding of complexity arising from random variation, but the limitations of such models can be used as evidence for ID as well, all they have to do is explain how selection algorithms represent randomness by design.

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I'm not sure what point you are making here. Are you saying that the purported Intelligent Designer may influence the outcome by tinkering with selection criteria rather than with the random distribution curve of trait variation?

Speedwell said:

May I take it, then, that you are a Dualist?

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I would say there is software and there is hardware and neither is particularly affective without the other. So, take that as you will.

I have never seen it done, nor am I aware of any ID proponent who argues anything but the incapacity of evolution.

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I am sure there are ID proponents that believe in some sort of theistic evolution. I don't, but I do recognize that organisms change, adapt, and specialize to their ecosystem over time, it is an intelligently designed feature. I however do not believe that all life is descended from a common organism.

I'm not sure what point you are making here. Are you saying that the purported Intelligent Designer may influence the outcome by tinkering with selection criteria rather than with the random distribution curve of trait variation?

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What I am saying is that selection algorithms do not represent a natural evolutionary process. They represent an intelligently designed process that requires a goal and structured guidelines in order to reach that goal in a way that mimics randomness, though it is not random.

R.J. Aldridge said:

What I am saying is that selection algorithms do not represent a natural evolutionary process. They represent an intelligently designed process that requires a goal and structured guidelines in order to reach that goal in a way that mimics randomness, though it is not random.

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How does it mimic a bell curve without being a bell curve?

Sanoy said:

Heres the thing, a single fin on the top or bottom I think would help keep the fish straight given the movement of the tail. But then at some point two identical fins, or fin nubs have to show up with bilateral symmetry and then evolve symmetrically with nerves wiring up to the vertebrae and then the brain and finally the cognitive function to control those two fins fluidly. Until that last step, to me, it would seem that they are going to slow the fish down and misdirect it's motion until they can be cognitively controlled. So it's more than just a gene that controls a "make this here" there is a novel "make these", and the "here" is actually a bilateral position, and then there is all the other things that seem to need a physical process to push them ahead of random acquisition.

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. Too lazy to look up the name of the genes. Since all cells have a copy of the genome all it takes is to have the genes turn on in two areas instead of one or to have the area widen and then separate. Not sure what happens in early bilaterians but developmental biologists can easily clear that up for you. Some of the genes that do head to tail patterning are the same genes that make limbs. When genes do that it’s called bricolage. Same genes different structures

I’m gonna let PZ explain the genetics of how limbs form but it’s about 40 mins. Keep in mind that this is a photo I can’t link. PZ is a developmental biologist. And yes that is YouTube

Speedwell said:

How does it mimic a bell curve without being a bell curve?

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If I sound like I don't know anything about programming, you would be correct. All I am trying to say is that, here we are discussing intentional vs. unintentional organization in regards to living organisms, and when the claim is made that life is a result of intentional design, there is push back from those who claim it is unintentional. You claimed that unintentional design can be simulated with computers, and I am trying to point out the irony of intentionally simulating unintentional organization. In other words, man is capable of using randomness in a functional way because we are designers. Remove the designer from the equation and what will we have?

While I do not agree that a designer used the evolutionary process to create the diversity of life we see, that scenario still attributes life to an intelligent source.

R.J. Aldridge said:

If I sound like I don't know anything about programming, you would be correct. All I am trying to say is that, here we are discussing intentional vs. unintentional organization in regards to living organisms, and when the claim is made that life is a result of intentional design, there is push back from those who claim it is unintentional.

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No, the pushback is on the claim that the mechanism of evolution as presently understood is inadequate--whether there is a designer behind it or not--and further, that if evolutionary process is inadequate, the only alternative is ID.

You claimed that unintentional design can be simulated with computers, and I am trying to point out the irony of intentionally simulating unintentional organization.

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No, I'm claiming that certain elements of the evolutionary process can be modeled successfully with computers, in particular those elements which are deemed to be inadequate by ID proponents.

In other words, man is capable of using randomness in a functional way because we are designers. Remove the designer from the equation and what will we have?

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That is a separate question. Man is capable of using randomness in a functional way because it exists. In selective breeding, for example, the randomly distributed variation common to all life is taken advantage of by manipulating the selection criteria.

If you want to argue that randomly distributed reproductive variation only exists because of the intention of some purported designer, go right ahead, but I think you will find that it is an unfalsifiable proposition.

Sanoy said:

SelfSim said:

And I say you are 'the intentional being' making that claim!

If you disagree, then cite the objective test which decouples your mind, as speaker of the claim, from the claim itself. What you mean by 'semantic content, a semantic paradigm, and an intention', 'deduce' and 'knowledge' demonstrates your mind in action in coming up with that meaning. 'Semantics', by definition, has meaning only to human minds, for goodness sake!
All these distinctions do, is provide evidence of your own mind in action .. and nothing independent from it!

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I agree with you that I am an intentional being, but you have come to that conclusion solely through an inference made by the semantic content of my posts and the semantic paradigm of the English language. Those same two things are found in the instruction of our dna which built the very thing you claim is an intentional agent. A blue print is at least as complex as the thing it describes, and our DNA is far more complex than the simple English that has warranted your belief that I am an intentional agent.

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I can test objectively, the hypothesis that: 'your words may be the decriptions of an intentional agent'. I can also test the hypothesis that: 'DNA may be required to produce a human brain'. Both tests also lead to practical outcomes (there's tonnes of biomedical evidence for that). (Such tests can make use of semantic meanings to do so because that is consisent with the notion that we (the human mind) create those meanings).

However, the hypothesis that: 'There may be an intentional agent which produced DNA and thence the (human brain) intentional agent', is objectively untestable and thus leads to mostly impractical outcomes. A belief is: 'A notion held as being true for any reason'. An 'intentional agent' is capable of conceiving both beliefs and objective tests. When something is objectively untestable, it is excluded from scientific thinking and designated as being a belief (as per the definition above).
The 'paradox' described earlier, relies on the untestable hidden assumption that 'something exists', (or 'is true'), independently from the mind conceiving that (it is based on pure logic). It is thus, based on a belief.

I don't need any beliefs to conclude that your words and their meanings 'may be the decriptions of an intentional agent' .. I can test for that, whereas the paradox described remains as objectively untestable .. until you rise to the challenge I presented above, albeit more elaborately worded as: 'Cite the objective test which unequivocally leads to the conclusion that something exists independently of the human mind perceiving it'.

R.J. Aldridge said:

If I sound like I don't know anything about programming, you would be correct. All I am trying to say is that, here we are discussing intentional vs. unintentional organization in regards to living organisms, and when the claim is made that life is a result of intentional design, there is push back from those who claim it is unintentional. You claimed that unintentional design can be simulated with computers, and I am trying to point out the irony of intentionally simulating unintentional organization. In other words, man is capable of using randomness in a functional way because we are designers. Remove the designer from the equation and what will we have?

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Well if you remove the human designer from the equation, you have also removed the meaning in your words as well as any perceptions of life, or existence .. or anything! Your point just got zapped into meaningless oblivion, for starters.

R.J. Aldridge said:

While I do not agree that a designer used the evolutionary process to create the diversity of life we see, that scenario still attributes life to an intelligent source.

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How?