Randomness

[Willtor]

I am speaking to the original post, and sorry, but the definition of random does include undirected.

What "random" (or any other word means) depends on who is speaking. When a scientist speaks, in a scientific context, he does not assign that meaning.

You know, I use "random" all the time in my lab, in contexts where it doesn't make sense to talk about directed vs. undirected.

 

[yeshuas1]

Actually, given our current understanding of physics, everything is random. It's just that certain states are more likely than others.For more information, look into wave particle duality.

everything on a micro scale, but not in practicality.
actually advancing physics is demonstrating God more and more.......whiel we can change the particle/energy charges in one part of the universe, apparently the universe itself will maintian the same balance.........

superstring theory in the bible - by Him all things were created and ae held together

 

[JohnR7]

Whoop Whoop Whoop... the alarms are going off.

The only alarm that is going off is the one that you are activating.

 

[Willtor]

everything on a micro scale, but not in practicality.
actually advancing physics is demonstrating God more and more.......whiel we can change the particle/energy charges in one part of the universe, apparently the universe itself will maintian the same balance.........

superstring theory in the bible - by Him all things were created and ae held together

I just read this, today (special thanks to Shernren):

It is obvious that such authors [who give their compositions an air of authority by inserting in them passages from the Bible, interpreted (or rather distorted) into senses as far fromt he right meaning of Scripture as their authors are near to absurdity who thus ostentatiously adorn their writings], not having penetrated the true senses of Scripture, would impose upon others an obligation to subscribe to conclusions that are repugnant to manifest reason and sense, if they had any authority to do so.

-- Galileo, "Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina"

---

Be careful that you aren't pulling text out of Scripture and trying to reinterpret it in a light to which only this current age has so far had access.

 

[[serious]]

everything on a micro scale, but not in practicality.
actually advancing physics is demonstrating God more and more.......whiel we can change the particle/energy charges in one part of the universe, apparently the universe itself will maintian the same balance.........

superstring theory in the bible - by Him all things were created and ae held together

macro scale is kept predictable by mass action. Flipping a coin is random, but if you flip it a whole bunch of times you will get a ~50/50 ratio. Likewise, it is possible for a baseball to fall through a solid table. It's just really unlikely due to the amount of mass that simultaneously has to pass out of a substantial energy well.

 

[TeddyKGB]

the questions of biogenesis and macro-evolution are NOT in the realm of operational science as they are not, at least to this point, subject to repeatable experiments or observations.
they are in the realm of forensic or historic science, which includes things like inference, continuity, etc.

Funny, I'm a science teacher and I have never had a lesson cover such material. In which high school-level textbook might I find the categories you mention?

 

[bluetrinity]

Nothing is random, If you throw dice the same way, you will get the same results.
You get different results because no matter how hard you try, you can not throw them the same way every time.

Actually, the outcome of throwing a dice is perfectly predictable. When I throw it 100 times, it will be tails 50 times and heads 50 times. So much for randomness.

 

[bluetrinity]

From a metaphysical standpoint one can argue determinism such that there is no such thing as random, but this is not the sense that is meant in evolutionary biology, all that is meant there is that relative to the theory one cannot calculate in advance what mutations will occur.

This leaves plenty of room for philosophers to argue over how random is random, just as you can argue over how random is a roll of dice, but for practical purposes, it is random without philosophy.

For practical purposes I agree. But the relevance of the outcome of this question might be my eternal destiny.

 

[bluetrinity]

there are at least two different reasons that this is not possible. the first is quantum uncertainty. at the level of DNA molecules this is significant.

the second is historical uncertainty and the inability to trace past actions. Say you are looking at the source of the HbS mutation, you have no way to reconstruct it's source. It is this usage of the term "random" in something like "random matings", it is not that matings are entirely random for they are not but the inability to map the consequences of those matings thousands of generations later.

i'm sure someone can add even more reasons that a reconstruction of even the events of a single mutation like HbS are impossible, even in theory.

I don't understand what you are saying. Does randomness exist and what is it?

 

[Willtor]

Actually, the outcome of throwing a dice is perfectly predictable. When I throw it 100 times, it will be tails 50 times and heads 50 times. So much for randomness.

I'd like to play poker with you, some time. I could use the money.

 

[bluetrinity]

No, science doesn't take a philosophically hard stance on randomness besides saying "we cannot predict." It loosely says that we have not discerned a pattern in a thing, but it does not state that there is or is not a pattern to be discerned.

If we were to discern a pattern in mutations (someone else might better know the implications such a thing would have in other sciences), then it wouldn't change what has been observed in evolution, though, it might increase the precision of what we can say regarding various ancestors.

In a sense, when people call the mutations random, you can think of it as a description of the absence of an observation. Nobody has observed a pattern, and we use the term, "random," to describe this.

It might be, however, that physics and mathematics assign particular constraints to this. But you shouldn't think that the scientific application of the word, "random," makes philosophical statements regarding determinism or whatever else. These really are philosophical questions.

So why then do evolutionists think of evolution as the Christian's cryptonite? Evolution proves nothing of value for anyone seeking to answer a God question.

 

[Willtor]

So why then do evolutionists think of evolution as the Christian's cryptonite? Evolution proves nothing of value for anyone seeking to answer a God question.

I don't think most evolutionists think of evolution as the Christian's cryptonite. If any do, however, they are mistaken because you are right. Evolution proves nothing of value for anyone seeking to answer a God question.

 

[bluetrinity]

while you all give good definitions of "random", at its root, random here means caused by natural non-conscious non-purposeful forces.

while there are differing theories of biogenesis and evolution, in the end, one comes to purposeful or purposeless

And that's the part that I just don't get. How does something happen in a non-conscious non-purposeful way? Additionally, am I to believe that the outcome of evolution is entirely non-conscious and non-purposeful? So then, non-conscious and non-purposeful forces worked together to enable me think a thought and understand justice and love. Doesn't that make any thought including this one non-conscious and non-purposeful? However, if this last question is non-purposeful and non-conscious, then isn't this whole question self defeating?

 

[[serious]]

And that's the part that I just don't get. How does something happen in a non-conscious non-purposeful way? Additionally, am I to believe that the outcome of evolution is entirely non-conscious and non-purposeful? So then, non-conscious and non-purposeful forces worked together to enable me think a thought and understand justice and love. Doesn't that make any thought including this one non-conscious and non-purposeful? However, if this last question is non-purposeful and non-conscious, then isn't this whole question self defeating?

Yet the vast majority of organisms are never self aware. Does that come at odds with one theory or another?

Evolution never touches on the matter of course. But even such things can be understood from an evolutionary perspective. We care about such things because they provide a more productive environment for us and our offspring. love and justice are beneficial for securing the future of our species.

Likewise, humans are more important when you ask a human that question. A tiger would be somewhat uninterested in such things. We accept that a tiger may eat a man as casually as a deer and hold no hate for tigers (though perhaps fear). Meanwhile, some people ask how the universe itself could not value man greater than anything else. It's a glorious example of doublethink.

 

[Maxwell511]

Actually, the outcome of throwing a dice is perfectly predictable. When I throw it 100 times, it will be tails 50 times and heads 50 times. So much for randomness.

A randomn variable is one where for a certain experiment the results is not predictable. In the case of a coin the experiment is flipping it once. Randomn variables follow a distribution function such that if a number of experiments are done then colletively the data will mimic the distribution function which in the coins case ideally should by 50 heads and 50 tails.

 

[Job_s_First_Son]

Actually, the outcome of throwing a dice is perfectly predictable. When I throw it 100 times, it will be tails 50 times and heads 50 times. So much for randomness.

Please try this a few times and let me know what you get.

 

[bluetrinity]

Yet the vast majority of organisms are never self aware. Does that come at odds with one theory or another?

Evolution never touches on the matter of course. But even such things can be understood from an evolutionary perspective. We care about such things because they provide a more productive environment for us and our offspring. love and justice are beneficial for securing the future of our species.

Likewise, humans are more important when you ask a human that question. A tiger would be somewhat uninterested in such things. We accept that a tiger may eat a man as casually as a deer and hold no hate for tigers (though perhaps fear). Meanwhile, some people ask how the universe itself could not value man greater than anything else. It's a glorious example of doublethink.

That was not the question that I meant to raise. The question that I meant to ask, is this: if my thoughts are the evolutionary outcome of a long chain of random events that have no purpose, then how can I know that any thought is in itself not merely a random purposeless event? But worse, the act of asking that question is a random and purposeless event and thus the whole thing becomes self-defeating.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

That was not the question that I meant to raise. The question that I meant to ask, is this: if my thoughts are the evolutionary outcome of a long chain of random events that have no purpose, then how can I know that any thought is in itself not merely a random purposeless event? But worse, the act of asking that question is a random and purposeless event and thus the whole thing becomes self-defeating.

your thoughts are not the result of a long chain of evolutionary events. your brain is.

this long chain of random events is not random, it is filtered through the grid of natural selection and has an an immediate purpose the increasing of general fitness of that population to it's environment.

science can not talk about purposes above this level. when you do think about and talk about higher purposes you are doing metaphysics not science.

so when you make statements like random and purposeless event to thoughts you are talking in metaphysics where your science will not inform you of how to answer issues here.

the usual answer is that of emergent properties, that choice and free will emerge out of the complexity and sophistication of the human CNS, so even though it is an immediate result of evolution the thoughts don't play by the same rules entirely, but by an extended set built on top of the lower levels but exceeding them, like chemistry is built on physics, and biology on chemistry.


this is also the "how do i trust the mind of a monkey" problem for Darwin. as well as how can there be personal responsibility in a deterministic and random world.

 

[Chalnoth]

That was not the question that I meant to raise. The question that I meant to ask, is this: if my thoughts are the evolutionary outcome of a long chain of random events that have no purpose, then how can I know that any thought is in itself not merely a random purposeless event?

And how do we know that the entire world wasn't created yesterday with all of our memories in tact? How do we know that we aren't just brains in jars with simulated lives? But more importantly, what is the point in asking these kinds of questions?

Questions like these are just self-defeating. So why bother to ask them? They can't really be answered, so it's best just to get on with life and try to answer more interesting questions that can be answered.

I have, of course, seen some people attempt to use questions like these as justification for their belief in a specific god. But that makes zero sense whatsoever. Consider what this means: I don't want to ask this question, so I'm going to assume this particular answer so that I can feel comfortable. That's just illogical. Reality does not conform to our whims. Reality just is. Placing descriptions upon reality because of what we want is just plain wrong.

This line of argument is one of the main issues I have with Christianity. It seems to be a commonly-taught idea within Christianity that belief in God gives life meaning, and makes people moral. That is a lie. And not only a lie, but a damned lie. Non-Christians can be every bit as moral, or more, as your average Christian. And non-Christians can derive meaning in their lives from other sources. Sometimes those other sources are other spiritual beings, sometimes their family, sometimes their work. I see these ideas as being further methods that Christianity uses to scare its followers into staying followers. I find them despicable.

 

[sfs]

As rmwilliamsII says, we can not predict which mutations will happen next. There is also another type of randomness in mutations. Mutations are random with respect to fitness. That is, the mechanisms that cause mutations are not influenced by what is beneficial in a given environment just like a pair of dice are not influenced by the bets laid down on a craps table.

I'd say that it's the second meaning you give that important here. It doesn't really matter whether a particular mutation could in principle (or even in practice) be predicted. What matters for the study of evolution is that there are multiple possible mutation events, and that which one happens can be adequately described by a random probability distribution; i.e., the random distribution is a complete a description of the process as you need for the kind of science you're doing. In particular, it means that the probability distribution is independent of the biological effect of the mutation.

If you were doing some other kind of science -- studying the molecular-scale physics of DNA interactions, for example -- a mutation might not usefully treated as random.