Annoying creationists

[hammegk]

... Can you really imagine for a second that studying and understanding those won't help (or hasn't already helped) us make medical breakthroughs?

I can imagine a lot of things. What I have difficulty imagining is why the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover.

[articulett]

Ditto. -- off to check out IIDB!

Well, I for one, will miss you should you post less here.

--but I heartily encourage those who find this place like the KKK (or whatever) to scurry along and find a forum where others seem to understand them. No use attempting to converse with people who do not comprehend you.

If it's just the flames that bother you, you can put the people you don't want to read on ignore. And, of course, I include myself in that as well (not that I have a choice on who puts me on ignore.) Besides, without the flames, would we have the chance to read the gems that Mercutio and Dr. A? You can then engage in debate with those whom you are eager to debate with and others can still learn from what you have to say--which, by the way, I often find insightful, interesting,--and just plain funny. Your contract response in particular regarding transfer of ownership of Language Awards was particularly great.

I know I overly enjoy the power of flaming on occasion, because in real life, I don't have the protection of cyberspace and so I only talk about the blowhards behind their back (I'm small; they are off kilter). But creationists, in general, have abused the public trust as badly as Sylvia Browne and then run and hid behind obfuscating language and holier than though platitudes while demonising the most profoundly useful and well supported and breathtakingly marvelous scientific understanding of our time (evolution); moreover, they've made other people fear it and doubt it and doubt science while offering not a single piece of useful scientific data in return. People praise non existent entities while demonising those who have brought forth all the technology and medicine and useful information that we use in our day to day lives. And this isfascinating data that anyone can check out the evidence for themselves. But creationists teach that faith (not facts) are a good way to know something while emphasizing that science can't explain everything (as if creationism or epistemological arguments can explain ANYTHING.)

As for "The Atheist"--I suggest "ignore". I think it was Paul Provenza who said, "I've met a lot of smart theists...and a whole lot of dumb theists...but I have never met a dumb atheist." I thought "the Atheist" was the exception--but he is clearly a liar...or maybe just mentally akimbo--and so I suspect that he is not an atheist--but some sort of Theist bent on given atheists a bad name by being a particular egregious example of humanity while disguised as an "an Atheist". I know you think this is unlikely, but that is probably because you are honest. The more you read the writings of "annoying creationists", the more you'll see the incredible deceits they will engage in so that someone might find them other than the woos that they are.

If you want to see a stellar example, then Behe's testimony in the Dover trial is priceless. Moving goal posts and changing definition and obfuscating all in the name of his "intelligent designer" which could (wink, wink) be an alien. Read about the wedge strategy and it will drive the point home. Some people clearly pretend to want to debate, but have to capacity for doing so.

[Dr Adequate]

So what great results has your "intelligent design" hypothesis brought to this planet except to make arrogant and ignorant individuals who think they are more moral because they've been able to find credibility in an absolutely unbelievable and rather barbaric and nonsensical myth? Does it have a single breakthrough going for it. Does any creationist "hypothesis"?The creationist contribution to medicine:

* Eating magic apples is bad for your health.
* Don't take dietary advice from talking snakes.
* Er ...
* ... that's it.

[articulett]

So yeah, I agree this thread has become a bit of an insult fest. Let's calm down a bit and get back to the subject(s) at hand, assuming there are any subjects anyone cares to discuss. It's also become a bit of repeat theatre.

~~ Paul

Oh come on Paul... you know you enjoy drawing forth creationists and then slowly slaying them with things like facts, reason, and a touch of sarcasm. It is somewhat sporting to watch them implode as they everlastingly pretend that they have knowledge that everyone else is too stupid to understand.

That is a big difference between scientists and creationists. The former want the facts tested and tested and tested...it's the way we learn more and learn how strong the information is. Creationists just want to try and cripple evolution--but they never ever offer up any counter explanation for us to examine, test, and poke at. Isn't that exactly what your first post on this thread was a link to?

Yet their tenacity can be entertaining. And you've gotta love the way they continue to post on a skeptics forum while telling us all how stupid and dogmatic and arrogant skeptics are. If they don't like the party here, why don't they check out the one down the street? (Perhaps it's because they are well aware that their wisdom is not in as great a demand as they pretend.)

[Mercutio]

I can imagine a lot of things. What I have difficulty imagining is why the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover.
Not "uncover". "Depend on" was the phrase, and it does. The example already given you (which you rejected) was only recently uncovered, but reflects millions of years of evolution, and would not have been discovered were it not for knowing where to look. The knowledge of where to look, of course, came from the Theory of Evolution.

You may disagree, but in my book, such a discovery can very accurately be described as depending on millions of years of evolution.

[Dr Adequate]

The knowledge that tuberculosis is descended from soil bacteria led directly to the discovery of the first antibiotics.

---

Oh, I nearly forgot. Another great creationist contribution to medical science:

* Anaesthesia is sinful, since it contradicts God's will as expressed in Genesis 3.

The City of Zurich initially outlawed anaesthesia altogether. "Pain is a natural and intended curse of the primal sin. Any attempt to do away with it must be wrong", averred the Zurich City Fathers

...

In Scotland, Sir James Young Simpson (1811-1870), eloquent advocate of chloroform anaesthesia and pioneer of painless delivery in childbirth, offended various Calvinist Scots by his presumption. For did not Genesis 3:16 declare: "Unto the woman he said, 'I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children'"? Religious traditionalists held that mothers ought to fulfil the "edict of bringing forth children in sorrow" as laid down in the Holy Bible. Simpson was accordingly denounced by a vocal minority of ministers and priests as a blaspheming heretic who uttered words put into his mouth by Satan. [see Triumph over Pain by René Fülöp-Miller, New York Library Guild, 1938]. One clergyman saw the new chloroform anaesthesia as "a decoy from Satan, apparently offering to bless woman; but, in the end, it will harden society and rob God of the deep earnest cries, which arise in time of trouble for help." God's reaction to being robbed of the cries of women in labour is not on record; but there were mutterings that infants delivered painlessly should be denied the sacrament of baptism. This never came to pass: mid-Victorian religious opposition to anaesthesia was neither as widespread nor as organised as some historians were later to suggest. Yet a hostile reaction to human tampering with the God-given order of things hadn't always been empty rhetoric. In the text of his A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology (1896), A.D. White relates how "as far back as the year 1591, Eufame Macalyane, a lady of rank, being charged with seeking the aid of Agnes Sampson for the relief of pain at the time of the birth of her two sons, was burned alive on the Castle Hill of Edinburgh; and this old theological view persisted even to the middle of the nineteenth century."

...

In The Lancet 2 (1849), 537, English doctor Robert Brown explained how God and Nature "walked hand in hand"; painless delivery was an invention of the Devil.

...

Dr William Henry Atkinson, first president of the American Dental Association (ADA), protested, "I think anesthesia is of the devil, and I cannot give my sanction to any Satanic influence which deprives a man of the capacity to recognize the law! I wish there were no such thing as anesthesia. I do not think men should be prevented from passing through what God intended them to endure." * (http://www.general-anaesthesia.com/)

[Jon the Geek]

One request, though.

We're all agreed that the insult-fest is over, but could you please post it in here as I need to have it in a post to copy it into my sig and it's is easily the best I've seen.
Hatred of "The Atheist" is the thing that could finally organize atheists into a unified group.

Dr Adequate and The Atheist sharing a sig? See, it's working already!

[The Atheist]

Hatred of "The Atheist" is the thing that could finally organize atheists into a unified group.

Dr Adequate and The Atheist sharing a sig? See, it's working already!

Cheers!

Fast work, eh?

Still have to update the links, though, so give me 10 minutes.

[RecoveringYuppy]

I can imagine a lot of things. What I have difficulty imagining is why the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover.
I described the technique and how it led to new knowledge (my claim was "leads to new knowledge") and cited a magazine where you can find the discoveries (which I don't remember in detail) if you care enough to look back through some issues. Dr Richard posted a link to a more specific example. I repeated the post number where you can find that very easy to find and specific example. Come back with some evidence you've read the link or found the article, your choice.

[delphi_ote]

What I have difficulty imagining is why the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover.
Well, being that it took us millions of years to evolve and that pretty much every single medical breakthrough requires us to be around to actually figure it out, I'm afraid all medical breakthroughs require millions of years of evolution to be uncovered.

But I don't think that's what you meant.

[articulett]

I can imagine a lot of things. What I have difficulty imagining is why the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover.

Well gee, I mentioned the Rhett syndrome breakthrough http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanId=sa003&articleId=A3AEF4A1-E7F2-99DF-396D2736ACA569EB
But how about this:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/02/070208211323.htm

or this

http://www.sciencedaily.com/

Or the hobbit: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/01/070129171908.htm

or this: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/01/070129171908.htm

Or this one especially appropos for some on this forum:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/02/070208230130.htm

Oh that's right...you can't be bothered to read. You were merely asking an inane question so you can keep saying that wasn't what you meant...the old goalpost game, eh?

Do you realize the the questions you ask make you sound as "off" as Kleinman and "the asstheist"?

[articulett]

The creationist contribution to medicine:

* Eating magic apples is bad for your health.
* Don't take dietary advice from talking snakes.
* Er ...
* ... that's it.

Don't bite from the "tree of knowledge"?

Kangaroos came from the middle east via ark?

Pimp out your daughters when men threaten to sodomize your male guests?

Impregnating virgins without their consent is a-okay if you're invisible and "all loving"?

I dunno....maybe you forgot a few.

[Mr. Scott]

That’s an interesting ribozyme these scientists developed. Would you care to describe a selective process where a molecule like this could evolve?

Hmmm... that was the last post by Doctor Kleinman: 9:00 PM ET Thursday. His last moment logged in was one minute after that. We didn't get his usual Friday "have a nice weekend." I wonder what's up. This thread will not be the same without him.

[delphi_ote]

Hmmm... that was the last post by Doctor Kleinman: 9:00 PM ET Thursday. His last moment logged in was one minute after that. We didn't get his usual Friday "have a nice weekend." I wonder what's up. This thread will not be the same without him.
I'm sure he'll be back. Sometimes reality just takes precedence over internet discussions.

[Kotatsu]

You would own the award.
A public offer of a reward in return for a member of the public satisfying the conditions of the offer, becomes an executory contract between the offeror and any person who begins performance required by the offer, within a reasonable time in reliance on the public offer.
Here, because the poem was nominated under terms of the offer, prior to transfer of the copyright license to you, Mercutio would be entitled to the benefit of the bargain.
However, because Mercutio expressly stated that he has assigned, not just the copyright license, but also the right to "claim" the poem "as your own," Mercutio has impliedly transferred the right to the executory contract to you
Therefore, you are entitled to any award, even though it is well known that you are not the actual author.
And so on and so forth...

Hooray for law!

[Kotatsu]

Should that post win the award (and should I decide I want the prize), I will summon the ghost of my Greek lawyer and her crocodiles. Where there is a will, as they say, there are several lawyers.

Boo for law!

[Yahzi]

And I am still waiting for a reply.
I'm sorry. I thought the answer was self-evident.

Yes, I do think that metaphysical naturalism has been adequate so far to explain every facet of human existance.

Now would you care to answer more than "Dunno?"

Edit: You might also suggest some area of human experience that is not, in your opinion, explainable by naturalism.

[Yahzi]

<snip>
The majority of your post contained no substance.

See, again you struggle with such simple language! We're discussing ACHIEVEMENTS. You haven't had any, Popper has. It's really very simple once you grasp the concept.
I understand that Popper has a list of achievements. What I don't understand is why that is relevant.

Insults? I haven't made an insult as far as I can tell. I'm just pointing out your very obvious deficiencies, so if you find that insulting, brush up on those weaknesses!
If you think your post was not insulting, you may want to ask for some help with your writing skills.

Being wrong does not make one an idiot.
Being egregiously wrong does. But of course, you have not read the linked book which makes the case for Popper's egregiousness. Rather than actually discuss why one might think Popper was egregiously wrong, you have preferred to talk about his social honors and issue insults.

[hammegk]

... Come back with some evidence you've read the link or found the article, your choice.
Sorry, that's not the way it works. Ya'll made the claim; either back it up, or agree it was (and is) armwaving bs -- which I'm becoming more and more inclined to consider it.

Others may be begin to wonder why "the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover".

[RecoveringYuppy]

And others will wonder why you didn't just open the link Dr Richard posted.

[Yahzi]

Sorry mate, insults are ad hominem attacks. Ad hominem usually has precisely nothing to do with the argument at all:
The fallacy consists of attempting to discredit an argument by discrediting the arguer. If one merely insults you, without expecting that insult to have any impact on the truth or falsity of your argument, then one has not committed a logical fallacy. One has merely committed an insult.

Can you show where Articulett or I argued that your position was false because you were a blathering nincompoop? If not, then we have not commited a logical fallacy.

Precision in writing really isn't possible without precision in thinking.

[Yahzi]

There go those damned goalposts again

I usually tell people I don't like poetry.

But you and Dr. A are changing my mind.

:)

[delphi_ote]

And others will wonder why you didn't just open the link Dr Richard posted.
And still others will wonder why hammy insists on using the same incoherent phrasing of his question. Those same people will probably suspect he's keeping enough wiggle room in there to run away when confronted with the abundant evidence that directly contradicts his nonsense.

[Yahzi]

No, just a tiny preliminary. You give me a serve, I return service. That's how most games go. Your opening attacks me, I send you a wee brickbat back.
There is a point at which errors of judgement are so egregious that they qualify as idiocy.

Picking a flame-war with Dr. Adequate, for example.

Are you new here, or what?

[Yahzi]

So, to your usual lies, you seem to have added the pretence that you don't know what "argument" means.
No it isn't!

That will be five pounds, please.

The Argument Clinic (http://www.mindspring.com/~mfpatton/sketch.htm)

Somebody had to do it... :D

[Yahzi]

Well, I hardly ever post there, so that raises the standard immediately!
That explains a mystery. I can't imagine your style surviving very long there.

The IIDB is quite stifiling in enforcing its rules. While that does tend to raise the bar of debate somewhat, it also precludes the wonderous amusments that Dr. A delivers so regularly.

It is not that reasonable debate is impossible on the JREF; rather, it's that we can call a fool a fool, and tend to do so.

I am quite happy with having access to both venues, and see no overwhelming value in either of them. They both have their advantages and disadvantages.

One minor request, The Atheist: could you please tell me your screen name on IIDB, so I can put you on /ignore? I'm a little worried that if I respond to you over there, you'll forget which forum you're at, and make an inappropriate post.

[hammegk]

They should wonder more why you can't name it. I do.

[Lonewulf]

What the hell was up with the argument given over the past few pages? That whole crazy flame war?

Seriously, is it Atheist or Adequate's contention that Evolution is wrong? If not, then why the whole flame war, especially in this particular thread? The whole thing seems rather useless to me, but I'm just a newb here...

[delphi_ote]

Seriously, is it Atheist or Adequate's contention that Evolution is wrong? If not, then why the whole flame war, especially in this particular thread? The whole thing seems rather useless to me, but I'm just a newb here...
You'll be shocked to find that people who agree on some things disagree on others. It's a rather startling fact, I know. I hope you were sitting down.

[delphi_ote]

They should wonder more why you can't name it. I do.
Please keep ignoring this post (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2329984#post2329984). It proves you wrong, and I know how hard that would be for you.

[RecoveringYuppy]

They should wonder more why you can't name it. I do.
And also forgetting the link at the bottom of this post (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2321817#post2321817)which I'm referring back to for the third time.

[The Atheist]

What the hell was up with the argument given over the past few pages? That whole crazy flame war?

Seriously, is it Atheist or Adequate's contention that Evolution is wrong? If not, then why the whole flame war, especially in this particular thread? The whole thing seems rather useless to me, but I'm just a newb here...

Certainly can't answer for the doc, but I certainly don't contend that it's wrong.

Looks like almost everyone but a die-hard or two has finished the skirmish - not really deserving of "war" status.

Jesus, if you're a noob, what am I?

[hammegk]

And also forgetting the link at the bottom of this post (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2321817#post2321817)which I'm referring back to for the third time.

Please keep ignoring this post (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2329984#post2329984). It proves you wrong, and I know how hard that would be for you.
Damn, it must have a long name.

Hmm. Medical breakthroughs? Bacteria cause disease, vaccination works, Salk vaccine closes the door on a viral disease, artificial heart/organ transplants, ...

What yours again?

[Schneibster]

Let's ask a question that is made obvious by the "framing science" thread running on this forum at this time.

What is the level of certainty of the scientific community at large with respect to the following theories?
1. Evolution by natural selection.
2. Generation of novel phenotypical characteristics that contribute to individual fitness through random alteration of genetic material in the breeding population, directly or indirectly.
3. Abiogenesis, by natural chemical and physical means.
4. Creation of the Solar System by natural cosmic physical means.
5. Initial creation of the universe by natural physical means.

I contend that the level of acceptance among the scientific community for the LEAST certain of these theories is at least 80%, constituting in legal terms a "clear showing," well beyond "preponderance of the evidence" necessary for a verdict in a civil trial, and well beyond "substantial and credible" needed for impeachment hearings; a "clear showing" is sufficient to obtain a preliminary injunction from a judge, requiring that someone cease and desist an activity unless or until a verdict in their favor shows that what they are doing is not a violation of another's rights. In the absence of a verdict in their favor, whether that does not come because they do not go to trial, or because the verdict in the trial is against them, they cannot continue that activity without being in contempt of court, at which point the judge in question will sanction them, up to and including imprisonment if necessary.

In the case of the second theory, I contend that the level of acceptance among the scientific community is at least 90%, constituting "very likely" in scientific terms, "clear and convincing" evidence in legal terms, sufficient to separate a child from a parent accused of a crime against the child permanently with only the right of appeal.

In the cases of the first and fourth theories, I assert that the level of certainty rises to better than 99%, sufficient evidence in a court of law to sentence an individual to death. I don't think more need be said to express this level of certainty.

That means that only abiogenesis and the initial creation of the universe are questionable even to the extent of a one-in-five chance that they are incorrect; and at best, there is a four out of five chance that our understanding of them is correct. For the remainder of these theories, assertion of "scientific uncertainty" is obfuscation, which an impartial and honest judge sitting on the bench judging cases would very properly and without chance of overturn on appeal either render judgment against or instruct a jury to ignore.

I don't think that unless substantial and credible evidence can be presented to overturn my assertions that there is any further need to discuss this.

[RecoveringYuppy]

Is post 2533 supposed to mean something?

[The Atheist]

I don't think that unless substantial and credible evidence can be presented to overturn my assertions that there is any further need to discuss this.

Phew, thank god for that.

I bet over 90% of the scientific community accept that psychics, astrologers, dowsers and the Tooth Fairy are all BS as well.

Jeff: Let Randi know he can retire now, paranormality and religion are dead; Scneibster just killed them off. Nothing to discuss.

How many astronomers decided that Pluto was no longer a planet?

Let the reign of science, mathematics and reason begin.

[hammegk]

Yeah, no doubt those assertions settled it. :)

Schneib, aren't you needed back on Olympus?

[hammegk]

Is post 2533 supposed to mean something?
Just asking for the name of the million years in the making clinical medical breahthrough. What's the problem? Cat got your tongue? Or you can't wave your arms fast enough?

[John Hewitt]

I'm sorry. I thought the answer was self-evident.

Yes, I do think that metaphysical naturalism has been adequate so far to explain every facet of human existance.

Now would you care to answer more than "Dunno?"

Edit: You might also suggest some area of human experience that is not, in your opinion, explainable by naturalism.
The notion that every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by by natural phenomena seems to imply that all scientific problems have now been answered. That is not the case. The origin of life remains a major problem that has been discussed at length on this thread. I, at least, try to discuss it seriously.
My own work is an evolutionary analysis and, in my opinion, it is a more compelling analysis of that problem than any other I have yet come across. One reason my work seems useful is that it pays serious attention to criticisms of evolutionary theory, as that theory is conventionally constructed. I find it deplorable that evolutionary theorists pay so little attention to those criticisms, especially as the apparent reason is that they disapprove of the motivations of the critics. It seems to me that what matters about those criticisms is not that the critics are often creationists, or that they have religious motivations, but the extent to which their criticisms of evolutionary theory are actually valid. In my opinion, those criticisms are much more valid than most scientific observers are willing to acknowledge.

Just as an aside, you might like to recall the anthropic principle and the idea of applying evolution to a near infinity of parallel universes. I am far from convinced that this idea, of parallel but unobservable universes, can be accommodated into the idea of naturalism.

[Schneibster]

Yeah, no doubt those assertions settled it. :)

Schneib, aren't you needed back on Olympus?I intend to give hammy a chance to respond; this was not it. Classic ad hominem, attempting to discredit the message by discrediting the messenger. Do you have a single thing to say, hammegk, that denies what I have said, or is this the extent of your argument against? If you have one, make it; and do so in your very next post. Fail, and be relegated again to ignore. Your choice.

Same for you, John Hewitt. Let's see even a preponderance of evidence (50%) to support your claims. Not that that level of certainty even approaches the level of certainty of actual scientific claims; nevertheless, to even assert that there is any reason to doubt whatsoever based on your claims, you must meet that minimal standard. One shot. No BS. Go for it.

[John Hewitt]

I intend to give hammy a chance to respond; this was not it. Classic ad hominem, attempting to discredit the message by discrediting the messenger. Do you have a single thing to say, hammegk, that denies what I have said, or is this the extent of your argument against? If you have one, make it; and do so in your very next post. Fail, and be relegated again to ignore. Your choice.

Same for you, John Hewitt. Let's see even a preponderance of evidence (50%) to support your claims. Not that that level of certainty even approaches the level of certainty of actual scientific claims; nevertheless, to even assert that there is any reason to doubt whatsoever based on your claims, you must meet that minimal standard. One shot. No BS. Go for it.
The meaning of this is unclear.

[Schneibster]

The meaning of this is unclear.No, it's not; present evidence to support your view that rises even to the level of a preponderance of evidence. I am giving you a serious chance to do so. If you can't, admit that instead. The third alternative is to be clearly labeled as supporting a hypothesis with a very low probability of being correct. And I see no reason to discuss low-probability hypotheses in the presence of high-probability ones.

[Schneibster]

Hell, for that matter, make even a credible attempt to do so. No obfuscation, no word games, no fallacies, no distortion of the level of scientific certainty. Just the facts, and why they support your views. You'll never get a better chance.

[Schneibster]

I'll even add kleinman to the list. Go for it, people. Good luck.

[RecoveringYuppy]

Just asking for the name of the million years in the making clinical medical breahthrough. What's the problem? Cat got your tongue? Or you can't wave your arms fast enough?
??? You're claiming you still can't find them even though you reposted the links yourself??

[Schneibster]

??? You're claiming you still can't find them even though you reposted the links yourself??Doesn't bode well for attempts to produce sufficient evidence to give a 50% probability, does it?

[Dr Adequate]

Others may be begin to wonder why "the genius level posters here can't manage to name a medical breakthrough (that helped a patient) that required those millions of years of evolution to uncover". But those who are literate will notice that we have.

---

So the verified facts are the least of his fears:
he just closes his eyes and he plugs up his ears,
and he carefully shuts off his brain.
When all of the lies that he loves to recite
have been proved to be wrong, he can prove that they're right
by reciting them over again.

[Dr Adequate]

Phew, thank god for that.

I bet over 90% of the scientific community accept that psychics, astrologers, dowsers and the Tooth Fairy are all BS as well.

Jeff: Let Randi know he can retire now ... Not at all: since Randi's current occupation is challenging the woos to provide evidence the these "over 90%" are wrong. As Schneibster is doing re the anti-evolution crowd.

This is what skeptics do: rather than sit complacently on the laurels of scientific orthodoxy, we challenge people to prove it wrong.

[Schneibster]

Thanks for the endorsement, Dr. A.

[Dr Adequate]

The notion that every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by by natural phenomena seems to imply that all scientific problems have now been answered. That is not the case. No, of course that is not "the case". It's a crude bundle of straw with a label attached to it saying "this is a man".

No-one claims that "every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by natural phenomena", and even if they had, this would, not, of course, "imply that all scientific problems have now been answered".

[The Atheist]

Not at all: since Randi's current occupation is challenging the woos to provide evidence the these "over 90%" are wrong. As Schneibster is doing re the anti-evolution crowd.

This is what skeptics do: rather than sit complacently on the laurels of scientific orthodoxy, we challenge people to prove it wrong.Yes, well that was kind of my point.

Isn't that why this forum exists? To be part of just that challenge?

[articulett]

The meaning of this is unclear.

The meaning of everything you say is unclear.

At least I think so...let me ask.

John contends there are many problems with evolutionary theory--anybody know what they are yet?

John contends that his theory is better; can anyone sum it up, yet or say how it differs?

Does anyone yet know why John Hewitt says the cell is the true replicator (per Behe whom he thinks cheating scientists ignore); not the nucleic acids as he repeats over and over? Does anyone agree or see a usefulness in seeing it that way?

And while we are at it...has anyone found anything of clarity in anything Hammegk, Kleinman, or "The Atheist" is saying? Any drop of wisdom? Anything that makes you think they are worth reading?

To me, most of the people on this thread are well worth reading--some are brilliant even--and funny. These four are the "annoying creationist" this thread is about. Or maybe "the atheist" is just deranged..he makes even less sense than Hammy. I'd love to see them talk to each other--but it doesn't seem they understand each other...much less anyone else.

[John Hewitt]

No, it's not; present evidence to support your view that rises even to the level of a preponderance of evidence. I am giving you a serious chance to do so. If you can't, admit that instead. The third alternative is to be clearly labeled as supporting a hypothesis with a very low probability of being correct. And I see no reason to discuss low-probability hypotheses in the presence of high-probability ones.

Do you ever take any point?

You will "give me a chance." Gosh, thanks. And how do you begin your gracious attempt to give me a chance? By applying a term like "BS" to me. Well, thank you but no thanks. You are not giving me or anyone else a chance to do anything and I do not care to persuade you of anything.

How could anyone possibly claim that your behaviour is intended to produce a serious dialogue? If that is your claim, I don't believe you - go and BS somebody else. I think your behaviour is intentional rudeness and I think there are too many such people on the JREF forum. I have seen it before from you and I don't want to see any more of it. Please put me back on your ignore list.

For the benefit of those people who can read and can manage simple logic, I will say it again. My work is evolutionary in its nature. It does not dispute the evidence for evolution that Darwin reviewed nor deny natural selection as a process.

But it is one thing to have factual support of evolution and another to have a theory of how evolution is structured or can operate at a fundamental level. There have been various theories for that but, ever since Bateson and Fisher, evolution has been more or less identified with genetics. I am a critic of that "gene theory" of evolution; it is not that I think genetics is wrong as an empirical science but that I think it is inadequate as a theory of evolution. I think evolutionary theory should be based on data, on the interpetation of that data into information and on the selection of information through the generations. Genetics is just a subset of that.

If you actually read books by IDers - rather than just ranting about them - you would read some serious, valid critiques of modern evolutionary theory. Such criticisms of evolution do not mean that ID or creationism are right, I think making that case would require strong positive evidence for their own approach, but such critiques do mean that evolutionary theory needs to be improved. Such improvement will not happen when even basic and obvious points are denied in a tirade of insults.

For example, I have seen Kleinman, on this thread say "tell us how genes arose" - or words to that effect. The question is legitimate and lies at the core of any serious attempt to understand origins. What comes back, from so-called skeptics? Well, actually, what comes back is mostly just rudeness, with no genuine content at all, but we also get "RNA ribozymes" and "parallel universes." Such notions unquestionably qualify as some of the worst drivel in modern science. They are, by any standards, "extraordinary claims" and the fact that they are even present in the scientific literature seems to reflect a determination among leaders in the field never to admit that there is anything wrong with their preconceived ideas. Are skeptics only skeptical about ID? Do we have faith about everything else? Switch on a few skeptical genes there eh!

[John Hewitt]

No, of course that is not "the case". It's a crude bundle of straw with a label attached to it saying "this is a man".

No-one claims that "every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by natural phenomena", and even if they had, this would, not, of course, "imply that all scientific problems have now been answered".

The take it up with Yahzi, he seems to think I should believe that.

[Schneibster]

You actually did it, John. I'm proud of you. And I'm serious. This is not a joke, not a taunt. You took up the gauntlet and actually said something that makes some sense.
Do you ever take any point?Yes. I will actually read it, and give it a chance to be right if it can be. But you have to make a genuine effort, and you have to be willing to be wrong. It's OK to be wrong, John- you'll learn something that way. Skeptigirl has that in her signature, and I think it's true.

You will "give me a chance." Gosh, thanks. And how do you begin your gracious attempt to give me a chance? By applying a term like "BS" to me. Well, thank you but no thanks. You are not giving me or anyone else a chance to do anything and I do not care to persuade you of anything. You read what your prejudices told you into it. Read it again. You are manufacturing the grounds for a disagreement. I expect you already know what I'm going to tell you, and you intend not to accept it, and you know that you don't have any argument to counter it. So it is your intent to be insulting until I go away so you can go back to your fantasy. It's too bad that you feel you have to stick to something that's wrong.

How could anyone possibly claim that your behaviour is intended to produce a serious dialogue? If that is your claim, I don't believe you - go and BS somebody else. I think your behaviour is intentional rudeness and I think there are too many such people on the JREF forum. I have seen it before from you and I don't want to see any more of it. Please put me back on your ignore list.More evidence of the same.

For the benefit of those people who can read and can manage simple logic, I will say it again. My work is evolutionary in its nature. It does not dispute the evidence for evolution that Darwin reviewed nor deny natural selection as a process.But you come to a skeptical forum, and when that skepticism is exercised, you take it as an insult, and act superior. I don't know what you expect if you act like that, John- nor why, after you have insulted first, you expect anything else from anyone serious. Try not being defensive; try looking seriously at the evidence; try understanding what that evidence consists of. Just a suggestion.

But it is one thing to have factual support of evolution and another to have a theory of how evolution is structured or can operate at a fundamental level. There have been various theories for that but, ever since Bateson and Fisher, evolution has been more or less identified with genetics. I am a critic of that "gene theory" of evolution; it is not that I think genetics is wrong as an empirical science but that I think it is inadequate as a theory of evolution.See? There's a clear, concise statement of your position. This isn't the problem. The problem is, challenged on that position, on the basis of facts, you fail to respond with facts of your own. You denigrate known facts of molecular biology, things that scientists have observed, not theorized but actually directly observed, for decades, and expect to be taken seriously. You have to account for facts, John, and when you can't, you have to abandon the idea and find one that works. That's how science is done. No other way works. You can't change the facts to fit the theory.

I think evolutionary theory should be based on data, on the interpetation of that data into information and on the selection of information through the generations. Genetics is just a subset of that.You see, there is this thing called the "genetic code." It is well known; in fact, it is so well known that several variations on it are also well known. It specifies the order in which the twenty amino acids that make up the core proteins upon which all life on Earth is based are combined to make those proteins. Its action to create those proteins, through three different sorts of RNA, are known in exhaustive detail. This is not conjecture; it is not theory. It is observable fact. There can be no question as to the utility of this code, nor as to its functional purpose in the living cell. This is fact.

These proteins form the "toolkit" that life uses to extract energy from its environment, build, maintain, and repair its structure, excrete its waste, and eventually replicate itself; and that process of replication contains special phases in which the genes are replicated, and this happens prior to the cell itself splitting in two. ALL of the chemical work done by the cell, and that includes the process of duplicating the genes, is done by these proteins. They appear in the cell when the time is right for them to complete their tasks; that is because their creation is controlled by sites on the genes that are activated or passivated by the presence or absence of the chemicals that signal what tasks must be accomplished for life to continue. These sites are called "regulatory" sites because they regulate the production of these proteins.

The cell itself is made of these proteins. Everything in the cell is water, food, micronutrients, proteins, lipids, and DNA. There isn't anything else in there, John. It's a relatively simple structure. There just isn't anyplace but the DNA for the information needed to construct and run a new cell to BE. So when you challenge the idea that the central dogma of molecular biology is correct, and fail to indicate the location of a replacement repository of the data, what you are doing is going against the 99%. And this is the point at which you start to receive criticism, criticism you are apparently unable to accept.

If you actually read books by IDers - rather than just ranting about them - you would read some serious, valid critiques of modern evolutionary theory. Such criticisms of evolution do not mean that ID or creationism are right, I think making that case would require strong positive evidence for their own approach, but such critiques do mean that evolutionary theory needs to be improved. Such improvement will not happen when even basic and obvious points are denied in a tirade of insults.We HAVE read them, John. They deny facts. That's their procedure. Every single one of them denies known, long proven, easily observable facts, and the only reason they get away with it among their followers is because they don't get their own microscopes out and look for themselves. You can do that too. You'll find, in every case, that they aren't denying theories, or hypotheses; they are denying observable facts, because if they weren't, if they were actually rival theories that explained the observable facts, then the majority of scientists would be looking for experiments or observations that would differentiate the central dogma of molecular biology from those alternative theories, and doing those experiments or making those observations, and winning prizes and getting famous. That's how science is done, John. And the fact that none of the biologists are doing that should tell you something; because if there really WAS something there, there is a long history of iconoclasts who have made themselves famous and won awards, and everybody is all looking to be that guy, and they'd find it, John. They really would. They all WANT to. That's how they get famous and win awards.

For example, I have seen Kleinman, on this thread say "tell us how genes arose" - or words to that effect. The question is legitimate and lies at the core of any serious attempt to understand origins.But it doesn't address how the thing WORKS, John. How we KNOW it works, because we can LOOK AND SEE IT. He ignores that, every single time; and he ignores it because he can't explain it without admitting he's wrong.

What comes back, from so-called skeptics? Well, actually, what comes back is mostly just rudeness, with no genuine content at all, but we also get "RNA ribozymes" and "parallel universes." Such notions unquestionably qualify as some of the worst drivel in modern science. They are, by any standards, "extraordinary claims" and the fact that they are even present in the scientific literature seems to reflect a determination among leaders in the field never to admit that there is anything wrong with their preconceived ideas. Are skeptics only skeptical about ID? Do we have faith about everything else? Switch on a few skeptical genes there eh!It is difficult to remain skeptical about the existence of gravity when one has apples falling on one's head, John. It's called EVIDENCE. And the problem here is, the evidence supports those assertions, and doesn't support yours. It's really simple, John. Get a microscope. Figure out how it works for yourself. Explain it, and do so in a manner that is consistent with what you see in that microscope. Tell what every one of those organelles is, and how it is made. Molecular biology can do that, John. In detail. All of it. When your ideas can do that, then you can challenge molecular biology; but I'm going to tell you that when they can, they will BE molecular biology. You see?

Now, I expect a storm of invective. I expect you to deny more obvious facts that everyone but you sees when they look in the microscope. And I expect more vague assertions about how "unlikely" it all is. So surprise me. Do something different. YOU break out of YOUR assumptions. Take a look around at the real world.

[articulett]

The take it up with Yahzi, he seems to think I should believe that.

That is a lie. Science explains things via natural phenomena--it is how we have come to understand everything in this physical world that we understand. No intelligent designer mentioned any of this stuff in any book--we just kept measuring and looking and testing and refining our tools for doing so....and asking more questions and testing and getting feedback and amassing data and honing along the way. Nobody believes that science or anything else explains everything. But if science can't explain it, nothing else can either. Science is the very best means we have at getting at the truth and understanding we human beings are ever eager for--nothing else compares when it comes to results. So if you ever have some data--not just pouting about why you think some explanations aren't worth considering or why you think they are useless--then bring it to the table. Saying that you don't think RNA is stable enough to become a self replicator is just not worth anything when there is a lot of data showing that it looks like it can be...and has been...and we've made some pretty great efforts at finding out how those molecules came to stick on mineral surfaces and become pre-biotic as the primordial soup washed over rocks and evaporated. What information have you offered except scoffing at evolution and claiming that "memes" don't exist and "scientists are liars" and you don't know what naturalism means?

And why all the dancing around the admission of your beliefs? It just seems so smarmy and dishonest. Why not admit your biases--at least to yourself. It's obvious to the majority here anyhow. Schneibster was posting on the meme thread--so he knows your "intelligent design" leanings. It's not like anyone is actually understanding your claims anyhow. And you might make a few more friends with a bit of honesty instead of your "everyone is picking on me" attitude and your obfuscating "I'm talking science--who said anything about god" claims.

Does your "intelligent designer" send out "data" via oscillations and the sun perhaps? Can you point to a conversation anywhere where someone seemed to correctly grasp what your "theory" is? Anyone...? Can anyone sum it up so we can look at it critically? Compare it with the data we have? See how the data fits it? It's a bit much to keep sending people over to your websites to plow through impossible to read nothingness where you try to sell your book, insult scientists in general, and gain fees to further the cause of "maverick" (e.g. creationist) scientists.

By the way--I posted a link for Kleinman which was a mathematical model that fit evolution perfectly. He wants to know how a gene could evolve via point mutation. It doesn't. Genes evolved in a continuum fashion, just like life itself. We don't need to know the math of it--we can see it...test it...see how it evolved in various species...how it changes...how it faded away...what base pairs came together and how early in the creation of the first "genomes"-- see?

It's not that you are a rare genius that has amazing insight that we are all too stupid to see--it's just that you are not adding any tool of understanding or any information of value to the journey of discovery--you're just like a whining kid in the backseat saying "Are we there yet??...I told you we should have gone to Disneyland instead..."

[articulett]

What the hell was up with the argument given over the past few pages? That whole crazy flame war?

Seriously, is it Atheist or Adequate's contention that Evolution is wrong? If not, then why the whole flame war, especially in this particular thread? The whole thing seems rather useless to me, but I'm just a newb here...

The Atheist pretends to accept evolution but doesn't seem to understand it, and most feel he's a creationist--or should be--but others just think he's an attention whore. Dr. A has a very thorough understanding of evolution, has written extensively about it, is glad to share the info., and feels disgust for those who lie about evolution because they prefer to promote a belief rather than the actual and very fascinating facts.

The thing about creationists is that they've learned to lie and sound all sciency (or try to) and pretend to be eager for discussion. They aren't. They're just eager to preach. They cannot and do not learn or engage in actual give and take conversation. However--it can be great fun to watch Dr. A. and other very brilliant and funny forum members give them a thorough trouncing but sometimes it takes awhile to understand the whole soap opera.

[John Hewitt]

You actually did it, John. I'm proud of you. And I'm serious. This is not a joke, not a taunt. You took up the gauntlet and actually said something that makes some sense.
<and content>
But you come to a skeptical forum, and when that skepticism is exercised, you take it as an insult, and act superior. I don't know what you expect if you act like that, John- nor why, after you have insulted first, you expect anything else from anyone serious. Try not being defensive; try looking seriously at the evidence; try understanding what that evidence consists of. Just a suggestion.
No its not a skeptical forum, more a patronizing, bad-mannered forum.


See? There's a clear, concise statement of your position. This isn't the problem. The problem is, challenged on that position, on the basis of facts, you fail to respond with facts of your own. You denigrate known facts of molecular biology, things that scientists have observed, not theorized but actually directly observed, for decades, and expect to be taken seriously. You have to account for facts, John, and when you can't, you have to abandon the idea and find one that works. That's how science is done. No other way works. You can't change the facts to fit the theory.

<etc>

The cell itself is made of these proteins. Everything in the cell is water, food, micronutrients, proteins, lipids, and DNA. There isn't anything else in there, John. It's a relatively simple structure. There just isn't anyplace but the DNA for the information needed to construct and run a new cell to BE. So when you challenge the idea that the central dogma of molecular biology is correct, and fail to indicate the location of a replacement repository of the data, what you are doing is going against the 99%. And this is the point at which you start to receive criticism, criticism you are apparently unable to accept. No, it is you who doesn't get it. Molecular biology and chemistry are what I am qualified in. You give the impression of being virtually unqualified in those fields and I will thank you to stop telling me how to suck eggs.


We HAVE read them, John. They deny facts. That's their procedure. Every single one of them denies known, long proven, easily observable facts, and the only reason they get away with it among their followers is because they don't get their own microscopes out and look for themselves. You can do that too. You'll find, in every case, that they aren't denying theories, or hypotheses; they are denying observable facts, because if they weren't, if they were actually rival theories that explained the observable facts, then the majority of scientists would be looking for experiments or observations that would differentiate the central dogma of molecular biology from those alternative theories, and doing those experiments or making those observations, and winning prizes and getting famous. That's how science is done, John. And the fact that none of the biologists are doing that should tell you something; because if there really WAS something there, there is a long history of iconoclasts who have made themselves famous and won awards, and everybody is all looking to be that guy, and they'd find it, John. They really would. They all WANT to. That's how they get famous and win awards.

But it doesn't address how the thing WORKS, John. How we KNOW it works, because we can LOOK AND SEE IT. He ignores that, every single time; and he ignores it because he can't explain it without admitting he's wrong.

It is difficult to remain skeptical about the existence of gravity when one has apples falling on one's head, John. It's called EVIDENCE. And the problem here is, the evidence supports those assertions, and doesn't support yours. It's really simple, John. Get a microscope. Figure out how it works for yourself. Explain it, and do so in a manner that is consistent with what you see in that microscope. Tell what every one of those organelles is, and how it is made. Molecular biology can do that, John. In detail. All of it. When your ideas can do that, then you can challenge molecular biology; but I'm going to tell you that when they can, they will BE molecular biology. You see? This is just patronizing. As I have said before - genetics should be seen as a subset of a properly constructed theory of evolution. There is no genetic result that is inconsistent with bioepistemic evolution.

Now, I expect a storm of invective. I expect you to deny more obvious facts that everyone but you sees when they look in the microscope. And I expect more vague assertions about how "unlikely" it all is. So surprise me. Do something different. YOU break out of YOUR assumptions. Take a look around at the real world.I don't do invective, I leave that to you.
Let's look at the real world and real humans. Humans have about 1000 times as much data in their brains, encoding socially inherited knowledge, as they have in their genes. (Sagan's estimate not mine but, in this respect humans are unique.) What is more, every single day, humans throw away far more sensory data than they store encoded as social knowledge. And you tell me that the only data that matters for human evolution is in genes? Perhaps you would like to reveal your reasoning?

Sorry, but I just think that attitude is ridiculous. Julian Huxley once wrote an essay entitled "The Uniqueness of Man" and he especially considered human biological uniqueness - noting, for example, our unusual sexuality and the phenomenon of humour. I suggest you read him and ask yourself, as I asked myself, whether such unique biological traits might, perhaps, have something to do with all that unique, stored data.

In addition, I refer you yet again to the question of abiogenesis, prebiotic evolution. It seems clear to me that genes did not arise by the chance emergence of some replicator in a random chemical mixture - that notion is totally unworkable, as are similar chance emergences of hypercycles or autocatalytic sets. I hold that living things arose as a result of some prebiotic evolutionary process and a genuinely satisfactory theory of evolution will, at least in principle, be capable of describing that process. Genetics is not capable of doing so and, on that ground as on others, it is unsatisfactory as a general theory of evolution.

[hammegk]

??? You're claiming you still can't find them even though you reposted the links yourself??
Unfortunately, Dr Richards made the claim. And I give up asking for facts regarding 'medical breakthroughs dependent on millions of years of evolution'. If what you are nominating is the cross-species relationship of insulin that sfaik adds nothing to clinical medicine.

Originally Posted by Dr Adequate
Not at all: since Randi's current occupation is challenging the woos to provide evidence the these "over 90%" are wrong. As Schneibster is doing re the anti-evolution crowd.

This is what skeptics do: rather than sit complacently on the laurels of scientific orthodoxy, we challenge people to prove it wrong.
A set of statements that overturn science, and burden of proof; why am I not surprised?

Schneibster: I've previously mentioned we are in 99.99% agreement, but I choose to retain my right to discuss matters in that highly improbable area.

I also note that your wholly arbitrary assignments of probabilities do yourself, and science no favors.

Maybe y'all should vote on the values to assign. ;)

[RecoveringYuppy]

Unfortunately, Dr Richards made the claim. And I give up asking for facts regarding 'medical breakthroughs dependent on millions of years of evolution'. If what you are nominating is the cross-species relationship of insulin that sfaik adds nothing to clinical medicine.

OK I suppose. But then do you accept my claim, which was "merely" that we've found new knowledge through interspecies comparisons that depend on us being related across millions of years?

[hammegk]

OK I suppose. But then do you accept my claim, which was "merely" that we've found new knowledge through interspecies comparisons that depend on us being related across millions of years?
I agree that is a logical --and sfaik correct-- interpretation based on the worldview that materialism/naturalism is the correct choice.

My question in return is that do accept your statement as having 100% certainty?

[Dr Adequate]

A set of statements that overturn science, and burden of proof; why am I not surprised? A more interesting question is: why are you not coherent?

[Yahzi]

The notion that every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by by natural phenomena seems to imply that all scientific problems have now been answered.
As Dr. A pointed out, this is a strawman.

It is rather curious that to create your strawman, you had to modify your own argument. You conviently left off the "so far" - which was present in your original text.

I believe that naturalism has been adequate to explain all of human experience so far. In other words, there is no human experience that is not a) explained, and b) explained by naturalism.

As to whether there are unexplained experiences: why yes, there are. Do we have any reason whatsoever to conclude, or even presume, that these experiences will not eventually be explained by materialism? Why no, we don't. Quite the contrary. We have every expectation that all of human experience will eventually be explained, and explained by naturalistic means.

While scientists are notably reluctant to stake out metaphysical claims, they nonetheless tacitly agree to this. They restrict their research to the natural, because they presume that will be adequate. So far, they've been right.

This is why we keep asking you if you accept non-natural explanations. To do so is to place your research in a realm that science has not yet seen necessary to visit. Thus, the mere fact of your methodology is vastly more controversial than whatever the details of your research are.

Since you claim to be a scientist, you should be aware of these facts. You should already understand that allowing for non-natural explanations is a violation of the accepted scientific process, and you should already understand why that is so.

The fact that you do not understand, the fact that you do not restrict your investigations to the merely natural, are indications that you are not doing science.

Which, I believe, was rather the original point.

The origin of life remains a major problem that has been discussed at length on this thread. I, at least, try to discuss it seriously.
Seriously, perhaps, but not scientifically.

My own work is an evolutionary analysis and, in my opinion, it is a more compelling analysis of that problem than any other I have yet come across.
While many of us have complained about the difficulty of extracting meaning from your text, you may rest assured that the above fact was always abundantly clear.

I find it deplorable that evolutionary theorists pay so little attention to those criticisms, especially as the apparent reason is that they disapprove of the motivations of the critics.
They disapprove of the methodology of the critics. That is, of the methodology of assuming that non-natural answers are adequate, acceptable, or useful.

In my opinion, those criticisms are much more valid than most scientific observers are willing to acknowledge.
This is why we keep asking if you are a creationist. All of the criticisms of evolution we have seen are religious ones, for religious reasons, using religious logic. They are ignored by scientific observers because they are not scientific criticisms. When you assert that you agree with these non-scientific criticisms, it is only natural to assume you are religious.

However, I believe we have adequately established this is not the case. It would seem that the only thing you agree with the Creationists on is that science is wrong. They wish to replace it with the Gospel of Paul, and you wish to replace it with the Gospel of John. While technically that does not make you a creationist, it does place you in the same category: so even while we now acknowledge you are not a creationist, our answer to you remains exactly the same as it is to the creationists.

[Schneibster]

John, you failed the test. It's simple: stick to the facts. You can't seem to do that. So what you do instead is insult the people who point them out to you, and deny what they say, which is substantiated by facts, without providing any of your own.

When you grow up, you might be worth talking to. Right now, you're a waste of time.

[Yahzi]

What the hell was up with the argument given over the past few pages? That whole crazy flame war?
I believe "The Atheist's" contention is that everybody but him is wrong.

Keep in mind that, while he has gallantly (some might say eagerly) leapt to the defense of Hewitt, he doesn't actually agree with Hewitt's claims.

Just as Hewitt doesn't agree with Creationism, except on the narrow point of everyone but him is wrong.

[Schneibster]

I've previously mentioned we are in 99.99% agreement, but I choose to retain my right to discuss matters in that highly improbable area. Instead of providing any facts.

I also note that your wholly arbitrary assignments of probabilities do yourself, and science no favors. If they're arbitrary, presumably they won't agree with the facts. But of course, you don't provide any. You don't even ask me to provide any. You just state that they are arbitrary, without investigating the claim.

As it turns out, they are not. But I'm not going to tell you where I got the numbers, because you didn't ask, and didn't provide any facts yourself.

And until you grow up, you're not worth talking to either.

[Schneibster]

Two down, one to go. Bring it, kleinman. Try to gather and present some facts, rather than playing footsie like these other two annoying cretinists.

[Yahzi]

You are not giving me or anyone else a chance to do anything and I do not care to persuade you of anything.
Despite your rancid disclaimer, I found the text that followed to be the most lucid and cogent explanation of your case so far.

Perhaps you should begin every post with a screed about how you don't have to explain anything, then go ahead and explain it, and then simply delete the screed part.

I think your behaviour is intentional rudeness and I think there are too many such people on the JREF forum.
You could also remove the irony. I get all the iron I need from supplements.

There have been various theories for that but, ever since Bateson and Fisher, evolution has been more or less identified with genetics.
Are you asserting that there is some other mechanism for the evolution of life (i.e. organisms with genes) other than genes?

I think evolutionary theory should be based on data, on the interpetation of that data into information and on the selection of information through the generations. Genetics is just a subset of that.
As I understand it, genes are the mechanism by which that "data" are expressed. You would have to show some other mechanism that records, maniuplates, and expresses data.

We already know of one example - culture. Culture is, in many ways, like a virtual set of genes. It certainly plays a crucial role in evolutionary pressures, and its ability to record, manipulate, and express data is easily demonstrated.

However, culture is expressed as a pattern of neurlogical elements. Thus, the vast majority of life on Earth gets by without the faintest shred of culture, or even the ability to create, maintain, or process culture, since most of life doesn't have a neurology.

What mechanism stores your non-genetic data in these creatures?

If you actually read books by IDers - rather than just ranting about them - you would read some serious, valid critiques of modern evolutionary theory.
Would you care to mention even one? Other than the problem of abiogenesis, which is not a part of the science of evolution.

For example, I have seen Kleinman, on this thread say "tell us how genes arose" - or words to that effect.
That's abiogenesis. Even if the original gene was created in a lab by an alien, that would change nothing about the science of evolution.

Are skeptics only skeptical about ID?
I believe we've demonstrated a healthy amount of skepticism about your theory. A cynic might suggest that you've made a Freudian slip here.



My Psychic Prediction: Hewitt will dismiss my comments as "trite" without answering them. I base this prediction off the last time I actually attempted to address Hewitt's theory, and the response I got then. As always, I am prepared to be proven wrong.

[John Hewitt]

John, you failed the test. It's simple: stick to the facts. You can't seem to do that. So what you do instead is insult the people who point them out to you, and deny what they say, which is substantiated by facts, without providing any of your own.

When you grow up, you might be worth talking to. Right now, you're a waste of time.

Oh gosh, I didn't know I was being tested - I am left wondering who is my judge? The facts you cite always seem to me either entirely irrelevant or just plain wrong - but then I actually know a lot of chemistry and molecular biology.

[John Hewitt]

Are you asserting that there is some other mechanism for the evolution of life (i.e. organisms with genes) other than genes?
Epigenesis has always been a theoretical possibility but only minor examples seem to have been demonstrated at the biological level. In some ways, culture is a large scale epigenesis.

As I understand it, genes are the mechanism by which that "data" are expressed. You would have to show some other mechanism that records, maniuplates, and expresses data.

We already know of one example - culture. Culture is, in many ways, like a virtual set of genes. It certainly plays a crucial role in evolutionary pressures, and its ability to record, manipulate, and express data is easily demonstrated.Culture is not demonstrated to be in any way analogous to genes; culture is not easily divisible into subsets with an apparently "atomic" nature. Cultural data is stored in the brain which seems to work as an analogue not a digital computer, so cultural data has an analog form, as do the modes of its transmission. Cultural data is not expressed as proteins, it is not reproduced sexually and is shared across a group rather than being confined to a single organism.

However, culture is expressed as a pattern of neurlogical elements. Thus, the vast majority of life on Earth gets by without the faintest shred of culture, or even the ability to create, maintain, or process culture, since most of life doesn't have a neurology.

What mechanism stores your non-genetic data in these creatures?Most of the data in simple creatures is genetic but some, even on DNA, is not. For example, the sequence of genes on a chromosome or the set of genes on a chromosome. In addition, there is data that was selected antecedently to DNA, such as the choice of bases that make up DNA. Such data, I would argue, must have arisen from a prebiotic evolution.


Would you care to mention even one? Other than the problem of abiogenesis, which is not a part of the science of evolution.
That's abiogenesis. Even if the original gene was created in a lab by an alien, that would change nothing about the science of evolution.Actually, I think taking abiogenesis out of evolution is an evasive redefinition - Gould did that to help in the legal debate following Scalia's dissenting judgement but I think Gould was ducking the problem.
Any sensible solution to abiogenesis must be evolutionary, if only for coherence. My solution has been to identify a process of purely chemical evolution within the type of environment believed to have existed on the primordial earth.
If you want another example of biological evolution in a none genetic context, consider the workings of the brain, which is considered a Darwinian machine that processes sensory data into knowledge, or the workings of the immune system.
Cultural evolution has been a problem since Darwin's time (he discussed it himself, as did Spencer and Sumner.) You might also consider the structure of ethics and subcultural evolution, though I think I am the only person to have considered that.
If you want the first person to look at evolution from a "cybernetic" perspective, that would have been Wallace, at the same time as Darwin. (Gregory Bateson discusses this in "Mind and Nature" on the "cybernetic" approach to evolution - I would now use the term data system, but that's just words.) It is interesting that Gregory Bateson was dissenting somewhat from his own father's approach.

[The Atheist]

Oh gosh, I didn't know I was being tested - I am left wondering who is my judge? The facts you cite always seem to me either entirely irrelevant or just plain wrong - but then I actually know a lot of chemistry and molecular biology.
Jesus, John; you must be GUTTED!

You failed the test!

Time to put all those years of training behind you and take up fishing, or some other pursuit more in keeping with your nature.

The only point I'll add is that I see you've been accused of insulting someone. I've had a look through your posts and I don't see it. I see you being insulted, but not insulting. It strikes me as hilarious that the truce lasted for all of about three posts before devolving back into name calling.

There's only one rule at this forum, fit in or #### off. Looks like you aren't going to fit in and I did suggest IIDB for you. (I don't fit in either, but I prefer it that way.) Whether or not your hypotheses are true, I'll probably never know, but as I said to you at the start - your method and book are worthy of discussion. Thanks to the inability of certain posters to read your plain comments, this thread has lost the ability to look at your ideas critically. The chances of serious discussion disappeared with the attitude of Yahzi and Articulett, and it was sure no surprise to see those being the two unable to douse the flames.

I guess that one of these days, Articulett's students - if she ever listens to them, which I strongly doubt - might wake her up to the fact that she's an exceedingly tedious person, clearly living alone in a fantasy world where she is queen of all she surveys and where people respect her opinion. As opposed to truth - a dull, repetitive, copyist without the wit or guts to actually do anything of note herself. I'm sure you can cast your mind back to those teachers whom every child found an object of pity and ridicule at the same time? Articulett's one of those.

Kudos to those with the class to not act like the school snitch - Paul, kjkent & others - & even the doc for stopping the flames. Funny that the school teacher acts most like a school pupil.

Me; I just get so far then can't resist. I managed to resist for a dozen or so utterly BS posts by your pals, but when I saw you being attacked for being insulting, my irony meter broke and I can stay quiet no more.

Anyway, the thread has served a purpose - I'm helping mould [geld?] the atheist community into one team.

Thank god I'm not on it!

This thread is an outstanding advertisement of the "critical thinking" available at JREF. Disagree with "us" and be classed as a creationist. (Although Arti's continued classing me as one is most gratifying.) When I see her so overcome with dislike that she continues insulting me literally pages after she apparently started "ignoring" me tells me quite a lot about obsessive behaviour. Plus, I've personally added three new links to my sig from this thread, so I'm doing fine.

I just feel that you'd get far more enjoyment from discussing your ideas rather than holding an insult-fest. Leave that to me.

[John Hewitt]

Jesus, John; you must be GUTTED!

You failed the test!
Time to put all those years of training behind you and take up fishing, or some other pursuit more in keeping with your nature.
The only point I'll add is that I see you've been accused of insulting someone. I've had a look through your posts and I don't see it. I see you being insulted, but not insulting. It strikes me as hilarious that the truce lasted for all of about three posts before devolving back into name calling.

Yes, Atheist, I been feeling terrible all evening; I've just been sitting alone in my darkened, room weeping tears of mortification at the thought that I failed Schneibster's test.

But seriously, I wouldn't worry too much about it. I know I'm not going to get an intelligent dialogue from some of these people. An "atheist community" - they could almost makes me want to go to church. (No, not really, only for weddings and funerals.)

I have joined IIDB in the hope of a more qualified and rule-bounded dialogue. I haven't posted there yet but I do hope for something more resembling an intelligent discussion. (Thanks for the reference by the way.)

In the meantime, I shall also stay with JREF. I have to remember that there is a readership on this forum and even on this thread besides the jerks. Some people will get the point, even if it takes them a while. In addition there are those who just drop in from other threads or even from the wider internet. In due course, they may cohere into a sensible dialogue and enhance the awareness of my work.

[Schneibster]

My Psychic Prediction: Hewitt will dismiss my comments as "trite" without answering them. I base this prediction off the last time I actually attempted to address Hewitt's theory, and the response I got then. As always, I am prepared to be proven wrong.As are we all. I'd welcome it, actually. But I certainly don't expect it.

[The Atheist]

:bgrin: I'll send you a couple of boxes of tissues!

Just a thought, too. You should try changing your sig to reflect the sexandphilosophy. You might get more people interested - anything with sex in it, plus it's positive rather than the negative connotation in your current one.

Good luck - I'll just stick around for the inevitable follow up to the next few posts. I have typed out some pages and sealed them in an envelope, because I'm: A) psychic, B)pretty sure I could guess the pattern anyway, and C)hoping it'll pass as a prelim. to challenge for Randi's mio!

I'll keep an eye out for you at IIDB as well, about time I got a warning or something over there.

Cheers

Alan

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

The notion that every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by by natural phenomena seems to imply that all scientific problems have now been answered. That is not the case.
But the question was whether naturalism has been adequate so far. No one implied that science is finished.


For example, I have seen Kleinman, on this thread say "tell us how genes arose" - or words to that effect. The question is legitimate and lies at the core of any serious attempt to understand origins. What comes back, from so-called skeptics?
What comes back is mostly "don't know yet."


They are, by any standards, "extraordinary claims" and the fact that they are even present in the scientific literature seems to reflect a determination among leaders in the field never to admit that there is anything wrong with their preconceived ideas.
What? You appear to be focusing on a few ideas that people are tossing about as some sort of evidence that they are closed-minded. At the same time, you ask people to be open-minded about your ideas.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

This thread is now officially crapola.

~~ Paul

[Dr Adequate]

I'll ... I ... I've ... I ... I ... me ...

I ... I ... I ... I'll ... I

I ... I ... I'm .

Me ... I ... I ... I ... my ... I ...

I'm ...

I'm ...

me ... I ... me ... me ... me ... I've ... my ... I'm ...

I ... me. You've made your point.

[The Atheist]

This thread is now officially crapola.

~~ Paul


<<<<< takes bow.

[The Atheist]

You've made your point.

Jolly decent of you to care so much as to spend time going through my posts like that!

Cheers.

[Schneibster]

My goal was to entice them to jump the shark.

[hammegk]

But the question was whether naturalism has been adequate so far.
Has it been? It would be an interesting claim. Care to prove it.


No one implied that science is finished.
It never started in the areas of contention, and never will.


What comes back is mostly "don't know yet."
You are wrong. What comes back is the inAdequate-inArticulett-Ynatzi-Schneibster-et al supercilious nastiness, aided and abetted by a group of moderators who protect their favorites.


What? You appear to be focusing on a few ideas that people are tossing about as some sort of evidence that they are closed-minded.
And that evidence abounds on JREF, in this thread, and many others.


At the same time, you ask people to be open-minded about your ideas.
And the evidence of that happening is also abundantly demonstrated to be completely lacking to any rational observer.

[Terry]

There's only one rule at this forum, fit in or #### off.

The evidence does not seem to support that statement.

[The Atheist]

..., aided and abetted by a group of moderators who protect their favorites. Sorry hammegk, I'm going to have to disagree with that.

If anyone was going to be picked on for being the least favourite, as well as a disruptive, abusive prick, it would be me and I haven't even had a warning in the past three months. Love 'em or hate 'em, you can't plead bias.

[The Atheist]

The evidence does not seem to support that statement.

I know - and I just admitted that much in the above post!

It just had that nice divisive ring about it. Surprised to find anyone other than John reading my posts, so give yourself a pat on the back for above and beyond the call of duty!

[Schneibster]

Don't confuse 'em with, you know, facts and stuff.

[articulett]

You are wrong. What comes back is the inAdequate-inArticulett-Ynatzi-Schneibster-et al supercilious nastiness, aided and abetted by a group of moderators who protect their favorites.


I think everyone would like to discuss facts--but none are ever offered by the creationists. Moreover, the rudest and most insulting people are blind to how offensive and off putting they are while crying and whining and screaming "no fair" when it comes back in far more tempered versions. You guys have an absolute inability to see yourselves.

Really. Cut and paste your comments and put them side by side to the worst comments you have seen from others--with an ordering of which post is in response to what--and ask any group of people whose comments are worse--who started the ad homs-- The problem with the dicks, is that they don't know what dicks they are. They just think everyone else is one. Yes, we think your theories or hypothesis etc. suck--but you don't ever present any evidence in support of any proposition that we can argue--you just use obfuscations, sarcasm, and ad homs--and then cry "no fair" when it is returned with far more eloquence and intelligence then you had managed to offer. You are only likable and reasonable and engaging in civil discourse IN YOUR OWN HEADS. There is no evidence on this forum that people are hearing what you are saying except that you are all saying evolution is wrong or has big problems and "something else" is a better answer.

Every time you whine or post the rules of this forum Hammy, you send the masses into fits of giggles, because every complaint readily applies to you more than anyone else. Really. Welcome to the reality based community. We're not the one's claiming to have "special knowledge"--that would be those of you who support "intelligent design" and the like.

[Schneibster]

the rudest and most insulting people are blind to how offensive and off putting they are while crying and whining and screaming "no fair" when it comes back in far more tempered versions. You guys have an absolute inability to see yourselves. Somehow I don't think it's a coincidence that this sounds a lot like the article you linked in your signature. I think we may have discovered a general principle. A general psychiatric principle. Isn't that interesting? Well, I suppose "interesting" in a slightly disgusting way, like watching all the sickly white slimy things crawl away looking for somewhere to hide when you turn over a rock.

[articulett]

Oh gosh, I didn't know I was being tested - I am left wondering who is my judge? The facts you cite always seem to me either entirely irrelevant or just plain wrong - but then I actually know a lot of chemistry and molecular biology.

That's amazing--because you seem to be unable to convey it to the many other people here who also know chemistry and molecular biology. However you imagine yourself brilliant enough to make the following assertions which nobody can pin you down on.

1. "there's no such thing as memes"
2. "current evolutionary theory and abiogenesis has big problems"
3. "ribonucleic acids are too unstable to be the first replicators"
4. "information via the sun and oscillations should be considered the "designer" of life's code--and the replicators should be considered the cells"
5. All other conjecture about abiogenesis is trite and readily dismissed as uninteresting and unimportant.
6. You assert that humans have something special (in your link) called "free will"--and other life forms don't have it. And this is important to your concepts of how sexuality, humor, and sexual deviancy evolve-- You don't think genes and memes are sufficient or good at explaining these traits and traits such as morality, and presumably you think you have a much better explanation but no scientists will listen to you.


So here is your chance. Everyone tries to listen--but no one can yet sum up what you are saying. Feel free to correct anything I got wrong. You have had chance after chance after chance--you cannot seem to fathom that maybe your ideas are not being grasped because they don't take the facts we know into account and/or they are not clear, useful, nor helpful in furthering understanding. Plus you see to have absolutely no curiosity about current developments in the field.

Calling everyone who tries to muddle through whatever you have to say a "lying cheating meanie" who is too stupid to understand anything--just helps fulfill your belief that you are a genius who has the key to show that evolution is on the wrong track and you somehow can explain it better through a more useful "epistemological" explanation. Certainly, you can see how that makes you very much like Michael Behe--a known creationist. These traits are traits of his as well as all scientists who have attempted to wade through his crap can probably attest...except for maybe those who have a vested interest in "intelligent design".

You guys cry like you are going to "take your ball and go home"--but you never had the ball.

Yahzi, Dr. A., and Schneibster are my heroes. You guys bleat on for pages saying nothing and tell yourselves how evolution is a false "dogma" while never bringing anything of value to the table when you have a willing audience, well schooled on evolution willing to subject the facts to any actual test that someone has. The knowledge brought forth by evolution is amazing , strong, and verified in incredible ways all the time. You lie to yourselves and anyone who will listen to you to support some illusory purpose. You add nothing to the knowledge of others because you are too busy protecting your ego and lying to yourselves--you can't believe that you could be wrong.

And your summation of Kleinman's views is an insult to Paul who spent hours explaining and testing and clarifying and writing programs for his idiotic contention that genomes couldn't evolve according to some inane math problem. No answer satisfies you guys...no amount of evidence ever will... You waste time, but at least you are online and not making the masses ignorant, and the rest of us have the pleasure of watching evolution explained and tested and refined in action.

If you can't communicate your hypothesis, test it, use it, nullify it--or explain why it is stronger than the information we have--then it is only good in your imagination. It is only right to you. It's useless in reality. Do you want to know the truth as best we can--or do you want to believe that somehow you already have it and the rest of us just won't listen?

[Dr Adequate]

Jolly decent of you to care so much as to spend time going through my posts like that!

...

function I(s:ansistring):ansistring;
var w:string; n:integer; p:set of char; t:string;
begin
p:=[' ','.',',',';','!','?','(',')']; t:=''; w:='';
for n:=1 to length(s) do
begin
if s[n] in p then
begin
if (w='I') or (w='I''m') or (w='I''d') or (w='I''ll') or (w='I''ve') or (w='me') or (w='Me') or (w='my') or (w='My') or (w='mine') or (w='Mine') then t:=t+w+' ... ';
w:=''
end
else w:=w+s[n]
end;
I:=t
end;

[Schneibster]

Rofflmfao!

[The Atheist]

Yes, but I'm sure you had to run the program and post the results. Jolly friendly.

Hey, I've been looking for you in chat, let me know what time you're in there so I can say hi.

[articulett]

If you actually read books by IDers - rather than just ranting about them - you would read some serious, valid critiques of modern evolutionary theory.

And if you actually read Darwin and Dawkins and even Dennett instead of dismissing them or purposely noting how you don't read them, you might understand why these valid critiques are not actually valid. In fact, you have not been able to coherently state a single valid complaint. You claim to be a scientist, but you want to discuss epistemology...your degrees are an M.A. and a Ph.D. You don't adhere to the basic premises of science or the scientific methodology. You think some intelligent design proponents have valid arguments against evolution--but the only one we hear from you is the one about cells being the "true replicators" per Behe--and you don't seem to understand why that is a useless path nor do you understand why that is a creationist argument. Data streams vs. genes? Any evidence other than your conjecture that RNA is too unstable to have been the first replicator?

You continually talk down to people who, sound a lot more intelligent and educated than you. You talk down about Dawkins but sound like a mental midget in comparison--not to mention your intellectual Paucity in comparison to those you insult on this forum.

[articulett]

A more interesting question is: why are you not coherent?

Oh, Oh, -- me--I know the answer.

Because he's a creationist.

Do I win?

[articulett]

The evidence does not seem to support that statement.

I agree...to me it seems that those who "don't fit in", certainly don't #### off. They complain about how every one on the forum is mean to them and what liars and cheaters and unfair debaters forum members and moderators are (and scientists and skeptics and all others who express negativity towards their pet views.)

I think the majority of people on this forum are really intelligent and interesting and funny--with a few loud and omnipresent "interesting-ian" types. And I suspect that is what most of the forum members think...which is why they stay. I just can't fathom why the complainers do. (Not that I'm discouraging them...I enjoy the soap opera of the clueless)... Maybe they are engaging in some fascinating dialogue on some other thread I'm not visiting.

(It's not crapola, Paul. It's entertainment.)

[Schneibster]

Since we're discussing classification, I suppose it's worth mentioning that they ALWAYS claim to have advanced degrees in some specialized technical discipline they never actually say anything technical about. John appears to believe he has a degree in molecular biology. I have yet to see any of the jargon of the trade.

[articulett]

Somehow I don't think it's a coincidence that this sounds a lot like the article you linked in your signature. I think we may have discovered a general principle. A general psychiatric principle. Isn't that interesting? Well, I suppose "interesting" in a slightly disgusting way, like watching all the sickly white slimy things crawl away looking for somewhere to hide when you turn over a rock.

Yeah, but these don't crawl away. They stick around. So I say, let's dissect them, and find out what we can learn!

(And I got that link on your "skeptoid" thread--I think kellyb posted it--and I think it explains a lot. The dolts never seem to know they are the dolts...they just presume everyone else is.)

[The Atheist]

(All bolding and changes of colour to posts is mine)
Cut and paste your comments and put them side by side to the worst comments you have seen from others--with an ordering of which post is in response to what--and ask any group of people whose comments are worse--who started the ad homs--

The problem with the dicks, is that they don't know what dicks they are. They just think everyone else is one. Yes, we think your theories or hypothesis etc. suck--

Hell yeah, I'll play. That's 2 to you.

And you sneaked a couple more in after that:

You continually talk down to people who, sound a lot more intelligent and educated than you. You talk down about Dawkins but sound like a mental midget in comparison--not to mention your intellectual Paucity in comparison to those you insult on this forum.

Now, going back through the thread, let's keep count.

4-0 to you.

That is a lie. ...
...--not just pouting...

...--you're just like a whining kid in the backseat ..."
7-0
This would imply that you would understand sensible debate. There is no evidence that you have engaged any. This forum is filled with back and forth discussion of Dr. Adequate--no one but those whom no one else seems to even understand has made accusations about his debating skills or his science.

You have demonstrated no social competence, no debating competence, no scientific competence, no credibility, and not even a comprehensible "hypothesize" that anyone can sum up.

Irony. I see it as evidence of a creationist.
I'll be generous and call that 2.

9-0

And presumably, your "theory" is more adequate....--

My god, a whole post with none! See, you can do it! Well, you did it once, anyway.

Struggling to find one coming back, so I'll go with this to get John on the board:
Today, you have again presented the group with an extended screed of ad hominem abuse. Those who try to debate alongside you must find your behaviour an embarrassment.

Barely worth 1, but we'll call it 9 - 1.

A lot of bright people have waded through your BS writings and tried to make sense of it. The least you can do is stop the insults and tell the truth about your beliefs instead of claiming naivete about the meaning of the word naturalism. You may think that your beliefs don't affect your work. But I submit that they are the reason no scientist can actually grasp what you are saying. Many of us read all types of scientific articles and have no problems grasping what is being said. Why can't anyone grasp your "theory"?

You are harder to make sense of than the bible.

11 - 1. (nice note about insults from John. Where the hell are they?)

That's the past week. Get that result, Arti, honey? ELEVEN - ONE!

N.B. I have looked only at posts which you and John have directed at each other - it would take me a week to get all of yours directed elsewhere onto one post.

So, the clear winner of the flame war, Arti. vs John, is YOU, honey. And the bad news is that you also started it.

What was your point again?

I'm surprised you're a woman, there's more wank in your posts than the average teenage boy's underpants.

[articulett]

Since we're discussing classification, I suppose it's worth mentioning that they ALWAYS claim to have advanced degrees in some specialized technical discipline they never actually say anything technical about. John appears to believe he has a degree in molecular biology. I have yet to see any of the jargon of the trade.

http://freespace.virgin.net/john.hewitt1/pg_pref.htm

I am a Yorkshireman, born 1947 in Bradford, West Yorkshire of a working class family. After attending a local grammar I went up, as they say, to Trinity College, Cambridge to study science, duly graduated and took a Ph.D. at the MRC laboratory for Molecular Biology also in Cambridge; I continued in research, in the US and England. The work from which "A Habit of Lies" grew, was done during the early part of 1978, following the beginning of my time as a university demonstrator in biochemistry at Cambridge. In the language used by most institutions, demonstrator means junior lecturer or assistant professor.
. . .

http://www.sexandphilosophy.co.uk/pe00_prebiotic_index.htm

However influential the gene concept may be in evolution, I have a serious problem with it. In my opinion, the gene is simply not an acceptable foundation for evolutionary theory. Now, please, my biologically trained readers, do not misunderstand me here. This essay will not present a creationist viewpoint and I fully accept that genes exist and that "selfish" genes improved on what they replaced – eliminating the idea that a species could be a unit of selection was a big advance – but that success should not blind people to the problems inherent in the idea of genes as central to all evolution. I do think there are serious problems with this approach and I am surprised at how little serious criticism of it is ever published. I will argue that, in reality, genes are not basic to evolution at all. In my view, the gene-centred approach to evolutionary theory is wrong in principle and in substance and that those errors become most clear when one attempts to merge of biological evolution with other forms of evolution, namely intellectual and social evolution.


. . .

http://www.sexandphilosophy.co.uk/bioepistemic.htm

Bioepistemic evolution recognizes this result and rejects the idea of fundamental replicators in evolving systems. Instead, bioepistemic evolution is built from the concept of stored data with biological evolution being described in terms of the data stored in DNA. This is the data that is formatted in genes.

Bare Bones Argument for the Theory of Prebiotic Oscillations

The theory takes two sets of premises

1. Our current best understanding of the chemical and physical conditions that prevailed on the early earth during the period of life's first emergence. The prebiotic earth is taken to have been quite warm, volcanically active, very moist, stormy and exposed to solar UV radiation. The prebiotic environment included a complex mixture of organic chemicals, the primordial soup. It is taken that life emerged from this environment by a process of evolution


. . .

Broadly, three proposals (models or hypotheses) have been advanced to explain the experimental observations. Although three ideas have been put forward, debate, investigation and reporting have portrayed the field as if only two of those models are possibilities, with virtually no explanation of how the third hypothesis was eliminated. This fact alone signals a poor investigation but it will be argued here that the proposals receiving the attention are plainly incorrect. The substantive evidence indicates that the neglected idea is actually the best.


His theory comes from nearly 30 years ago. It might have value, but he seems unaware of current research and angry and dismissive when it is brought to his attention. He thinks people are clearly keeping his view from being heard. I tried to cut and paste and find some cohesiveness or value, but I can't. It gets worse (from my perspective) when he gets into sex and humor. He seems to feel that group selection cannot be accounted for by genes nor can moral dilemmas despite multiple references given to him on the topic. He seems like a nice guy stuck on an old idea that he thinks didn't get a fair shake at one time--but I don't understand it enough to convey it to anyone, and I think it didn't get a fair shake because it wasn't coherent...it isn't useful for furthering understanding... Maybe the people at IIDB can understand it or find use for it. To me, it seems like he has been so invested in this theory, that he has missed some important data in the field--

Everyone he seems to think is mean, wrong, closed minded, unfair, dismissive, etc. and lying cheating scientists, are people who seem intelligent and remarkably coherent to me. Those whom he thinks have valid criticisms like Behe and his "cells are replicators" and those "other" ID proponents he refers to, are people whom I think are incoherent--like Kleinman.

If someone could sum up what he was trying to say, it might help his case. But I just get the feeling he's going to shop around his idea until someone attaches to it. He encourages cellular biology students to ask their teachers about his theory-- what I want to know is this-- what is his theory?--his model (and what, in brief, are the other two options that get all the attention--one is "genes" as replicators, what is the other?)...why does he think his data stream model is better or more explanatory than what we are working on. Can any of the very intelligent people on this forum tell me? We could be missing something really important just because we can't tell what he's actually saying. He thinks his data theory, not only explains the origins of life, but things like humor and sexual deviancy--I don't know how he links all this together--but, in his head at least, it all goes together. Read his links.

John, if no one is able to come back and paraphrase or sum up what you are communicating--then that makes you less comprehensible than Kleinman and his faulty math example. That isn't good for your cause or furthering understanding.

[John Hewitt]

But the question was whether naturalism has been adequate so far. No one implied that science is finished.
What comes back is mostly "don't know yet."
Yes, absolutely, I don't know yet and you don't know yet. So please ask Yahzi to stop demanding a declaration of faith that one day we all will know. My answer was "dunno" - what is your problem?


What? You appear to be focusing on a few ideas that people are tossing about as some sort of evidence that they are closed-minded. At the same time, you ask people to be open-minded about your ideas.

~~ PaulThe ideas in question are
1. That a self-replicating molecule can be made from RNA. Yes, I consider that extraordinary and unsupported by any evidence and outside of any parallel.
2. That reality includes a virtual infinity of parallel universes, undetectable from the one which we inhabit.

My suggestion, as an alternative, is that the sun comes up in the morning and goes down at night and that it provides the data flow that triggers evolution.

And you think my claims are extraordinary?

[John Hewitt]

Read his links.

John, if no one is able to come back and paraphrase or sum up what you are communicating--then that makes you less comprehensible than Kleinman and his faulty math example. That isn't good for your cause or furthering understanding.
Yes, I recommend reading the links but I do not recommend doing what Articulett has done and jumbling quotes from both sites together.

[Schneibster]

Good God. Well, at least he has the trappings- but the trappings he learned 'way back when appear to be all he knows. No wonder I keep hearing about how we haven't explained this and that.

John, welcome to the twenty-first century; we've completely mapped the human genome, and completely described the transcription process, from soup to nuts. Or, if you prefer, from gene to protein. It's all been done. We know how it works. We are even to the point of being able to forensically tell someone's hair and eye color, and whether their earlobes are attached or not, and whether they have a widow's peak, from their DNA alone. We're talking about mapping the genotype directly to the phenotype. We've done it, John. And if we can do that, then if the phenotype changes, it means the genotype has to have- and that means that evolution happens in the genotype. There just isn't anywhere to hide.

I'll tender my apologies for doubting your training- but you have to accept some responsibility too, because you never spoke of anything that would lead me to believe that you actually knew what you were talking about. You have to try harder if you ever want anyone to understand. That's what articulett is saying. And if you don't understand that we get every woo on the 'Net here, I suggest you go have a look at the two running threads by the latest woo to show up, who apparently thinks that the distance to the Moon is dependent upon the size of the Great Pyramid, or some such crap.

Do better.

ETA: And just because you have the training doesn't mean you're not a woo. I'll warn you about IIDB: they're more polite there; they'll just put you on ignore. And if you're as nasty there as you've been here, you won't last long.

Bring data, John. Not ideas; not theories; not mysterious connections between this and that. Hard data. Tell us about experiments that should be run. Tell us about observations that have not been made and should be. That was your mistake the first time. Don't make it again.

[John Hewitt]

John, welcome to the twenty-first century; we've completely mapped the human genome, and completely described the transcription process, from soup to nuts. Or, if you prefer, from gene to protein. It's all been done. We know how it works. We are even to the point of being able to forensically tell someone's hair and eye color, and whether their earlobes are attached or not, and whether they have a widow's peak, from their DNA alone. We're talking about mapping the genotype directly to the phenotype. We've done it, John. And if we can do that, then if the phenotype changes, it means the genotype has to have- and that means that evolution happens in the genotype. There just isn't anywhere to hide.

I'll tender my apologies for doubting your training- but you have to accept some responsibility too, because you never spoke of anything that would lead me to believe that you actually knew what you were talking about.
Actually, my background has been made perfectly clear all along and I am much more up to date than you appear to think. This is just yet another from your library of ill-mannered ad hominems. So, in return, let me guess at your background and offer you a few ad hominems in return.
Let's see, trained in physics or something similar?
Worked in computing?
Reads amateur science books?
Hasn't got a clue about chemistry or molecular biology?

The last one must be true because, quite simply, I cannot remember you saying anything, from either field, that is both correct and relevant.

Please, I invite you, choose one item from the first paragraph of empty headed babble quoted above and explain why you think it is relevant. I am really looking forward to you explaining why you think earlobes or hair colour come into this!

[Dr Richard]

The ideas in question are
1. That a self-replicating molecule can be made from RNA. Yes, I consider that extraordinary and unsupported by any evidence and outside of any parallel.
2. That reality includes a virtual infinity of parallel universes, undetectable from the one which we inhabit.

My suggestion, as an alternative, is that the sun comes up in the morning and goes down at night and that it provides the data flow that triggers evolution.

And you think my claims are extraordinary?

John - your idea - that the fluctuations in temperature provided by the sun drive the chemical reactions/equilibrium which create self-replicating molecules - does not seem that extraordinary to me. In fact, it seems a fairly mundane hypothesis, given what we know about DNA/RNA repliacation.

Given that, you then have to answer the following question: which molecules is your sun acting upon?

I would accept that at present we do not have a strand of RNA capable of self-encoding a ribozyme, but at present I would say there is considerably more evidence to support the RNA world hypothesis than your....

...

erm... what is it again? What are your proposed self-replicators? Please don't say cells, we need to know what came before that...


This article (http://www.springerlink.com/content/m17k1608441623t4/) gives a fairly up to date review of where the evidence for the RNA world hypothesis stands.

If you can provide evidence that your own idea is more fully developed than the data presented in this paper, I would be happy to reconsider, but at the moment I view an RNA world as being the most credible explanation of early molecular evolution.

[Ivor the Engineer]

You know how some people's personality radically changes when they get behind the wheel of a car? A similar thing appears to be happening to people on this forum.

It must be encoded in their genes. So there's no point thinking they may be able to bring in new knowledge and produce a different output. Because a phenotype can't evolve. The books say so you see, so it must be true.

Just because you don't agree with one idea a person has proposed, is not a sensible reason to ignore all their ideas.

I've read some of what John has written on his sex&philosophy site and while I don't agree with or know enough to argue with some of what he's proposing, some of it I do agree with and do know enough to evaluate it reasonably.

[Mr. Scott]

You know how some people's personality radically changes when they get behind the wheel of a car? A similar thing appears to be happening to people on this forum.

Monsters from the ID (http://imdb.com/title/tt0049223/quotes) (intentional pun).

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Has it been? It would be an interesting claim. Care to prove it.
I think I can show it's true almost by definition if someone can define supernatural. The only way it's not true is if there is a current theory of something that could be improved by invoking supernaturalism. But the way improvement is measured would be by showing that supernaturalism provides a better explanation of observed phenomena. But since, by definition,* supernatural influences can't be observed, I'm not sure how that could work. Supernatural entities are assumed by faith, and faith doesn't help improve theory.


You are wrong. What comes back is the inAdequate-inArticulett-Ynatzi-Schneibster-et al supercilious nastiness, aided and abetted by a group of moderators who protect their favorites.
So one of those people has claimed a final theory of abiogenesis? Or have they just thrown out some ideas they think are relevant, as has Hewitt?


And that evidence abounds on JREF, in this thread, and many others.
...
And the evidence of that happening is also abundantly demonstrated to be completely lacking to any rational observer.
But what is interesting is that Hewitt is being just as closed-minded about his opponents' ideas (e.g., RNA self-replication) as other people are about his ideas. I think what's really going on is lively debate about abiogenesis, with a good dollop of name-calling thrown in. Whether Hewitt deserves to be called a creationist I do not know, because I really can't figure that out.


~~ Paul

* At least I think that's part of its definition.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Yes, absolutely, I don't know yet and you don't know yet. So please ask Yahzi to stop demanding a declaration of faith that one day we all will know. My answer was "dunno" - what is your problem?
Sorry, I haven't been paying enough attention to know whether Yahzi has been making such demands.


The ideas in question are
1. That a self-replicating molecule can be made from RNA. Yes, I consider that extraordinary and unsupported by any evidence and outside of any parallel.
2. That reality includes a virtual infinity of parallel universes, undetectable from the one which we inhabit.

My suggestion, as an alternative, is that the sun comes up in the morning and goes down at night and that it provides the data flow that triggers evolution.

And you think my claims are extraordinary?
I don't really care where all the claims lie on the ordinariness scale. If you dismiss RNA self-replication, then you are doing exactly what it is you're asking others not to do. I'm sure you think you have good reasons for doing so, as does everyone else.

~~ Paul

[articulett]

http://www.sexandphilosophy.co.uk/author.htm

Dr. Hewitt has become a fierce critic of the academic community, in particular of the scientific establishment, which (Perutz not included) he often found to be corrupt, unwilling to engage in rational debate, censorious of criticism and dissent and, at times, deliberately deceitful. A description of one instance can be found in his work at A Habit of Lies.

The conflict between scientific deceit, which is actually quite common, and science's claims of rationality, led to Dr. Hewitt's interest in scientific method and philosophy. This interest, in its turn, led to his studying the application of evolutionary theory to epistemology, the theory of knowledge, and hence to his development of the generalized form of evolutionary theory, bioepistemic evolution, described in "The Architecture of Thought." The radical departure underpinning the theory of bioepistemic evolution is that it is based on data, rather than genes, which are treated as a format for the data contained on DNA. The aim of his present work is to describe and develop this form of evolutionary theory particularly its application to our understanding of human nature and origins.

http://www.sexandphilosophy.co.uk/conclusions.htm

Free Will and the Ascent of Man

It is not unusual for commentators on evolutionary theory to decry its depiction of humans as programmed mechanisms, unable to make decisions for themselves. "What about free will and personal responsibility?" they say and it is a fair question, though not one to which they usually offer any real answer of their own. The answer implied by this work is that free will is itself a function of knowledge separate from genes.

. . . With the passage of time, we have come to possess so much more knowledge than animals, so many more choices, that humans, alone among the animals may be said to possess free will.

Free will grows from knowledge and has grown apace as civilization has developed. As Jacob Bronowski's TV series, The Ascent of Man, discussed, civilization greatly increases mankind's stock of knowledge and is built around new ways of accumulating, storing and distributing social knowledge. In his accumulated knowledge, mankind really has ascended above the animals and become the pinnacle of evolution.

I'm just picking out some passages to help clarify John's position--he doesn't like it, but I'd love it if someone could understand it enough to explain it to me. His theory, as you'll see from the link involves abiogenesis up through "free will". Free will isn't defined, and is a term usually involved with religious leanings. There isn't a good scientific definition of free will or a concensus as to how much of it humans possess and at what point. And even if we can conceive of it being data, rather than genes, that he's talking about, I just don't see how or what his theory is useful for. He seems to have a very poor understanding of how genes mold brains that in turn are molded by the environment. His theory involves group selection, and he, like many creationist, don't seem to understand basic game theory--how group selection factors (such as in group amity and out group enmity) can be encoded in genes) even though it is present in our closest primate kin.

I don't even know how the proteins made by genes are a part of this theory or why we should look at it this way or why he keeps insisting that nucleic acids aren't the basis for replication, when it is so clear that it is--and that understanding has lead to all the things Shneibster and Dr. Adequate describe which he repeatedly dismisses as irrelevant.

So, if you understand him Ivor. Or anyone else. Can you clarify the meaning in these passages and why we should think his theory is more worth looking into than, say, Kleinman's maths or Behe's "irreducible complexity"? How can anyone take hims seriously when he hasn't the slightest interest in current understanding and uses terms like "free will" in a paper that is supposed to be scientific--or maybe "epistemological"-- but science cares about facts--not philosophy.

[Ivor the Engineer]

http://www.sexandphilosophy.co.uk/author.htm

Dr. Hewitt has become a fierce critic of the academic community, in particular of the scientific establishment, which (Perutz not included) he often found to be corrupt, unwilling to engage in rational debate, censorious of criticism and dissent and, at times, deliberately deceitful. A description of one instance can be found in his work at A Habit of Lies.

The conflict between scientific deceit, which is actually quite common, and science's claims of rationality, led to Dr. Hewitt's interest in scientific method and philosophy. This interest, in its turn, led to his studying the application of evolutionary theory to epistemology, the theory of knowledge, and hence to his development of the generalized form of evolutionary theory, bioepistemic evolution, described in "The Architecture of Thought." The radical departure underpinning the theory of bioepistemic evolution is that it is based on data, rather than genes, which are treated as a format for the data contained on DNA. The aim of his present work is to describe and develop this form of evolutionary theory particularly its application to our understanding of human nature and origins.

http://www.sexandphilosophy.co.uk/conclusions.htm

Free Will and the Ascent of Man

It is not unusual for commentators on evolutionary theory to decry its depiction of humans as programmed mechanisms, unable to make decisions for themselves. "What about free will and personal responsibility?" they say and it is a fair question, though not one to which they usually offer any real answer of their own. The answer implied by this work is that free will is itself a function of knowledge separate from genes.

. . . With the passage of time, we have come to possess so much more knowledge than animals, so many more choices, that humans, alone among the animals may be said to possess free will.

Free will grows from knowledge and has grown apace as civilization has developed. As Jacob Bronowski's TV series, The Ascent of Man, discussed, civilization greatly increases mankind's stock of knowledge and is built around new ways of accumulating, storing and distributing social knowledge. In his accumulated knowledge, mankind really has ascended above the animals and become the pinnacle of evolution.

I'm just picking out some passages to help clarify John's position--he doesn't like it, but I'd love it if someone could understand it enough to explain it to me. His theory, as you'll see from the link involves abiogenesis up through "free will". Free will isn't defined, and is a term usually involved with religious leanings. There isn't a good scientific definition of free will or a concensus as to how much of it humans possess and at what point. And even if we can conceive of it being data, rather than genes, that he's talking about, I just don't see how or what his theory is useful for. He seems to have a very poor understanding of how genes mold brains that in turn are molded by the environment. His theory involves group selection, and he, like many creationist, don't seem to understand basic game theory--how group selection factors (such as in group amity and out group enmity) can be encoded in genes) even though it is present in our closest primate kin.

I don't even know how the proteins made by genes are a part of this theory or why we should look at it this way or why he keeps insisting that nucleic acids aren't the basis for replication, when it is so clear that it is--and that understanding has lead to all the things Shneibster and Dr. Adequate describe which he repeatedly dismisses as irrelevant.

So, if you understand him Ivor. Or anyone else. Can you clarify the meaning in these passages and why we should think his theory is more worth looking into than, say, Kleinman's maths or Behe's "irreducible complexity"? How can anyone take hims seriously when he hasn't the slightest interest in current understanding and uses terms like "free will" in a paper that is supposed to be scientific--or maybe "epistemological"-- but science cares about facts--not philosophy.

I think "Free Will" is being used to describe the fact that as you gain more knowledge you can make more "choices". Thus simple organisms, with very little knowledge, behave in very predictable ways, while animals with more capacity for knowledge are harder to predict and have a wider range of behaviors.

[cyborg]

That's not free then.

[Ivor the Engineer]

That's not free then.

But I bet you act on a day to day basis as if you do have free will. It's a very persistent illusion.

[Mercutio]

But I bet you act on a day to day basis as if you do have free will. It's a very persistent illusion.
So is a sunrise; we should not ignore the "illusion" part, just because of the "persistent" part.

[Ivor the Engineer]

So is a sunrise; we should not ignore the "illusion" part, just because of the "persistent" part.

And what should we do with the knowledge that free will is an illusion on a day to day basis?

Or to put it another way, what tasks can you perform better by incorporating that knowledge?

[John Hewitt]

John - your idea - that the fluctuations in temperature provided by the sun drive the chemical reactions/equilibrium which create self-replicating molecules - does not seem that extraordinary to me. In fact, it seems a fairly mundane hypothesis, given what we know about DNA/RNA repliacation.

Given that, you then have to answer the following question: which molecules is your sun acting upon?

I would accept that at present we do not have a strand of RNA capable of self-encoding a ribozyme, but at present I would say there is considerably more evidence to support the RNA world hypothesis than your....

...

erm... what is it again? What are your proposed self-replicators? Please don't say cells, we need to know what came before that...

This article (http://www.springerlink.com/content/m17k1608441623t4/) gives a fairly up to date review of where the evidence for the RNA world hypothesis stands.

If you can provide evidence that your own idea is more fully developed than the data presented in this paper, I would be happy to reconsider, but at the moment I view an RNA world as being the most credible explanation of early molecular evolution.

I agree that the assumptions of my prebiosis work are "mundane," your word and chosen negatively I think. There is nothing exceptionable about the assumptions but I have not found them applied previously and my theory does seem to be original.

The sun would act upon any chemical equilibrium that was not thermoneutral - so there is a great variety of oscillations and selection would act upon them. The final products of selection would resemble biochemical pathways. Hence my work is a "metabolism first" theory.

Erm ... your facetiousness and negativeness is showing. I do not think a replicator is needed for evolution, what is needed is replicating data. I am proposing that the sun provides that until self-replicating systems emerge by evolution. I suggest you read Shapiro - what was his title "A Replicator is not Needed for the Origin of Life" - something like that.

I haven't got the paper you cite but I collect these things so if you can get me a pdf of it that would be helpful.

Thank you for saying that "If you can provide evidence that your own idea is more fully developed than the data presented in this paper, I would be happy to reconsider, but at the moment I view an RNA world as being the most credible explanation of early molecular evolution." There is no serious evidential support for the RNA world theory and that theory makes assumptions that are chemically unworkable. As for the above comment, I think it a one-sided prejudgement.

[John Hewitt]

I think "Free Will" is being used to describe the fact that as you gain more knowledge you can make more "choices". Thus simple organisms, with very little knowledge, behave in very predictable ways, while animals with more capacity for knowledge are harder to predict and have a wider range of behaviors.
Exactly so!

[hammegk]

Sorry hammegk, I'm going to have to disagree with that.
Go ahead, noobie.

If anyone was going to be picked on for being the least favourite, as well as a disruptive, abusive prick, it would be me and I haven't even had a warning in the past three months. Love 'em or hate 'em, you can't plead bias.
You being outside the US and an avowed atheist bought you membership in the clique ... :) Lovers' quarrels even occur among insiders.

And your meaningless attacks in this thread certainly helped provide a derail.

If your title was The Theist and you were a US poster you'd have been suspended long ago.

[cyborg]

And what should we do with the knowledge that free will is an illusion on a day to day basis?

Or to put it another way, what tasks can you perform better by incorporating that knowledge?

Nothing. But then I can be a completely successful human animal without any advanced knowledge whatsoever so this seems a fairly disingenuous question for a science forum.

That is really such a silly thing to say.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Nothing. But then I can be a completely successful human animal without any advanced knowledge whatsoever so this seems a fairly disingenuous question for a science forum.

That is really such a silly thing to say.

And what I said was silly!

[cyborg]

Yes Ivor, that's right. I NEED the Internet, central heating, processed foods, ICBMs, cars, the electric light bulb, television et al in order to exist. That's right - as we know all those things were around in the time of the Flintstones and it has always been that way. Without them I would wither and die instantly.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Yes Ivor, that's right. I NEED the Internet, central heating, processed foods, ICBMs, cars, the electric light bulb, television et al in order to exist. That's right - as we know all those things were around in the time of the Flintstones and it has always been that way. Without them I would wither and die instantly.

I don't know about you, but I think a grasp of grammar and language is pretty advanced. As are the nuances of social knowledge.

Could you be a "a completely successful human animal" without those things?

[delphi_ote]

Could you be a "a completely successful human animal" without those things?
In the context of biology, yes. Successful would mean surviving and procreating. You can do both without any of those things (otherwise we wouldn't be here.)

[Apathia]

In the context of biology, yes. Successful would mean surviving and procreating. You can do both without any of those things (otherwise we wouldn't be here.)

Sad but true. The Biological Imperitive generally sweeps away any conventional cultural wisdom, good judgement, and Science anyway. :blush:

What value knowing the abstraction of Free Will is illusory may have in your daily life, is outside the subject area of this thread. Consider that it will help break the attachment to that perverse abstraction called the 'ego" and help foster tollerance and compassion.

[cyborg]

I don't know about you, but I think a grasp of grammar and language is pretty advanced. As are the nuances of social knowledge.

I don't.

A capacity for language is an innate thing - the complexity of modern languages did not spring up overnight.

A capacity for social behaviour is an innate thing - the complexity of modern societies did not spring up overnight.

Could you be a "a completely successful human animal" without those things?

Unless you're going to posit a Flintstones view of reality then this fact is self-evident.

[Mercutio]

And what should we do with the knowledge that free will is an illusion on a day to day basis?

Or to put it another way, what tasks can you perform better by incorporating that knowledge?

I refer you to 30 years and 39 years, respectively, of publication of the peer-reviewed journals Behavior Modification and the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis. More recently we can include 15 years of the journal Behavior and Society, and of course decades of scholarly books. Remember that any attempt to scientifically study our behavior must rely on our behavior acting lawfully. Advances in education, behavioral medicine, industrial/organizational applications, clinical Behavior Modification, all (tacitly or explicitly) depend upon assumptions of determined behavior.

[Dr Richard]

I agree that the assumptions of my prebiosis work are "mundane," your word and chosen negatively I think. There is nothing exceptionable about the assumptions but I have not found them applied previously and my theory does seem to be original.

The sun would act upon any chemical equilibrium that was not thermoneutral - so there is a great variety of oscillations and selection would act upon them. The final products of selection would resemble biochemical pathways. Hence my work is a "metabolism first" theory.



Which chemical equilibria?

How would selection act upon them?

And, cruicially, how would these pathways generate a mechanism for "genetically" passing on the results of this selection?

And how would this lead to the generation of RNA/DNA?


Erm ... your facetiousness and negativeness is showing. I do not think a replicator is needed for evolution, what is needed is replicating data. I am proposing that the sun provides that until self-replicating systems emerge by evolution. I suggest you read Shapiro - what was his title "A Replicator is not Needed for the Origin of Life" - something like that.

But, as detailed above, that data needs to be recorded, stored and passed on in a reasonably faithful manner.

Again, your theory (as explained so far) seems to have no idea how this would occur.

I have had a look at Shapiro's Hypothesis paper (http://taylorandfrancis.metapress.com/(eoq2djrvtbe3ucfv2ygrbe55)/app/home/contribution.asp?referrer=parent&backto=issue,3,14;journal,71,79;linkingpublication results,1:103791,1) ( I presume this is the one you mean) - essentially a critique of the RNA world hypothesis - and one that rests the majority of its case on the assumption that meteorites replicate the conditions found on prebiotic Earth. The only real discussion of absent self-replicating mechanisms comes in the last paragraph:

Several scientists have put forth theories that do not require an ordered polymeric replicator at the start of life. They propose, instead, that life began with a mutually sustaining set of catalytic reactions involving smaller molecules (see, for example, 33–35). Such theories provide a robust alternative to ideas based on a replicator. The details can differ; for example, the reaction set might be carried out on a mineral surface (36), or within a membrane-bound compartment (37–39). Insufficient experimental attention has been given to such ideas, but if the hypothesis presented here is accepted, perhaps they will move to the forefront of origin-of-life research.

But I have to say that I feel all such debate essentially ends up running down the same pathway. The "RNA world" supporters are, I would say, looking at end-stage abiogenesis, the creation of the self-replicating molecules that went on to become the first forms of "life".

I think you (and the references Shapiro cites) are looking at earlier events - what drove the chemical reactions to create the RNA (or equivalent) environment from which they formed.

You may disagree, but unless you can provide a more detailed theory of your own, I stand by my interpretation.

I haven't got the paper you cite but I collect these things so if you can get me a pdf of it that would be helpful.

Hummnnnnn... not sure what the forum rules are about distributing copyrighted material... (ahem) - PM me?

Thank you for saying that "If you can provide evidence that your own idea is more fully developed than the data presented in this paper, I would be happy to reconsider, but at the moment I view an RNA world as being the most credible explanation of early molecular evolution." There is no serious evidential support for the RNA world theory and that theory makes assumptions that are chemically unworkable. As for the above comment, I think it a one-sided prejudgement.

I feel it is a perfectly reasonable position, in that currently the RNA world hypothesis has many more adherents in the scientific community than the John Hewitt hypothesis. If you want to convince me (and them) then provide some evidence/more detailed reasoning.

I'm not sure why you have a problem with this concept (c.f. cellular motion and the cytoskeleton).

In my opinion, if a good scientist comes up with a good alternative hypothesis to that of prevailing wisdom, then it should be possible to back that claim with repeatable experimental evidence. If not, then the hypothesis has to go to the "interesting idea, but..." pile - my own is fairly considerable!

[kleinman]

You all have been very busy!
That’s an interesting ribozyme these scientists developed. Would you care to describe a selective process where a molecule like this could evolve?I wouldn't care to. Fortunately, Joyce has already done so in simple language on his website:Just as organisms undergo Darwinian evolution in nature, molecules can be made to evolve in the test tube. This can lead to the production of molecules with interesting properties, including the ability to catalyze a particular chemical reaction. The recipe for Darwinian evolution of molecules is simple:

1) Start with a large population of molecules of varying composition;

2) Select those molecules, however rare, that have the desired chemical properties;

3) Produce many copies of the selected molecules, introducing occasional random changes in their composition;

4) Repeat as desired.

In our laboratory we have harnessed the power of Darwinian evolution as applied to populations of trillions of different RNA or DNA molecules. At their most rapid, our procedures allow us to carry out over 100 "generations" of test-tube evolution in a single day. The resulting molecules have interesting catalytic properties, teach us about evolution itself, and have potential application as therapeutic agents.
This is typical for an evolutionarian proof, superficial slogans. Do you want to describe that selection process in 2) that would make this self replicator? Feel free to use 4) when using the terminology “mutation and selection” since we all now know that it is only a superficial slogan. Do you want to comment on the following line from the abstract you linked to and how this study has any relationship with what could realistically happen outside a laboratory without intelligent scientists setting up the conditions for this reaction?
The R3C ligase ribozyme was redesigned so that it would ligate two substrates to generate an exact copy of itself, which then would behave in a similar manner.
I added the bold face and underlining. Seems your link on self-replicating ligase ribozyme is an argument for intelligent design.

Oh, I know, you have “billions of years” for it to happen. “billions of years” and “mutation and selection”, slogans that constitute an evolutionarian concept of proof for their theory.
They say we need a creator, then who made God? I think thats a pretty reasonable question to ask.
The question is off topic since I am not making a claim that I can prove creationism scientifically. We are discussing the mathematics of mutation and selection and how mathematics shows that the theory of evolution to be impossible. Would it make a difference to you if you had an answer?
Certainly I do. You can start with the results from ev computer model, a peer reviewed and published model of random point mutations and natural selection which shows this mechanism of evolution is so profoundly slow when using realistic genome lengths and mutation rates that nothing can evolve by this mechanism.Why your maths is incorrect has been explained to you many times.
I will not take credit for Dr Schneider’s math and Paul’s computer programming.
Then you can again consider the concept of natural selection which can only operate if there is a benefit or detriment to the creature.Selection can occur in non-living things.
We are all waiting for you to mathematically describe your sieve that can evolve a gene from the beginning. Perhaps you want to describe how the self replicating RNA molecule that is described in Delphi’s link could have evolved from the beginning?
I have shown that natural selection can not evolve a gene from the beginning. I will repeat it again since so many evolutionarians are in denial about this issue.No, you haven't kleinman. You have made an assertion, and all 'evidence' you have provided has been shown to be wrong. More then once. Please see Dr. Adequate's sig, and the various posts responding to your mathematics.
You are going to use scatequate’s posts to support your arguments? Scatequate has done no better at describing natural selection mathematically than you have. Taffer is a laffer.
A gene is to evolve.Can you please tell me what this means?
Unless you believe that genes are eternal, your theory requires that they had to start somewhere, somehow.
The first base in the sequence for the gene is laid down on the genome.How is a sequence "laid down on" a genome? Genomes are sequences.
Have these sequences always existed?
One base codes for nothing so there is nothing for natural selection to act upon. A second base added by random chance is laid down in the sequence. Still nothing to code for, natural selection can not act on this sequence. A third base in the sequence is laid down. You now have enough bases to form a codon for a single amino acid. A single amino acid has no functional use so there is still nothing for natural selection to act upon. So bases must be added randomly until you have a long enough sequence of bases to produce a functional polypeptide and then natural selection can act. Adding bases randomly yield probabilities so infinitesimally small that evolution is mathematically impossible.This is quite simply a perfect example of you understanding little about evolution and genetics.
Feel free to tell us all how the first gene arose from the beginning.
It has never been claimed that the only benificial characteristic of a sequence of DNA is in the form of producing proteins. There are many more things that a sequence of DNA can do. That doesn't even start on RNA, and other organic molecules.
You need to get on the same page with Dr Richard.
Do you evolutionarians see the goal posts or are you so far out of the ball park you need the Hubble telescope just to see the ball park?I have not seen a single person who understands genetics, biology and evolution move any goal posts in this thread. If you think there has been, please provide evidence.
Goal posts:
My argument is that the ev computer program shows that the process random point mutations and natural selection is so profoundly slow when realistic parameters are used in the model that macroevolution by this mechanism is mathematically impossible. In addition, Dr Schneider in his publications on ev concludes that ev demonstrates evolution by punctuated equilibrium as described by Stephen Gould. Dr Schneider’s conclusions are likewise impossible since Gould’s thesis of punctuated equilibrium states the evolution occurs over short time spans in small sub-populations. The mathematical results from the ev model directly contradict these two conditions.

In addition, there is no selection process that can evolve a gene from the beginning.

So the theory of evolution started without any mathematical foundation and continues to suffer from the same deficiency. The theory of evolution is modern mythology, not hard mathematical science.
This thread is about mathematically modeling evolution by mutation and selection. If you believe there is and was selective pressure to do this, present a description for this so that you can evolve a gene from the beginning. As I already said, I do not have access to my research nor my papers from where I am. I am returning to university at the start of next week. I should be able to provide a better explanation then. However, I feel this has adequately been answered already.
God willing, we will be here for your answer when you get back to your papers.
Feel free not to discuss this topic if you believe that all genes formed during abiogenesis.I never said this. Please follow along. The evolution of a novel gene has been demonstrated. Please see Dr. Adequate's sig. However, the formation of the first replicating molecules deals with abiogenesis, and not evolution. You have constantly failed to show a grasp of this point.
Taffer the laffer quotes scatequate as proof.
However, you have acknowledged the first step in disproving the theory of evolution.What? Where have I done this?
You said the following.
You are correct that, without selection pressure, the theory of evolution is not mathematically possible.
So give us a mathematical description of the selection process that proves your theory. Oh, I forgot, you don’t have your papers.
The next step is understanding that there is no selective pressure that can evolve a gene from the beginning.This is an assertion. Care to try to prove it?
I’ll quote my proof again for you.
A gene is to evolve. The first base in the sequence for the gene is laid down on the genome. One base codes for nothing so there is nothing for natural selection to act upon. A second base added by random chance is laid down in the sequence. Still nothing to code for, natural selection can not act on this sequence. A third base in the sequence is laid down. You now have enough bases to form a codon for a single amino acid. A single amino acid has no functional use so there is still nothing for natural selection to act upon. So bases must be added randomly until you have a long enough sequence of bases to produce a functional polypeptide and then natural selection can act. Adding bases randomly yield probabilities so infinitesimally small that evolution is mathematically impossible.
You can refute my argument by describing a selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning.
The only thing that natural selection can do is select for a creature with a beneficial property and select against a creature with a detrimental property.Correct. However, selection can act on things which are not 'alive', in the biological sense. Try to understand this.
Do you want to describe selection mathematically rather than using the synonym “sieve”. Otherwise, you continue to use slogans to describe abiogenesis.
The addition of bases to a sequence which is neither beneficial nor detrimental will not alter the frequency of occurrence of that sequence in the population. You do not understand population genetics. Try looking up 'genetic drift'.
Are you arguing that ‘genetic drift’ is how a gene evolves from the beginning or is ‘genetic drift’ your new slogan for the theory of evolution?
Without selection pressure, the theory of evolution is not mathematically possible as you so correctly have said.Of course. But, again, there are and always were selective pressure. "Natural selection" on 'living' things, and just plain, ol' "selection" on non-living things.
You have missed an important principle that ev shows concerning selective pressures. If you have more than one selective pressure acting at a time, these pressures compete against each other and profoundly slow down the rate of information gain. The more different and varied selection pressures there are, the slower the evolutionary process. This same effect would interfere with concept of chemical abiogenesis. Consider the link that Delphi posted concerning the self replicating RNA molecule. This experiment only gets results in a highly controlled laboratory environment. In any realistic environment outside a laboratory, there would be many other chemical reactions occurring that would interfere with the RNA self replication.
Taffer, that’s a lovely semantic dance you are doing here.Perhaps you care to explain how it is a "semantic dance"? I answered his question.
You move from one slogan to the next. We are looking for a mathematical description for a selection process that can evolve a gene from the beginning that can be put into ev and correct its and your theory of evolution’s mathematical deficiency.
I’m not talking about abiogenesis, I am talking about the evolution of a new gene from the beginning. Here are some examples to consider. The gene that codes for insulin, the gene that codes for globulin, the genes that code for the enzymes for the Krebs cycle, the genes that code for the proteins in the DNA replicase system and so on. Do you believe that all these genes arose during abiogenesis? Unless you can describe a sieve that would give rise to these genes from the beginning, you theory of evolution is mathematically impossible as you so correctly noted earlier.This has already been answered, so I will not deal with the latter part of this paragraph. However, you are constantly dealing with both evolution and abiogenesis, and equating the two. It has been shown that novel genes evolve.
If you are talking about Dr Richard’s missed field goal of describing a classification system for insulin like genes from Zebra fish to humans, he failed to describe how the ancestral antecedent arose and he failed to give the selection process which evolve these genes from one to the next. Similarity of molecules does not constitute a proof of evolution. You have to show how mutation and selection gives rise to these molecules and how the molecules transform from one to the next. Ev shows that random point mutations and selection is profoundly slow, too slow to accomplish the evolution and transformation of these molecules you see as being so similar.
You have also not answered a number of questions of mine. But, let's stick to just one.

Can you please provide a definition of "soul"?
Why, you don’t believe you have one or do you?
What this is indicating that if you have more than a single selection condition, one may interfere with the other. If you have multiple genes evolving, each is responding to their selection pressure (whatever that may be), each is interfering with others preventing any from evolving.You have no clue about evolutionary theory.
I do have a clue on what ev is showing and that is a peer reviewed and published computer simulation of random point mutations and natural selection. The ev computer simulation shows that when there is more than one selection process operating at a time, this profoundly slows the evolutionary process.
So, at what point does a mutation in a non-binding site region obtain greater selective value than of a mutation in a binding-site region?That's way too complicated a question for my poor little brain.
Your Rcapacity equation appears to give a fairly accurate estimate for this.
This effect is not sudden, the generations for convergence increases with increasing genome length until you reach a tipping point where the errors in the binding site region dominate the selection process and you can no longer evolve binding sites in the binding site region."Not sudden" is incompatible with "tipping point."
The point is that as you lengthen the genome, the non-binding site region is being lengthened and the probability of non-binding site errors are increasing. This is what is slowing the rate of information accumulation. Counting the errors in both region will determine which errors are determining selection.
Is the Rcapacity problem related to the information content of the binding site or to the selection process?I'm not sure what this means. The Rcapacity problem arises when the number of bits of information needed to uniquely identify the binding sites from the rest of the DNA cannot be held within the binding sites. Therefore it becomes difficult/impossible to evolve a code in the binding sites. I ran experiments that decoupled the Rcapacity problem from the size of the genome, showing that there are two different issues at play.
Is the information in a binding site dependent on the selection process? Unnamed’s selection process almost completely uncouples the selection process from the genome length by biasing selection to errors in the binding site region. This is why his selection process converges so quickly despite increases in the genome length.
I agree with you, two different selection processes in operation simultaneously would slow down the process down further. A third selection process would slow evolution even more so. Each additional selection process would continue to slow evolution further and as you said “certainly there are millions of selection pressures in the real world”.Yes, but I did not say that all the extant genetic control mechanisms evolved at the same time, did I?
What do you think a realistic number of selection pressures that are acting at any given time? Which genetic control mechanisms evolve when and how?
Subtitle: Mountain of evidence -- meet bronze age manuscript.)
It seems that ev is less than a mole hill of evidence for the theory of evolution. And as I told Dr Schneider, once evolutionarians understood what ev is computing when using realistic mutation rates and genome lengths, that his model would be discredited.
Since your theory of evolution is based on mutation and selection, there is no other point to be made until you describe what the selection mechanism is."My" theory of evolution is based observations of actually occuring evolution, which are described by, among other things, mutations and selection.

The selection mechanism can be the preferance of, or disinclination to mate with, individuals displaying a certain feature or behaviour corresponding to a certain set of alleles or genes.
I don’t question your observation, I question your interpretation of your arguments. Recombination and selection can accomplish rapid changes in a species. Are you saying that recombination and selection is how speciation occurs?
A slogan does not constitute a scientific proofThen I take it that your repeated claim of having disproved the theory of evolution mathematically does not constitute scientific proof, and should not be treated as such? Likewise with, oh, perhaps 80% of the rest of your posts?
My mathematical proof is based on results from the ev computer simulation. The author of the computer program believes this computer model simulates reality. The peer review editors at Nucleic Acids Research published this model. Not only does this model demonstrate how profoundly slow random point mutations and natural selection is at accumulating information when using realistic genome lengths and mutation rates, it shows how important the selection process is. There is no realistic selection process that can evolve a gene from the beginning and ev shows that with more than a single selection condition, evolution slows profoundly.
Please everyone, stop with the flame war, already!Yes. Please. Let's get back to the incredibly productive discussion about ev and evolution. We were so close to a breakthrough with our creationist friends. All we need now to show them once and for all they are wrong is a time machine and a notebook big enough to write the complete history of every molecule in the universe in. Don't let personal quibbles get in the way of such reasonable evidentiary standards. We only need to know everything there is to know about everything to prove to them the world wasn't created by a giant imaginary being. That seems perfectly fair to me and has yielded such an interesting discussion so far.
The only thing that has happened in this discussion about ev is that evolutionarians have abandoned it in droves. So now you have no mathematical model for mutation and selection. You have no mathematical description of selection. The theory of evolution started without a mathematical basis and continues that way. The theory of evolution is nothing more than a slogan “mutation and selection”.
So yeah, I agree this thread has become a bit of an insult fest. Let's calm down a bit and get back to the subject(s) at hand, assuming there are any subjects anyone cares to discuss. It's also become a bit of repeat theatre.
It seems that very few evolutionarians want to discuss ev. Do think that is because the evolutionarians don’t understand Dr Schneider and your (used to be realistic but now stylized) model or they do understand the model?
That’s an interesting ribozyme these scientists developed. Would you care to describe a selective process where a molecule like this could evolve?Hmmm... that was the last post by Doctor Kleinman: 9:00 PM ET Thursday. His last moment logged in was one minute after that. We didn't get his usual Friday "have a nice weekend." I wonder what's up. This thread will not be the same without him.
I’m still here. Care to answer the question?
quote="Mr Scott"]Hmmm... that was the last post by Doctor Kleinman: 9:00 PM ET Thursday. His last moment logged in was one minute after that. We didn't get his usual Friday "have a nice weekend." I wonder what's up. This thread will not be the same without him.I'm sure he'll be back. Sometimes reality just takes precedence over internet discussions[/quote]
Reality has never gotten in the way of a discussion on the theory of evolution.
The notion that every facet of human existence has been adequately explained by by natural phenomena seems to imply that all scientific problems have now been answered. That is not the case.But the question was whether naturalism has been adequate so far. No one implied that science is finished.
No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized) computer model shows this.
For example, I have seen Kleinman, on this thread say "tell us how genes arose" - or words to that effect. The question is legitimate and lies at the core of any serious attempt to understand origins. What comes back, from so-called skeptics?What comes back is mostly "don't know yet."
Ah yes, the gap theory. Your own computer model shows the mathematical problem that arises when you have multiple selection processes acting simultaneously, but I guess that is just another gap.
They are, by any standards, "extraordinary claims" and the fact that they are even present in the scientific literature seems to reflect a determination among leaders in the field never to admit that there is anything wrong with their preconceived ideas.What? You appear to be focusing on a few ideas that people are tossing about as some sort of evidence that they are closed-minded. At the same time, you ask people to be open-minded about your ideas.
Tossing ideas about? Paul this is about your computer simulation that at one time you said modeled reality and now say it is a stylized representation of a tiny part of the evolutionary landscape. Look how your fellow believers see this computer simulation now. They try to call this my mathematics, I guess this is the evolutionarian idea of derision. I wonder what Dr Schneider would think that his computer model was attributed to a creationist. How low can his work go?
This thread is now officially crapola.
Are you annoyed?
How would selection act upon them?

And, cruicially, how would these pathways generate a mechanism for "genetically" passing on the results of this selection?

And how would this lead to the generation of RNA/DNA?
Those are appropriate questions. The value of the ev computer model is that it shows how crucial the selection process is for convergence. Not only is there no selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning, the model also shows a severe difficulty for the theory of evolution in that competing selection processes markedly slow the rate of information gain.

[John Hewitt]

Which chemical equilibria?
How would selection act upon them?

All chemical equilibria that are not thermoneutral (which means virtually all chemical equilibria) shift position in response to changes in temperature. This is school level chemistry. The resulting multiplicity of oscillations are interpretations of the sun's data input and are subject to evolutionary selection.

And, cruicially, how would these pathways generate a mechanism for "genetically" passing on the results of this selection? They do not need to inherit their data, the sun does the inherit bit for them. Selection is discussed at length on my site. I cannot repeat it here

And how would this lead to the generation of RNA/DNA?
But, as detailed above, that data needs to be recorded, stored and passed on in a reasonably faithful manner.I took the theory to protocells containing metabolic pathways and meeting the old schoolboy criteria for life - move, (breath), feed, grow, excrete, reproduce and respond to stimuli. (The protocells would not breath and no oxygen is assumed.) I stopped there because the further away from the sun's own cycle the less compelling the arguments become.

I do intend going on, first to chirality, then to data carrying molecules. I broadly know how to do these things but, especially with data carrying, the whole thing becomes more and more of a molecular fairy tale.

But I have to say that I feel all such debate essentially ends up running down the same pathway. The "RNA world" supporters are, I would say, looking at end-stage abiogenesis, the creation of the self-replicating molecules that went on to become the first forms of "life". There is some truth to that but, more substantially, I would say the RNA world has always been outright science fiction.
The problem I find with the people in the RNA world field is the same as with so many scientists, including cell motility - they aggrandise the evidence "for" their ideas and diminish or suppress the evidence that contradicts them. Ridiculous behaviour - some of them should just switch careers and move into advertising.

[Yahzi]

In some ways, culture is a large scale epigenesis...

Culture is not demonstrated to be in any way analogous to genes;
First, let me note my psychic prediction was wrong: you've actually responded to the points I made. Why it took you 65 pages to decide to actually communicate is anybody's guess, but whatever.

Yes, culture is not like a gene: I just meant that it was a method for transmitting historical data.

From your comments I take it this your actual point: that the information coded in genes is not the sole source of information that affects evolution. You feel additional data is stored in chromosomes, and in the particular choice of bases, and perhaps in other places.

What you haven't explained is how this matters. There might be some historical information in the particular set of bases, but how does that affect evolution? As an analogy, there are considerable differences between AMD and Intel processors - but this difference is virtually invisible to the software that runs on them. Why should we assume the mechanical instantiation of a data structure should affect the data in the structure? In most other cases, it doesn't. What makes genetics different?

Or, to put it another way: I don't see that your signal has risen above the noise level.

Actually, I think taking abiogenesis out of evolution is an evasive redefinition
There is a discipline that studies how genes and environment interact to produce changes in living organisms. This discipline does not care where genes came from, nor does it care about extra-genetic information that is not significant. The discipline is called "evolutionary biology." I don't see what's wrong with that.

To assert that we cannot study genetic evolution in isolation is to refute the reductive principle of science.

If you want another example of biological evolution in a none genetic context, consider the workings of the brain, which is considered a Darwinian machine that processes sensory data into knowledge, or the workings of the immune system.
I don't think that really should be called biological evolution, for much the same reasons you cited about: it's not sexually reproduced, etc. etc.

As best as I can sum up: you seem to be complaining that biologists focus their attention on genes, while ignoring the substrate in which the genes are embedded in. My question is: what percentage of the signal (the change in evolution) is attributable to these non-genetic factors?

[Yahzi]

There's only one rule at this forum, fit in or #### off.

I know - and I just admitted that much in the above post!
So you're admitting that you don't let facts get in the way a of a good rant.

But you wonder why people dismiss you as troublemaker with nothing signficant to say.

So many times in life, I find the choices other people make to be so utterly mystifying.

:huh:

[hammegk]

The problem I find with the people in the RNA world field is the same as with so many scientists, including cell motility - they aggrandise the evidence "for" their ideas and diminish or suppress the evidence that contradicts them. Ridiculous behaviour - some of them should just switch careers and move into advertising.
Did you miss this thread? The game is already afoot with a few of the usual suspects. :)

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=74269

[Yahzi]

But, as detailed above, that data needs to be recorded, stored and passed on in a reasonably faithful manner.
That's my perinnial question:

But how does it work?

:D

[kjkent1]

Unnamed’s selection process almost completely uncouples the selection process from the genome length by biasing selection to errors in the binding site region. This is why his selection process converges so quickly despite increases in the genome length.

Well, it's good that you admit that. What you seem to be missing is the fact that Unnamed's selection process is, if anything, more realistic than Schneider's original, because it gives little weight to mutations in the junk DNA region, which have neutral evolutionary effect on the organism.

You're not being objectively honest about your position anymore, Alan. Your original claim has been soundly refuted, though you pretend that it hasn't.

[Dr Adequate]

See my sig.

[kleinman]

Unnamed’s selection process almost completely uncouples the selection process from the genome length by biasing selection to errors in the binding site region. This is why his selection process converges so quickly despite increases in the genome length.Well, it's good that you admit that. What you seem to be missing is the fact that Unnamed's selection process is, if anything, more realistic than Schneider's original, because it gives little weight to mutations in the junk DNA region, which have neutral evolutionary effect on the organism.
I’m all for making the ev computer model more realistic but Unnamed’s selection process is not the way to do it. How much “junk DNA” is there in a bacterial genome?

If you want to make ev more accurate, use a realistic genome and mutations to the genome that are detrimental to the creature, select out and mutations which are beneficial select in and mutations which are neutral are neither selected for or against. But what is the selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning? All your mutations would be neutral until you had a functional gene. What happens if you have two selection process acting simultaneously in competition with one another?
You're not being objectively honest about your position anymore, Alan. Your original claim has been soundly refuted, though you pretend that it hasn't.
Now what are you whining about?

[kjkent1]

I’m all for making the ev computer model more realistic but Unnamed’s selection process is not the way to do it. How much “junk DNA” is there in a bacterial genome?If you want to argue that no prokaryotes have junk DNA, then prove it and produce a realistic selection mechanism which should be preferred to Unnamed's. Otherwise, you lose. Simple as that.

I recognize that prokaryotes usually have less than 15% junk DNA, but what of it? Suppose Unnamed's selection method uses two separate binding site regions, rather than binding and non-binding regions. The point is that any such activity shortens the length of genetic material undergoing evolutionary change, and that shreds your mathematical theory, which depends on huge gene lengths evolving all at once. You're setting up a false premise -- there's no reason why this must occur.

If you want to make ev more accurate, use a realistic genome and mutations to the genome that are detrimental to the creature, select out and mutations which are beneficial select in and mutations which are neutral are neither selected for or against.I think ev is sufficiently accurate already. So, if YOU want to make it more accurate, then YOU do the above experiment and see what happens. Otherwise, you lose. Simple as that.

But what is the selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning? All your mutations would be neutral until you had a functional gene.You evidently have some definition of "functional gene" which is apparently written down and stored in a library where genes can check it out and follow the rules while they evolve.


You constantly invent premises which are self evident to you as axiomatic, as if there is a Ten Commandments which dictates the only ways that genes are allowed to evolve. You have decided, a priori, that genes must be at least a certain length, that they must compete to their mutual detriment, that a very small section of genetic material cannot possibly have any selective advantage to the host organism, that huge genes must evolve independently to their currently observed completed state, rather than as the product of many smaller evolutionary steps which may or may not have anything to do with what we currently observe, that gene fusions, recombinations, transcriptions, shifts, insertions, deletions, etc. ad infinitum, all are useless for evolution. Instead, you demand that every gene must start from a totally random point and then evolve to its currently observed state via one process: point mutation and natural selection.

But, you cannot prove that this is the requirement. It's a total strawman, Alan.


I don't think that there's a biologist/geneticist anywhere who would subscribe to the rules which you seem to view as mandatory. If there are any reading this thread, then I'd like to read their concurrence.

What happens if you have two selection process acting simultaneously in competition with one another?Your question assumes a fact not in evidence: that the processes are necessarily competing and thus detrimental rather than beneficial or neutral. The observed reality is that two or more selection processes acting simultaneously produce a very wide diversity of life. So, unless you have some proof that multiple parts of a genome evolving separately must operate detrimentally to the organism, then the empirical evidence suggests that this doesn't occur, and thus you lose this argument.Simple as that.

If all mutations are evenly distributed (I don't know if they are or not, but you seem to suggest this as axiomatic), then any section of binding sites is equally likely to produce a functional gene (whatever the definition of that gene may be) as any other section. It's not as if there's a little sign on the molecule which says, "No evolution allowed beyond this point."

There's nothing to prevent two binding site regions being close together and separately evolving different functions. Nor is there anything to prevent the two regions from later fusing together to produce some completely different function.

Now what are you whining about?I'm not whining at all. I'm winning this argument. Simple as that.

[Schneibster]

Please, I invite you, choose one item from the first paragraph of empty headed babble quoted above and explain why you think it is relevant. I am really looking forward to you explaining why you think earlobes or hair colour come into this!Sigh. Data? Just once?

Fine. What evolves, John?

More precisely, when evolution has occurred, what has changed?

[Schneibster]

Oh, and worth noting that Kleinman fails on the "present data" test too. Bye Kleinman.

[kleinman]

I’m all for making the ev computer model more realistic but Unnamed’s selection process is not the way to do it. How much “junk DNA” is there in a bacterial genome?If you want to argue that no prokaryotes have junk DNA, then prove it and produce a realistic selection mechanism which should be preferred to Unnamed's. Otherwise, you lose. Simple as that.
Here is a description of a realistic selection process. This is the closest I can get to such a process and it is the reason why I think the theory of evolution is impossible.

There are three possible outcomes from any particular mutation. The mutation can be beneficial, the mutation can be detrimental or the mutation can be neutral. A benefical mutation would help the reproductivity of that creature, a detrimental mutation would hurt the reproductivity of that creature and a neutral mutation would have no effect either way. You can also put gradation on the benefit or detriment that a mutation might pose, That is a mutation my offer slight benefit or slight detriment to the creature or offer large benefit or be fatal to that creature. Where Unnamed’s selection process becomes unrealistic is in ignoring virturally all harmful mutations that occur in the non-binding site region. Unnamed’s selection process does this by using a gradation to the selection that is very beneficial to the evolution of binding sites while at the same time not identifying harmful mutations in the non-binding site region.

A more realistic simulation of random point mutations and natural selection would start with an evolved genome except for a small portion of the genome where some gene or binding site is to evolve. Then mutations in the evolved region would have to be evaluated as to whether they are beneficial, detrimental or neutral while the evolving portion of the genome can have selection benefit only when that portion evolves to some beneficial function.

This is where the argument about a partially evolved gene not having a beneficial selection effect causes trouble for the theory of evolution. Unless you can somehow show that a partially evolved gene offers some selective benefit to that creature, selection is going to be controlled by mutations in the evolved portion of the genome. If that occurs, you will have the same situation that Dr Schneider’s selection process has when the errors in the non-binding site region controls selection, that is binding sites never evolve.
I recognize that prokaryotes usually have less than 15% junk DNA, but what of it? Suppose Unnamed's selection method uses two separate binding site regions, rather than binding and non-binding regions. The point is that any such activity shortens the length of genetic material undergoing evolutionary change, and that shreds your mathematical theory, which depends on huge gene lengths evolving all at once. You're setting up a false premise -- there's no reason why this must occur.
The what of it is that prokaryotes do not have much junk DNA and mutations are much more likely to be harmful to functioning DNA than to DNA that has no function. Selection will remove those creatures who suffer a fatal mutation to an otherwise functioning gene no matter what is evolving on the “junk DNA”. Mutations in the “junk DNA” will offer no selective benefit until those mutations produce a functioning gene (or at least some form of genetic benefit) for that creature.

Even in ev’s crude form, this problem is already manifest in Dr Schneider’s selection process. Unless the mutations in the area you want to evolve is controlling the selection process, that portion of the genome will not evolve. Selection in other areas of the genome is controlling which creatures are reproducing and which ones are selected out.
If you want to make ev more accurate, use a realistic genome and mutations to the genome that are detrimental to the creature, select out and mutations which are beneficial select in and mutations which are neutral are neither selected for or against.I think ev is sufficiently accurate already. So, if YOU want to make it more accurate, then YOU do the above experiment and see what happens. Otherwise, you lose. Simple as that.
I hope my description above illuminates why ev is not sufficiently accurate already. I also hope you can recognize why ev does not converge as you extend the genome length. In addition, natural selection can only select based on benefit or detriment. Once you come to grips with this issue, you will understand why the theory of evolution by mutation and natural selection has a fatal mathematical flaw.
But what is the selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning? All your mutations would be neutral until you had a functional gene.You evidently have some definition of "functional gene" which is apparently written down and stored in a library where genes can check it out and follow the rules while they evolve.
Many genes are hundreds if not thousands of bases long. Are you arguing that portions of these genes have other benefits? If you do, then I ask you what was the benefit of fragments of the DNA replicase system before they evolved to the DNA replicase system?
You constantly invent premises which are self evident to you as axiomatic, as if there is a Ten Commandments which dictates the only ways that genes are allowed to evolve. You have decided, a priori, that genes must be at least a certain length, that they must compete to their mutual detriment, that a very small section of genetic material cannot possibly have any selective advantage to the host organism, that huge genes must evolve independently to their currently observed completed state, rather than as the product of many smaller evolutionary steps which may or may not have anything to do with what we currently observe, that gene fusions, recombinations, transcriptions, shifts, insertions, deletions, etc. ad infinitum, all are useless for evolution. Instead, you demand that every gene must start from a totally random point and then evolve to its currently observed state via one process: point mutation and natural selection.
I have not invented the lengths of genes, these are measured quantities. I have not invented the lengths of genomes in living creatures, these are measured quantities. It is you who invents small genes that can perform the necessary processes that support life and tiny genomes that can reproduce and transform to larger genomes. You are seeing the theory of evolution like a computer booting up. A small amount of code in ROM allows the CPU to access the disk drive which in turn allows more information to be loaded into memory which in turn allows the CPU to access the video display, keyboard and so on but in the theory of evolution you don’t have the ROM and you only have mutation and selection to “boot up” your life forms. The mathematics is just not there for you to do this.
I don't think that there's a biologist/geneticist anywhere who would subscribe to the rules which you seem to view as mandatory. If there are any reading this thread, then I'd like to read their concurrence.
They can’t subscribe to these rules because the theory of evolution collapses under these rules. So evolutionists live in denial and extrapolate the concept of natural selection far beyond what it is capable of doing.
What happens if you have two selection process acting simultaneously in competition with one another?Your question assumes a fact not in evidence: that the processes are necessarily competing and thus detrimental rather than beneficial or neutral. The observed reality is that two or more selection processes acting simultaneously produce a very wide diversity of life. So, unless you have some proof that multiple parts of a genome evolving separately must operate detrimentally to the organism, then the empirical evidence suggests that this doesn't occur, and thus you lose this argument.Simple as that.
There are numerous selection pressures that are acting all the time. The diversity of life you see is due to recombination and selection, not mutation and selection and I doubt there are many evolutionists who attribute speciation to recombination and selection.

What you are having trouble seeing is that ev is showing that even two selection conditions can stop an evolutionary process when one selection condition dominates the other.
If all mutations are evenly distributed (I don't know if they are or not, but you seem to suggest this as axiomatic), then any section of binding sites is equally likely to produce a functional gene (whatever the definition of that gene may be) as any other section. It's not as if there's a little sign on the molecule which says, "No evolution allowed beyond this point."
It’s not me showing this, it is what ev is showing. Competing selection conditions interfere with the evolution of binding sites.
There's nothing to prevent two binding site regions being close together and separately evolving different functions. Nor is there anything to prevent the two regions from later fusing together to produce some completely different function.
That is not what ev is showing as you extend the genome and non-binding site errors dominate the selection process and prevent binding sites from evolving.
Now what are you whining about?I'm not whining at all. I'm winning this argument. Simple as that.
You were whining that I was not being objectively honest when from the very first post in this debate I said that ev was showing that evolution by random point mutation and natural selection was mathematically impossible when realistic genome lengths and mutation rates are used in the model. The only thing that has changed in my position is that I have added that ev shows that two competing selection conditions interfere with the evolutionary process. This is the explanation why evolution by random point mutations and natural selection is mathematically impossible.

These conclusion are based on the peer reviewed and published computer model of random point mutations and natural selection. What are your conclusions based on little gator?

[delphi_ote]

Here is a description of a realistic selection process. This is the closest I can get to such a process and it is the reason why I think the theory of evolution is impossible.
Even if you disagree that evolution produced the diversity of life from a common ancestor, you really can't argue that evolution and natural selection themselves are impossible. You're talking about a computer model that demonstrates exactly those concepts. You've watched it happen right in front of your eyes when you ran the simulation.

You know the concept of evolution is possible, but you keep saying you think evolution is "impossible." Why? Is there some kind of disconnect between what you witness and what you type? When you're making up your arguments here, is there a point where you stop to consider reality? Does evidence even give you pause, or is scoring points for Jesus more important than pondering obvious facts?

[kjkent1]

Here is a description of a realistic selection process. This is the closest I can get to such a process and it is the reason why I think the theory of evolution is impossible.I appreciate that you're attempting to respond with what you propose as a rational argument.

There are three possible outcomes from any particular mutation. The mutation can be beneficial, the mutation can be detrimental or the mutation can be neutral. A beneficial mutation would help the reproductivity of that creature, a detrimental mutation would hurt the reproductivity of that creature and a neutral mutation would have no effect either way. You can also put gradation on the benefit or detriment that a mutation might pose, That is a mutation my offer slight benefit or slight detriment to the creature or offer large benefit or be fatal to that creature. Where Unnamed’s selection process becomes unrealistic is in ignoring virturally all harmful mutations that occur in the non-binding site region. Unnamed’s selection process does this by using a gradation to the selection that is very beneficial to the evolution of binding sites while at the same time not identifying harmful mutations in the non-binding site region.What evidence do you have to support the conclusion that a mutation in a junk region of the genome is likely to be harmful at anywhere near the rate of a mutation in a binding-site region? Point being, if you seek realism, then someone needs to quantify the deficit/benefit/neutrality of a mutation in either region.

A more realistic simulation of random point mutations and natural selection would start with an evolved genome except for a small portion of the genome where some gene or binding site is to evolve. Then mutations in the evolved region would have to be evaluated as to whether they are beneficial, detrimental or neutral while the evolving portion of the genome can have selection benefit only when that portion evolves to some beneficial function.

This is where the argument about a partially evolved gene not having a beneficial selection effect causes trouble for the theory of evolution. Unless you can somehow show that a partially evolved gene offers some selective benefit to that creature, selection is going to be controlled by mutations in the evolved portion of the genome. If that occurs, you will have the same situation that Dr Schneider’s selection process has when the errors in the non-binding site region controls selection, that is binding sites never evolve.I'm thinking you mean "selection is going to be controlled by mutations in the 'un'evolved portion of the genome." I won't argue against this point until I'm sure I understand your position here.

The what of it is that prokaryotes do not have much junk DNA and mutations are much more likely to be harmful to functioning DNA than to DNA that has no function. Selection will remove those creatures who suffer a fatal mutation to an otherwise functioning gene no matter what is evolving on the “junk DNA”. Mutations in the “junk DNA” will offer no selective benefit until those mutations produce a functioning gene (or at least some form of genetic benefit) for that creature.I don't think that you will get much disagreement that prokaryotes evolve more slowly than do eukaryotes. Perhaps that is the selective advantage of junk DNA: it allows most mutations to have a neutral effect on the host.

The point is that you are attempting to imply certain required conditions, a priori, to your personal notion of a what constitutes a partially constructed gene, which prevents it from conveying a selective advantage. But, you don't know all the possible selective advantages that there are. For all you know, just storing useless base pairs provides some, as yet unknown selective advantage to the organism, because it offers the possibility of some mutation causing a new function to suddenly appear "by chance."

Obviously, some such mutations might be detrimental -- some neutral -- some beneficial. But, here again, how do we quantify the probability of a beneficial vs. detrimental mutation without knowing something about the external environment into which it is introduced? Furthermore, how do we weight that benefit/detriment?

I don't think this is possible -- or at least it would be incredibly complicated. The best that anyone would be likely to do would be to create an artificial environmental algorithm to operate while ev was doing it's RMNS trick. Or, maybe we should simply use the empirical evidence of actual change over time as a means of weighting the probability of beneficial/detrimental change.

Of course, you wouldn't go for that scenario, because your position is that the changes are supernatural. But, if you keep your scientist's hat on, you have no choice but to assume that the changes are all naturalistic and therefore statistically representative of reality.

Even in ev’s crude form, this problem is already manifest in Dr Schneider’s selection process. Unless the mutations in the area you want to evolve is controlling the selection process, that portion of the genome will not evolve. Selection in other areas of the genome is controlling which creatures are reproducing and which ones are selected out.How do you know that the other portion of the genome which you are describing as useless except for the purpose of making evolution unreasonably slow, is not also evolving some different function in a smaller part (or many smaller parts)?

You are using ev which has fixed boundaries and definitions of and between binding and non-binding sites to suggest that reality is similar. A real DNA molecule doesn't have these fixed boundaries. It just does what it does where it does it. You could have a genome that was one million base pairs long, and every 1,000 pairs might be evolving separately. If so, then your theory fails.

I hope my description above illuminates why ev is not sufficiently accurate already. I also hope you can recognize why ev does not converge as you extend the genome length. In addition, natural selection can only select based on benefit or detriment. Once you come to grips with this issue, you will understand why the theory of evolution by mutation and natural selection has a fatal mathematical flaw.You are creating a false premise that every huge gene must have evolved from scratch, rather than from many smaller genes with other functions. You don't know that to be true, and all of the other types of genetic changes/translations/combinations/shifts/fusions/deletions/additions/etc. could permit what you view as mathematically impossible to be true.

And, it must be true, because the alternative is supernatural intervention -- something which only occurs in places like Never Never Land.

Many genes are hundreds if not thousands of bases long. Are you arguing that portions of these genes have other benefits? If you do, then I ask you what was the benefit of fragments of the DNA replicase system before they evolved to the DNA replicase system?This is the abiogenesis question. It’s really out of scope for the discussion, but my answer is simple: random chance created the first self-replicating life form. It doesn’t matter how “mathematically impossible” you wish to believe this occurrence to be. Either abiogenesis happened by random chance, or the universe is ruled by magic. There is no other alternative.

I have not invented the lengths of genes, these are measured quantities. I have not invented the lengths of genomes in living creatures, these are measured quantities. It is you who invents small genes that can perform the necessary processes that support life and tiny genomes that can reproduce and transform to larger genomes. You are seeing the theory of evolution like a computer booting up. A small amount of code in ROM allows the CPU to access the disk drive which in turn allows more information to be loaded into memory which in turn allows the CPU to access the video display, keyboard and so on but in the theory of evolution you don’t have the ROM and you only have mutation and selection to “boot up” your life forms. The mathematics is just not there for you to do this.Well, unless you have some two billion year old DNA that we can examine, you don't know that your position is correct. You are claiming that your mathematics defies the reality which is observed in nature, because you want to believe it to be true. The reality proves that your mathematics are wrong -- otherwise we live in a universe where the supernatural is constantly altering the rules.

If this is true, then science is a total waste of effort -- we should just pray, because ultimately, God will fix every problem if we are sufficiently devoted.

They can’t subscribe to these rules because the theory of evolution collapses under these rules. So evolutionists live in denial and extrapolate the concept of natural selection far beyond what it is capable of doing.You have a thing for insisting on rules. There are no "rules." There are only models of what is observed in nature.

There are numerous selection pressures that are acting all the time. The diversity of life you see is due to recombination and selection, not mutation and selection and I doubt there are many evolutionists who attribute speciation to recombination and selection.Define "speciation," precisely otherwise no one can argue the point.

What you are having trouble seeing is that ev is showing that even two selection conditions can stop an evolutionary process when one selection condition dominates the other.One again, you are assuming facts not in evidence. You have no proof whatsoever that two or more selection conditions are more likely to stop evolution, rather than to accelerate it.

It’s not me showing this, it is what ev is showing. Competing selection conditions interfere with the evolution of binding sites.Assumes facts not in evidence.

That is not what ev is showing as you extend the genome and non-binding site errors dominate the selection process and prevent binding sites from evolving.You keep falling back to the original ev algorithm. That algorithm is incredibly unrealistic, and that viewpoint was brought up by me very early in this thread. Unnamed demonstrated that the algorithm is unrealistic, and provided something considerably more realistic. You just don't like the new method, because it substantially undermines your original theory.


You were whining that I was not being objectively honest when from the very first post in this debate I said that ev was showing that evolution by random point mutation and natural selection was mathematically impossible when realistic genome lengths and mutation rates are used in the model. The only thing that has changed in my position is that I have added that ev shows that two competing selection conditions interfere with the evolutionary process. This is the explanation why evolution by random point mutations and natural selection is mathematically impossible.You can only maintain this position with respect to the original selection algorithm. You cannot maintain the position in the face of the new algorithm.

These conclusion are based on the peer reviewed and published computer model of random point mutations and natural selection. What are your conclusions based on little gator?This is a pure argument from authority. If you are going to continue to fall back on ev's original selection mechanism, then no one can defeat your argument, because that selection mechanism is completely unrealistic, except with extremely short genome lengths. In order for it to be realistic for longer genomes, the selection mechanism must weigh the various benefits/detriments of mutations inside and outside the binding site region. Unnamed's selection mechanism does this, and when it does, your theory fails.

Simple as that.

[kleinman]

Here is a description of a realistic selection process. This is the closest I can get to such a process and it is the reason why I think the theory of evolution is impossible.Even if you disagree that evolution produced the diversity of life from a common ancestor, you really can't argue that evolution and natural selection themselves are impossible. You're talking about a computer model that demonstrates exactly those concepts. You've watched it happen right in front of your eyes when you ran the simulation.
If you recall from earlier in this thread that I acknowledged and agreed that microevolutionary processes can and do occur however macroevolutionary process do not occur. We spent some time trying to come up with definitions for micro and macroevolution that were agreeable to both sides in this debate. Since Paul and other evolutionists hold to the position that macroevolution is simply a series of microevolutionary steps, I postulated that the evolution of a gene from the beginning is a representation of macroevolution. I believe that recombination and selection can and does produce a diversity of life forms and give dog breeding and Darwin’s observations on the diversity of finch beaks as examples. I consider recombination and natural selection as microevolutionary process since homology is maintained. I suspect that the varied fossils found are the result of recombination and natural selection and not mutation and selection. Likewise, I believe that Gould’s hypothesis of punctuated equilibrium is only applicable to recombination and selection and not mutation and selection. The evolution that is mathematically impossible and that is demonstrated so by ev is macroevolution. Selection of mutations to evolve a new gene from the beginning can not happen because there is no selective advantage to a partially completed gene and transformation of genes from one form to another is interfered with by competing selection processes.
You know the concept of evolution is possible, but you keep saying you think evolution is "impossible." Why? Is there some kind of disconnect between what you witness and what you type? When you're making up your arguments here, is there a point where you stop to consider reality? Does evidence even give you pause, or is scoring points for Jesus more important than pondering obvious facts?
I entered this discussion with an open mind. I don’t know of any other creationist or IDer who felt that ev represented a plausible model of random point mutation and natural selection. What I did was study the behavior of the model using varied input parameters and tabulated the results. What I’m am trying to do here is sort out what is truthful and what is inappropriate extrapolation or invalid interpretation of observations. I asked the question whether natural selection can perform what evolutionists attribute to this phenomena. Ev gives a platform to test these concepts. Evolutionists were content with the result that Dr Schneider obtained with his single published case because it fit your world view. I scratched a little deeper and saw something different in ev.

[John Hewitt]

Sigh. Data? Just once?

Fine. What evolves, John?

More precisely, when evolution has occurred, what has changed?
Data, just once? Are you seriously disputing that temperature driven oscillations will have existed on the prebiotic earth? If you are asking me to provide evidence in support of the laws of chemical equilibrium, or how they shift when the temperature changes, I would refer you to high school chemistry texts.
The oscillation is the entity that evolves. It is not a physical object, it is a replicating data pattern. There will have been many such, consequent upon their being many organic equilibria in a random mixture. Each oscillation exists as an independent entity in "chemical space" not, initially, in physical space. These oscillations compete with one another and are subject to selection and even to variation.
Eventually they evolve to self-oscillating biochemical pathways that resemble Eigen's hypercycles; and yes Schneibster, biochemical pathways do self-oscillate - not widely known that but they do.

Ear lobes? You haven't me yet told me how ear lobes come into this?

[The Atheist]

You know how some people's personality radically changes when they get behind the wheel of a car? A similar thing appears to be happening to people on this forum.

It must be encoded in their genes. So there's no point thinking they may be able to bring in new knowledge and produce a different output. Because a phenotype can't evolve. The books say so you see, so it must be true.

Just because you don't agree with one idea a person has proposed, is not a sensible reason to ignore all their ideas.

I've read some of what John has written on his sex&philosophy site and while I don't agree with or know enough to argue with some of what he's proposing, some of it I do agree with and do know enough to evaluate it reasonably.

Articulett: Ha! You're a creationist!

Me: Ivor, great stuff - extremely well said.

[The Atheist]

Ear lobes? You haven't me yet told me how ear lobes come into this?
John! You call your site sexandphilosophy and you ask that question???

[The Atheist]

And what should we do with the knowledge that free will is an illusion on a day to day basis?

Or to put it another way, what tasks can you perform better by incorporating that knowledge?
And that's one of the best two-liners I've seen.

Notice there haven't been any answers either. The only use on a daily basis would be if you wanted to become a fatalist.

[The Atheist]

Go ahead, noobie.:bgrin:

Well, you're still here!

You being outside the US and an avowed atheist bought you membership in the clique ... :) Lovers' quarrels even occur among insiders.Lovers' quarrel????

You seen my sig?
And your meaningless attacks in this thread certainly helped provide a derail.I thought the standard has risen immeasurably since Paul suggested everyone take a deep breath.
If your title was The Theist and you were a US poster you'd have been suspended long ago.Well, I find it hard to believe, but as you note, I haven't been here that long. If it ever happens, I will certainly be speaking up - I'm a christian apologist!

[The Atheist]

So you're admitting that you don't let facts get in the way a of a good rant.You're an engineer, you live and die on facts - they're your way of life.

I'm a salesman. Facts are anathema.
But you wonder why people dismiss you as troublemaker with nothing signficant to say.Completely incorrect. I have never wondered why, in fact, I'm pretty sure I've been honest right from the start - N.B the "Train Wreck" above my avatar.
So many times in life, I find the choices other people make to be so utterly mystifying.You need to get out more.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Mercutio: I've fixed it for you

I refer you to 30 years and 39 years, respectively, of publication of the peer-reviewed journals Behavior Modification and the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis. More recently we can include 15 years of the journal Behavior and Society, and of course decades of scholarly books. Remember that any attempt to scientifically study our behavior must rely on our behavior acting lawfully. Advances in education, behavioral medicine, industrial/organizational applications, clinical Behavior Modification, all (tacitly or explicitly) depend upon assumptions that their exists at least some determined behavior.

Cyborg:

I’d agree that if you could find a time machine and travel back to a time when language and our wide range of social nuances were less developed, then yes, you could be a “completely successful human animal”. However, people without these skills in the present day are not “completely successful human animals”, with my understanding of the words ‘completely’ and ‘successful’.

But perhaps you have a really low standard for your sexual partners?

[Kotatsu]

Contrast:
This is typical for an evolutionarian proof, superficial slogans.

With:

mathematics shows that the theory of evolution to be impossible

,

you want to describe how the self replicating RNA molecule that is described in Delphi’s link could have evolved from the beginning?

,

Feel free to tell us all how the first gene arose from the beginning

,

the ev computer program shows that the process random point mutations and natural selection is so profoundly slow when realistic parameters are used in the model that macroevolution by this mechanism is mathematically impossible.

,

there is no selection process that can evolve a gene from the beginning

,

So the theory of evolution started without any mathematical foundation and continues to suffer from the same deficiency

,

You can refute my argument by describing a selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning.

,

Ev shows that random point mutations and selection is profoundly slow, too slow to accomplish the evolution and transformation of these molecules you see as being so similar.

,

The ev computer simulation shows that when there is more than one selection process operating at a time, this profoundly slows the evolutionary process.

,

Not only does this model demonstrate how profoundly slow random point mutations and natural selection is at accumulating information when using realistic genome lengths and mutation rates, it shows how important the selection process is.

,

There is no realistic selection process that can evolve a gene from the beginning and ev shows that with more than a single selection condition, evolution slows profoundly.

,

The theory of evolution started without a mathematical basis and continues that way. The theory of evolution is nothing more than a slogan “mutation and selection”.

,

No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized) computer model shows this.

and

Not only is there no selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning, the model also shows a severe difficulty for the theory of evolution in that competing selection processes markedly slow the rate of information gain.

You can't buy this stuff.

[Kotatsu]

I don’t question your observation, I question your interpretation of your arguments. Recombination and selection can accomplish rapid changes in a species. Are you saying that recombination and selection is how speciation occurs?

I would say that, yes, recombination and selection may be one way for speciation to occur, but there are certainly others. Autopolyploidization, for example.

[Dr Richard]

All chemical equilibria that are not thermoneutral (which means virtually all chemical equilibria) shift position in response to changes in temperature. This is school level chemistry. The resulting multiplicity of oscillations are interpretations of the sun's data input and are subject to evolutionary selection.

They do not need to inherit their data, the sun does the inherit bit for them. Selection is discussed at length on my site. I cannot repeat it here.


I have looked at you website John, but it it gives NO hypothetical examples, as all. All of your proposed "chemical reactions" are of the form

dA1 < > iA1 < > jA1 < > nA1

I wanted to see what actual chemicals could oscillate in this way. Surely you must have some reactions in mind? Some proposed chemical pathways?


There is some truth to that but, more substantially, I would say the RNA world has always been outright science fiction. The problem I find with the people in the RNA world field is the same as with so many scientists, including cell motility - they aggrandise the evidence "for" their ideas and diminish or suppress the evidence that contradicts them. Ridiculous behaviour - some of them should just switch careers and move into advertising.

But the "evidence" for your own hypothesis is utterly non-existent. You have no proposed reaction schemes and no evidence that they would oscillate in the manner you propose.

I am afraid that as it stands, your website is one big advertisement for your idea with not one shred of evidence to back it up.

[cyborg]

I’d agree that if you could find a time machine and travel back to a time when language and our wide range of social nuances were less developed, then yes, you could be a “completely successful human animal”. However, people without these skills in the present day are not “completely successful human animals”, with my understanding of the words ‘completely’ and ‘successful’.

Well not withstanding I don't have a real clue what 'social nuances' you think are so vital that without them people couldn't cope - using the wrong fork or something I guess - I see some pretty rude mofos who seem to do quite fine not just ignoring but completely destroying social nuances. In short I think you're basically talking nonsense and giving humans far more credit than they deserve.

Why don't you just admit it was a silly thing to say it doesn't matter if 'free-will' is an illusion or not because it 'won't get you laid' ,on a science forum?

But perhaps you have a really low standard for your sexual partners?

Maybe I don't need to talk. Besides I don't even have a clue what standards you are proposing - is it important that you sleep with people who know which fork to use?

You might at least attempt some precision if you're going to keep digging that hole.

[Cuddles]

Autopolyploidization, for example.

My mother said that makes you go blind.

[Mercutio]

Mercutio: I've fixed it for you
Depending on how strict you are, that "fix" would apply equally well to any science. Do you suggest that the unexplained in physics is due to the free will of inert matter?

I humbly suggest, then, that yours is a "free will of the gaps". Everywhere we look, we find causal influences on our behavior, and we do not find evidence for anything at all like the "free will" cherished by the philosophers. The gaps are shrinking.

In science, as a general rule, when we tighten controls, what is artifact fades away; what is real stands out more sharply. We have looked at consciousness, we have looked for free will, for over a century (scientifically--longer than that less strictly), and the gaps are still shrinking.

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized) computer model shows this.
Gee, if I'd known you were going to start adding "stylized," I would have said "stylized to demonstrate one particular thing." Then you would say:

No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized to demonstrate one particular thing) computer model shows this.

Then your statement would be even more clearly and self-evidently ludicrous.

~~ Paul

[Ivor the Engineer]

Well not withstanding I don't have a real clue what 'social nuances' you think are so vital that without them people couldn't cope - using the wrong fork or something I guess - I see some pretty rude mofos who seem to do quite fine not just ignoring but completely destroying social nuances. In short I think you're basically talking nonsense and giving humans far more credit than they deserve.

Why don't you just admit it was a silly thing to say it doesn't matter if 'free-will' is an illusion or not because it 'won't get you laid' ,on a science forum?

I won't admit it because I didn't say that. Perhaps you should review the posts so you don’t have to totally fabricate my comments to win a rather pointless argument you appear to want to have?

My original two questions were:

And what should we do with the knowledge that free will is an illusion on a day to day basis?

Or to put it another way, what tasks can you perform better by incorporating that knowledge?

You appear to have sex on the brain because I fail to see how the above to questions are limited to procreation.

At least Mercutio gave a relevant answer.

Maybe I don't need to talk. Besides I don't even have a clue what standards you are proposing - is it important that you sleep with people who know which fork to use?

You might at least attempt some precision if you're going to keep digging that hole.

Precision is good. You should try it sometime.

Let’s try a little thought experiment:

You have a “choice” of pursuing two human sexual partners. One has a good grasp of language and grammar and knows how to behave in common social situations. The other has a very limited grasp of language and behaves in inappropriate ways in various common social situations.

Who would you “choose” to procreate with? Do you think they both have similar chances of passing on their genes?

N.B: Quotes used around the word ‘choice’ so I don’t get accused of believing in free-will.

[John Hewitt]

I have looked at you website John, but it it gives NO hypothetical examples, as all. <snip>
I wanted to see what actual chemicals could oscillate in this way. Surely you must have some reactions in mind? Some proposed chemical pathways?

But the "evidence" for your own hypothesis is utterly non-existent. You have no proposed reaction schemes and no evidence that they would oscillate in the manner you propose.
I think you are rather missing the point. Virtually all equilibrium reactions will have oscillated.

Equilibrium reactions include ester formation from acids plus alcohols; aldehyde polymerisations reactions, for example the very complex polymerization reactions of methanal that lead to sugars (among a great many other things) or aldol condensations to produce long carbon chains. Ammonia-carbonyl addition elimination reactions are mostly equilibria and these can lead to heterocyclic ring formation reactions, potentially leading to purines and pyrimidines.

In general, if a chemical equation has an equilibrium sign in it, then the position of that equlibrium will normally shift in response to changes in temperature. Since the earth's temperature oscillates, all those equilibrium reactions will have been oscillating on the early earth. This is simple thermodynamics and I don't need to prove it. Why do I need to specify one of those reactions and say, "look that will oscillate?"

Trying to do so seems pointless to me. Specifying more detailed chemistry needs model experiments and people who are funded to do them. I aim simply to lay down the architecture of the approach.

Also, remember that the early earth was warm, so some reactions, which we now think of as static, would have been in dynamic equlibrium on the early earth.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Depending on how strict you are, that "fix" would apply equally well to any science. Do you suggest that the unexplained in physics is due to the free will of inert matter?

No.

I humbly suggest, then, that yours is a "free will of the gaps". Everywhere we look, we find causal influences on our behavior, and we do not find evidence for anything at all like the "free will" cherished by the philosophers. The gaps are shrinking.

Yes, they are.

In science, as a general rule, when we tighten controls, what is artifact fades away; what is real stands out more sharply. We have looked at consciousness, we have looked for free will, for over a century (scientifically--longer than that less strictly), and the gaps are still shrinking.

I agree 100%.

But I still feel I had a choice if I answered this post, just as I feel I have choices about what I’m going to cook for dinner tonight and what I’m going to watch on TV.

Perhaps you are a more committed Determinist than I?

[kleinman]

I don’t question your observation, I question your interpretation of your arguments. Recombination and selection can accomplish rapid changes in a species. Are you saying that recombination and selection is how speciation occurs?I would say that, yes, recombination and selection may be one way for speciation to occur, but there are certainly others. Autopolyploidization, for example.
Are you proposing that humans and chimpanzees evolved from the primate precursor by these mechanisms?
No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized) computer model shows this.Gee, if I'd known you were going to start adding "stylized," I would have said "stylized to demonstrate one particular thing." Then you would say:

No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized to demonstrate one particular thing) computer model shows this.

Then your statement would be even more clearly and self-evidently ludicrous.
Let’s see, if I use your terminology to describe your computer model, it is ludicrous. Is there any terminology of yours that you use to describe your computer model and I can use and not sound ludicrous? So let’s consider what else your stylized to demonstrate one particular thing computer model shows.

This point has only been briefly touched on. When selection is turned off, the binding site region reverts to a random sequences. Is there any significance to this? I believe there is. What this says is that natural selection restrains the transformation of genes and that according to the results from ev, natural selection pressures must be maintained in order for information content in the genome to be maintained. Not only must there be selection pressures to evolve genes from the beginning, these pressures must be maintained in order for the gene to remain in their states.

Is that the one thing that your stylize to demonstrate one particular thing computer model shows? Or will you continue to devalue Dr Schneider’s and your computer model?

[cyborg]

I won't admit it because I didn't say that.

Didn't say you did. It was paraphrasing the thrust of your argument which is that discussing the concept and actuality of free-will is a waste of time because it is not practical in everyday terms - well neither is quantum physics for the most part but damn it if I want to discuss it in a science forum I will.

Perhaps you should review the posts so you don’t have to totally fabricate my comments to win a rather pointless argument you appear to want to have?

You started the pointless argument when you asked what the point of decomposing the concept of free-will had. That was a stupid thing to say.

You appear to have sex on the brain because I fail to see how the above to questions are limited to procreation.

As far as evolution is concerned not having sex is a fairly unsuccessful thing for a genetic entity that sexual reproduces.

You do remember that this topic is about evolution and not forks right?

Who would you “choose” to procreate with? Do you think they both have similar chances of passing on their genes?

Your situation fails to capture any actual relevant information - since the qualities you seem to think are so important are not anywhere near as genetically influenced as you seem to be implying. Since I mix with all types of people I find your attitude incredibly condescending. I do not judge the quality of people as a function of arbitrary human constructs. Why does choosing the right fork matter so much to you?

Besides why would I have to choose? I don't believe monogamy was noted as a necessity anywhere here.

N.B: Quotes used around the word ‘choice’ so I don’t get accused of believing in free-will.

You're being accused of saying that discussing the issue is a waste of time - nothing else.

[cyborg]

But I still feel I had a choice if I answered this post,

I couldn't give a crap if you feel Jesus told you to create a new Christian cult - feelings are irrelevant.

Why do you seem to think how you feel overrides how it is?

[Kotatsu]

Are you proposing that humans and chimpanzees evolved from the primate precursor by these mechanisms?

Surely you can read? I propose that those mechanisms are possible ways by which speciation may occur. Nothing more. I have not proposed that they are necessarily part of any or all given speciation processes. In fact, I have suggested a case of speciation where neither has to occur: autopolyploidization. However, that is not to say that I would hold it impossible that one or both of those processed were involved, at least at some point.

As to your specific example, I have no idea. My area is oligochaetes. Ask me about them.

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>
You're being accused of saying that discussing the issue is a waste of time - nothing else.

Then I'm not guilty your honour. And I can prove it:


And what should we do with the knowledge that free will is an illusion on a day to day basis?

Or to put it another way, what tasks can you perform better by incorporating that knowledge?


Mercutio gave me an intelligent and sensible reply. You appear to be up for an argument and want me to bend to your (non-free) will. It isn’t going to happen.

[Dr Richard]

I think you are rather missing the point. Virtually all equilibrium reactions will have oscillated.

(snip)

Specifying more detailed chemistry needs model experiments and people who are funded to do them. I aim simply to lay down the architecture of the approach...


So, supposing you got some funding tomorrow from a benefactor who read your website or your posts here and was so impressed with the idea they wanted you to progress your work experimentally, to the tune of say a million dollars.

Where would you start? Which model experiments would you propose? Which chemicals would form your initial starting set and what reactions would you be looking for?

[Dr Richard]

[continue_thread_derail_with_free_will_debate]

“What comes before determines what comes after….”
“And just what comes before…?”
“For Men? History. Language. Passion. Custom. All these things determine what men say, think, and do. These are the hidden puppet-strings from which all men hang.”

“We seek absolute awareness, the self-moving thought. The thoughts of all men arise from the darkness. If you are the movement of your soul, and the cause of that movement precedes you, then how could you ever call your thoughts your own? How could you be anything other than a slave to the darkness that comes before? ...Only knowing the sources of thought and action allows us to own our thoughts and our actions, to throw off the yoke of circumstance.”

The Darkness That Comes Before, R Scott Bakker (http://www.amazon.com/Darkness-Comes-Before-Prince-Nothing/dp/1585675598)


[end_thread_derail_with_free_will_debate????]

[John Hewitt]

So, supposing you got some funding tomorrow from a benefactor who read your website or your posts here and was so impressed with the idea they wanted you to progress your work experimentally, to the tune of say a million dollars.

Where would you start? Which model experiments would you propose? Which chemicals would form your initial starting set and what reactions would you be looking for?
I did touch on this toward the end of my work.
1. Take the best current estimates for the temperature, daily, 13 hour, temperature excursion.
2. Set up an apparatus to apply those temperature cycles.
3. Add in high energy events such as UV light during the high temperature part of the cycle. Add mixing processes.
4. Add substrates - salty water, suitable igneous rocks and whatnot to provide a range of protected and unprotected environments.
5. Add suitable chemicals, possibly an approximation to the soup, possibly more specific chemicals to test specific ideas.
6. Abstract samples over time and lay hand upon a GC/MS apparatus, which can rapidly identify and measure the concentrations of a large number of different organic chemicals. Then plot variations in the composition as they develop - if they develop. If they do not, begin again at step one.
7. Use the resulting data to narrow down the range of likely pathways through which prebiotic oscillations would have evolved.

It is true that one could guess at likely reactions but, really, one would hope that the experimental data would be telling you.

[kleinman]

Are you proposing that humans and chimpanzees evolved from the primate precursor by these mechanisms?Surely you can read? I propose that those mechanisms are possible ways by which speciation may occur. Nothing more. I have not proposed that they are necessarily part of any or all given speciation processes. In fact, I have suggested a case of speciation where neither has to occur: autopolyploidization. However, that is not to say that I would hold it impossible that one or both of those processed were involved, at least at some point.
Surely you can do mathematics? If it was autopolyploidization or recombination, show us how this was done. Random point mutations is a profoundly slow mechanism for accumulating information when using realistic genome lengths and mutation rates as show by ev. So what mechanism evolved the human and chimpanzee from its ancestral predecessor? Describe to us the mechanism of selection.
So, supposing you got some funding tomorrow from a benefactor who read your website or your posts here and was so impressed with the idea they wanted you to progress your work experimentally, to the tune of say a million dollars.

Where would you start? Which model experiments would you propose? Which chemicals would form your initial starting set and what reactions would you be looking for?I did touch on this toward the end of my work.
1. Take the best current estimates for the temperature, daily, 13 hour, temperature excursion.
2. Set up an apparatus to apply those temperature cycles.
3. Add in high energy events such as UV light during the high temperature part of the cycle. Add mixing processes.
4. Add substrates - salty water, suitable igneous rocks and whatnot to provide a range of protected and unprotected environments.
5. Add suitable chemicals, possibly an approximation to the soup, possibly more specific chemicals to test specific ideas.
6. Abstract samples over time and lay hand upon a GC/MS apparatus, which can rapidly identify and measure the concentrations of a large number of different organic chemicals. Then plot variations in the composition as they develop - if they develop. If they do not, begin again at step one.
7. Use the resulting data to narrow down the range of likely pathways through which prebiotic oscillations would have evolved.

It is true that one could guess at likely reactions but, really, one would hope that the experimental data would be telling you.
John, your proposal will encounter the same mathematical limitations that other proposals of abiogenesis have. Without a selection mechanism, the probabilities for forming the complex molecules needed for living things will be astronomically small. The miniscule probabilities occur even if you assume that the only mers in your salty solution are amino acids or RNA bases. Consider the link that Delphi provided with the self replicating ribozyme. This reaction requires a carefully controlled environment to get an results. What happens when you have a complex soup of molecules, your equilibrium equations have numerous competing chemical reactions.

And consider this, we still have a 24 hour heating and cooling cycle today. Why aren’t new life forms being generated all the time?

[Mercutio]

But I still feel I had a choice if I answered this post, just as I feel I have choices about what I’m going to cook for dinner tonight and what I’m going to watch on TV.When Wilhelm Wundt, in his early psychological laboratory, introspected about the decision-making process, he deliberately started with very very simple decisions. Seeing a signal, deciding which of two signals it was, responding appropriately. And introspecting about what the processes must be that make up this chain. Perception, apperception, thought, each subjectively dissected; we have extensive writings on what this task feels like.

Modern neuroscience can trace the pathways back and forth (there are always feedback loops; it is not a one-way process) through various serial and parallel brain processes, from the retina through the LGN to the primary (V1) visual cortex, though V2, V4, on to the infratemporal cortex, up to the prefrontal, primary motor cortext, motor projection areas, spinal cord, down to the finger that presses the key. What is happening is very little like what it feels like (we have no sensory nerves in the brain, after all).

Even when we can locate the neural equivalent of "this is what making a choice feels like", we see (a la Libet) that it is effect, rather than cause. We also see (e.g., Chalmers) that conscious awareness is not necessary for many of the things we do for which we have always assumed that conscious awareness in necessary (blindsight is perhaps the most well-known counter-example, but it is not the only one).

Perhaps you are a more committed Determinist than I?
Or perhaps I have simply filled in more gaps. At some point, thinking those gaps are big enough to hide "free will" is just silly; even the defenders of free will on this forum have had to redefine it in a much more modest form than "free will" has historically taken.

[John Hewitt]

John, your proposal will encounter the same mathematical limitations that other proposals of abiogenesis have. Without a selection mechanism, the probabilities for forming the complex molecules needed for living things will be astronomically small. The miniscule probabilities occur even if you assume that the only mers in your salty solution are amino acids or RNA bases. Consider the link that Delphi provided with the self replicating ribozyme. This reaction requires a carefully controlled environment to get an results. What happens when you have a complex soup of molecules, your equilibrium equations have numerous competing chemical reactions.

And consider this, we still have a 24 hour heating and cooling cycle today. Why aren’t new life forms being generated all the time?

There is a selection mechanism inherent in my work and the initial environment could be essentially random with few high energy molecules present. I agree that mathematical modelling, or even computer modelling, would be waste of time without some model experimental figures to start off with and point the simulations in some kind of direction.

The careful control of conditions needed for RNA synthesis experiments is, indeed, one of several very strong reasons not to take the RNA world seriously.

On a point of detail, the prebiotic earth probably had a 12-13 hour day - the earth's spin is slowing down due to tidal friction. (This is why "leap seconds" are periodically added to days.) In principle, the mechanism I propose could still exist, though the presence of oxygen might change the details of the chemistry. In any event, and whether or not my work is correct, I think any evolutionary model implies that current life forms would be able to outcompete newly emerging competitors.

[kleinman]

John, your proposal will encounter the same mathematical limitations that other proposals of abiogenesis have. Without a selection mechanism, the probabilities for forming the complex molecules needed for living things will be astronomically small. The miniscule probabilities occur even if you assume that the only mers in your salty solution are amino acids or RNA bases. Consider the link that Delphi provided with the self replicating ribozyme. This reaction requires a carefully controlled environment to get an results. What happens when you have a complex soup of molecules, your equilibrium equations have numerous competing chemical reactions.There is a selection mechanism inherent in my work and the initial environment could be essentially random with few high energy molecules present. I agree that mathematical modelling, or even computer modelling, would be waste of time without some model experimental figures to start off with and point the simulations in some kind of direction.
I have challenged the other readers of this thread for a description of their selection mechanism that would lead to the complex molecules that are in all life forms. Do you care to take up this challenge?

How much time do you think your experiment would take before you have some experimental figures to use in a computer simulation?
The careful control of conditions needed for RNA synthesis experiments is, indeed, one of several very strong reasons not to take the RNA world seriously.
RNA proponents have not offered a description of a selection mechanism either that would form their self replicators.
And consider this, we still have a 24 hour heating and cooling cycle today. Why aren’t new life forms being generated all the time?On a point of detail, the prebiotic earth probably had a 12-13 hour day - the earth's spin is slowing down due to tidal friction. (This is why "leap seconds" are periodically added to days.) In principle, the mechanism I propose could still exist, though the presence of oxygen might change the details of the chemistry. In any event, and whether or not my work is correct, I think any evolutionary model implies that current life forms would be able to outcompete newly emerging competitors.
You are assuming that the earth was around long enough for the slowing of the spin to give us our present day time duration, but I’ll leave that argument to the young earth geologists who seem to be coming out from under the rocks.

Do you think your experiment would run more quickly with a 12-13 hour cycle or a 24 hour cycle? Let’s say that you can generate some complex biological molecules by your heating and cooling proposal, how long do you think these molecules would stay in their complex form before they denature?

If your theory is correct, why wouldn’t we find signs of the chemicals required to generate life spontaneously around all the time even though they may not form new life because they are out competed by other competitiors.

[hammegk]

... Seeing a signal, deciding which of two signals it was, responding appropriately. And introspecting about what the processes must be that make up this chain. Perception, apperception, thought, each subjectively dissected; we have extensive writings on what this task feels like.
What might rote signal processing as described have to do with free will?


Even when we can locate the neural equivalent of "this is what making a choice feels like", we see (a la Libet) that it is effect, rather than cause.
Er, yes. What do you actually have to say regarding a "cause"?


We also see (e.g., Chalmers) that conscious awareness is not necessary for many of the things we do for which we have always assumed that conscious awareness in necessary (blindsight is perhaps the most well-known counter-example, but it is not the only one).
Yawn. What makes you believe free will involves any public behavior? I will ask how science samples which thought is selected from the ongoing possibilities, and why it was selected?


Or perhaps I have simply filled in more gaps. At some point, thinking those gaps are big enough to hide "free will" is just silly; even the defenders of free will on this forum have had to redefine it in a much more modest form than "free will" has historically taken.
Even if our minds are programmed automata 99.9999% of the time, why would you suggest meaningful free will has no room to operate? Are you with Schneib -- if it's 90% probable, there's nothing left to discuss?

[Kotatsu]

Surely you can do mathematics? If it was autopolyploidization or recombination, show us how this was done. Random point mutations is a profoundly slow mechanism for accumulating information when using realistic genome lengths and mutation rates as show by ev. So what mechanism evolved the human and chimpanzee from its ancestral predecessor? Describe to us the mechanism of selection.

So I shall conclude that you cannot read, is that correct?

I would wager that that part of evolutionary history was achieved by a combination of several mechanisms, including random point mutations, sexual selection, natural selection, and several other mechanisms which are well understood, and many of which have actually been discussed and even described earlier in this thread.

You will notice that I used "random point mutations" in my answer. This is because you have failed to show that this is too slow a mechanism when using not only realistic values of the parametres you chose to use, but also include all other known mechanisms. Well, in fact you have failed to show anything.

[John Hewitt]

I have challenged the other readers of this thread for a description of their selection mechanism that would lead to the complex molecules that are in all life forms. Do you care to take up this challenge?

How much time do you think your experiment would take before you have some experimental figures to use in a computer simulation?

RNA proponents have not offered a description of a selection mechanism either that would form their self replicators.

You are assuming that the earth was around long enough for the slowing of the spin to give us our present day time duration, but I’ll leave that argument to the young earth geologists who seem to be coming out from under the rocks.

Do you think your experiment would run more quickly with a 12-13 hour cycle or a 24 hour cycle? Let’s say that you can generate some complex biological molecules by your heating and cooling proposal, how long do you think these molecules would stay in their complex form before they denature?

If your theory is correct, why wouldn’t we find signs of the chemicals required to generate life spontaneously around all the time even though they may not form new life because they are out competed by other competitiors.
The selection mechanism I describe is in chapter 4 under the prebiotic evolution link of "sex and philosophy." It depends on the high energy processes such as UV exposure, lightning etc. and competition for environments that are protected from such processes. Many of the equilibrium reactions leading to oscillations are likely to include polymerization steps that might generate macromolecules.

I do not have a fairy godfather and do not anticipate doing the kind of experiment I described in response to Dr. Richard's inguiry. I do not know how many cycles one would need to use but one would not have enough time to replicate the real earth. Instead, one would try to devise conditions that would speed things up and use the results to extrapolate over longer time frames.

The word "denature" is used to describe the unfolding of a protein with consequent loss of its biological activity. Emergent macromolecules would themselves be subject to selection according to whether their physicochemical properties did or did not cause them to occupy protected niches. However, they would have no preexisting biological function and hence, the word "denature" is inapplicable.

You are correct that I have taken my estimate of the earth's age from conventional dating procedures. As I have often stressed, my work is evolutionary and it would be inconsistent to adopt any other figure. I do not think the mechanism I propose could be easily accommodated into a young earth scenario.

Modern organisms would be expected to be more efficient and to outcompete any prebiotic process. This would be expecially true of the mechanism I have suggested since it depends upon high energy processes, including those following UV exposure. UV exposure is now much lower than it would have been on the prebiotic earth due to the appearance of an oxygenated atmosphere and the ozone layer. The ozone absorbs UV and greatly reduces UV intensity at the surface. Oxygen would also tend to oxidise many organic compounds to CO2 and water. Hence, there are several reasons to expect this phenomenon to be less significant on the modern earth than it was before the emergence of life. Nonetheless, to a small extent, it may still exist.

[kleinman]

Surely you can do mathematics? If it was autopolyploidization or recombination, show us how this was done. Random point mutations is a profoundly slow mechanism for accumulating information when using realistic genome lengths and mutation rates as show by ev. So what mechanism evolved the human and chimpanzee from its ancestral predecessor? Describe to us the mechanism of selection.So I shall conclude that you cannot read, is that correct?
You draw so many illogical conclusion, why not one more?
I would wager that that part of evolutionary history was achieved by a combination of several mechanisms, including random point mutations, sexual selection, natural selection, and several other mechanisms which are well understood, and many of which have actually been discussed and even described earlier in this thread.
The difference between Dr Schneider and you is that Dr Schneider performed mathematical computations with his slogan. His mathematical computations show that random point mutations do not get anywhere close to showing how macroevolution could have occurred. You reiterate and discuss the slogans but do not show how mutations of any kind and selection can evolve a gene from the beginning. Without a selection mechanism there is no mathematics of mutation and selection.
You will notice that I used "random point mutations" in my answer. This is because you have failed to show that this is too slow a mechanism when using not only realistic values of the parametres you chose to use, but also include all other known mechanisms. Well, in fact you have failed to show anything.
Ask Paul whether I have shown anything as his description of ev goes from a model of reality to it models a small part of the evolutionary landscape to it is a stylized model…

Unless you can present a realistic description of how selection works to evolve a gene from the beginning, your explanation for the theory of evolution collapses to mutation without selection.
I have challenged the other readers of this thread for a description of their selection mechanism that would lead to the complex molecules that are in all life forms. Do you care to take up this challenge?The selection mechanism I describe is in chapter 4 under the prebiotic evolution link of "sex and philosophy." It depends on the high energy processes such as UV exposure, lightning etc. and competition for environments that are protected from such processes. Many of the equilibrium reactions leading to oscillations are likely to include polymerization steps that might generate macromolecules.
UV exposure can be destructive to organic molecules. Look what happens to the tires on you automobile if it is parked in the sun for long periods. Perhaps you can get polymerization in the experiment you prepose but how do you get the unique sequences of mers necessary to generate life?
How much time do you think your experiment would take before you have some experimental figures to use in a computer simulation?I do not have a fairy godfather and do not anticipate doing the kind of experiment I described in response to Dr. Richard's inguiry. I do not know how many cycles one would need to use but one would not have enough time to replicate the real earth. Instead, one would try to devise conditions that would speed things up and use the results to extrapolate over longer time frames.
You can make rough estimates for the number of cycles. For example, if it took 100,000,000 years to spontaneously generate life, that would give approximately 2 * 365 * 100,000,000 cycles. I included the factor of 2 since the earth was rotating twice as fast. I don’t know of anyone since the Miller experiment of the 1950’s who tried to demonstrate chemically how life could have formed. What kind of polymer do you believe was the initial source of life?
Do you think your experiment would run more quickly with a 12-13 hour cycle or a 24 hour cycle? Let’s say that you can generate some complex biological molecules by your heating and cooling proposal, how long do you think these molecules would stay in their complex form before they denature?The word "denature" is used to describe the unfolding of a protein with consequent loss of its biological activity. Emergent macromolecules would themselves be subject to selection according to whether their physicochemical properties did or did not cause them to occupy protected niches. However, they would have no preexisting biological function and hence, the word "denature" is inapplicable.
I use the term “denature” in a more general sense and include unfolding of a molecule or mechanism of altering a molecule from its original state. For example, iodine disinfects by attaching to the proteins of a cell which in turn changes the folding of that protein and its enzymatic properties.

Biologic molecules such as proteins, DNA and carbohydrates are very reactive molecules and don’t remain in their original condition for very long when exposed to the wide array of chemicals you would find in the primordial soup. Even if you manage to generate biologic polymers, how long do you think they would remain in that state before react with other chemicals in the primordial soup?
You are assuming that the earth was around long enough for the slowing of the spin to give us our present day time duration, but I’ll leave that argument to the young earth geologists who seem to be coming out from under the rocks.You are correct that I have taken my estimate of the earth's age from conventional dating procedures. As I have often stressed, my work is evolutionary and it would be inconsistent to adopt any other figure. I do not think the mechanism I propose could be easily accommodated into a young earth scenario.
That’s fine, I have used the “conventional” age of the earth in these discussions since ev is so slow at converging that the age of the earth doesn’t have to enter the debate.
If your theory is correct, why wouldn’t we find signs of the chemicals required to generate life spontaneously around all the time even though they may not form new life because they are out competed by other competitiors.Modern organisms would be expected to be more efficient and to outcompete any prebiotic process. This would be expecially true of the mechanism I have suggested since it depends upon high energy processes, including those following UV exposure. UV exposure is now much lower than it would have been on the prebiotic earth due to the appearance of an oxygenated atmosphere and the ozone layer. The ozone absorbs UV and greatly reduces UV intensity at the surface. Oxygen would also tend to oxidise many organic compounds to CO2 and water. Hence, there are several reasons to expect this phenomenon to be less significant on the modern earth than it was before the emergence of life. Nonetheless, to a small extent, it may still exist.
UV light is used as a disinfectant. If I understand this mechanism, the high energy UV photons knock off electrons making free radicals which are more chemically reactive. You believe you can make biologic polymers this way? I think you could set up an experiment fairly easily to try and demonstrate if this happens. A UV light, a heater, a timer, a flask and some raw chemicals. What chemicals would you put in the flask?

[kjkent1]

Gee, if I'd known you were going to start adding "stylized," I would have said "stylized to demonstrate one particular thing." Then you would say:

No one said science is finished, only that the theory of evolution is finished, it is mathematically impossible, your own (stylized to demonstrate one particular thing) computer model shows this.

Then your statement would be even more clearly and self-evidently ludicrous.

~~ PaulPaul, have you ever run Unnamed's selection function past Dr. Schneider to see if he found it a reasonable response to the allegation that ev's original selection method is unrealistically slow?

[Schneibster]

The oscillation is the entity that evolves. John, when evolutionary biologists talk about the evolution of the common ancestor of chimps and people into chimps and people, they don't talk about evolution of oscillations.

Let's try this again. Perhaps I wasn't specific enough. When a living creature on Earth, that is, a single- or multicellular life form that uses DNA, evolves, what precisely evolves?

BTW, it is not my intent to be obtuse. I can see where you want to go with the conversation, and if you'll humor me for a little while, we'll go there. I just want to establish some common ground so that I'm sure we're communicating on the same terms.

ETA: I forgot to answer your question. I'll get to how earlobes get into it when we've established that common ground.

[articulett]

The problem with the creationists is they want everybody to spend time proving each of their individual pet hypotheses wrong when we have a great framework that is amassing data and furthering understanding. It always sounds to me like someone trying to reorganize the periodic chart because of something they feel they can explain better or something that doesn't make sense to them.

I don't care why John uses the term "free will"--it's just not scientific or scholarly--it's obfuscating. As is his refusal to say whether he believes in an "intelligent designer" or rather his theory sticks to naturalistic explanations.

As for his pre-biotic theory...it never links up to the facts we have. Yet there is so much more that does. Like this information, which Hewitt dismissed. Why is he not interested? Why does he not want to illustrate how his "hypothesis" is better or more useful or where it dovetails.

http://www.physorg.com/news82299861.html

David Deamer, professor of chemistry and biochemistry at U.C. Santa Cruz, commented that "Bob Hazen is boldly asking a fundamental question related to the origin of life. We know that organic compounds were present in the early Earth environment, but as dilute solutions of thousands of different species in the global seas. How were specific kinds of organics selected to assemble into the first forms of life, and by what process were they sufficiently concentrated to initiate a primitive version of metabolism? We now know that minerals select specific organic compounds out of solution, and can even distinguish between subtle properties such as chirality, binding a left-handed amino acid in preference to one that is right handed. These are very significant results that are guiding my own research as well as many other investigators in the field."

Yes, energy going into the system is a major component in life formation--energy from the sun and movements...and also energy from the core of the earth--which may be the most important energy source at the bottom of the "primordial soup"--but the article above actually links the input of energy with the output of certain kinds of molecules sticking together--the kinds of molecules associated with life-- ribonucleic acids. When does John's theory get to the nucleic acids? And how can he keep insisting that the cell is the true replicator when we know that both RNA and DNA can replicate outside of a cell with the right catalyst. Denucleated cells can't--nor can prokaryotic cells without DNA. Or can they under his hypothesis.

[Yahzi]

Facts are anathema.
That's all I needed to hear.

[The Atheist]

That's all I needed wanted to hear.

Fixed it for you!

[Yahzi]

Eventually they evolve to self-oscillating biochemical pathways that resemble Eigen's hypercycles; and yes Schneibster, biochemical pathways do self-oscillate - not widely known that but they do.
If the RNA world was too chaotic to allow RNA to reproduce, how could it have been stable enough for your pathways to maintain an oscillation?

Shouldn't there be some calculations about binding strengths here?

[Schneibster]

The problem with the creationists is they want everybody to spend time proving each of their individual pet hypotheses wrong when we have a great framework that is amassing data and furthering understanding. It always sounds to me like someone trying to reorganize the periodic chart because of something they feel they can explain better or something that doesn't make sense to them.
<snip>
And how can he keep insisting that the cell is the true replicator when we know that both RNA and DNA can replicate outside of a cell with the right catalyst. Denucleated cells can't--nor can prokaryotic cells without DNA. Or can they under his hypothesis.This is right where I see a potential interpretation problem; a misunderstanding. And John has enough experience that I really don't want to think he's a woo. I'm giving him the widest possible latitude, despite his earlier apparently ridiculous claims, and making absolutely certain whether he does or does not believe that the content of DNA determines the vast majority of phenotypical characteristics.

I can't tell for certain- and I've spent quite some time on it- whether John is actually literally maintaining that the appearance of novel phenotypical characteristics, that accumulate over time and eventually result in the appearance of novel species, is not accompanied, or rather driven, by change in the content of the genetic material. His point may be completely dissociated from that position, and have only to do with the prebiotic or transition from abiotic to biotic conditions, rather than evolution subsequent to the formation of life, or perhaps subsequent to the first use of DNA.

His early remarks on the subject militate toward the conclusion that he in fact is denying that changes in the expressed DNA result in changes in the phenotype, but he does not, as far as I was able to determine, directly state that he denies this. I could have missed something. It is difficult for me to imagine that someone with that much experience in molecular biology could seriously maintain that denial. I do not say it is impossible; merely, IMHO, very unlikely. It's kind of like Einstein suddenly telling everyone he believes in, I dunno, say, witchcraft or something.

The core problem with maintaining this denial would be that we now know enough to state unequivocally that we can directly predict with very high certainty certain phenotypical characteristics if we have ONLY the DNA of the individual- such as, for example, to answer your question sooner than I wanted to, John, detached earlobes. And that is the trend of my questions about "what evolves." The obvious answer is, "phenotypical characteristics evolve- novel ones appear." The less obvious answer is, "DNA evolves, because those novel phenotypical characteristics can only have appeared as a result of the alteration of the DNA."

Perhaps I've tipped my hand- but you know, I never really intended to conceal it, nor would I expect to be able to do so from anyone north of the age of eight or so.

[Schneibster]

I'll also take a moment to point out that we have absolutely no way of determining whether the person posting here under the name "John Hewitt" is actually the John A. Hewitt, PhD, who wrote the material on those web sites, and in the presence of what appears to be denial of the central dogma of molecular biology, at least some evidence to suggest that this individual may actually not be that John A. Hewitt. It is possible that the disconnect here is because this individual has only partly understood the thrust of Dr. Hewitt's ideas, which may apply only to prebiotic evolution and not to the evolution of DNA-bearing organisms.

This is merely speculation; I don't say it is so. But I consider it a possibility.

[kjkent1]

I can't tell for certain- and I've spent quite some time on it- whether John is actually literally maintaining that the appearance of novel phenotypical characteristics, that accumulate over time and eventually result in the appearance of novel species, is not accompanied, or rather driven, by change in the content of the genetic material.This may be a silly thought, but could it be Dr. Hewitt's position that changes in DNA are a recorded effect of an organism's evolution, rather than the cause of that evolution?

[articulett]

But the John A. Hewitt in the article suggests that the data he's using to explain pre-biotic evolution also explains group selection, ethics, morality, sexuality, sexual deviancy and humor. He seems unaware of twin studies and animal studies which show how genes play a role in shaping these traits coupled with the interaction of the gene vectors (organisms) with their environment. The whole "free will" discussion seems to imply that humans have something "additional"-- certainly they have language...but we know that evolved through genetic selections and we know certain gene mutations associated with particular types of language difficulties.

He seems to believe his hypothesis not only explains the emergence of life--but higher characteristics of human life associated with frontal lobe function, language, etc. He avoids some subjects like speciation and acts as if the RNA world hypothesis is a fantastical fairytale despite the ever accumulating evidence in it's favor coupled with zero evidence regarding his theory. I can't even understand it. Sure, energy is what allows matter to organize rather than dissipating through entropy...so the sun and oscillations play a role--but it sounds like trying to using quantum mechanics to justify new age thinking to me. I just think John's trying to associated this energy with an "intelligent designer" and that's why we can't nail him down on the details.

The link I posted also utilized energy in that the primordial soup evaporates and washes over mineral surfaces--but it was very specific. Moreover, the article noted that life and life-ish things are everywhere and the problem is not too few possibilities--but to wheedle down which events were the most likely progenitors of life as we've come to know it. So why doesn't John or whomever just talk like a scientist. e.g."that theory posits "xyz" which is similar to my theory, only my theory is more explanatory and slightly different because..."

His article notes that there are 3 theories for life and only 2 are getting attention, but his isn't. One, is of course, the RNA world--nucleic acids--genes as replicators--resulting in brains that adapt "memes" and environment and experience to enhance the survival of the species...resulting in humans who have their own desires or at least feel as if they do--

And what's the 3rd? I didn't know anyone was still trying to argue a case for something other than nucleic acids as replicators--is there any data for anything else? What does he mean by 3 theories? The "god went poof hypothesis", "evolution", and "inbetween"?? Does anyone know what he means? Does anyone know how his theory fits in with evolution and the data we have. Can anyone explain why or how it would be useful to think of the cell as the replicator when we know it's the genes that code for the amino acids that are the messages (data) that build and drive every aspect of an organism including the brain which has evolved to interact with it's environment!? It is the nucleic acids which tell a cell when to divide and what kind of cell each cell is supposed to be as it differentiates--it's genes like the hox genes which drive the floor plan of animals from insects to us.

Sure, most genes reproduce in cells just as most families live in homes. But you can still be a family without a home and you can still be a replicator without a cell.

[Apathia]

This one's for Hammegk:

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=64005

[Schneibster]

This may be a silly thought, but could it be Dr. Hewitt's position that changes in DNA are a recorded effect of an organism's evolution, rather than the cause of that evolution?The problem is, it's like postulating that blueprints are caused by buildings.

But I'm not convinced that's what he's getting at. Let's let him speak for himself.

[Ivor the Engineer]

When Wilhelm Wundt, in his early psychological laboratory, introspected about the decision-making process, he deliberately started with very very simple decisions. Seeing a signal, deciding which of two signals it was, responding appropriately. And introspecting about what the processes must be that make up this chain. Perception, apperception, thought, each subjectively dissected; we have extensive writings on what this task feels like.

Modern neuroscience can trace the pathways back and forth (there are always feedback loops; it is not a one-way process) through various serial and parallel brain processes, from the retina through the LGN to the primary (V1) visual cortex, though V2, V4, on to the infratemporal cortex, up to the prefrontal, primary motor cortext, motor projection areas, spinal cord, down to the finger that presses the key. What is happening is very little like what it feels like (we have no sensory nerves in the brain, after all).

Even when we can locate the neural equivalent of "this is what making a choice feels like", we see (a la Libet) that it is effect, rather than cause. We also see (e.g., Chalmers) that conscious awareness is not necessary for many of the things we do for which we have always assumed that conscious awareness in necessary (blindsight is perhaps the most well-known counter-example, but it is not the only one).

Or perhaps I have simply filled in more gaps. At some point, thinking those gaps are big enough to hide "free will" is just silly; even the defenders of free will on this forum have had to redefine it in a much more modest form than "free will" has historically taken.

Perhaps I'm not making myself clear. I shall try harder.

I do not believe free will can exist. It is the brains' own illusion.

The definition that John gave was of the modest variety which I paraphrased.

On a day to day basis everyone goes along with the illusion of free will. Even researchers of the brain behave in this way. They seem to get along just fine.

You may think the gaps in our knowledge of the function of the brain are small. I do not.

For example:

What’s the function of Glia? Are they just packaging and clean-up cells for neurons and their chemical products?

[Schneibster]

I do not believe free will can exist. It is the brains' own illusion.Do you know how long the edge of a Koch curve is?

It's infinite.

Did you know that the area it encloses is NOT infinite?

OK, first explain that to me- then tell me why there can't be free will in a brain, if there can be an infinite length surrounding a finite area.

The real world is fractal. Your linear mind is incapable of conceiving it as it actually exists.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Do you know how long the edge of a Koch curve is?

Not before you told me.

It's infinite.

Ok.

Did you know that the area it encloses is NOT infinite?

No. Is that like e^-(x^2) (aka ‘The Gaussian’)?

OK, first explain that to me- then tell me why there can't be free will in a brain, if there can be an infinite length surrounding a finite area.

Apart from trying to make you appear deep and smart, and me ignorant and stupid I don’t see the relevance of the latter to the former. Nor do most researchers of brain function that I’ve read.

Unless you want to get down to quantum mechanics, which I know so little about I couldn’t argue about it with you, the neuronal-chemical-messaging model appears to be sufficient. The operation of neurons is quite well understood.

So if you accept all the brain does is take input, process it (which can include modifying the processing) and produce an output it follows that there can be no free will. Not that I think it likely that anybody anytime soon will be able to account for enough of the inputs (both internal and external) to model complicated behavior accurately.

If you would like me to explain to you how various parts of the brain function, please ask a specific question and I’ll go look up the answer in my neuroscience books if I can’t remember off the top of my head.

The real world is fractal. Your linear mind is incapable of conceiving it as it actually exists.

Are you trying to chat me up?

[John Hewitt]

UV exposure can be destructive to organic molecules. Look what happens to the tires on you automobile if it is parked in the sun for long periods. Perhaps you can get polymerization in the experiment you prepose but how do you get the unique sequences of mers necessary to generate life?
UV exposure would certainly randomize organic molecules. My point is that some chemicals, including those that are components to some oscilations, will have physicaochemical properties that cause them to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV. The difference will lead to selection and I propose that such selection leads to lrger organic molecules and, ultimately to the polymers to which you refer.

You can make rough estimates for the number of cycles. For example, if it took 100,000,000 years to spontaneously generate life, that would give approximately 2 * 365 * 100,000,000 cycles. I included the factor of 2 since the earth was rotating twice as fast. I don’t know of anyone since the Miller experiment of the 1950’s who tried to demonstrate chemically how life could have formed. What kind of polymer do you believe was the initial source of life? I do not have a good way of making such estimates and, as I said to Dr. Richard, model experiments might be the best approach to deciding specific chemistry.

I use the term “denature” in a more general sense and include unfolding of a molecule or mechanism of altering a molecule from its original state. For example, iodine disinfects by attaching to the proteins of a cell which in turn changes the folding of that protein and its enzymatic properties. At this level, I think folding and unfolding is just a matter of molecular conformation.

Biologic molecules such as proteins, DNA and carbohydrates are very reactive molecules and don’t remain in their original condition for very long when exposed to the wide array of chemicals you would find in the primordial soup. Even if you manage to generate biologic polymers, how long do you think they would remain in that state before react with other chemicals in the primordial soup?
I think you would need to be getting protocells before such sensitive molecules became abundant.

That’s fine, I have used the “conventional” age of the earth in these discussions since ev is so slow at converging that the age of the earth doesn’t have to enter the debate.

UV light is used as a disinfectant. If I understand this mechanism, the high energy UV photons knock off electrons making free radicals which are more chemically reactive. You believe you can make biologic polymers this way? I think you could set up an experiment fairly easily to try and demonstrate if this happens. A UV light, a heater, a timer, a flask and some raw chemicals. What chemicals would you put in the flask? Yes, UV does generate free radicals from whence all manner of things can happen. I tend to just think of any high energy events as randomizing molecules. Such randomization will tend to lead to the accumulation of oscillations whose component chemicals are protected from randomization.

[Dr Richard]

I did touch on this toward the end of my work.
1. Take the best current estimates for the temperature, daily, 13 hour, temperature excursion.
2. Set up an apparatus to apply those temperature cycles.
3. Add in high energy events such as UV light during the high temperature part of the cycle. Add mixing processes.
4. Add substrates - salty water, suitable igneous rocks and whatnot to provide a range of protected and unprotected environments.
5. Add suitable chemicals, possibly an approximation to the soup, possibly more specific chemicals to test specific ideas.
6. Abstract samples over time and lay hand upon a GC/MS apparatus, which can rapidly identify and measure the concentrations of a large number of different organic chemicals. Then plot variations in the composition as they develop - if they develop. If they do not, begin again at step one.
7. Use the resulting data to narrow down the range of likely pathways through which prebiotic oscillations would have evolved.

It is true that one could guess at likely reactions but, really, one would hope that the experimental data would be telling you.

John, thank you for at least outlining the basics of your experimental design, but as you say there will be no fairy godmother to give you the money and any research grant would need a lot more detail.

A lot of theoretical work has been done on RNA/DNA evolution using computer simulations and if you could put together some likely chemical pathways and show they are capable of oscuillating and evolving as you suggest then I would be inclined to accept your theory as a possibility.

Until then, I must remain skeptical.

I must disagree with others who would tar you with the IDiot brush; from my own reading of your work and theory (as abiogenesis goes) this is a theory that requires no God/alien/FSM input.

It would of course be sadly ironic, and IMHO possible, if John's prebiotic oscillating experimental system produced a self-replicating RNA (given that it includes rocks that could act as intial substrates for template-induced RNA self-replication) - but I suspect the experiments will never get done, which is a shame.

[John Hewitt]

I can't tell for certain- and I've spent quite some time on it- whether John is actually literally maintaining that the appearance of novel phenotypical characteristics, that accumulate over time and eventually result in the appearance of novel species, is not accompanied, or rather driven, by change in the content of the genetic material. His point may be completely dissociated from that position, and have only to do with the prebiotic or transition from abiotic to biotic conditions, rather than evolution subsequent to the formation of life, or perhaps subsequent to the first use of DNA.

Most of this discussion has concerned prebiotic evolution which, in my opinion, cannot have involved DNA or RNA. A great many selections have to be made before DNA could become the genetic material. For example, the bases need to be selected, as does ribose as the appropriate enantiomer. DNA itself cannot be made without prior enzyme activity to make the selected nucleotides in an energetically activated form. A great variety of prior selections have to be made in order for such materials to be synthesized. So many, that the entites that did it must have been, to all intents and purposes, already alive. Those selections must have been made by a prebiotic evolution and I am concerned with that process.

However, my point about data, rather than genes, being the proper foundation for evolution is more general than its application to prebiosis. Most of the data associated with biological evolution is associated with DNA sequence but, as I have said before, epigenesis has always been a theoretical possibility and various people have claimed to have found minor examples of it.

More importantly, data associated with sense organs and the brain and with social knowledge sets is also subject to evolution. Pehotype is a product of both genotype and environment and, for practical purposes, environment varies with behaviour. Since many of the behaviours of higher animals stem from sensory or social knowledge (encoded as data in the brain) the phenotye of higher animals depends not just on biological evolution but also on those other forms of evolution.

[Mr. Scott]

I do not believe free will can exist. It is the brains' own illusion.

Ivor, help me out here. I argued whether or not we have free will since I was in High School (long time ago). I couldn't get away from the idea that not believing in free will seems to take the wind out of our motivational sails. Why put in any effort to make intelligent choices if they are pre-ordained? It is intuitively obvious that we have free will. If I'm asked if I want vanilla or chocolate ice cream, I feel completely free, without any perception of illusion, to choose.

One of my acid tests of truth is identifying a use for the idea. I can't think of any use of the idea that free will is an illusion. In fact, the idea seems harmful. It's like suggesting that since we can model physical systems in a computer, they are perfectly predictable. Model the whole universe in a computer, every position and velocity of every particle, and we can see everything is pre-ordained and we therefore can't have free will. To me it seems like a woo idea masquerading as a scientific/skeptical idea.

In summary: If it's correct that we don't have free will, then so what? Why care? What difference does it make? What utility does the idea have?

Do we have free will to believe or not to believe in free will?

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Ask Paul whether I have shown anything as his description of ev goes from a model of reality to it models a small part of the evolutionary landscape to it is a stylized model
What you have shown is that I must be careful lest you interpret my statements too broadly. Ev is a model of reality, yet clearly a quite narrow one. It suffices to demonstrate what it was meant to demonstrate, and it suffices to piss off creationists. It simply doesn't model 99% of the evolutionary landscape, which should go without saying, yet I have to be careful to say it over and over again.

However, you have done us a favor by sticking my feet to the fire, which is to make it quite clear that any conclusions you draw from Ev about the totality of the evolutionary landscape are simply ridiculous. Some limited conclusions could be drawn if you really knew realistic genome sizes, mutation rates, populations, and time spans, but you do not. Even so, we have tentatively agreed with you that evolution by nothing more than random point mutations is unlikely.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Paul, have you ever run Unnamed's selection function past Dr. Schneider to see if he found it a reasonable response to the allegation that ev's original selection method is unrealistically slow?
I mentioned it to him and he thought it was interesting. That's as far as we've gotten. I think you could say that he's "moved on."

~~ Paul

[Mercutio]

What might rote signal processing as described have to do with free will?
Thank you for illustrating my point, that the defenders of free will on this forum have had to radically redefine it. Historically, making such a decision (even so simple a one as Wundt examines) is a free-will decision (you could have chosen not to press the button, or to press a different one). That you describe it now as "rote signal processing" illustrates the dissappearance of that particular "gap".

Er, yes. What do you actually have to say regarding a "cause"?
In Libet's experiment? The ultimate cause was not something that was controlled for, so the answer is "we don't know". What we do know is that the subjective experience of freely choosing occurred well after the motor process was under way. The historical concept of free will (the subjective experience of freely choosing) is clearly not sufficient to serve as the original cause.

Yawn. What makes you believe free will involves any public behavior? I will ask how science samples which thought is selected from the ongoing possibilities, and why it was selected?
What makes you believe I limit this to public behavior? I know that you took the time, years ago, to read that tutorial on radical behaviorism; you know that private behavior is subject to systematic investigation. As to "why", you must recognise that there are two entirely different answers to that question. If "why" means "under what conditions", then we can vary conditions and see differential probabilities of the ongoing possibilities. (If you are looking for linear determinism, you won't see me defending it; we are complex systems. Like weather, we will always be unpredictable to some extent even as we are predictable in many other ways. But unpredictability is not evidence of free will--indeed, it is evidence against it, when we consider that we do not predict our own behavior very well.) The other "why" is a teleological question that is not part of a scientific investigation.
Even if our minds are programmed automata 99.9999% of the time, why would you suggest meaningful free will has no room to operate? Are you with Schneib -- if it's 90% probable, there's nothing left to discuss?Again, thank you for demonstrating the shrinking gaps and the changing definition of free will. Consider, though; if we remove 99.9999% of the tarnish from a piece of silver, we ought to be rewarded by a clear view of a shiny spoon (for instance). If we remove 90% of the carbon, and what is left isn't even vaguely spoon-shaped, there is little reason to be happy we are most of the way done with polishing. We have examined a great deal of our experience. So far, determinism has been a far better description of what we have found; even those who defend free will are defending something vastly different from the "free will" we have historically believed in. To continue to call it "free will" at this point seems a little silly; it's like we are looking for unicorns, and have found something which, the more we look at it, looks more and more like a goat. How long do we keep calling it a unicorn?

[Mercutio]

Ivor, help me out here. I argued whether or not we have free will since I was in High School (long time ago). I couldn't get away from the idea that not believing in free will seems to take the wind out of our motivational sails. Why put in any effort to make intelligent choices if they are pre-ordained? It is intuitively obvious that we have free will. If I'm asked if I want vanilla or chocolate ice cream, I feel completely free, without any perception of illusion, to choose.
As you appear to realize below, determined is not pre-ordained.

One of my acid tests of truth is identifying a use for the idea. I can't think of any use of the idea that free will is an illusion. In fact, the idea seems harmful. It's like suggesting that since we can model physical systems in a computer, they are perfectly predictable. Model the whole universe in a computer, every position and velocity of every particle, and we can see everything is pre-ordained and we therefore can't have free will. To me it seems like a woo idea masquerading as a scientific/skeptical idea.
Would you suggest that a more and more accurate model of a physical system is somehow dangerous? I don't think so. Why would a more and more accurate model of a behavioral system be any more dangerous?

In summary: If it's correct that we don't have free will, then so what? Why care? What difference does it make? What utility does the idea have?
If we recognize that we are shaped by our environments, we can build environments that shape the behaviors we value. Currently, we deny environmental influence, blame the individual's free choice, and punish them after they behave in ways we do not value.

Do we have free will to believe or not to believe in free will? You have been raised to believe in it. You are the product of your culture. Why should this belief be any different than what language you learned, or what religion (or lack therof) you profess?

[Mercutio]

You may think the gaps in our knowledge of the function of the brain are small. I do not.
Let me emphasize, I am speaking historically. We know much more about the function of the brain than we would have thought possible to know a century ago. The philosophical arguments have not yet caught up with what we *do* know, let alone what we do not. What we do know is much much more than what the public perception of what we know is.

It reminds me of Nelson, from The Simpsons: "It's like asking what's the square root of a million--we'll never know..."

[kleinman]

The problem with the creationists is they want everybody to spend time proving each of their individual pet hypotheses wrong when we have a great framework that is amassing data and furthering understanding. It always sounds to me like someone trying to reorganize the periodic chart because of something they feel they can explain better or something that doesn't make sense to them.
The only pet hypothesis you need to prove is “selection” in your slogan “mutation and natural selection”.
UV exposure can be destructive to organic molecules. Look what happens to the tires on you automobile if it is parked in the sun for long periods. Perhaps you can get polymerization in the experiment you prepose but how do you get the unique sequences of mers necessary to generate life?UV exposure would certainly randomize organic molecules. My point is that some chemicals, including those that are components to some oscilations, will have physicaochemical properties that cause them to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV. The difference will lead to selection and I propose that such selection leads to lrger organic molecules and, ultimately to the polymers to which you refer.
What would cause these molecules to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV?
You can make rough estimates for the number of cycles. For example, if it took 100,000,000 years to spontaneously generate life, that would give approximately 2 * 365 * 100,000,000 cycles. I included the factor of 2 since the earth was rotating twice as fast. I don’t know of anyone since the Miller experiment of the 1950’s who tried to demonstrate chemically how life could have formed. What kind of polymer do you believe was the initial source of life?I do not have a good way of making such estimates and, as I said to Dr. Richard, model experiments might be the best approach to deciding specific chemistry.
The Miller experiment from the 1950’s was barely able to produce any amino acids. What type of mers do you think you could produce and how would these mers link to form polymers, especially the ones which would lead toward living things?
I use the term “denature” in a more general sense and include unfolding of a molecule or mechanism of altering a molecule from its original state. For example, iodine disinfects by attaching to the proteins of a cell which in turn changes the folding of that protein and its enzymatic properties.At this level, I think folding and unfolding is just a matter of molecular conformation.
How long do you think you can keep the polymers you would form with your experiment in a conformation necessary to form a living thing?
Biologic molecules such as proteins, DNA and carbohydrates are very reactive molecules and don’t remain in their original condition for very long when exposed to the wide array of chemicals you would find in the primordial soup. Even if you manage to generate biologic polymers, how long do you think they would remain in that state before react with other chemicals in the primordial soup?I think you would need to be getting protocells before such sensitive molecules became abundant.
What would these protocells be made of?
UV light is used as a disinfectant. If I understand this mechanism, the high energy UV photons knock off electrons making free radicals which are more chemically reactive. You believe you can make biologic polymers this way? I think you could set up an experiment fairly easily to try and demonstrate if this happens. A UV light, a heater, a timer, a flask and some raw chemicals. What chemicals would you put in the flask?Yes, UV does generate free radicals from whence all manner of things can happen. I tend to just think of any high energy events as randomizing molecules. Such randomization will tend to lead to the accumulation of oscillations whose component chemicals are protected from randomization.
Do you believe that such randomization leads to accumulation of chemicals with similar oscillations?
Ask Paul whether I have shown anything as his description of ev goes from a model of reality to it models a small part of the evolutionary landscape to it is a stylized modelWhat you have shown is that I must be careful lest you interpret my statements too broadly. Ev is a model of reality, yet clearly a quite narrow one. It suffices to demonstrate what it was meant to demonstrate, and it suffices to piss off creationists. It simply doesn't model 99% of the evolutionary landscape, which should go without saying, yet I have to be careful to say it over and over again.
Ev does not piss me off at all. In fact I have enjoyed learning about it and working with the model. It has proven to be an excellent instructment in showing how flawed the theory of evolution is. So you say that random point mutations and natural selection represents only 1% of the evolutionary landscape. Do you want to mathematically describe the other 99% of this landscape, and don’t forget to include a mathematical description of selection that would evolve a gene from the beginning. I’m interested in hearing how a gene can evolve from the beginning by recombination, insertions/deletions, transposon, interspecies gene transfers, inversions, translocations,…
However, you have done us a favor by sticking my feet to the fire, which is to make it quite clear that any conclusions you draw from Ev about the totality of the evolutionary landscape are simply ridiculous. Some limited conclusions could be drawn if you really knew realistic genome sizes, mutation rates, populations, and time spans, but you do not. Even so, we have tentatively agreed with you that evolution by nothing more than random point mutations is unlikely.
Do you think that the effect of conflicting selection processes that slow or stop the evolutionary process in ev reflects anything that might happen in reality?

We have the data on realistic genome sizes and mutation rates as well as populations and time spans. This is empirical evidence. You have to speculate that somehow early life forms could survive and reproduce with small genomes and high mutation rates. You have no empirical evidence for this.
Paul, have you ever run Unnamed's selection function past Dr. Schneider to see if he found it a reasonable response to the allegation that ev's original selection method is unrealistically slow?I mentioned it to him and he thought it was interesting. That's as far as we've gotten. I think you could say that he's "moved on."
It’s time for everyone to move on from the theory of evolution. It’s mathematically impossible. There are no selection processes that can evolve a gene from the beginning and different selection processes conflict and prevent evolution.

It’s interesting that Dr Schneider is abandoning something that he has spent more than 20 years working on and defending.

[John Hewitt]

copy deleted sorry for the problem

[John Hewitt]

What would cause these molecules to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV?
As I said previously, their physicochemical properties.

The Miller experiment from the 1950’s was barely able to produce any amino acids. What type of mers do you think you could produce and how would these mers link to form polymers, especially the ones which would lead toward living things?As I said to Dr. Richard, I can only answer such questions with speculations of variable plausibility. The real answer is that, at present, I don't know.

How long do you think you can keep the polymers you would form with your experiment in a conformation necessary to form a living thing? Conformation changes in organic chemistry are usually of the order of less than one second, but they are equilibria.

What would these protocells be made of?I think they would need to be based on amphiphiles because of the need for self-bounding - first just emulsifiers and then bilayer forming lipids of some kind.

Do you believe that such randomization leads to accumulation of chemicals with similar oscillations? I do not understand this question.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Ivor, help me out here. I argued whether or not we have free will since I was in High School (long time ago). I couldn't get away from the idea that not believing in free will seems to take the wind out of our motivational sails. Why put in any effort to make intelligent choices if they are pre-ordained? It is intuitively obvious that we have free will. If I'm asked if I want vanilla or chocolate ice cream, I feel completely free, without any perception of illusion, to choose.

One of my acid tests of truth is identifying a use for the idea. I can't think of any use of the idea that free will is an illusion. In fact, the idea seems harmful. It's like suggesting that since we can model physical systems in a computer, they are perfectly predictable. Model the whole universe in a computer, every position and velocity of every particle, and we can see everything is pre-ordained and we therefore can't have free will. To me it seems like a woo idea masquerading as a scientific/skeptical idea.

In summary: If it's correct that we don't have free will, then so what? Why care? What difference does it make? What utility does the idea have?

Do we have free will to believe or not to believe in free will?

Modeling the universe in a computer, which is contained in the universe you are modeling, so the effects of its output in the universe need to be included in the model... you have an infinite regress.

Mercutio has provided a partial answer to the utility of believing we are not free in that it appears from experiment, behavior is determined even when we think and believe we have chosen what to do and when we did it as shown by some interesting experiments, described in the Wikipedia article on free will under ‘Neuroscience and free will’ See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will

Perhaps the gaps that Mercutio was taking about will be as problematic to close as modeling the universe problem is. I.e. measuring all the inputs affects them so the initial state of the brain cannot be determined and thus the resulting output cannot either. Butterflies flapping their wings and all that.

As for motivation, isn't not knowing what’s going to happen tomorrow enough?

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

It’s interesting that Dr Schneider is abandoning something that he has spent more than 20 years working on and defending.
You should stop purveying this lie unless you have evidence to back it up.

~~ Paul

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

You have to speculate that somehow early life forms could survive and reproduce with small genomes and high mutation rates.
Notice how you didn't mention the population sizes.

~~ Paul

[Mr. Scott]

Modeling the universe in a computer, which is contained in the universe you are modeling, so the effects of its output in the universe need to be included in the model... you have an infinite regress.

I know, it's a thought experiment, and logistical details like infinite regress don't matter.

Mercutio has provided a partial answer to the utility of believing we are not free in that it appears from experiment, behavior is determined even when we think and believe we have chosen what to do and when we did it as shown by some interesting experiments, described in the Wikipedia article on free will under ‘Neuroscience and free will’?

If we take Mercutio's suggestion of utility too far, then why not empty all the jails and let the twinkie defense prevail and its ilk prevail?

I guess I'm unwilling to give up on that little humunculous in my brain.

Thanks, guys, it's making more sense to me now.

[Mr. Scott]

I was housecleaning and came across the Oct 2006 Discover Magazine with an interview with Newt Gingrich. He seems to believe in both god and evolution.

He did say something that I'm skeptical of:

"Cockroaches became successful several hundred million years ago and just stopped evolving." How do we really know this? Because they look the same? How do we know their internal mechanisms (behavior, digestion, taste in food, metabolism, immune systems, sexual strategies) didn't robustly evolve in that time? Why are many people quick to assume that if creatures look the same after millions of years they didn't evolve at all?

[Mercutio]

I know, it's a thought experiment, and logistical details like infinite regress don't matter.

If we take Mercutio's suggestion of utility too far, then why not empty all the jails and let the twinkie defense prevail and its ilk prevail?
Although this is a common enough thought that it is taken as reasonable, it is a strawman (and not just because it is taken too far): If determinists think our behavior is shaped by its antecedents and consequences in the environment (and they do, and it is), why on earth would their solution involve removing the consequences of behavior?

I guess I'm unwilling to give up on that little humunculous in my brain.
Hey, some people are still unwilling to give up special creation or geocentrism! Change comes gradually... :D

Thanks, guys, it's making more sense to me now.

[articulett]

If we take Mercutio's suggestion of utility too far, then why not empty all the jails and let the twinkie defense prevail and its ilk prevail?



We don't pet sharks and we keep the tigers and gorillas out of the petting portion of the zoo. We can't change the "will" of a tornado either, but we don't use a twinkie defense or anything so flimsy to protect ourselves from them.

In Ivor's example, his preference for chocolate or vanilla ice cream is not a choice-- His choice may be, but every choice is intricately tied up with a brain molded by genes and further refined by it's environment and the experience it finds itself in. It seems like the "narrator" in the head is strongly tied in with language, and there are some interesting phenomena a perception deficitis notable when people experience damage to the language centers of their brain--there are even genetic mutations that effect the genes that are active in portions of the brain producing some unusual deficits in the carriers of the mutation.

In any case, the idea that the twinkie defense would bring chaos upon us should the penal system acknowledge that people aren't necessarily in control of their behavior, is unlikely. In fact, prison would probably become a place to house the people others need to be protected from instead of a place where taxpayers pay for peope to be punished who could be contributing to society. Sex Offenders and Pedophiles are very resistant to treatment--but under the current system, they do their time and then go free to repeat a behavior they probably didn't choose to have. If we based our penal system on how threatening people were to others then repeat sex offenders would not leave their prisons with their gonads and Dr. Kavorkian and Cheech Marin would not be wasting tax payer money.

I often wonder about clergy who profess a belief in free will and hell and then molest children. Certainly, no one chooses to be a pedophile, right? And if the threat of eternal suffering isn't enough to make someone control their behavior, then what the heck is a year in prison going to do?

I think the notion of free will is simplistic--like "good guys" and "bad guys" and not something that can even be discussed without some concrete definitions.

[Mr. Scott]

Dr. Kleinman, you've said that when you ran Ev with what you consider realistic parameters, it shows the length of time required for macro-evolution is so long it proves macro-evolution didn't happen. You've also said that you believe Ev to be an accurate model of evolution.

I was wondering, what would your reaction have been if all your runs of Ev resulted in time estimates that closely matched what evolutionists claimed?

What would you do if a new, improved, more comprehensive evolution modeler showed, when run with parameters you felt were realistic, results consistent with evolutionists' time frames?

[Schneibster]

Most of this discussion has concerned prebiotic evolution which, in my opinion, cannot have involved DNA or RNA. A great many selections have to be made before DNA could become the genetic material. For example, the bases need to be selected, as does ribose as the appropriate enantiomer. DNA itself cannot be made without prior enzyme activity to make the selected nucleotides in an energetically activated form. A great variety of prior selections have to be made in order for such materials to be synthesized. So many, that the entites that did it must have been, to all intents and purposes, already alive. Those selections must have been made by a prebiotic evolution and I am concerned with that process.I cannot but agree with this.

However, my point about data, rather than genes, being the proper foundation for evolution is more general than its application to prebiosis. Most of the data associated with biological evolution is associated with DNA sequence but, as I have said before, epigenesis has always been a theoretical possibility and various people have claimed to have found minor examples of it.Well, since epigenesis concerns the growth of an organism from zygote or seed to fully formed adult, I really can't disagree with this either. I can imagine that there might be some disagreement over the comparative importance of genetics and environment, and in fact this is the old nature/nurture debate, but that both influence epigenesis is pretty much unquestionable. I hope I'm using epigenesis the way you meant it; there are several meanings, some aside from biology.

It has always been my position that both organisms developing from genes, and minds/brains developing from genes, are affected strongly by their environment. One need only read of cases where children are not exposed to language consistently while of an age to learn it, and the problems that these unfortunate children have dealing with other people, to understand that the growth of our minds is heavily influenced by our environment and in fact depends on that environment for important elements of its growth. On the other hand, one also cannot deny that damage to the genes can lead to the growth of a brain incapable or only partially capable of absorbing these environmental influences, resulting in the mentally defective. This shows that both nature and nurture have their influences, and both are required for the proper growth of a mind. Similar considerations apply to the growth of organisms' physical characteristics of most types we see around us.

But the form of an adult organism, the vast majority of its phenotypical characteristics, is the result of its genes. One reason that this is not always immediately obvious is because genes only code for proteins; of course, they also regulate the production of these proteins, and this is key. The proteins are not randomly formed; they are produced in the presence or absence of key environmental factors. The proteins, when combined with these environmental factors, form cells; and these cells form organisms. One of the key points of ontogeny is that adult humans don't recapitulate prebiotic evolution; we all start from cells, zygotes. And there is a continuous unbroken line of such cells back to the first ones; there must be.

More importantly, data associated with sense organs and the brain and with social knowledge sets is also subject to evolution. Absolutely. No question about it. See above.

Pehotype is a product of both genotype and environment and, for practical purposes, environment varies with behaviour. Since many of the behaviours of higher animals stem from sensory or social knowledge (encoded as data in the brain) the phenotye of higher animals depends not just on biological evolution but also on those other forms of evolution.This also is undeniable. However, I have to re-emphasize that genetics is the primary determinant- without the genes, the environment creates nothing.

Now let's see where we go from here.

[kleinman]

What would cause these molecules to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV?As I said previously, their physicochemical properties.
Which physicochemical property would cause a molecule to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV?
The Miller experiment from the 1950’s was barely able to produce any amino acids. What type of mers do you think you could produce and how would these mers link to form polymers, especially the ones which would lead toward living things?As I said to Dr. Richard, I can only answer such questions with speculations of variable plausibility. The real answer is that, at present, I don't know.
Fair enough.
How long do you think you can keep the polymers you would form with your experiment in a conformation necessary to form a living thing?Conformation changes in organic chemistry are usually of the order of less than one second, but they are equilibria.
Let me ask the question in a different way. How long do you think you can keep the polymers you form with your experiments in the same chemical structure to form a living thing. That is, what to you think the half lives of the polymers would be before they decompose?
What would these protocells be made of?I think they would need to be based on amphiphiles because of the need for self-bounding - first just emulsifiers and then bilayer forming lipids of some kind.
Are you talking about lipid based amphiphiles, if so, where do you get the lipids?
Do you believe that such randomization leads to accumulation of chemicals with similar oscillations?I do not understand this question.
You said the following in your previous post, “Such randomization will tend to lead to the accumulation of oscillations whose component chemicals are protected from randomization.” I am trying to understand this statement.
It’s interesting that Dr Schneider is abandoning something that he has spent more than 20 years working on and defending.You should stop purveying this lie unless you have evidence to back it up.
Oh, so when you said the following in response to kjkent1’s inquiry about Unnamed’s selection process being presented to Dr Schneider:
I mentioned it to him and he thought it was interesting. That's as far as we've gotten. I think you could say that he's "moved on."
So Dr Schneider has not abandoned ev, he is just moving on. That’s good since I thought I was going to be all alone in believing that ev is a plausible representation of random point mutations and natural selection. When you presented Unnamed’s selection process to Dr Schneider, did you have a chance to ask him what the selection process would be to evolve a gene from the beginning is?
You have to speculate that somehow early life forms could survive and reproduce with small genomes and high mutation rates.Notice how you didn't mention the population sizes.
Since you mention it, perhaps you could tell us what the population was when the first life form appeared?
Dr. Kleinman, you've said that when you ran Ev with what you consider realistic parameters, it shows the length of time required for macro-evolution is so long it proves macro-evolution didn't happen. You've also said that you believe Ev to be an accurate model of evolution.

I was wondering, what would your reaction have been if all your runs of Ev resulted in time estimates that closely matched what evolutionists claimed?

What would you do if a new, improved, more comprehensive evolution modeler showed, when run with parameters you felt were realistic, results consistent with evolutionists' time frames?
I think I have used the word “plausible” to describe ev and “realistic” to describe measured genome lengths and measured mutation rates. It is true that neither Paul or I have run cases with “realistic” genome lengths for known free living organisms but have done cases with genome lengths of 100k which is still about a factor of 5 too short. Even so, it takes at least hundreds of millions of generations to evolve only 100 loci with Dr Schneider’s contrived selection process.

If you can present a reasoned and logical selection process that when used in the ev model shows that you can accumulate information quickly enough, you have proved your case. That is why I continually challenge you to describe a selection process that would do this. I think Paul’s use of the word “stylized” to describe ev is an accurate descriptor for ev but that doesn’t mean that ev doesn’t have anything to tell us about the random point mutation and natural selection process. The ev model tells something about how difficult it is to mathematically model selection. Dr Schneider’s process converges very quickly for short genomes but slows down profoundly for longer genomes. Unnamed came up with a selection process that converges quickly for both short and long genomes by essentially ignoring mutations on the non-binding site portion of the genome. The challenge for evolutionists is to define a realistic selection process that does what they claim mutation and selection is capable of doing. I’ve written and used complex mathematical simulations for decades and I don’t believe there is a selection process that can correct the mathematical deficiencies that ev reveals for your theory but I leave it up to you evolutionists to write your own programs. Perhaps then you will be convinced of the mathematical impossibility of your theory.

[Yahzi]

Although this is a common enough thought that it is taken as reasonable, it is a strawman (and not just because it is taken too far): If determinists think our behavior is shaped by its antecedents and consequences in the environment (and they do, and it is), why on earth would their solution involve removing the consequences of behavior?
A smashingly good point.

[kjkent1]

If you can present a reasoned and logical selection process that when used in the ev model shows that you can accumulate information quickly enough, you have proved your case. That is why I continually challenge you to describe a selection process that would do this. I think Paul’s use of the word “stylized” to describe ev is an accurate descriptor for ev but that doesn’t mean that ev doesn’t have anything to tell us about the random point mutation and natural selection process. The ev model tells something about how difficult it is to mathematically model selection. Dr Schneider’s process converges very quickly for short genomes but slows down profoundly for longer genomes. Unnamed came up with a selection process that converges quickly for both short and long genomes by essentially ignoring mutations on the non-binding site portion of the genome. The challenge for evolutionists is to define a realistic selection process that does what they claim mutation and selection is capable of doing. I’ve written and used complex mathematical simulations for decades and I don’t believe there is a selection process that can correct the mathematical deficiencies that ev reveals for your theory but I leave it up to you evolutionists to write your own programs. Perhaps then you will be convinced of the mathematical impossibility of your theory.Why do you believe that ignoring, or strongly disfavoring the detrimental effect of a mutation in the non-binding site region is unrealistic?

If the region is filled with junk-DNA, then what difference does it make that a mutation occurs there, when the region contributes no substantive effect to the host organism?

[articulett]

Here's a very recent article from the Shapiro mentioned by Hewitt: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=B7AABF35-E7F2-99DF-309B8CEF02B5C4D7&pageNumber=1&catID=4

Is this what you are saying, John? He doesn't mention data or oscillations...he is critical of the RNA world. He doesn't extrapolate to sexuality, humor, or "free will" either. Maybe you can tell us how your hypothesis is similar to his...

The functioning of living cells is amazing. From the operations of RNA and ribosomes in protein synthesis to the "walking" of myosin molecules along actin filaments to generate muscle contractions, innumerable molecules of all levels of complexity come together in the remarkable dance that keeps us alive.

Darwinian evolution accounts for how such intricate structures and processes can arise once there is a replicator capable of undergoing mutation and natural selection, but how could the first replicator have formed? Cells require proteins (enzymes) to replicate DNA, and they require DNA to carry the recipes for building the right proteins. Which came first? The protein or the DNA? Just how did life get its start?

For about two decades, many scientists have envisaged an "RNA World" as the way out of this chicken-and-egg dilemma. RNA, it turns out, can perform the enzymatic functions of proteins as well as its better known role of carrying genetic information. Thus, if self-replicating RNA could be formed in Earth's primordial environment, evolution could then take over and ultimately result in the protein-DNA-RNA-based life we know today.

Some, such as Shapiro, argue that that is a big "if." His article outlines the case against "RNA First" and presents some basic ideas of a competing "Metabolism First" group of theories in which simple molecules could form a system of reactions capable of using an energy source to sustain themselves and grow and reproduce—in short, a form of life having no need for a complicated replicator molecule.

See what Shapiro has to say, and join in the discussion. Enjoy!

[The Atheist]

So far, determinism has been a far better description of what we have found; even those who defend free will are defending something vastly different from the "free will" we have historically believed in. To continue to call it "free will" at this point seems a little silly; it's like we are looking for unicorns, and have found something which, the more we look at it, looks more and more like a goat. How long do we keep calling it a unicorn?

Maybe it is as simple as coming up with a name for it. The persistency of the illusion of free will added to the depth it's buried in society's consciousness means that there needs to be a noun to describe what it actually is.

Human will? Free choice?

[Apathia]

Maybe it is as simple as coming up with a name for it. The persistency of the illusion of free will added to the depth it's buried in society's consciousness means that there needs to be a noun to describe what it actually is.

Human will? Free choice?

I like "volition." This term doesn't have the metaphysical attachments and conotations "will" does. Saying I have "volition" doesn't carry with it the metaphysical baggage that "Free Will" does.

Individual volition is that I make my own choices.
But these choices aren't the exclusive doing of my fictitious ego.
They come about in integration with my body and my environment.
This dynamic interplay is my being, not the ego mental abstraction.
Environment shapes my choices, and my choices shape my environment.
Both the ground and the figure within define each other and aren't apart from each other. I am that realtionship, dynamic, and whole.

Looking at it that way, I don't see fatalism, because I'm not some inert thing apart from nature that nature manipulates. Ditching the metaphysical Free Will is a liberation for me. It frees me from the tyranny of the fantasy self.
Volition is free to respond with creativity.

Of course, Mercutio's statments on the value of ditching the concept of Free Will are more practical in terms of Behavioral and Social Science, but I like throwing in the personal angle just to say that I don't feel I've lost any humanity by letting go of "Free Will."

Some days I just revell in the unity of nature and that all I am is integral to the reality I experience as it is to me.

[Mr. Scott]

I think I have used the word “plausible” to describe ev and “realistic” to describe measured genome lengths and measured mutation rates. It is true that neither Paul or I have run cases with “realistic” genome lengths for known free living organisms but have done cases with genome lengths of 100k which is still about a factor of 5 too short. Even so, it takes at least hundreds of millions of generations to evolve only 100 loci with Dr Schneider’s contrived selection process.

Perhaps my question was not clear. What would your response be, Dr. Kleinman, if a mathematical model for evolution were developed that proved, beyond any reasonable doubt, that evolution could have happend the way evolutionists say it happened?

[Ivor the Engineer]

I like "volition." This term doesn't have the metaphysical attachments and conotations "will" does. Saying I have "volition" doesn't carry with it the metaphysical baggage that "Free Will" does.

Individual volition is that I make my own choices.
But these choices aren't the exclusive doing of my fictitious ego.
They come about in integration with my body and my environment.
This dynamic interplay is my being, not the ego mental abstraction.
Environment shapes my choices, and my choices shape my environment.
Both the ground and the figure within define each other and aren't apart from each other. I am that realtionship, dynamic, and whole.

Looking at it that way, I don't see fatalism, because I'm not some inert thing apart from nature that nature manipulates. Ditching the metaphysical Free Will is a liberation for me. It frees me from the tyranny of the fantasy self.
Volition is free to respond with creativity.

Of course, Mercutio's statments on the value of ditching the concept of Free Will are more practical in terms of Behavioral and Social Science, but I like throwing in the personal angle just to say that I don't feel I've lost any humanity by letting go of "Free Will."

Some days I just revell in the unity of nature and that all I am is integral to the reality I experience as it is to me.

My two bits on free will and determinism:

The fundamental difference between the belief in free will and the belief in determinism is that belief in free will allows you to blame someone and belief in determinism only allows you to assign responsibility to them for their actions.

As Articulett mentioned earlier, prison (and probably the world) would be a very different place if society could give up the idea of free will and focus on how to modify a person’s behavior and the risk of the individual committing unwanted behavior in the future.

And finally, as a wise person once said:

“Never judge someone until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes. Then you’ll be a mile away and have their shoes.”

[John Hewitt]

Here's a very recent article from the Shapiro mentioned by Hewitt: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=B7AABF35-E7F2-99DF-309B8CEF02B5C4D7&pageNumber=1&catID=4

Is this what you are saying, John? He doesn't mention data or oscillations...he is critical of the RNA world. He doesn't extrapolate to sexuality, humor, or "free will" either. Maybe you can tell us how your hypothesis is similar to his...
<snip>
See what Shapiro has to say, and join in the discussion. Enjoy!
Thank you for the link, it is very useful. I put a comment onto that blog with a link to my own work.
Shapiro doesn't talk about data or oscillations because that is my work, not his and my work is not yet widely known - though, I have previously sent Shapiro an email when I asked him for a copy of one of his papers. I do agree with him in supporting a metabolism first theory since I think that my work resolves many of the problems in such theories.

[kleinman]

If you can present a reasoned and logical selection process that when used in the ev model shows that you can accumulate information quickly enough, you have proved your case. That is why I continually challenge you to describe a selection process that would do this. I think Paul’s use of the word “stylized” to describe ev is an accurate descriptor for ev but that doesn’t mean that ev doesn’t have anything to tell us about the random point mutation and natural selection process. The ev model tells something about how difficult it is to mathematically model selection. Dr Schneider’s process converges very quickly for short genomes but slows down profoundly for longer genomes. Unnamed came up with a selection process that converges quickly for both short and long genomes by essentially ignoring mutations on the non-binding site portion of the genome. The challenge for evolutionists is to define a realistic selection process that does what they claim mutation and selection is capable of doing. I’ve written and used complex mathematical simulations for decades and I don’t believe there is a selection process that can correct the mathematical deficiencies that ev reveals for your theory but I leave it up to you evolutionists to write your own programs. Perhaps then you will be convinced of the mathematical impossibility of your theory.Why do you believe that ignoring, or strongly disfavoring the detrimental effect of a mutation in the non-binding site region is unrealistic?
It is clear that there are harmful mutations. Consider how many genetic diseases are caused by mutations. Any realistic selection mechanism must consider both beneficial and harmful mutations. Dr Schneider’s selection process is contrived but at least considers both beneficial and harmful mutations.
If the region is filled with junk-DNA, then what difference does it make that a mutation occurs there, when the region contributes no substantive effect to the host organism?
This is why I posed to you the question about how much “junk-DNA” there is in prokaryotes. You can’t define a simulation with a genome composed of all “junk-DNA” except a small portion that is evolving and call this realistic.
I think I have used the word “plausible” to describe ev and “realistic” to describe measured genome lengths and measured mutation rates. It is true that neither Paul or I have run cases with “realistic” genome lengths for known free living organisms but have done cases with genome lengths of 100k which is still about a factor of 5 too short. Even so, it takes at least hundreds of millions of generations to evolve only 100 loci with Dr Schneider’s contrived selection process.Perhaps my question was not clear. What would your response be, Dr. Kleinman, if a mathematical model for evolution were developed that proved, beyond any reasonable doubt, that evolution could have happend the way evolutionists say it happened?
If you had read the next sentence in that post you would have seen:
If you can present a reasoned and logical selection process that when used in the ev model shows that you can accumulate information quickly enough, you have proved your case.
I have already presented an argument why there is no selection process to evolve a gene from the beginning. I now present an argument why there is no selection process that can evolve existing genes to entirely new genes.

Consider the concept of evolving an existing gene that produces a polypeptide with a particular function to an entirely new gene that produces a polypeptide with an entirely different function. Let’s call the initial form of the gene, genex and the final form of the gene, geney and the transformation genex -> geney requires n base substitutions such that genex1 -> genex2 -> genex3 -> … -> genexn = geney. Each one of the base substitutions to genex (genex1, genex2, genex3, …, genexn) must produce beneficial polypeptides (protein1, protein2, protein3, …, proteinn) in order to give beneficial selection so that the frequency of each of the n steps in the sequence be maintained or increased in the gene pool. If any of the n steps in the processes is a detrimental mutation and produces a nonfunctional polypeptide, that sequence will be selected against and the frequency of that sequence will be reduced in the gene pool and interfere with the transformation. There is no selection process that can accomplish the n steps for the tens of thousands of different genes seen in living things since every step in the transformation requires benefical mutations, otherwise selection can not occur.

[John Hewitt]

Which physicochemical property would cause a molecule to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV?Relevant properties would include volatility, solubility in water and oil, partition equilibrium constants onto available surfaces etc.

Let me ask the question in a different way. How long do you think you can keep the polymers you form with your experiments in the same chemical structure to form a living thing. That is, what to you think the half lives of the polymers would be before they decompose?
Indefinitely, since the molecular selections derive from dynamically shifted equilibrium reactions. We are discussing equilibria, where rate of formation equals rate of decomposition.

Are you talking about lipid based amphiphiles, if so, where do you get the lipids? This takes us back not knowing specific chemistry. A great many compounds are amphiphiles. The theory certainly posits that the end point of selection is phospholipid but I cannot, at present, specify starting points.

You said the following in your previous post, “Such randomization will tend to lead to the accumulation of oscillations whose component chemicals are protected from randomization.” I am trying to understand this statement.
An oscillation must involve at least two component chemicals - to produce an equilibrium reaction whose position shifts in response to temperature changes. The degree of protection will be some weighted average drawn from the physicochemical properties of an oscillation's component chemicals.

[kleinman]

Which physicochemical property would cause a molecule to accumulate in locations that protect them from UV?Relevant properties would include volatility, solubility in water and oil, partition equilibrium constants onto available surfaces etc.
I understand the concept that gradients of one type can lead to gradients of other types, for example a temperature gradient can lead to an electric gradient. Why do you think that UV light can produce the complex molecules that are necessary for life?
Let me ask the question in a different way. How long do you think you can keep the polymers you form with your experiments in the same chemical structure to form a living thing. That is, what to you think the half lives of the polymers would be before they decompose?Indefinitely, since the molecular selections derive from dynamically shifted equilibrium reactions. We are discussing equilibria, where rate of formation equals rate of decomposition.
The experiment you are proposing is not an equilibrium condition. You are proposing a cycle of heating and cooling and exposure to UV light and then the absence of light. This doesn’t even represent a steady state thermodynamic condition. Any molecules you might form are subject to these same dynamic conditions. The exposure of these molecules to UV light would create free radicals increasing their reactivity to other molecules.
Are you talking about lipid based amphiphiles, if so, where do you get the lipids?This takes us back not knowing specific chemistry. A great many compounds are amphiphiles. The theory certainly posits that the end point of selection is phospholipid but I cannot, at present, specify starting points.
Unless you can describe how lipids form in large amounts inorganically (in order to produce phospholipids), your concept of protocells has no more logical basis than the RNA world hypothesis which posits that large amounts of RNA bases can somehow be formed inorganically. At least the Miller experiment produced a few amino acids from simple inorganic chemicals.
You said the following in your previous post, “Such randomization will tend to lead to the accumulation of oscillations whose component chemicals are protected from randomization.” I am trying to understand this statement.An oscillation must involve at least two component chemicals - to produce an equilibrium reaction whose position shifts in response to temperature changes. The degree of protection will be some weighted average drawn from the physicochemical properties of an oscillation's component chemicals.
The concept of an oscillation in the thermodynamic sense is the exchange of energy back at forth between two forms of energy. For example a pendulum oscillates back and forth with exchanges of energy between kinetic and potential forms. Perhaps if you describe your oscillations in terms of the energy forms being exchanged, your proposal would be more comprehensible. Why should simply heating and cooling a solution protect that solution from randomization?

[Mercutio]

Maybe it is as simple as coming up with a name for it. The persistency of the illusion of free will added to the depth it's buried in society's consciousness means that there needs to be a noun to describe what it actually is.

Human will? Free choice?Within the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, we simply call it "choice". An organism (human or other) does choose to do one thing or another; there is no question of that. But by manipulating the environmental conditions favoring one option or another, we can experimentally study the determinants of those choices. There is no reason to add the "free" to "choice", at least not until there is evidence that it is an appropriate adjective. :D

[Mr. Scott]

If you had read the next sentence in that post you would have seen: "If you can present a reasoned and logical selection process that when used in the ev model shows that you can accumulate information quickly enough, you have proved your case."

That avoided answering my question. I asked what your response/reaction would be. You merely reiterated my statement, essentially saying, redundantly, "If you prove your case, then you prove your case." You did not say what your reaction would be to evolutionists proving that evolution was possible in the given time frame.

Would it have any effect on your belief system? Would you abandon creationism and cease this crusade? If not, why not?

[kjkent1]

It is clear that there are harmful mutations. Consider how many genetic diseases are caused by mutations. Any realistic selection mechanism must consider both beneficial and harmful mutations. Dr Schneider’s selection process is contrived but at least considers both beneficial and harmful mutations.You are intentionally blinding yourself to avoid any hypotheses which will defeat your logic, and thereby defeat your theology. If an area contains non-functional dna, then (and according to your own mathematical impossibility argument) the chance that a mutation might accidentally cause a non-coding area to suddenly start coding for an activity, beneficial or detrimental, is infinitesimally small. So, ignoring the junk-dna area as a selective mechanism is entirely consistent with YOUR OWN theory.

But, in order to maintain your own argument, you are unconsciously avoiding this reality. So your logic fails here completely, and Unnamed's selection method absolutely defeats your conclusion that it is unrealistic.

This is why I posed to you the question about how much “junk-DNA” there is in prokaryotes. You can’t define a simulation with a genome composed of all “junk-DNA” except a small portion that is evolving and call this realistic.Once again, you shield yourself from the obvious possibility that two small sections of the genome can evolve to code for different functions, but when viewed in retrospect, they will appear for all the world to be one section which has evolved multiple functions. Similarly, those two sections could evolve along with another small section and when viewed in retrospect, the three will appear to be one bigger section coding for even more functions.

So, as I've been saying all along, you have set up a false premise: that one huge section of the genome must evolve all at once, when in fact, no such requirement exists. Your theory is mathematically correct, and entirely irrelevant, because it does not model reality.

Your insistence that a gene must code for its entire modern functionality in one fell swoop, as if the gene (or a designer) had a final goal in mind, when the molecule was first forming, blinds you to any alternate possibility.

This is a requirement of your own belief system, however it is not a requirement of nature. In fact, the means by which the molecule avoids your law of large numbers problem, proves why there is no designer. If there were a designer, the gene wouldn't have to evolve in small steps, because the goal would be set in advance.

I now present an argument why there is no selection process that can evolve existing genes to entirely new genes. Consider the concept of evolving an existing gene that produces a polypeptide with a particular function to an entirely new gene that produces a polypeptide with an entirely different function. Let’s call the initial form of the gene, genex and the final form of the gene, geney and the transformation genex -> geney requires n base substitutions such that genex1 -> genex2 -> genex3 -> … -> genexn = geney. Each one of the base substitutions to genex (genex1, genex2, genex3, …, genexn) must produce beneficial polypeptides (protein1, protein2, protein3, …, proteinn) in order to give beneficial selection so that the frequency of each of the n steps in the sequence be maintained or increased in the gene pool. If any of the n steps in the processes is a detrimental mutation and produces a nonfunctional polypeptide, that sequence will be selected against and the frequency of that sequence will be reduced in the gene pool and interfere with the transformation. There is no selection process that can accomplish the n steps for the tens of thousands of different genes seen in living things since every step in the transformation requires benefical mutations, otherwise selection can not occur.This is another false premise. You avoid the equally likely possibility that at any step along the way, a mutation may be neutral. So, using your logic, if there are two states which do not defeat evolution, and one that does, then given random chance, it is 1/3rd more likely that the the molecule will remain in the race than it is that the molecule will be destroyed. And, even the premise that a harmful mutation guarantees destruction is false. You are trying to characterize everything that happens as a choice between a cancerous death and the arising of a new species.

But, the mutations that you're arguing about are only relevant if they occur in a germ cell, so these mutations, good or bad will either propagate throughout the entire organism, or they will prevent the organism from developing. And, so the odds are 1/3rd in favor of maintaining the organism's existence at every decision point.

[kleinman]

If you had read the next sentence in that post you would have seen: "If you can present a reasoned and logical selection process that when used in the ev model shows that you can accumulate information quickly enough, you have proved your case."That avoided answering my question. I asked what your response/reaction would be. You merely reiterated my statement, essentially saying, redundantly, "If you prove your case, then you prove your case." You did not say what your reaction would be to evolutionists proving that evolution was possible in the given time frame.
Oh, you are looking for the touchy/feely answer to the question for your touchy/feely theory . Well the touchy/feely answer to that question is, I would be amazed since there is no selection process that can evolve a gene from the beginning and no selection process that can transform an existing gene with a given function to a new gene with a totally different function. Is that touchy/feely enough for you?
Would it have any effect on your belief system? Would you abandon creationism and cease this crusade? If not, why not?
Why do ask this question? Do you think I would do what evolutionists do and just claim that there are gaps in my belief system?

Mr Scott, in case you haven’t noticed, there are real mathematical problems with your theory. The slogan “mutation and natural selection” no longer qualifies as an explanation for how evolution occurs, let alone a proof for the theory. Unless you or some other evolutionist can explain how selection can evolve a gene from the beginning and how selection can transform genes from one to another, you have no scientific basis for your theory.
It is clear that there are harmful mutations. Consider how many genetic diseases are caused by mutations. Any realistic selection mechanism must consider both beneficial and harmful mutations. Dr Schneider’s selection process is contrived but at least considers both beneficial and harmful mutations.You are intentionally blinding yourself to avoid any hypotheses which will defeat your logic, and thereby defeat your theology. If an area contains non-functional dna, then (and according to your own mathematical impossibility argument) the chance that a mutation might accidentally cause a non-coding area to suddenly start coding for an activity, beneficial or detrimental, is infinitesimally small. So, ignoring the junk-dna area as a selective mechanism is entirely consistent with YOUR OWN theory.

But, in order to maintain your own argument, you are unconsciously avoiding this reality. So your logic fails here completely, and Unnamed's selection method absolutely defeats your conclusion that it is unrealistic.
I’m waiting for you to open my eyes to the selection process that would evolve a gene from the beginning and the selection process that would transform genes from one to another. Why don’t you explain how the “junk DNA” area of a genome is a selective mechanism? The only thing you can say about a mutation which occurs in “junk DNA” area is that it has no selective effect either way. The problem with Unnamed’s selection process is that mutations in the entire non-binding site region have almost no selective effect. You said that prokaryotes have only about 15% “junk DNA”. As a starting point, take 15% of the genome in ev as “junk DNA” and the other 85% as functioning DNA. Mutations in the functioning area cause those creatures to be selected out while mutations in the other 15% are selected for benefical effect.
This is why I posed to you the question about how much “junk-DNA” there is in prokaryotes. You can’t define a simulation with a genome composed of all “junk-DNA” except a small portion that is evolving and call this realistic.Once again, you shield yourself from the obvious possibility that two small sections of the genome can evolve to code for different functions, but when viewed in retrospect, they will appear for all the world to be one section which has evolved multiple functions. Similarly, those two sections could evolve along with another small section and when viewed in retrospect, the three will appear to be one bigger section coding for even more functions.
Unfortunately for your argument, ev is demonstrating something completely different. When you have two different selection criteria, one can and does dominate the other and in the case of Dr Schneider’s selection process, prevents binding sites from evolving when the errors in the non-binding site region dominate the selection process.
I now present an argument why there is no selection process that can evolve existing genes to entirely new genes. Consider the concept of evolving an existing gene that produces a polypeptide with a particular function to an entirely new gene that produces a polypeptide with an entirely different function. Let’s call the initial form of the gene, genex and the final form of the gene, geney and the transformation genex -> geney requires n base substitutions such that genex1 -> genex2 -> genex3 -> … -> genexn = geney. Each one of the base substitutions to genex (genex1, genex2, genex3, …, genexn) must produce beneficial polypeptides (protein1, protein2, protein3, …, proteinn) in order to give beneficial selection so that the frequency of each of the n steps in the sequence be maintained or increased in the gene pool. If any of the n steps in the processes is a detrimental mutation and produces a nonfunctional polypeptide, that sequence will be selected against and the frequency of that sequence will be reduced in the gene pool and interfere with the transformation. There is no selection process that can accomplish the n steps for the tens of thousands of different genes seen in living things since every step in the transformation requires benefical mutations, otherwise selection can not occur.This is another false premise. You avoid the equally likely possibility then at any step along the way, a mutation may be neutral. So, using your logic, if there are two states which do not defeat evolution, and one that does, then given random chance, it is 1/3rd more likely that the the molecule will remain in the race than it is that the molecule will be destroyed. And, even the premise that a harmful mutation guarantees destruction is false. You are trying to characterize everything that happens as a choice between a cancerous death and the arising of a new species.
If a mutation is neutral, selection does not occur and the frequency of occurrence of the sequence of bases is not increased in the gene pool. Base substitutions that are neutral do not improve the probability that a gene can evolve. Of course, you have 10^500 alternative universes so you don’t need selection to evolve anything, random chance is enough for your theory.

[cyborg]

Mr Scott, in case you haven’t noticed, there are real mathematical problems with your theory.

Mr Kleinman, in case you haven't noticed, there is a real mathematical problem with you claiming 'improbable' is 'impossible'.

Until you can grasp this your opinions on mathematics are worthless.

[John Hewitt]

I understand the concept that gradients of one type can lead to gradients of other types, for example a temperature gradient can lead to an electric gradient. Why do you think that UV light can produce the complex molecules that are necessary for life?
If we take a simple example of selection, derived from the volatility of molecules. Volatie molecules will tend to be found in the atmosphere, where they are easily exposed to UV. Many free radicle generating reactions produce can couplings of chains - for example, the Wurtz reaction between sodium metal and alkyl halides, such as ethyl chloride, works by producing alkyl radicals which then join to produce an alkane, in the case of ethyl chloride it would be butane. A similar coupling reactions is found in the free radicle mediated chlorination of methane, and produces ethane as a minor product.
Such free radicle mediated couplings will produce higher molecular weight and lower volatility products. For similar reasons, molecular selection will tend to produce oxygenated molecules which are usually less volatile than hydrocarbons and also often to dissolve in water where they will be more proected from UV.
These larger molecules are not, in themselves, the molecules necessary for life, and neither is molecular selection by this route evolution but it does provide us with a pool of chemicals within which equilibria will occur to produce oscillations in response to the daily solar cycle.

The experiment you are proposing is not an equilibrium condition. You are proposing a cycle of heating and cooling and exposure to UV light and then the absence of light. This doesn’t even represent a steady state thermodynamic condition. Any molecules you might form are subject to these same dynamic conditions. The exposure of these molecules to UV light would create free radicals increasing their reactivity to other molecules. No its is not an equilibrium situation, it is the best available guess at conditions on the prebiotic earth. I take that as my starting point. Yes free radicles are highly energetic and reactive, and essentially randomized a mixture of chemicals. Selection will favour those molecules that are minimally exposed to UV.

Unless you can describe how lipids form in large amounts inorganically (in order to produce phospholipids), your concept of protocells has no more logical basis than the RNA world hypothesis which posits that large amounts of RNA bases can somehow be formed inorganically. At least the Miller experiment produced a few amino acids from simple inorganic chemicals. No more experimental basis - that is true. No more logical basis? I would disagree but I am sure that many others would agree with you.

The concept of an oscillation in the thermodynamic sense is the exchange of energy back at forth between two forms of energy. For example a pendulum oscillates back and forth with exchanges of energy between kinetic and potential forms. Perhaps if you describe your oscillations in terms of the energy forms being exchanged, your proposal would be more comprehensible. Why should simply heating and cooling a solution protect that solution from randomization?
What you say is true but not applicable. I am suggesting driven oscillations that draw their energy from the sun's heat. The reactions I have in mind are equilibrium reactions that only oscillate because of the sun's influence. My point is that those oscillations will be subject to a selection that derives from the kinds of high energy processes we were just discussing.

[Dr Richard]

Dear Kleinman,

Base substitutions that are neutral do not improve the probability that a gene can evolve.

Would you please define what you mean by "neutral" as I suspect you are being rather tautalogical and defining as "neutral" as "not improving the probability that the gene will evolve."

[kleinman]

I understand the concept that gradients of one type can lead to gradients of other types, for example a temperature gradient can lead to an electric gradient. Why do you think that UV light can produce the complex molecules that are necessary for life?If we take a simple example of selection, derived from the volatility of molecules. Volatie molecules will tend to be found in the atmosphere, where they are easily exposed to UV. Many free radicle generating reactions produce can couplings of chains - for example, the Wurtz reaction between sodium metal and alkyl halides, such as ethyl chloride, works by producing alkyl radicals which then join to produce an alkane, in the case of ethyl chloride it would be butane. A similar coupling reactions is found in the free radicle mediated chlorination of methane, and produces ethane as a minor product.
Such free radicle mediated couplings will produce higher molecular weight and lower volatility products. For similar reasons, molecular selection will tend to produce oxygenated molecules which are usually less volatile than hydrocarbons and also often to dissolve in water where they will be more proected from UV.
These larger molecules are not, in themselves, the molecules necessary for life, and neither is molecular selection by this route evolution but it does provide us with a pool of chemicals within which equilibria will occur to produce oscillations in response to the daily solar cycle.
The Wurtz reaction requires metallic sodium. Are you proposing that this reaction is the mechanism for forming long chain hydrocarbons in the primordial soup? How long do you think sodium would remain in a metallic form outside a tightly controlled environment?
The experiment you are proposing is not an equilibrium condition. You are proposing a cycle of heating and cooling and exposure to UV light and then the absence of light. This doesn’t even represent a steady state thermodynamic condition. Any molecules you might form are subject to these same dynamic conditions. The exposure of these molecules to UV light would create free radicals increasing their reactivity to other molecules.No its is not an equilibrium situation, it is the best available guess at conditions on the prebiotic earth. I take that as my starting point. Yes free radicles are highly energetic and reactive, and essentially randomized a mixture of chemicals. Selection will favour those molecules that are minimally exposed to UV.
So on one hand, you propose that UV light is driving the reactions while on the other hand selection favors those molecules that are minimally exposed to the UV. Why do you believe that this type of chemical environment can produce the most complicated chemicals known?
Unless you can describe how lipids form in large amounts inorganically (in order to produce phospholipids), your concept of protocells has no more logical basis than the RNA world hypothesis which posits that large amounts of RNA bases can somehow be formed inorganically. At least the Miller experiment produced a few amino acids from simple inorganic chemicals.No more experimental basis - that is true. No more logical basis? I would disagree but I am sure that many others would agree with you.
Your explanation above for the formation of long chain hydrocarbons works fine in the laboratory but what is you logical basis for using the Wurtz reaction in the uncontrolled environment of the primordial earth?
The concept of an oscillation in the thermodynamic sense is the exchange of energy back at forth between two forms of energy. For example a pendulum oscillates back and forth with exchanges of energy between kinetic and potential forms. Perhaps if you describe your oscillations in terms of the energy forms being exchanged, your proposal would be more comprehensible. Why should simply heating and cooling a solution protect that solution from randomization?What you say is true but not applicable. I am suggesting driven oscillations that draw their energy from the sun's heat. The reactions I have in mind are equilibrium reactions that only oscillate because of the sun's influence. My point is that those oscillations will be subject to a selection that derives from the kinds of high energy processes we were just discussing.
Could you explain how heating and cooling a solution will produce the complex molecules required of living things? If you were to perform this experiment, what would be the raw materials you would use to initiate this experiment?
Base substitutions that are neutral do not improve the probability that a gene can evolve.Would you please define what you mean by "neutral" as I suspect you are being rather tautalogical and defining as "neutral" as "not improving the probability that the gene will evolve."
A base substitution which is beneficial would give selective benefit for that creature and improve the likelihood that the creature would reproduce, a base substitution which is detrimental would reduce the selective benefit for that creature and reduce the likelihood that the creature would reproduce, a base substitution which is neutral would not alter the likelihood that the creature can reproduce.

Unless a mutation gives selective benefit, you can not improve the probabilities of evolving a gene. Beneficial mutations increase the frequency of that gene in the gene pool. Neutral mutations have no affect on the frequency of that gene in the gene pool and detrimental mutations reduce the frequency of that gene in the gene pool.

This is why I argue that when evolving a gene from the beginning, that until that gene does some beneficial function for that creature, the partially evolved gene offers no selective benefit and thus does not increase in frequency in the gene pool. Evolution of this gene from the beginning is dependent on mutation without selection.

[cyborg]

Evolution of this gene from the beginning is dependent on mutation without selection.

Which, despite you insisting otherwise, is not impossible - until G is infinite at least. Insisting otherwise is to not even understand your own supposedly mathematical argument.

[John Hewitt]

The Wurtz reaction requires metallic sodium. Are you proposing that this reaction is the mechanism for forming long chain hydrocarbons in the primordial soup? How long do you think sodium would remain in a metallic form outside a tightly controlled environment?
That reaction was merely an example of a free radicle reaction. The addition of sodium metal to ethyl chloride generates ethyl radicles whuch can react together to produce butane. The net effect of this radicle reaction leads to larger molecular weight compounds. UV radicle formation is likely to produce similar pathways and, I suggest, their differential volatilities will lead to differential exposures to UV.

So on one hand, you propose that UV light is driving the reactions while on the other hand selection favors those molecules that are minimally exposed to the UV. Why do you believe that this type of chemical environment can produce the most complicated chemicals known? For this you are referred to the extended discussion on my web site.

Your explanation above for the formation of long chain hydrocarbons works fine in the laboratory but what is you logical basis for using the Wurtz reaction in the uncontrolled environment of the primordial earth? Refer to first reply above.

Could you explain how heating and cooling a solution will produce the complex molecules required of living things? If you were to perform this experiment, what would be the raw materials you would use to initiate this experiment?
Chemical equilibria are usually temperature senisitive - that is to say, their equilibrium constants vary with temperature. I would use a mixture that approximated our present best guess about the prebiotic soup and/or the atmosphere of early earth.

[kleinman]

The Wurtz reaction requires metallic sodium. Are you proposing that this reaction is the mechanism for forming long chain hydrocarbons in the primordial soup? How long do you think sodium would remain in a metallic form outside a tightly controlled environment?That reaction was merely an example of a free radicle reaction. The addition of sodium metal to ethyl chloride generates ethyl radicles whuch can react together to produce butane. The net effect of this radicle reaction leads to larger molecular weight compounds. UV radicle formation is likely to produce similar pathways and, I suggest, their differential volatilities will lead to differential exposures to UV.
Coupling of haloalkanes in the presence of an active metal increases yields in these reactions which lengthen hydrocarbons. This has to be done in an inert solvent. Why do you think UV exposure would perform anything similar to this type of reaction in a salt solution?
So on one hand, you propose that UV light is driving the reactions while on the other hand selection favors those molecules that are minimally exposed to the UV. Why do you believe that this type of chemical environment can produce the most complicated chemicals known?For this you are referred to the extended discussion on my web site.
Why don’t you post a link to the page? You seem to be saying something contradictory here.
Your explanation above for the formation of long chain hydrocarbons works fine in the laboratory but what is you logical basis for using the Wurtz reaction in the uncontrolled environment of the primordial earth?Refer to first reply above.
Why do you think that Wurtz reaction is a reasonable analogy to what would happen on the primordial earth. What is analogous between the Wurtz reaction and what you propose to do with UV light?
Could you explain how heating and cooling a solution will produce the complex molecules required of living things? If you were to perform this experiment, what would be the raw materials you would use to initiate this experiment?Chemical equilibria are usually temperature senisitive - that is to say, their equilibrium constants vary with temperature. I would use a mixture that approximated our present best guess about the prebiotic soup and/or the atmosphere of early earth.
What inorganic chemicals can you cyclically heat and cool and form the mers of complex organic molecules let alone link these mers to form the complex polymers seen in living things whether they be proteins, lipids, carbohydrates or genetic polymers?

[cyborg]

What inorganic chemicals can you cyclically heat and cool and form the mers of complex organic molecules let alone link these mers to form the complex polymers seen in living things whether they be proteins, lipids, carbohydrates or genetic polymers?

There is, by definition, no inorganic chemicals that can form organic molecules.

What a stupid question.

[John Hewitt]

Coupling of haloalkanes in the presence of an active metal increases yields in these reactions which lengthen hydrocarbons. This has to be done in an inert solvent. Why do you think UV exposure would perform anything similar to this type of reaction in a salt solution?

Why don’t you post a link to the page? You seem to be saying something contradictory here.

Why do you think that Wurtz reaction is a reasonable analogy to what would happen on the primordial earth. What is analogous between the Wurtz reaction and what you propose to do with UV light?

What inorganic chemicals can you cyclically heat and cool and form the mers of complex organic molecules let alone link these mers to form the complex polymers seen in living things whether they be proteins, lipids, carbohydrates or genetic polymers?
I merely used the Wurtz reaction as an example of free radicle generation and its consequences. I am sorry you disapproved of that but I am not suggesting it was involved in prebiosis. The point of my work is that protected chemicals will not be exposed (much) to UV and selection would operate to favour oscillations involving those chemicals; the concentrations of chemicals involved in protected oscillations will tend to increase at the expense of those involved in unprotected oscillations.
The atmosphere would have contained such things as methane, which is an "organic" chemical and CO2 which is "inorganic" but the distinction is human and has no real meaning. Whenever, by chance, high energy reactions produced carbon compounds involved in protected oscillations, the net effect would be an increase in the concentration of all the component chemicals of that oscillation.

[The Atheist]

Within the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, we simply call it "choice". An organism (human or other) does choose to do one thing or another; there is no question of that. But by manipulating the environmental conditions favoring one option or another, we can experimentally study the determinants of those choices. There is no reason to add the "free" to "choice", at least not until there is evidence that it is an appropriate adjective. :DSure; a dog can choose to lay down in the grass or on the driveway. I think we have a great deal more choices than animals and a different way of assessing the choices available to the extent that a specific description of what humans have would be helpful when talking to those people who still need a blanky.

Hyparxis' "volition" is close, although it leans more towards the will than I'd personally use.

<<I'll leave the subject there though, as it appears that the thread has been un-derailed to the extent that people are actually listening to each other!>>

[kleinman]

Coupling of haloalkanes in the presence of an active metal increases yields in these reactions which lengthen hydrocarbons. This has to be done in an inert solvent. Why do you think UV exposure would perform anything similar to this type of reaction in a salt solution?

Why don’t you post a link to the page? You seem to be saying something contradictory here.

Why do you think that Wurtz reaction is a reasonable analogy to what would happen on the primordial earth. What is analogous between the Wurtz reaction and what you propose to do with UV light?

What inorganic chemicals can you cyclically heat and cool and form the mers of complex organic molecules let alone link these mers to form the complex polymers seen in living things whether they be proteins, lipids, carbohydrates or genetic polymers?I merely used the Wurtz reaction as an example of free radicle generation and its consequences. I am sorry you disapproved of that but I am not suggesting it was involved in prebiosis. The point of my work is that protected chemicals will not be exposed (much) to UV and selection would operate to favour oscillations involving those chemicals; the concentrations of chemicals involved in protected oscillations will tend to increase at the expense of those involved in unprotected oscillations.
The atmosphere would have contained such things as methane, which is an "organic" chemical and CO2 which is "inorganic" but the distinction is human and has no real meaning. Whenever, by chance, high energy reactions produced carbon compounds involved in protected oscillations, the net effect would be an increase in the concentration of all the component chemicals of that oscillation.
It’s not that I disapprove of your example, I just don’t see an analogy between the Wurtz reaction and the reactions that might have occurred in the primordial soup.

I don’t doubt that heating and cooling a mixture of CH4, CO2, NH3, H2 in a solution of salt water and exposing this solution to UV light will give some chemical reactions but the yield of amino acids, RNA bases and lipids would be tiny if at all. Any polymerization of this mixture would not stay stable for long periods of time and what would determine the sequence of any of the polymers you might get?

[kjkent1]

Why don’t you explain how the “junk DNA” area of a genome is a selective mechanism? The only thing you can say about a mutation which occurs in “junk DNA” area is that it has no selective effect either way.OK, the junk DNA region stores unused genetic material which is occasionally mutated, recombined, translated, inserted, deleted, etc. If any length of that non-coding region receives a change which suddenly codes for something, and that something provides a selective advantage, then that advantage will be maintained. This would permit a potentially very complex change to arise suddenly, rather than to slowly evolve over a long period of time. And, since the length and location of the suddenly appearing coded region can be of any length and in any location, the odds of the occurrence are not determined by permutations available as a function of the total length of the region.

The region could be a million bases long, but if only 1,000 suddenly code for a selective advantage, then that's the only portion which will be activated.

The problem with Unnamed’s selection process is that mutations in the entire non-binding site region have almost no selective effect. You said that prokaryotes have only about 15% “junk DNA”. As a starting point, take 15% of the genome in ev as “junk DNA” and the other 85% as functioning DNA. Mutations in the functioning area cause those creatures to be selected out while mutations in the other 15% are selected for benefical effect.I've reviewed Unnamed's algorithm, and you are not describing what the algorithm is doing. At the beginning of an ev run, the algorithm gives equal selective weight to the value of a mistake/mutation in either the binding or non-binding region. The selective weight increasingly favors the binding site region as the creature approaches perfection. This seems to me a pretty reasonable assumption of reality.

I believe that you are very mistakenly treating all the permutations of a length of n genetic material as if it were a probability space which has one possible biological coding, and n - 1 non-coding space. From that, you extrapolate that life is mathematically impossible.

But, suppose that of all the possible genetic codes, that 0.1% of those codes code for some biological feature. If that ratio happens to be true, then your statement about infinitely small probabilities is meaningless, because the reality is that the odds of biology occurring is really 1/1000, rather than one over near infinity. But, I'll be generous. Let's say that the probability space is only 1/1E+9. That's still a long way from your mathematically impossible argument.

So, unless you're prepared to show how the probability space codes for biology vis-a-vis junk, you cannot possibly maintain the assertion of mathematical impossibility, because you don't really have any idea of what the actually odds of an emergent biological function are.

What you DO know, is that there are a hell of a lot of different species running around, and an even larger number of other species which have gone extinct. So there is definitely a very wide diversity of possible life-coding permutations -- although I doubt that anyone can calculate the useful organic probability space. If you can, then please do the calculations for us.

Reality shows a huge diversity of life, while you demand that life is impossible because your math says so.

If a patient presents to you with the claim that he has a formula which proves that all life is mathematically impossible, unless you believe in magic, do you say, "Sounds good to me," or do you refer him/her to a therapist?

[John Hewitt]

It’s not that I disapprove of your example, I just don’t see an analogy between the Wurtz reaction and the reactions that might have occurred in the primordial soup. I have already stated my position of this.

I don’t doubt that heating and cooling a mixture of CH4, CO2, NH3, H2 in a solution of salt water and exposing this solution to UV light will give some chemical reactions but the yield of amino acids, RNA bases and lipids would be tiny if at all. Any polymerization of this mixture would not stay stable for long periods of time and what would determine the sequence of any of the polymers you might get? It seems to me that the assertions in here are untested, untestable or immaterial and the questions unanswerable.

[kleinman]

Why don’t you explain how the “junk DNA” area of a genome is a selective mechanism? The only thing you can say about a mutation which occurs in “junk DNA” area is that it has no selective effect either way.OK, the junk DNA region stores unused genetic material which is occasionally mutated, recombined, translated, inserted, deleted, etc. If any length of that non-coding region receives a change which suddenly codes for something, and that something provides a selective advantage, then that advantage will be maintained. This would permit a potentially very complex change to arise suddenly, rather than to slowly evolve over a long period of time. And, since the length and location of the suddenly appearing coded region can be of any length and in any location, the odds of the occurrence are not determined by permutations available as a function of the total length of the region.

The region could be a million bases long, but if only 1,000 suddenly code for a selective advantage, then that's the only portion which will be activated.
Your description of junk DNA sounds frighteningly like my refrigerator. You wouldn’t be stringing me along would you?
The problem with Unnamed’s selection process is that mutations in the entire non-binding site region have almost no selective effect. You said that prokaryotes have only about 15% “junk DNA”. As a starting point, take 15% of the genome in ev as “junk DNA” and the other 85% as functioning DNA. Mutations in the functioning area cause those creatures to be selected out while mutations in the other 15% are selected for beneficial effect.I've reviewed Unnamed's algorithm, and you are not describing what the algorithm is doing. At the beginning of an ev run, the algorithm gives equal selective weight to the value of a mistake/mutation in either the binding or non-binding region. The selective weight increasingly favors the binding site region as the creature approaches perfection. This seems to me a pretty reasonable assumption of reality.
Unnamed’s selection process is so rapid, we should at least have evolved to the level of Vulcans by now.
I believe that you are very mistakenly treating all the permutations of a length of n genetic material as if it were a probability space which has one possible biological coding, and n - 1 non-coding space. From that, you extrapolate that life is mathematically impossible.
Are you sure it’s not the permutations and combinations?
But, suppose that of all the possible genetic codes, that 0.1% of those codes code for some biological feature. If that ratio happens to be true, then your statement about infinitely small probabilities is meaningless, because the reality is that the odds of biology occurring is really 1/1000, rather than one over near infinity. But, I'll be generous. Let's say that the probability space is only 1/1E+9. That's still a long way from your mathematically impossible argument.
Your logic is impeccable, oops, I mean imperceptible.
So, unless you're prepared to show how the probability space codes for biology vis-a-vis junk, you cannot possibly maintain the assertion of mathematical impossibility, because you don't really have any idea of what the actually odds of an emergent biological function are.
Your honor, I do maintain that the theory of evolution resides on the junk DNA region of science.
What you DO know, is that there are a hell of a lot of different species running around, and an even larger number of other species which have gone extinct. So there is definitely a very wide diversity of possible life-coding permutations -- although I doubt that anyone can calculate the useful organic probability space. If you can, then please do the calculations for us.
Don’t forget, some of those species also fly, swim, hop, slither, squirm, flagellate and a whole bunch just sit there.
Reality shows a huge diversity of life, while you demand that life is impossible because your math says so.
A famous mathematician once said “I’m definitely positive about the negative but I’m a little negative about the positive.”
If a patient presents to you with the claim that he has a formula which proves that all life is mathematically impossible, unless you believe in magic, do you say, "Sounds good to me," or do you refer him/her to a therapist?
I only refer him/her to a therapist when they have denialophila, hyperextraplopia, speculitis and amathematica sciencea.

Now I will be away from this discussion until next week. I want you all to behave while I’m gone because we don’t want Paul having to say such things as:
This thread is now officially crapola.

[Apathia]

Sure; a dog can choose to lay down in the grass or on the driveway. I think we have a great deal more choices than animals and a different way of assessing the choices available to the extent that a specific description of what humans have would be helpful when talking to those people who still need a blanky.

Hyparxis' "volition" is close, although it leans more towards the will than I'd personally use.

<<I'll leave the subject there though, as it appears that the thread has been un-derailed to the extent that people are actually listening to each other!>>

Nostrilldumass predicts that any term used will eventually bloat to metaphysical proportions.

[kjkent1]

If a patient presents to you with the claim that he has a formula which proves that all life is mathematically impossible, unless you believe in magic, do you say, "Sounds good to me," or do you refer him/her to a therapist?I only refer him/her to a therapist when they have denialophila, hyperextraplopia, speculitis and amathematica sciencea.Then, your therapy bill must look like the national debt.

[Dr Richard]

A base substitution which is beneficial would give selective benefit for that creature and improve the likelihood that the creature would reproduce, a base substitution which is detrimental would reduce the selective benefit for that creature and reduce the likelihood that the creature would reproduce, a base substitution which is neutral would not alter the likelihood that the creature can reproduce.[/SIZE][/FONT]

So yes, you are defining a base substitution as neutral as one not improving the likelihood of the creature to reproduce, rendering your earlier statement a tautology.


Unless a mutation gives selective benefit, you can not improve the probabilities of evolving a gene. Beneficial mutations increase the frequency of that gene in the gene pool. Neutral mutations have no affect on the frequency of that gene in the gene pool and detrimental mutations reduce the frequency of that gene in the gene pool.


Could you please give examples of substitutions you would consider neutral? And why?

This is why I argue that when evolving a gene from the beginning, that until that gene does some beneficial function for that creature, the partially evolved gene offers no selective benefit and thus does not increase in frequency in the gene pool. Evolution of this gene from the beginning is dependent on mutation without selection.[/QUOTE]

A gene mutation which is truly neutral according to your definition would actually persist within the gene pool, until it was further influenced by a mutation which would make it beneficial or harmful. This allows the accumulation of many alleles of the gene which may then be of benefit to the creature when subjected to a change in selection pressure.

Which is what happens in real life, interestingly enough. Isn't science cool?

[cyborg]

Unnamed’s selection process is so rapid, we should at least have evolved to the level of Vulcans by now.

Well a Star Trek view of evolution certainly would explain some things.

Levels indeed. What a moron.

[delphi_ote]

Unnamed’s selection process is so rapid, we should at least have evolved to the level of Vulcans by now.
Our lack of pointy ears and Leonard Nemoy-esque features is on par with the rest of your arguments against evolution. You seem to have a habit of mixing fiction and non-fiction. Just like your creation hypothesis, Star Trek is nothing more than a nice story.

[The Atheist]

Nostrilldumass predicts that any term used will eventually bloat to metaphysical proportions.

:dl:

True.

[Schneibster]

Nostrilldumass predicts that any term used will eventually bloat to metaphysical proportions.The average IQ is 100.

[articulett]

Thank you for the link, it is very useful. I put a comment onto that blog with a link to my own work.
Shapiro doesn't talk about data or oscillations because that is my work, not his and my work is not yet widely known - though, I have previously sent Shapiro an email when I asked him for a copy of one of his papers. I do agree with him in supporting a metabolism first theory since I think that my work resolves many of the problems in such theories.

Regarding scientific fraud, what did you think about the fraudulent Columbia prayer studies mentioned in Randi's commentary this week? Do you consider those individuals part of the cheating scientists you mention?

http://www.randi.org/jr/2007-02/021607failure.html

[John Hewitt]

Regarding scientific fraud, what did you think about the fraudulent Columbia prayer studies mentioned in Randi's commentary this week? Do you consider those individuals part of the cheating scientists you mention?

http://www.randi.org/jr/2007-02/021607failure.html
Following the link I cannot find the Columbia studies but I agree that there are a good many fraudulent studies of this ilk.
I vaguely recall a report, from many years ago, by some nun, that one could increase the enzymatic activity of trypsin solutions by blessing them. I did find that amusing but I don't know whether it ever developed into a fraud and I don't think it is unscientific to look for a phenomenon that is not predicted by current theory.
Thus, for example, I don't feel I would categorise Ted Jahn as a fraud, though one can argue that he made some mistakes. Works, such as those become frauds when the claims are maintained even when the irreproducibility has become clear. I do regard Geller as a fraud.

What you need to try to understand is that fraud ocurs in all areas of human endeavour - including science proper. Intentional fraud becomes manifest when false claims are maintained into the teeth of contradiction and correction.
If you turn to my work on cell biology and cell motility, there were three theories in that field - all published in the supposedly "quality controlled" scientific literature. Never mind whether my work is better or worse evidenced than the alternatives (and I think it better evidenced.) The irrefutable basic truth is that there were always three theories; at least three to be more precise, since I may not know of others. And yet, these so called scientific experts, these leaders in their field, repeatedly report that there are only two.

That is fraud. The difference between two and three is not a matter of opinion or judgement, it is simply a matter of fact. It is repeated and deliberate false reporting into the teeth of correction. Scientists are entitled to think my work is wrong - and to defend their claim. They are not entitled to claim to have drawn a conclusion they are not willing to defend. Personally I do not believe those scientists are capable of defending their ideas against mine and I think that is why they ignore my work.

[articulett]

Can you give a quick run down of the three theories--just the 2 or 3 world title they are referred to by...