Comment #110670

Posted by Parse on July 8, 2006 1:53 AM (e)

“Edited report.” Sheesh. At least they’re somewhat honest and are admitting what they’re quoting isn’t verbatim. However, with enough editing, anything can happen. For example, here’s my version of the latest “edited post:”

A couple of weeks ago, William Dembski wrote another chapter of what could be considered the third testament of the bible. This anonymously edited report covered a talk that the heathen Ken Miller gave at Texas Tech back in March. This pillar of truth states that even though the majority of his views are in opposition to The Truth, there is still a ray of hope that he could possibly be saved since at this meeting he turned on the entire Neo-Darwinist Liberal Pseudoscience culture and embraced The Truth. Note that the majority of the Materialistic Conspiracy is in denial about this actually occurring; however, since they question what they think the truth is, this simply means they accept this verbatim recollection of events.

(Good grief, I feel like I need a shower after spewing such drivel…)

Comment #110683

Posted by Popper's ghost on July 8, 2006 4:43 AM (e)

DaveScot wrote:

The question and answer as Bill Dembski was given by someone in the audience recalling it wasn’t an unfair paraphrase. The verbage was different but the points were essentially the same.

We know that DaveScot is that dishonest, but is he that stupid to believe that “the points were essentially the same”?

And whether Ken Miller wants to admit it or not a unverse that was designed so that the evolution of life was inevitable fits just fine into the big ID tent.

Good grief, he must be. The “big ID tent” can contain the view that the evolution of life was “inevitable” … implying that it occurred? Well, gee, I guess there’s no controversy after all, and the IDiots can all pack up and go home.

Comment #110693

Posted by FastEddie on July 8, 2006 6:47 AM (e)

Dembski is a Lying Creationist Weasel.

Comment #110702

Posted by Freud_wore_a_slip? on July 8, 2006 7:38 AM (e)

Has anyone collected the specifics of every time IDers have out and out lied?

It’s fascinating that these folks clamor for respectability, whine that they aren’t, but fundamentally are just liars–in public and to themselves.

In the excellent new book Follies of the Wise, Frederick Crews writes:

“Certain indicators of bad faith, however, are unmistakable: persistence in claims that have already been exploded; reliance on ill-designed studies, idolized law givers, and self serving anecdotes; evasion of objections and negative instances; indifference to rival theories and to the need for independent replication; and ‘movement’ belligerence. Where several of these traits are found together, even a lay observer can be sure that no sound case could be made for the shielded theory; its uncompetitiveness is precisely what has necessitated these indulgences.”

To which I would add lies and quote mining.

Comment #110703

Posted by Jack Krebs on July 8, 2006 7:41 AM (e)

Let me remind people that we should always tape speeches we attend, if possible, and especially the Q&A sessions. This example, like others, is astounding: the difference between what actually happened and the spin put on it would be nothing but a “he said, she said” if we didn’t have the evidence.

Oh yeah - that’s exactly what the whole thing is about, isn’t it: just a bunch of competing assertions until you bring in that one little kicker - the evidence.

Oh well ….

As usual, by the way, Ken did a great job answering the question, I think.

Comment #110711

Posted by normdoering on July 8, 2006 8:26 AM (e)

From William Dembski:

Why shouldn’t Miller and Collins be called ID proponents (or at least ID sympathizers) when it comes to the origin of life? And if ID is scientifically valid at the origin of life, aren’t they on a slippery slope? If ID is potentially valid at the origin of life, what is to preclude its validity for the subsequent history of life?

Boy, is Dembski flubbing it. If he’d only open his ears and hear what Miller was saying he could find the real dividing line, the real wedge, between theistic and atheistic evolution.

Miller says:

The ironic thing is that the proponents of intelligent design actually don’t think that. Because they don’t think that the universe is well enough designed to make the evolution of life inevitable. They think constant intervention on the part of the creator is required to bring about the first life, the first living cell, the first chordate, the first insect, the first bird. In other words, the designer or the creator had to keep tinkering with it. So, in away, In think most biologists look at the universe and have a grander appreciation for the orderliness of the universe based on what many of us regard as the almost inevitability of the evolution of living things.

That’s what Dembski would call “front loading.” And in there Miller has buried what looks like an assumption I do not agree with. When Miller says “they don’t think that the universe is well enough designed to make the evolution of life inevitable,” he is still saying the universe is _designed_.

And there I think is the metaphysical dividing point where the theistic evolutionists line up with the IDists and us few atheistic evolutionists would part company from both.

When Miller then talks about “a grander appreciation for the orderliness of the universe” is there an assumption in there that this “orderliness” requires mind as a prime cause? Or can he turn that around and think “a mind requires orderliness in order to evolve?” Which is the cause and which is the effect?

Comment #110716

Posted by ag on July 8, 2006 8:42 AM (e)

For an analysis of Kenneth Miller’s positions on evolution and faith see this essay on Talk Reason.

Comment #110720

Posted by k.e. on July 8, 2006 9:38 AM (e)

Well norm’ the ‘wedge’ IS the dividing line as far as the DI-IDs are concerned, they desparately want Miller on their (political)team, hail the dear leader (corporal Howie and the seditious scribes of Seattle…..spoken with a lisp..th).

Dembski has thrown off his purple robes of neutral politics to come out all wing-nutty with a cute phrase such as

“Neo-Darwinist Liberal Pseudoscience culture “

…wha????

Hey Bill I thought this was all about religion?
Now its anti liberalism ? I’m shocked ..shocked I tell you.

NEXT you will be saying its anti-dishonesty and we all know the slippery slope THAT leads to….snicker.

So Pontius Dembski and his ‘nwaughty’ friends can go up and down the line of Centurions and ask each one JUST WHAT is so funny….(giggle).

Unfortunately for them, Miller is too smart (as well as being just a plain extraordinary honest scientist) to be dragged down by a reactionary rabble of ridiculous reductionists(Spoken MP like ..we-lease woger).

Ah you can’t make this stuff up.. the beauty of Pontius Dembski’s ivory tower is that inside, all kiss his lily white…. but the moment he steps outside the brown smelly stuff is up to his neck.
Pretty soon he’ll need an Ark, once the stuff seeps under the doors.
Serves the scum right.

Comment #110722

Posted by normdoering on July 8, 2006 9:44 AM (e)

When I said:

That’s what Dembski would call “front loading.” And in there Miller has buried what looks like an assumption I do not agree with. When Miller says “they don’t think that the universe is well enough designed to make the evolution of life inevitable,” he is still saying the universe is _designed_.

This is not the same as agreeing with Dave Scott who wrote:

…whether Ken Miller wants to admit it or not a unverse that was designed so that the evolution of life was inevitable fits just fine into the big ID tent.

Scott is wrong because nothing Behe wrote in his books or that Dembski has written about information is an argument for the complete front loading Miller is talking about. If Darwinian style mechanisms can’t create a bacterial flagellum then something else had to tweak it and that is what Miller was talking about when he says “they don’t think that the universe is well enough designed to make the evolution of life inevitable.” That is indeed what their arguments mean. As long as those are their arguments then their tent is not as big as Dave Scott thinks.

ID is those arguments made by Behe and Dembski. You can’t define it outside those arguments to include Miller’s view.

But that doesn’t mean I agree with any of them.

Comment #110730

Posted by steve s on July 8, 2006 10:43 AM (e)

I do wonder why he makes stuff up to mislead the readers of his blog.

As they say on Law and Order, ‘Asked and answered’.

Comment #110733

Posted by PuckSR on July 8, 2006 11:07 AM (e)

Wow…I cannot believe that I missed this.
Ken really needs to announce his lectures.
I had no idea that Ken Miller was lecturing at Texas Tech, despite being a student at the University.

There are a few “IDists” at Texas Tech, but unfortunately I have spoken with every one who is employed by the University…and they all will admit to actually being Creationists.

I am even more suprised that Dr. Dini was not more involved with his visit. Dr. Dini is an avid supporter of Evolution, and an ex-Catholic priest.

Ah well…maybe next time.

Comment #110737

Posted by k.e. on July 8, 2006 12:06 PM (e)

PuckSR said:

There are a few “IDists” at Texas Tech, but unfortunately I have spoken with every one who is employed by the University…and they all will admit to actually being Creationists.

Well it’s nice to know some people honestly own up to being credulous beyond reason.

Is that the result of some sort of Post McCarthiest “Cultural Engineering”?.

I’ll think I’ll drop my schtick about foreskin collectors and just go with full on genital mutilation..the revenge of the grandmothers. Pussy whacked …well pussies.

Puck, at least you know now whaat you have to do if you want a (MISSIONARY) position at the ‘tech.

2 cheers for hypocracy and all that, not 2 b confused with democracy.

Comment #110742

Posted by DragonScholar on July 8, 2006 12:41 PM (e)

Truly jaw-dropping. Honestly, does Dembski really believe in anything he says, if he has to resort to such blatant lying?

Comment #110743

Posted by fnxtr on July 8, 2006 12:45 PM (e)

If any judge ever believes that “intelligent design” is anything other than Christian apologetics, just show him/her that particular page of UD. Holy cow.

So Ken Miller believes his God started the universe so that life was “almost inevitable”, and then let it run. So what? Whether God made the first quark soup or not doesn’t matter to biology.

And apparently Dembski’s fingerpuppet davescot agrees with the naturalist explanation of life. I wonder what Silly Billy thinks of that.

But remember, ID is not about religion.

Ha. Ha. Ha.

Comment #110746

Posted by frank schmidt on July 8, 2006 1:22 PM (e)

As has been said many times, the conflict is really a sectarian one, within Christianity (broadly defined), and not between religious and non-religious views of the Universe. Ken Miller, George Coyne, Francis Collins, Simon Conway Morris et al. are more threatening to Dembski than Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett or Jerry Coyne.

The chief selling point of the theocratic fundies is that they are more anti-godless than anyone else. If that theme gets undercut, they will lose market share and money. That’s why Dembski worked so hard to lie about what Ken actually said and why we can expect more of the same in the future.

Comment #110750

Posted by Rupert on July 8, 2006 1:46 PM (e)

Have I got this straight? Dave Scott is on the side of mainstream Darwinism and against the whole ID business of complexity and information proving that Darwinism is wrong? And this is because Ken Miller has desperately tried to hide his closet ID beliefs through the backhanded, backtracking ploy of actually presenting real evidence which directly contradicts something Dembski says?

Jeez, it’s hard to follow IDers. Makes you sigh for MAN AS OLD AS COAL.

R

Comment #110752

Posted by Shaffer on July 8, 2006 2:15 PM (e)

Reading through that page of UD (I need a shower now) reminds me just how insidious the whole “big tent” strategy is, at least, in making arguments that can sound appealing to a passing layman. By sticking to nothing specific, DS, Demski et al always seem to leave themselves the argument that they’re being misrepresented. So long as the ID crowd allows its members to profess identification with so many different contradictory stances, then any attempts to educate people on what they believe will be terribly complicated.

The upswing is that their strategy means that as a united front, they will never be able to say anything substantive other than “it wasn’t all random” and “atheism is bad.” Any time you nail them to a chair and force them to give a straight answer (as in, say, the Dover trial), their true Creationist colors shine right through.

As an exercise in linguistic chicanery, the ID movement never fails to fascinate me.

Comment #110764

Posted by Michael Roberts on July 8, 2006 3:31 PM (e)

In a sense Dembski is right. A Christian like Ken Miller (whose views are very similar to mine) beleives in a real Creator and thus in a sense an intelligent designer. Hence ID has an initial apeal to most Christians - until they realise as I did that it is a load of distortion and bullshit.

By failing to capitalise the first letters of intelligent design many can get swept into ID and do. I have often tried to steer colleagues away from ID becuase they cnnot see the difference as they dont have the nouse to see the difference

Michael

Comment #110765

Posted by Karen on July 8, 2006 3:41 PM (e)

Hmmm….still learning the ropes around here and elsewhere. I finally actually read UD’s moderation policy, if you can call anything over there “moderate”. It was an AH HA!!! moment. No wonder I didn’t get my comment of awhile back posted. I was “moderated” out of existence for pointing out, very politely I might add, the twisting of meaning by quoting out of context, of an article by Michael Schermer at Sciam.

I also got a bit tickled by a post of a few weeks ago, by the admin over there, to the effect of coyly stating that everyone needed to stick to ID rather than everyone’s favorite topic - religion. Who do they think they’re kidding? That’s all the site IS!

Must be nice to get to misquote people like Schermer and Miller, (whose comments are ridiculously easy to verify, so one wonders why UD thinks they can do it with impunity), twist their words, and not have a soul be able to refute you to your face. To be surrounded by sycophantic hangers-on who only say what you want to hear…

Comment #110769

Posted by Anton Mates on July 8, 2006 4:16 PM (e)

Karen wrote:

Must be nice to get to misquote people like Schermer and Miller, (whose comments are ridiculously easy to verify, so one wonders why UD thinks they can do it with impunity

Hey, when they’re not doing that, they’re accusing Kevin Padian of anti-Asian rhetoric. I think they figure that if the probability of a claim’s truth falls within Dembski’s 1:(10^150) minimum bound, might as well go for it.

Comment #110783

Posted by Andrew McClure on July 8, 2006 5:34 PM (e)

So now ID has moved beyond just claiming supporters they don’t have, and into the realm of actually accusing people who are opponents of being supporters. Amazing.

Comment #110792

Posted by Eric Peterson on July 8, 2006 6:00 PM (e)

I don’t understand why Darwinists never write on the information content of structures or fail to follow a simple syllogism:

All instances of CSI is caused by intelligence.

All organisms are caused by CSI(DNA)

All organisms are caused by intelligent causation.

Are there other causes of information other than intelligence? Could Darwin produce a ships propellor by randomly entering(program)instructions into the computer of a cnc gantry mill used to mill huge propellors. Why not simply use flattened-out ‘82 buicks for the prop blades?

Comment #110795

Posted by Shaffer on July 8, 2006 6:20 PM (e)

Not really amazing. Remember that all Creationism is, when you boil it down, is a false dichotomy. Pro-science vs. Pro-God, anti-science vs. anti-God. Miller obviously isn’t anti-God, therefore he must be anti-science. If the public were to catch on that pro-science is not necessarily anti-God - that the two are reconcilable on some level - the damage done to Creationism’s ideological crusade would be substantial. Thus someone as good at reconciling the two as Miller is is a liability that must either be trashed and belittled, or made out as a “convert” that actually isn’t opposed to ID at all.

Comment #110796

Posted by normdoering on July 8, 2006 6:23 PM (e)

Eric Peterson asked:

Are there other causes of information other than intelligence?

Yes. Existence.

Could Darwin produce a ships propellor by randomly entering(program)instructions into the computer of a cnc gantry mill used to mill huge propellors. Why not simply use flattened-out ‘82 buicks for the prop blades?

Look up genetic algorithms and evolutionary programming on Google – then read websites that come up.

Comment #110798

Posted by Bob Maurus on July 8, 2006 6:42 PM (e)

I must correct what Eric Peterson said in #110792:

“All instances of CSI is caused by intelligence.

All organisms are caused by CSI(DNA)

All organisms are caused by intelligent causation.”

It should say, based on the totality of the evidence, that:

All known instances of CSI are caused by Human Intelligence.

All organisms are caused by CSI

(Therefore) all organisms are caused by human intelligent causation.

Carp and nitpick all you want, that is the only valid conclusion that can be arrived at through that chain of logic.

Comment #110809

Posted by 'Rev Dr' Lenny Flank on July 8, 2006 8:00 PM (e)

All organisms are caused by CSI(DNA)

All DNA is caused by chemistry

All chemistry is caused by the interaction of electron shells

All interactions between electron shells are unintelligent processes (all electrons are unintelligent)

Therefore all life is produced by unintelligent processes

That was easy, wasn’t it?

Comment #110811

Posted by PuckSR on July 8, 2006 8:27 PM (e)

“All instances of CSI is caused by intelligence.”

Wait…where did you prove this?
???….people have observed every instance of something????

Im sure everyone else here will enjoy destroying the rest of the argument…and the logical fallacies…
but the initial statement is so fundamentally flawed that it cannot be ignored.

All instances of CSI cannot *possibly* be observed.
Since we are discussing multiple cases…you should also use the plural “are”
You also cannot prove that all cases of CSI are caused by intelligence…since a majority of your examples of CSI are not the product of Living Entities…and therefore you can only make this statement if you assume that all complex things are created by intelligence…which is both an assumption…and what you are trying to prove…and something that has never been proven.

This is similiar to claiming that the Bible is inerrant, since it was written by God, and the Bible tells us God is perfect. Even a graduate of Bob Jones University would laugh at your logical reasoning in this case.

Comment #110816

Posted by Torbjörn Larsson on July 8, 2006 9:14 PM (e)

normdoering says:
“When Miller says “they don’t think that the universe is well enough designed to make the evolution of life inevitable,” he is still saying the universe is _designed_. And there I think is the metaphysical dividing point where the theistic evolutionists line up with the IDists and us few atheistic evolutionists would part company from both.”

I agree with your comment on deism, which also the essay ag links to do. But since evolution doesn’t include this dividing point usually there isn’t much to discuss.

The gliding Miller does is from:
“And the reason for that is that any person who sees meaning and purpose and order to the universe — and I certainly do — in a sense believes in a kind of “design,” that things sort of make sense. “
and occur here:
“the capacity for life is inherent in matter. Matter is…. Life is a chemical and physical phenomenon. I think that the universe does have a “design,” and that the design is so grand that it makes the evolution of life not only possible but almost inevitable.”
Obviously ““design”” and “design” isn’t the same here.

On this Rossow says in his essay about “Finding Darwin’s God”:
“Miller provides no arguments in favor of his belief in a supernatural creator which would reasonably compete with the hypotheses not assuming such a creator.”
and:
“If, though, the physical constants happen to be so precisely “fine-tuned” for the existence of life, there is nothing surprising that life indeed does exist in such a hospitable universe, thus requiring no arbitrary hypothesis of a supernatural source of life.”

It also answers Einstein’s observation on order: “Einstein told us that the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it seems to be comprehensible,” A chaotic universe wouldn’t be conducive to life, as the finetuning (which apparently is rather weak, ie a few order of magnitudes for some constants) of constants tells us. As you say.

Eric,
CSI has as all other ID concepts been shown to be vacuous a number of times in various ways, and never exemplified by experiments. See for example http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2006/06/dembskis_profound_lack_of_comp.php showing that “specified” isn’t clearly specified, :-) and if it tentatively was by applying Dembski’s formalism it means the opposite of complex as Dembski defines it. It is crank science.

“Are there other causes of information other than intelligence?”

Entropy and evolution are two known sources. For the later, see for example the graph in http://www-lmmb.ncifcrf.gov/~toms/paper/ev/ and for details http://www-lmmb.ncifcrf.gov/~toms/paper/ev/latex/index.html .

Comment #110817

Posted by Torbjörn Larsson on July 8, 2006 9:28 PM (e)

Eric,
I forgot another information source (a real high entropy source): randomness generated by quantum mechanics. It was for example the cause of the density variations in inflation that seeded the galaxies.

Comment #110835

Posted by Sounder on July 8, 2006 11:27 PM (e)

DaveScott’s retort to this post confuses me. So he accepts as true that life did not require direct intervention to evolve? Does that mean he rejects irreducible complexity? I thought that the hallmark of ID was the asserted necessity of a divine agent for life?

Comment #110837

Posted by Anton Mates on July 8, 2006 11:32 PM (e)

This is fun!

All instances of Large-scale Nuclear Reactions (LNR) are caused by human militaries

All stars are powered by LNR

Therefore, the Sun is operated by the Pentagon.

Comment #110846

Posted by James Taylor on July 9, 2006 1:27 AM (e)

William Dembski has openly broken one of his central religious tenets… “Thou shalt not bear false witness against your neighbor”. Awesome.

Comment #110867

Posted by Shalini, BBWAD on July 9, 2006 7:58 AM (e)

[William Dembski has openly broken one of his central religious tenets… “Thou shalt not bear false witness against your neighbor”. Awesome.]

NOOOOO! ID isn’t about religion. It’s just those EVILutionists that say so! ID is science, it’s SCIENCE, I tell you! It’s science because the Designer said so, and it gives us the right to misquote whoever we like! All hail the Designer!

Comment #110889

Posted by wamba on July 9, 2006 10:19 AM (e)

Even Dembski’s fabricated version of events was wrong in other ways:

couldn’t the origin of life be the point at which God’s involvement in creation was direct?” As this question was posed, at least a third of the students in the crowd nodded their heads yes. The professors in the crowd just looked confused; and scared. To my surprise however, Dr. Miller said, “absolutely!” That made the professors look even more confused.”

On the basis of that “report,” Dembski then asked “Why shouldn’t Miller and Collins be called ID proponents (or at least ID sympathizers) when it comes to the origin of life? And if ID is scientifically valid at the origin of life, aren’t they on a slippery slope?”

He slid straight from “It could have happened that way” to “its scientifically valid”. There was no mention in the (fabricated) question or answer about predictions, testability or evidence; i.e. the properties that would make something scientific.

Comment #110898

Posted by TheThinPanda on July 9, 2006 11:03 AM (e)

So, let’s get this straight; someone who runs an evolutionion website, with many articles having a distinct counter-ID air, who explicitly calls himself an evolutionist and who stated the belief that the possibility of life occuring is an inherent result of the mere existance of matter, is an IDist because, just like anyone in science, he believes that the order of nature could potentially be considered to have a similar appearance to ‘some sort of design’.

Fantastic definition of IDist!! Anytime you want to claim someone as an IDist, just say they are! Bingo! Any scientist who believes that the universe follows some form of rule-set must be an IDist.

Comment #110907

Posted by Karen S. on July 9, 2006 11:42 AM (e)

We all know that Ken Miller is not part of the ID crowd, but I have a question about Francis Collins. Why does Dembski think that Collins is an ID proponent/sympathizer when it comes to the origin of life?

Comment #110916

Posted by k.e. on July 9, 2006 12:01 PM (e)

TheTinPanda (AKA Panda Ex Machina)
says:-
…with many [PT] articles having a distinct counter-ID air…

That’s an ironic joke …right?

Just in case you DON’T GET IT, (rolls eyes) ID is reactionary right wing fundamentalist political apologetics disguised as religion. Just ask it’s biggest financial backer, a certain Howard Ahmanson. If you are not sure about that, maybe you could actually find some liberal, non religious, reality based facts that support ID…..good luck.

I would almost think DS of UD could have written that. But even he doesn’t disappear so firmly up his own tautological sphincter….normally.

I could be wrong though,.maybe DT is the Tin Panda.

Comment #110923

Posted by wamba on July 9, 2006 12:28 PM (e)

That’s an ironic joke …right?

That was my impression.

Comment #110925

Posted by Raguel on July 9, 2006 12:38 PM (e)

I got a good laugh out of Dave Scot’s “uber front-loading”. There’s already a word for that Dave: chemistry. :p

Comment #110927

Posted by Freelurker on July 9, 2006 12:48 PM (e)

That’s an ironic joke …right?

TheThinPanda appears to be referring to Ken Miller and his website. With that understanding, the comment makes sense.

Comment #110952

Posted by TheThinPanda on July 9, 2006 3:04 PM (e)

I’m confused as to how anyone could have thought I was talking about anyone other than Ken Miller, given that he is the subject of the thread. Having said that, the post wasn’t exactly clearly laid out, and does indeed look a bit like something DScot might write on one of his good days.

Comment #110954

Posted by Bruce Thompson GQ on July 9, 2006 3:11 PM (e)

Eric Peterson questions:
I don’t understand why Darwinists never write on the information content of structures or fail to follow a simple syllogism

Lets put your information content suggestion into the real world of Biology and ask what does information content under design tell us about the following situations.

Haploid genome size has been determined for many organisms (C-value) and can be converted to genome length, 1pg DNA ~ 1 Mb. If we compare genomes among various organisms there are vast differences in size. For example in frogs:

1. Cuban tree frog Osteopilus septentrionalis
C-value 1.95 (pg DNA), 2n=24

2. Tailed frog Ascaphus truei
C-value = 4.26 (pg DNA), 2n=46

3. Hochstetter’s frog Leiopelma hochstetteri
C-value 8.63 (pg DNA), 2n=?

There is a 4.25 fold difference in information (DNA) content. Why the difference in making the same organism. Based on chromosome number it looks like a doubling of the genome.

If as you claim:

All instances of CSI is caused by intelligence.
All organisms are caused by CSI(DNA)
All organisms are caused by intelligent causation.

What is the point of the large information differences between species? If detecting design through information content, what do 2 frogs, 1 with double the genome size (twice the information content) tell you. If the first meets design criteria the second by definition must be designed. This immediately raises the question, what was the intelligence(s) purpose in changing ploidy between these different species? Unless you propose an additional genome is required for the morphological differences between the 2 frogs (the tail).

A second example are salamanders

1. Italian cave salamander Hydromantes italicus, (no morphological cave adaptations)
C-value ~ 72 (pg DNA, 2n =28

2. Cave salamander Eurycea lucifuga (no morphological cave adaptations)
C-value = 21 (pg DNA), 2n=28

3. Pyrenean brook salamander Euproctus asper (surface dweller)
C-value = 28 (pg DNA, 2n = 24

4. Spring salamander/Tennessee cave salamander Gyrinophilus porphyriticus (cave adapted)
C-value = 22 (pg DNA), 2n = 28

5. European cave salamander Proteus anguinus (cave adapted)
C-value = 48 (pg DNA), 2n = 38

Here, the first 2 salamander species have 3.5 fold difference in information (DNA) and both have similar ecologies. There is no evidence of genome doubling. The third species is a surface dweller with an similar genome size and similar chromosome complement but different ecology. The fourth has both a different ecology and morphological modifications but similar information content. Finally, the fifth has increased information but has the same ecology and morphological changes as number 4. What does design detection and information theory tell you? How does information theory help you solve this problem? How, without using evolutionary theory, do you explain these organisms?

For fun lets throw in a mammal, Homo sapiens sapiens
C value 3.5 pg 2n=46.
Humans have similar information content to Cuban and tailed frogs but 20 fold less information than Italian cave salamanders and 14 fold less than European cave salamanders.

Is this the result of coding differences? If so, what are the possible explanations that could be tested. If these are the result of noncoding differences, and as claimed noncoding (junk) DNA is functional, what is it’s function in salamanders? How does information theory and design detection answer these questions? Why is this extra information important for salamanders and not humans?

Delta Pi Gamma (Scientia et Fermentum)

Comment #110958

Posted by RBH on July 9, 2006 3:27 PM (e)

Eric Peterson remarked

I don’t understand why Darwinists never write on the information content of structures …

PubMed search on “information theory” AND evolution: 134 hits. Scirus journal search on the same terms: 2,351 hits. PubMed search on “bioinformatics”: 12,867 hits.

Don’t mistake your own ignorance for lack of writing on it, Eric.

RBH

Comment #110959

Posted by RBH on July 9, 2006 3:28 PM (e)

Eric Peterson remarked

I don’t understand why Darwinists never write on the information content of structures …

PubMed search on “information theory” AND evolution: 134 hits. Scirus journal search on the same terms: 2,351 hits. PubMed search on “bioinformatics”: 12,867 hits.

Don’t mistake your own ignorance for lack of writing on it, Eric.

RBH

Comment #111014

Posted by Albion on July 9, 2006 9:14 PM (e)

Well, I know that IDists find theistic evolutionists to be a real thorn in the side because the very existence of theistic evolutionists refutes the “evolution is atheistic” subtext behind ID, but I didn’t realise the ID answer to this “problem” was to simply define theistic evolutionists out of existence. Not that it’s all that surprising, I suppose, since ID is largely a definitions game anyway.

Comment #111493

Posted by Giordano Sagredo on July 11, 2006 2:32 PM (e)

Miller’s response is a little strange, from a scientific perspective. While Dembski minsconstrued the content, as saying that Miller supports a god for the origins of life, Miller’s response does sound a lot like a kind of design argument for the universe, that a creator set up the universe so that life, and funky species, would evolve. It is really odd that Dembski didn’t focus on this admittedly odd bit of Miller’s response.

However, substitute “origins of the universe” for “origins of life” and the Dembski claim isn’t far off as a paraphrase.