Comment #30125

Posted by SEF on May 15, 2005 04:03 AM (e) (s)

He also accidentally said heliocentric instead of geocentric in his round-up of wrong ideas held tenaciously. That seems to be a fairly common mistake (so much so that people following the intent of what is being said may not even notice the slip).

Comment #30126

Posted by snaxalotl on May 15, 2005 06:06 AM (e) (s)

The “definitional complexity” entry at Evowiki says this:

“Dembski produces a massive amount of text to explain what he means by [‘complex’ and ‘specified’]”

I think I just realised where the Dembski boosters have it wrong - he’s the Freud of information theory.

Comment #30133

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 09:12 AM (e) (s)

Nick wrote:

But the core issue is not really whether or not a system is irreducible, it is whether or not a system is unbuildable.  This is a very different thing.

Yes, by God, you’ve got it!

But then you go on to say:

A system that is currently irreducible for its current function might well be buildable anyway, most obviously via change-of-function.

  “Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight. And insight requires intelligence.
  Nelson’s Law states that “things do not organize themselves without intelligent guidance”. Randomly generated systems do not adapt means to ends, they do not adapt structure and process to function and they do not self-organize.
  Behe’s mousetrap is unevolvable, not because you can’t take it apart without it losing it’s function, it’s unevolvable because you can’t put it together in the first place using only random, non-directed, accidental occurrences. The selection of the parts, the configuration in which they’re aligned, the assembly into one unit all require intelligent decisions at every step of the way.  It’s not that you can’t remove parts and lose total function, it’s that you can’t explain why these particular parts were selected, why they’re integrated together in just such a way and how they were assembled from raw materials without invoking an intelligent agent.
  Living systems are unevolvable by non-directed processes for the same reason. Living systems are made up of structures and processes integrated in such a way that they not only support each other, but they contribute to the overall function of the living system. This type of organization, in which means are adapted to ends and multiple structures and processes perform multiple functions, all of which contribute to the overall functioning of the organism are unattainable by any kind of random process or chance occurrence. It requires insight and insight means intelligence. There’s simply no way to get around that basic point.

http://www.charliewagner.net/casefor.htm…

Comment #30134

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 09:28 AM (e) (s)

From this weks “Nature” via “Science Now”

The bunchberry dogwood (Cornus Canadensis) is the quickest gun in the plant world, scientists report 12 May in Nature. High-speed videos reveal that its flowers burst open in less than 0.5 milliseconds. At such speeds, pollen granules shoot up to more than 10 times the height of the flower itself. The impressive launch capability comes from the release of elastic energy stored in the flower stamens, which are designed much like medieval catapults.

Designed?  Really….

Comment #30137

Posted by steve on May 15, 2005 09:34 AM (e) (s)

Shorter Charlie Wagner:

Evolution can’t happen blah blah blah purpose.

It was stupid the first 10^14 times he said it. He’s the most boring creationist on this site. And he’s refused now, half a dozen times, to answer the very simple question, “Do you believe that the medical community is being dishonest w/r/t cholesterol, blood pressure, and heart disease.” At least that would be amusing. Not the same hand-waving claim, year after year.

Comment #30140

Posted by steve on May 15, 2005 09:41 AM (e) (s)

Sanjai Tripathi’s article is indeed the best short-form take on IDology I’ve seen.

Comment #30143

Posted by Malkuth on May 15, 2005 10:10 AM (e) (s)

Charlie Wagner wrote:

“Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight.

…so… mutating requires insight…?

Comment #30145

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 15, 2005 10:18 AM (e) (s)

No one cares what you think, Charlie.  <shrug>

Comment #30146

Posted by harold on May 15, 2005 10:18 AM (e) (s)

Charlie Wagner -

““Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight. And insight requires intelligence.”

I see no reason to accept this statement.  It’s merely an articulate but vacuous “sounds right to me” statement.  If I try to brew a batch of beer, and bacteria infect the wort it and spoil it, did they need ‘insight’ to ‘change the function’?

‘Nelson’s Law states that “things do not organize themselves without intelligent guidance”.’

What about all that ice I saw last winter?  Every crystal structure is a trivial falsification of this statement, which does not imply that crystals are the ONLY such falsification.  This is just a standard misstatement of the thermodynamics, “Nelson” notwithstanding. 

‘Randomly generated systems do not adapt means to ends, they do not adapt structure and process to function and they do not self-organize.’

This statement indicates that you do not understand the theory of evolution.  Challenge - can you give a brief explanation of the most basic principles of the theory of evolution?  That’s not necessarily an easy challenge.  However, your reference to ‘randomly generated systems’ indicates a very profound misunderstanding.
 
‘Behe’s mousetrap is unevolvable, not because you can’t take it apart without it losing it’s function, it’s unevolvable because you can’t put it together in the first place using only random, non-directed, accidental occurrences. The selection of the parts, the configuration in which they’re aligned, the assembly into one unit all require intelligent decisions at every step of the way.  It’s not that you can’t remove parts and lose total function, it’s that you can’t explain why these particular parts were selected, why they’re integrated together in just such a way and how they were assembled from raw materials without invoking an intelligent agent.’

At least you’re fair.  You misstate and distort creationism as well.  This is a NOT the point Behe attempted to make with his ‘mousetrap’ argument.  He did NOT make the utterly trivial point that a mousetrap is a human construction which would not ‘evolve’ naturally without human agency, as you do above.  He used it an analogy or model of an ‘irreducibly complex’ system.  His very point WAS very much that it was ‘irreducible’.  He’s been shown wrong in at least two ways - biological systems that appear irreducible need not be unbuildable, as mentioned above, and on a more concrete level, mousetraps themselves aren’t even irreducible.  So it was a bad analogy and a false analogy, at the seme time.  It was, however, a far more thoughtful point than merely pointing out that some obvious human construction is an example of ‘intelligent design’, which of course, no-one would disagree with.

Comment #30147

Posted by shiva on May 15, 2005 10:19 AM (e) (s)

Charlie Wagner; [ref]“Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight. And insight requires intelligence.
  Nelson’s Law states that “things do not organize themselves without intelligent guidance”. Randomly generated systems do not adapt means to ends, they do not adapt structure and process to function and they do not self-organize.[/ref]

Using Parts…who uses the parts[i/]
Originally designed…. [i]By whom
Requires intelligence….on whose part?
Nelson’s Law….Who is Nelson?
Randomly generated systems all this and much more. Maybe you don’t know about it after all?

Comment #30148

Posted by steve on May 15, 2005 10:24 AM (e) (s)

““Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight. And insight requires intelligence.”

I see no reason to accept this statement.

Nobody does.

Comment #30149

Posted by Malkuth on May 15, 2005 10:29 AM (e) (s)

steve wrote:

Nobody does.

Why not?  I think he’s made a considerable insight.  Living things must have insight to mutate, and we already know that all living things mutate, so all living things must have insight.  All living things must also have insight, since they have intelligence.  I propose that we throw out evolutionary theory and replace it with something more animistic.  And fight for plants’ rights, because they’re insightful, intelligent beings too.

Comment #30151

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 10:48 AM (e) (s)

steve wrote:

“Do you believe that the medical community is being dishonest w/r/t cholesterol, blood pressure, and heart disease.”

For purposes of amusement, I’ll answer that question.

Not “dishonest”.

Misguided.

In short, they’re wrong.

I refer you to:
http://www.charliewagner.net…
where more complete answers can be found.

Comment #30152

Posted by steve on May 15, 2005 10:52 AM (e) (s)

It’s about time.

So the biologists are wrong about evolution, and the doctors are wrong about diet and the heart. Does it stop there? Or are you aware of other fields which are fundamentally mistaken?

Comment #30153

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 10:59 AM (e) (s)

steve wrote:

are you aware of other fields which are fundamentally mistaken?

Well of course, there’s the cosmologists…

At least 90% of what people tell you in this world is complete horsepookey. My advice to you is:
  “Believe nothing of what you hear, only half of what you see and question everything.”

Comment #30154

Posted by Intelligent Design Theorist Timmy on May 15, 2005 11:00 AM (e) (s)

You’re dead wrong, Charlie.

Its the doctors who are wrong and know it, while the biologists are wrong but don’t know it. Furthermore, the chemists are wrong, but they are just slightly suspicious about it. And don’t get me started on the geologists. Buncha cretins, those guys.

Comment #30157

Posted by Bing on May 15, 2005 11:34 AM (e) (s)

harold wrote:

If I try to brew a batch of beer, and bacteria infect the wort it and spoil it,…..

bacteria - ugghhhh!  But do the wild yeast spores that ‘infect’ lambics show that G*d is a zymurgist too?

Comment #30159

Posted by Russell on May 15, 2005 11:53 AM (e) (s)

bacteria - ugghhhh!  But do the wild yeast spores that ‘infect’ lambics show that G*d is a zymurgist too?

Actually, bacteria are essential in the first phase of brewing lambics. And not just any bacteria: enteric bacteria.

Comment #30161

Posted by Intelligent Design Theorist Timmy on May 15, 2005 12:01 PM (e) (s)

Comment #30149

Posted by Malkuth on May 15, 2005 10:29 AM (e) (s)

  steve wrote:

  Nobody does.

Why not?  I think he’s made a considerable insight.  Living things must have insight to mutate

Malkuth, nothing could be further from the truth. Living things don’t need insight to mutate. They need insight to experience differential reproduction. If on organism gets a point mutation which causes sickle-cell anemia, and malaria comes through, the organism won’t survive unless it understands how the variant hemoglobin polymerizes. Because the polymerization can be interpreted as being a function, therefore something has to understand it for it to work. I mean, really. Didn’t you learn Nelson’s Law in Bio 101? it’s like you’re not even trying to understand Charlie’s phenomenal breakthroughs.

Comment #30162

Posted by not buyin it on May 15, 2005 12:07 PM (e) (s)

Flagella is a trivial case.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.

Good luck.

Comment #30163

Posted by Michael Finley on May 15, 2005 12:10 PM (e) (s)

Sanjai Tripathi wrote:

That anthropomorphic view of the universe has gotten Bible literalists in trouble before. They used to think that the Earth was at the center of the universe. Then, people like Copernicus took a rigorous scientific look through their telescopes, and their carts of what they saw showed that the earth actually rotated around the sun.

They also used to believe that the earth was flat, and only about 5,000 years old, as the Old Testament tells us.

A nit-pick that does not affect Mr. Tripathi’s account of ID:

The earth being at the center of the universe is not a Christian idea per se. It was held by all of the Greek cosmologists from Anaximander to Aristotle, some of whom (e.g., Leucippus, Democritus) were materialists. The roundness of the earth was also accepted from antiquity. Plato, for example, speaks of the earth as a sphere in the Republic.

The young-earth view is not essentially Christian either. It is a 17th-century idea owing to James Usher, Archbishop of Armagh, Ireland. In 1654 Usher used Old Testament geneologies to calculate the number of years from creation to the birth of Jesus. The number he arrived at was 4004 years.

Comment #30164

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 15, 2005 12:14 PM (e) (s)

Flagella is a trivial case.

Translation;  we shot our load on that one and lost.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.

Good luck.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via non-natural intelligent design.

Good luck.

Essentially, this is what *all* ID argumetns boil down to —- “evolution  can’t explain X, Y or Z, therefore my religious opinions must be right”.

It’s the same old crap that creation ‘scientists’ tried to peddle in court 20 years ago.  They were tossed out on their holy little asses.  And so will the IDers.  I haven’t seen any ID argument yet that wasn’t just cribbed from something ICR was yammering about three decades ago.

Comment #30165

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 15, 2005 12:16 PM (e) (s)

The young-earth view is not essentially Christian either.

So . ..  now in addition to being a philosopher, you’re a theologian, too?

Would you mind telling us the source of your religious authroity?

Morris and Gish think that a young earth *is* essentially Christian — indeed, they think one cannot be a “True Christian(c)<tm>” without it.

Why are their relgiious opinions wrong and yours are right.  Other than your say-so.

Comment #30166

Posted by bill on May 15, 2005 12:36 PM (e) (s)

Trilobyte Extinct!

As a scientist I thought I’d try a little experiment.  So, I created a userid, Trilobyte, on Dembski’s blog, UncommonDescentIntoBanality and posted a very neutral and possibly humorous one-liner about a funny little video he has of a guy rescuing an antelope from a cheetah. 

I closed the lid to the petrie dish and went away for a few days.  When I returned, shock-horror!, both my commment and Trilobyte were gone.

R.I.P.  Trilobyte, old buddy, you were a good friend.

According to Dembski’s Rules for Comments, I’m boring.  QED

————-

Ignore Bill Part 2

I was talking with a biologist friend of mine this weekend and I asked him what he thought about all the ruckus in Kansas.  What about Dembski and Behe, I pressed, how do you deal with fundamentalist creationists?

He said, “What?  Who?  I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  My biologist friend said that he didn’t see what the big deal was because  a) he’s never heard of Dembski or Behe and b) they were irrelevant to his work in wildlife management.

He continued, “They haven’t done any research.  They haven’t published any papers, not splitting hairs with the papers they sneaked into obscure journals, there are millions of biologists and zero biological creationists.”

So, you’re saying just ignore them?

“Well,” he mused, “not ignore, exactly, but observe.  Study.  You know, like Jane Goodall.  Document their habitat, track their movements, keep an eye on them.  Who knows, you might discover a new species.”

Yeah, I thought, that would be cool.  I could see the title appearing in Nature:  Primitive Anti-Science Tribe Discovered in Seattle.

I’ll be famous.

Comment #30167

Posted by Michael Finley on May 15, 2005 12:42 PM (e) (s)

Tireless Blowhard,

I usually don’t stoop to respond to your blather, but I’m feeling charitable.

I am a Christian, and a well-read one at that, but any fool (viz., you) can look up ‘young-earth’ or ‘Archbishop Usher’ on google and verify my comment.

The fact that the young-earth position didn’t come about until the 17th-century, and therefore, that Christianity is 17 centuries older than the idea leads to the conclusion that it is not an essential doctrine of Christianity.

Aside from Usher’s dubious method, there is no revealed reason to believe in a young-earth, Morris et al. notwithstanding.

Comment #30169

Posted by harold on May 15, 2005 12:44 PM (e) (s)

Charlie Wagner -

I see you ignored my challenge.  I’ll repeat it, and in fact, although I show up here only randomly, I’ll make an effort to issue it every time I see you.  Repeat - can you correctly summarize the basic principles of the theory of evolution?  It stands to reason that being able to understand a theory is a prerequisite to criticizing it.  Your statements indicate profound misunderstanding of the theory of evolution.  Can you prove me wrong?

Not Buyin’ It -

You don’t have to “buy” the theory of evolution.  Unlike ID books, it isn’t sold for profit. 

“Flagella is a trivial case.”

A trivial case of what?  Your logic seems to be “if there is no current evolutionary explanation, then my God must have specifically created it”.  That’s poor logic and poor theology (please note right now that my arguments below are in no way intended to ‘deny the existence of God’, and that I consider the  ID way of ‘proving’ the existence of God to be a poor one). 

1.How do you know an explanation won’t emerge?  2.How do you know good hypotheses about bacterial flagella evolution aren’t already available - do you know anything about the rather substantial field of research on bacterial flagella?  3.If you don’t, why did you mention it?  4.If scientists never explain the evolution of bacterial flagella, does that mean that we should conclude that they were magically created?  5.How does ID explain - details, please - the bacterial flagellum? 6. If the bacterial flagellum was designed, can we tell, using ID theory, whether it was designed by your God, Vishnu, Allah, Gitchi Manitou, Zeus, hyper-intelligent aliens (but then who designed them?) etc? 7.  If ID can’t answer question “6”, what good is it? 8. Why do scientists who actually know something about bacterial flagella almost uniformly accept the theory of evolution?

That’s eight questions.  However, if your answer to “3” is “I heard that some guy said that he heard from some other guy that evolution can’t explain the flagella (whatever that is)”, please feel free to skip the other seven.

“Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.”

Same questions, substitute “ribosome” for “flagellum”

Comment #30170

Posted by steve on May 15, 2005 12:45 PM (e) (s)

Comment #30162

Posted by not buyin it on May 15, 2005 12:07 PM (e) (s)

Flagella is a trivial case.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.

Good luck.

History of Evolution Denial
1880 “Evolution does not happen”
1990 “Okay, maybe it happens for small changes, but it can’t make IC things like flagella, no way no how.”
2005 “Okay, flagella are trivial, but it can’t make a ribosome…”

Hey, guys with your broken Ironymeters—pull out your Trend Detectors, and see where this is going.

Comment #30171

Posted by Nick (Matzke) on May 15, 2005 12:47 PM (e) (s)

“Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight. And insight requires intelligence.

So are you seriously telling me that it took intelligent intervention to change from the flying wings of a bird, to the flying/swimming wings of a seabird, to the swimming flippers of a penguin?  Yes or no?

Nelson’s Law states that “things do not organize themselves without intelligent guidance”. Randomly generated systems do not adapt means to ends, they do not adapt structure and process to function and they do not self-organize.

Matzke’s law says that Nelson’s Law is bogus because it invokes pure randomness and doesn’t take into account the anti-randomness of natural selection.

Comment #30172

Posted by steve on May 15, 2005 12:50 PM (e) (s)

So, I created a userid, Trilobyte, on Dembski’s blog, UncommonDescentIntoBanality and posted a very neutral and possibly humorous one-liner about a funny little video he has of a guy rescuing an antelope from a cheetah.

I closed the lid to the petrie dish and went away for a few days.  When I returned, shock-horror!, both my commment and Trilobyte were gone.

R.I.P.  Trilobyte, old buddy, you were a good friend.

He’s deleting left and right, even such mild things. Maybe you guys are taking the wrong approach, trying to fly under the radar. Take the opposite tack. Go really flamboyant. See if he’s too stunned to delete usernames like “BillDembski’sABigFag”

Comment #30173

Posted by Bayesian Bouffant, FCD on May 15, 2005 12:50 PM (e) (s)

not buyin it wrote:

Flagella is a trivial case.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.

Good luck.

Just the other day I was reading Of Pandas and people, which I cannot recommend, even to Pennsylvanian schoolchildren, and after giving short shrift to the RNA World theory the book was running on about non-productive cross-reactions. Then it occured to me: Suppose, as all the available evidence indicates, that there was an RNA World preceding the modern cellular RNA-DNA-protein world. Suppose some collection of RNA developed a detoxification mechanism for removing amino acids from strands of nucleic acid… gosh, wouldn’t that be the very core of a ribosome?  And all those protein parts of the ribosome are pasted on the outside, like armor plating, to protect the ribosome from the RNAse built by other ribosomes once protein manufacture evolved to the state of an arms race.

I couldn’t come up with a way to test these ideas, but I don’t see why that should stop me from lobbying school boards to mandate their teaching in the kindergartens.

Comment #30175

Posted by harold on May 15, 2005 01:02 PM (e) (s)

Michael Finley -

According to my general recollection (and not any recent detailed research), your facts about Archbishop Usher appear to be correct.  I don’t know off the top of my head if Usher was Catholic or Anglican (he was Irish, and an archbishop, so those are more or less the only two possibilities).  Earlier figures made similar calculations, however; I’m fairly sure Venerable Bede, the inventor of the modern system of dates, tried to calculate the “age of the universe” from the Bible (presumably he would have been using the Vulgate of St Jerome).  Neither the Catholic Church nor the Anglican Church accepts a literal intepretation of Genesis at present, at any rate. 

But what’s your point?  Are you saying that something that’s demonstrably wrong, and based on a selective interpretation of specific translations of Genesis, should be taught as science, if it “isn’t specifically Christian”?  If it isn’t Christian, what’s the point of it anyway?

Comment #30177

Posted by Cassanders on May 15, 2005 01:07 PM (e) (s)

not buyin it wrote
—————————————begin quote
Flagella is a trivial case.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.

Good luck.
—————————————end quote

Hmmmm, does this mean that you accept the current scientific understanding (which of course is coherent with contemporary evolutionary theory) of flagellae?

To me it looks like your presentation of ribosomes as a “problem” is just another version of the old “half eye /half wing” argument. (Which of course also the psudoargument on flagella is)

Cassanders
Monism is the theory that enything less than everything is nothing!
(S.Gorn’s Compendium of Rarely Used Clichés)

Comment #30178

Posted by "Rev Dr" Lenny Flank on May 15, 2005 01:13 PM (e) (s)

The fact that the young-earth position didn’t come about until the 17th-century, and therefore, that Christianity is 17 centuries older than the idea leads to the conclusion that it is not an essential doctrine of Christianity.

I see.  So the fact that the canonized New Testament didn’t exist until the 5th century and therefore that Christianity is 5 centuries older than the New Testament, leads to the conclusion that the New Testament is also not an essential doctrine of Christianity.

Right?

Oh, and the doctrines of Original Sin and the Trinity weren’t adopted until centuries after Christ, too.  Does that mean they’re also not an essential part of Christianity?

And you still didn’t answer my question.  You say young-earth isnt’ essential.  Morris and Gish say it is.  What makes your opinion better than theirs.  Other than your say-so.

Comment #30179

Posted by Don Sheffler on May 15, 2005 01:18 PM (e) (s)

malkuth snarkingly wrote:

All living things must also have insight, since they have intelligence.  I propose that we throw out evolutionary theory and replace it with something more animistic.  And fight for plants’ rights, because they’re insightful, intelligent beings too.

Every Saturday morning on Cartoon network and Nickelodion I see Dogs and Elephants, Rocks, Trees, and Flowers, all singing and dancing, wearing snappy clothes and interacting with each other just like humans.

I say, not only do they have insight and intelligence, but a snappy fashion sense and solid rhythm too.

Comment #30180

Posted by bill on May 15, 2005 01:21 PM (e) (s)

I can’t stand reading this any more:

Flagella ARE a trivial case. 

You write about as well as you think, incorrectly and trivially.

Comment #30181

Posted by 386sx on May 15, 2005 01:26 PM (e) (s)

harold wrote:

Earlier figures made similar calculations, however; I’m fairly sure Venerable Bede, the inventor of the modern system of dates, tried to calculate the “age of the universe” from the Bible (presumably he would have been using the Vulgate of St Jerome).  Neither the Catholic Church nor the Anglican Church accepts a literal intepretation of Genesis at present, at any rate.

Ussher was hardly the first person to use the “dubious method” of adding up the chronologies. Augustine himself used this method to get an approximate date for the creation of man. (Not the creation of the universe, though. He did think that the six days of creation were allegorical.)

http://www.brainfly.net/html/books/brn0219l.htm…

The City of God, Book 12, Chapter 12

Comment #30182

Posted by Russell on May 15, 2005 01:28 PM (e) (s)

Thank you bill. All together now:
one flagellum
two flagella
(though, if you really hate Latin and Latin forms, “two flagellums” is grudgingly accepted by Merriam-Webster)

Comment #30183

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 01:33 PM (e) (s)

Nick wrote:

So are you seriously telling me that it took intelligent intervention to change from the flying wings of a bird, to the flying/swimming wings of a seabird, to the swimming flippers of a penguin?  Yes or no?

Short answer: Yes.

But I don’t necessarily agree with your premise that one structrure “changed into” another. You’re so immersed in the notion of evolution that you explain everything you see in that context.
  We don’t know where these structures came from but we do know that in nature, the same genes, the same processes and the same structures are used over and over again in a wide variety of applications across a wide spectrum of life forms.
  This informs us that there ia a great unity in nature among living organisms that demonstrates that they are closely related and probably had a common origin. This unity of nature, this profound relatedness among all living things on every level is often mistaken for evolution. Even the great evolutionists made this error. They were seeing the clear and unambiguous similarities among living things and interpreting this observation as evolution, the notion that the one descended from the other. There is no phylogenetic significance in any of these observations.
  And even if it is an example of evolution, where living systems change over time, there is no evidence of any kind that it is a random or non-directed process that can be accomplished without intelligent input. In fact, intelligent input is perfectly compatible with evolution in the sense that evolution is a process and ID and NS are proposed mechanisms. This point is often lost on most people.

Matzke’s law says that Nelson’s Law is bogus because it invokes pure randomness and doesn’t take into account the anti-randomness of natural selection.

  That’s one of the biggest lies told by evolutionists. For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction. But then someone decided that story was flawed. So they invented this new story that while mutation is random, natural selection is not. Horsepookey. Natural selection can only act on variation that is already present, it cannot create new variation or assemble structures and processes where they did not exist before.
  The question is settled. Evolutionists are just going to have to get used to the idea that there is no natural process available to them that can explain the organization and complexity of living systems. Either there is a natural process that is yet to be discovered (an option that I favor) or it’s supernatural.

Comment #30184

Posted by PvM on May 15, 2005 01:43 PM (e) (s)

[/quote]That’s one of the biggest lies told by evolutionists. For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction.[/quote]

Your unfamiliarity with evolutionary theory is self evident Charles.

Comment #30185

Posted by Russell on May 15, 2005 01:47 PM (e) (s)

For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction. But then someone decided that story was flawed. So they invented this new story that while mutation is random, natural selection is not.

Here’s CW, once again making it up as he goes along. It’s pretty obvious even from reading Darwin (you might say Year One of evolution) that natural selection is not random. I challenge you to cite one reference from all these “decades” of the doctrine of randomness before “someone decided that story was flawed”.

You’re a Dylan fan, CW, no? “Don’t criticize what you can’t understand”.

Comment #30186

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 02:00 PM (e) (s)

“For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction”.

prove it, idiot.  show me where any evolutionary biologist EVER says what i just quoted you as saying.

“The question is settled. Evolutionists are just going to have to get used to the idea that there is no natural process available to them that can explain the organization and complexity of living systems”

It seems the only one getting used to the idea evolutionary theory doesn’t work, is you, Idiot.

Comment #30187

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 02:04 PM (e) (s)

Nick,
  Rest assured that despite what I said above, I am 100% in support of your goal to keep religion and religious creationism out of schools. This is a science issue, not a philosophical issue or an ideological issue.
The fact that I am not supportive of Darwinian evolution should in no way be interpreted as giving comfort to creationists.

Charlie Wagner
http://www.charliewagner.com…

Comment #30188

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 02:05 PM (e) (s)

damnit, I thought we got rid of CW?

his comments do nothing but foment my continuing distaste for idiocy.

He’s like JAD.  constantly spouting the same made up drivel over and over again.

Of what value are his comments again?  someone please tell me.

Comment #30189

Posted by roger Tang on May 15, 2005 02:19 PM (e) (s)

<i>That’s one of the biggest lies told by evolutionists. For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction</i>

Charlie, that is a lie. You’ve been called on this before and you KEEP repeating it. At first, it may have been from ignorance, but after all this time, after being repeatedly corrected, it’s just a lie.

From now on, I’ll consider you a garden variety liar.

Comment #30190

Posted by not buying it on May 15, 2005 02:19 PM (e) (s)

Hmmm… we gots just one attempt to actually answer the ribosome question amidst a flurry of attempts at deflection.

The RNA World.  What a wonderful narrative!  Not testable.  Not falsifiable.  Not science.  A nice story though as long as we ignore the fact that RNA is extremely volatile and even before it can begin to undergo mutation/selection it needs a stable environment similar to that provided by the cell membrane.  I really like the clay substrate speculation for that function as it’s like channelling the ancients that said life emerges spontaneously from mud.  :-)

Anyone got an honest answer that isn’t a sci-fi story or an appeal to Darwin of the Gaps?

Comment #30192

Posted by Paul Flocken on May 15, 2005 02:32 PM (e) (s)

Comment #30166
Posted by bill on May 15, 2005 12:36 PM

Trilobyte Extinct!… …According to Dembski’s Rules for Comments, I’m boring.  QED

One wonders why the sycophancy of davescot is not boring to dembski.

from Lenny Flank

“his martyr complex does seem to be extremely overdeveloped”

and from Sir_Toejam

“he craves attention and we’re giving it to him.”

Ah.  That’s why.

Comment #30193

Posted by JRQ on May 15, 2005 02:33 PM (e) (s)

Charlie: “Change of function”, using parts that were not originally designed for that function requires insight. And insight requires intelligence.

“things do not organize themselves without intelligent guidance”

They were seeing the clear and unambiguous similarities among living things and interpreting this observation as evolution, the notion that the one descended from the other. There is no phylogenetic significance in any of these observations. [emphasis mine]

For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction.

Truly extraordinary…can you actually demonstrate any of this?  I mean can you, in fact, go beyond simply making these assertions and show with data how we have been misled by this grand “evolution illusion” all these years?

Comment #30194

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 02:40 PM (e) (s)

CW:

I wish you would realize what Anthony Flew did after the Kansas Kangaroo.

“All I can say is, Anthony Flew, too! I’ll let him say the rest:

I now realize that I have made a fool of myself by believing that there were no presentable theories of the development of inanimate matter up to the first living creature capable of reproduction.”

now just extend that a bit for yourself, Charlie, and you will grasp “truth”.

Comment #30195

Posted by Paul Flocken on May 15, 2005 02:40 PM (e) (s)

Comment #30186
Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 02:00 PM

prove it, idiot.  show me where any evolutionary biologist EVER says what i just quoted you as saying.

Sir Toejam, charlie has admitted to being a biology teacher of some 33 years.  It may very well be true, charlie being the sole example.

It seems the only one getting used to the idea evolutionary theory doesn’t work, is you, Idiot.

Be careful STJ, charlie might just whip out his mensa card on you.  Whatever will you do then?
Paul

Comment #30196

Posted by PvM on May 15, 2005 02:41 PM (e) (s)

The RNA World.  What a wonderful narrative!  Not testable.  Not falsifiable.

Another one ignorant of the work done by science in this area. Seems Sanji was right when he observed

Do you understand that so far? No, I didn’t think so. Unless you have some background in genetics, the concepts of evolution are pretty technical. The ID proponents are relying on the general public to not understand, because that is the only way people will believe them.

Comment #30197

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 02:47 PM (e) (s)

“Be careful STJ, charlie might just whip out his mensa card on you.  Whatever will you do then?”

Knowing that things reproduce sexually:  high school diploma

Knowing that sexual reproduction results in selectable variability: college diploma

Having rational thought to begin with:  priceless

for everything else, there’s Mensa.

;)

Comment #30200

Posted by bill on May 15, 2005 02:55 PM (e) (s)

So long as I’m having a bad hair day, my Trilobyte died and I’m boring I’d like to make one comment strictly from a pompous ass point of view.

Charlie says “We know where these structures come from…”

What do you mean “we”, Charlie?  Huh?  Like, you speak for humanity or the scientific community? 

The more Charlie writes the more he demonstrates the vast depth of his ignorance.  And the deeper he digs that hole, spurning attempts to offer help, the more he demonstrates his vast capacity for stupidity.

I, on the other hand, do know where the structures came from, why and how, because I’ve done research.  I, on the other hand, have contributed to mankind’s body of knowledge because I’ve done research.  I am the “we” you of which you so cavalierly write.  You, however, are not in the club.

You’re banned for being boring.

If you write, for example, Charlie, that “we know the earth orbits the sun,”  no you don’t, Charlie.  You personally don’t know that at all.  You read it in a book written by somebody who did know.  You don’t even know how to figure it out.  You don’t know the earth is round because you don’t know how to figure that out either.  So, if you want to be accurate, from now on you should say “I read in a book that x is y” and leave it at that.

You are not in the Knowing Club, Charlie, so stop pretending.

Comment #30204

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 03:05 PM (e) (s)

“So long as I’m having a bad hair day”

sorry to hear that, bill.  I know that can be just awwwful.

;)

Comment #30205

Posted by Albert Einstein, Jr. on May 15, 2005 03:12 PM (e) (s)

Matzke,

There are hundreds of similar (anti-ID) articles written every day. If this error-filled article is “way above average”, the anti-ID movement is in trouble.

Firstly, Tripathi admits a crucial error:

^^big factual error:
I just realized when I woke up that what I wrote about flagellum isnt exactly correct. The ID people refer to the Eubacterial flagellum, which is homologous to the type III system, BUT, the pilus/type IV system is homologous to the archaebacterial flagellum. the archael and eubac flagella are functionally equivalent, but supposedly not-homologous or evolutionarily related.

Secondly, as you should know, the argument parroted by Tripathi concerning the bacterial flagellum has already been address by Dembski here.

Comment #30206

Posted by Brian Andrews on May 15, 2005 03:13 PM (e) (s)

I see. So the fact that the canonized New Testament didn’t exist until the 5th century and therefore that Christianity is 5 centuries older than the New Testament, leads to the conclusion that the New Testament is also not an essential doctrine of Christianity

You cling to this as essential to Christianity even though you know it was invented several centuries later? Don’t let the truth get in the way of the will to believe.

“The true-believer syndrome merits study by science. What is it that compels a person, past all reason, to believe the unbelievable? How can an otherwise sane individual become so enamored of a fantasy, an imposture, that even after it’s exposed in the bright light of day he still clings to it—- indeed, clings to it all the harder?

-M. Lamar Keene
from http://holysmoke.org/keene.htm

Comment #30208

Posted by Sir_Toejam on May 15, 2005 03:22 PM (e) (s)

@”albert”

“Firstly, Tripathi admits a crucial error”

oh, and you know this is a “crucial error” because…?

because Dembski says so? 

do you really understand what you are saying when you say crucial?

prove it.

just because there is a difference between the two, does not invalidate the argument the author was making.

@Nick:

you’re at UCSB?  ahhh, my old alma-mater, where i got my BA in Aquatic Biology.

how is UCSB these days?  shoot me an email so i can catch up a bit?

Comment #30210

Posted by Great White Wonder on May 15, 2005 03:33 PM (e) (s)

Finley

[/quote]The young-earth view is not essentially Christian either. It is a 17th-century idea owing to James Usher, Archbishop of Armagh, Ireland. In 1654 Usher used Old Testament geneologies to calculate the number of years from creation to the birth of Jesus.[/quote]

Where do people come up with this crap?  And how much kool-aid does one have to drink before one is capable of shameless reciting such drivel?

The young-earth view is not a 17th century idea.  It’s a freaking prehistoric idea, just like “intelligent design”, like bogeymen, like the gods of fire and lightening, and like the idea that tangible societal benefits flow from human sacrifice.

None of these beliefs has anything to do with science or reason.  If we could speak to the humans who first came up with this garbage we’d call them “primitives” for lack of a better term.  If a modern day Western civilized human recited such garbage we’d say they were “retarded” or “insane” unless they belonged to a religious cult, in which case that fact would be noted and questions of mental retardation or insanity would be set aside until a crime against children is committed.

Let me summarize in case I’m not being perfecty clear.  People who can solve an algebraic equation but who claim that the earth is 10,000 years old or who claim that “intelligent design theory” is science are deluded morons or liars.  The louder such people proclaim their beliefs, the more deluded they are or the more despicably dishonest they are.  Shall we run through the list of names?

Did Salvador ever let Tristan Abbey out of his crib?

Comment #30212

Posted by Russell on May 15, 2005 03:55 PM (e) (s)

Al Jr. wrote:

There are hundreds of similar (anti-ID) articles written every day. If this error-filled article is “way above average”, the anti-ID movement is in trouble.

uh oh.

Secondly, as you should know, the argument parroted by Tripathi concerning the bacterial flagellum has already been address by Dembski here.

[guffaw]
Cancel that ‘uh-oh’.
If that’s your idea of an effective rebuttal, I’m afraid the ID movement is in trouble.

The first half of the “rebuttal” consists of wholly irrelevant ad hominem considerations and page counts. Page counts! (Typical Dembski, by the way. It’s not easy to pump out a steady stream of sophistry elaborating the notion “it looks designed so it must be” without decorating it with this kind of crap).

Then he gets to the heart of the matter. He destroys Matzke with this brilliant observation:

If the bacterial flagellum did indeed evolve, then a bacterium, call it B, with a bacterial flagellum evolved from a bacterium, call it A, lacking not only a flagellum but also all the genes for the flagellum (including any genes homologous to the genes for the flagellum).

Now, Al. Can you tell me what’s wrong with that? Tell you what. Let’s make it easy. Can you tell me what’s right with that?

Comment #30213

Posted by JRQ on May 15, 2005 04:07 PM (e) (s)

“If this error-filled article is “way above average”, the anti-ID movement is in trouble.”

Lol…”anti-ID movement”…

How can there be such a thing when we still don’t know what the “theory of ID” is?

I think what you mean is “Anti-‘ID-movement’ movement” or “Anti-‘argument-from-ignorance’ movement”.

Comment #30214

Posted by harold on May 15, 2005 04:10 PM (e) (s)

Not Buyin’ It

“Hmmm… we gots just one attempt to actually answer the ribosome question amidst a flurry of attempts at deflection.”

No, actually I adressed your comments above.  I see that you, on the other hand, made no attempt to answer the questions I asked you.  So it seems that the situation is the opposite of what you suggest.  I certainly hope you will answer my questions.

“Anyone got an honest answer that isn’t a sci-fi story or an appeal to Darwin of the Gaps?”

You don’t seem to understand the meaning of the term ‘god of the gaps’.  It means doing what you are doing - insisting that if something is currently not fully explained by science, it must have a magical explanation. 

What is YOUR explanation of how ribosomes came to be?  Please explain how your idea can be tested.

Charlie Wagner -

Please stop evading my challenge.  Can you explain the basic principles of the theory of evolution?

Comment #30215

Posted by Nick (Matzke) on May 15, 2005 04:12 PM (e) (s)

Al Einstein wrote,

Matzke,

There are hundreds of similar (anti-ID) articles written every day. If this error-filled article is “way above average”, the anti-ID movement is in trouble.

It’s not true that there are hundreds of such articles written each day.  Believe me, I know most of the people involved and I watch the news alert pretty carefully.  Even generic anti-ID articles are a few a week at most, and most of those don’t discuss the science.

Firstly, Tripathi admits a crucial error:

  ^^big factual error:
  I just realized when I woke up that what I wrote about flagellum isnt exactly correct. The ID people refer to the Eubacterial flagellum, which is homologous to the type III system, BUT, the pilus/type IV system is homologous to the archaebacterial flagellum. the archael and eubac flagella are functionally equivalent, but supposedly not-homologous or evolutionarily related.

First, for those who are wondering, this is apparently a comment posted by Tripani here.

Second, Tripani might have initially confused the bacterial and archaeal flagellum in his head — which is extremely common, since the archaeal flagellum is not well known — but that was not apparent in his essay.  These are the relevant bits:

The question is whether fewer than the 30 subunits of the flagellum could have had any other function. By comparing gene sequences for similarity with computers, we can see that the answer is clearly “yes.”

The pore-forming base of the flagellar structure is very similar to the base of the type III secretion system, which allows many bad bacteria, like Salmonella, for example, to infect host cells.

True so far.

Other parts of the flagellar structure are also similar to the sex-pilus (yes, bacteria can have “sex” too), that allows conjugation and gene transfer.

Tripani may have been thinking of homology between sex-pili and archaeal flagella here, but what he actually wrote was the word “similar”, and it is true that pili and eubacterial flagellar are similar in a generic, non-homologous sense.

In Actinobacillus, an operon of just seven genes, and only three with homology to flagella and secretion system genes, forms its own rudimentary secretion system, dubbed the tad operon. This bacteria lives in your mouth and is mostly responsible for making the slime that forms on your teeth when you don’t brush. Without the secretion system, it can’t make slime.

I read this statement, “three with homology to flagella and secretion system genes”, as meaning the ATPase in the tad operon is homologous to the flagellar and secretion ATPases, and that the tad operon probably has a secretin and secretin chaperone, which is shared across many secretion systems (including Type III systems; I suspect the flagellum L- and P-ring are homologous to these proteins as well, just highly divergent, but this is hard to prove).

In fact, an even more rudimentary homologous secretion system, with just four genes, is found in many other bacteria (including the Mycobacteria we study in my lab).

Proving that the “minimum number of parts” for a mere secretion system is pretty low — I once asked a creationist point-blank how many parts were required for a minimal secretion system, and the answer was “less than three”.

This is all rather beside-the-point anyway, because the archaeal flagellum and its related systems are another big headache for the ID movement.  The eubacterial flagellum is homologous to Type III secretion, and that archaeal flagellum is homologous to Type IV secretion.  It doesn’t take a genius to see a pattern here, or to propose a hypothesis, namely that secretion systems are easily exapted to become flagella.

Let me know if you ever find Behe or Dembski discussing the archaeal flagellum — it seems to be one of those things that their data filters screen out. I don’t recall Dembski or Behe ever acknowledging the existence of the archaeal flagellum in print, so I don’t really see why Tripani should be criticized for temporarily missing it, resulting in non-mistakes in his essay, which he nonetheless corrected publicly within 24 hours.

Secondly, as you should know, the argument parroted by Tripathi concerning the bacterial flagellum has already been address by Dembski here.

Response?  You call that a response?  (Dembki is giving a ludicrous reply to a long essay I wrote on the origin of the bacterial flagellum a year and a bit back.

Dembski accepts all my scientific claims as accurate, he just ends up whining that the 58 single-spaced pages of the essay (on Dembski’s printer — he spends half his critique counting pages) are “not sufficiently detailed.” 

Well, I don’t think the ID explanation, namely, “Poof!”, is sufficiently detailed. In fact, for Constitutional reasons it intentionally exhibits maximum vagueness.

When Dembski has an equally detailed, testable, data-driven model for the origin of the bacterial flagellum, let us know.

Comment #30216

Posted by Russell on May 15, 2005 04:12 PM (e) (s)

Flagella is [sic] a trivial case.

Someone explain to me how to build a ribosome via Darwinian mechanisms.

Good luck.

Then:

Hmmm… we gots just one attempt to actually answer the ribosome question amidst a flurry of attempts at deflection….
Anyone got an honest answer that isn’t a sci-fi story or an appeal to Darwin of the Gaps?

Nope. We can only draw general scenarios involving the kinds of catalytic activities we’ve painstakingly researched in the laboratory. I guess you’ll regard that as “Darwin of the Gaps” till every detail is filled in. Sorry, that will take a while. But science is chipping away at it, using those materialistic methods that have proved so useless in the past.

So, in the meantime can you tell us how to build anything at all using Dembskian mechanisms? Recognizing as I do the limits of human understanding, I’m willing to accept even a general scenario.

Comment #30217

Posted by Nick (Matzke) on May 15, 2005 04:16 PM (e) (s)

Sir_Toejam,

I graduated from UCSB in 2003.  It was a nice place when I left, though!

Nick

Comment #30218

Posted by Bayesian Bouffant, FCD on May 15, 2005 04:43 PM (e) (s)

The RNA World.  What a wonderful narrative!  Not testable.  Not falsifiable.  Not science.

Not only testable, but tested, and has passed all tests to date. Sorry you didn’t get the memo.

Comment #30220

Posted by Nick (Matzke) on May 15, 2005 04:54 PM (e) (s)

Regarding the origin of the ribosome:

Why, oh why, does no one ever search PubMed or Google Scholar before bloviating about the non-evolution of a particular complex system?

E.g., searching Google Scholar on “origin of the ribosome” gets 9,970 hits, and the first one is:

HF Noller (1993).  “On the origin of the ribosome: coevolution of subdomains of tRNA and rRNA.”  RNA World.  Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, New York, 1993.

The Amazon.com page for the book is here,  and the 2nd edition (2000) of the book is here, and the text is searchable.

I’m sorry we don’t have a ribosome evolution expert on hand to educate the creationists in detail about the basic scientific literature they should have gone and looked up before opening their mouths on the topic.  We can’t cover everything…

About all I know about the topic is that the ribosome is a complex of RNA molecules, with a bunch of accessory proteins glommed on to it.  Looks to me like good evidence for the RNA world as an early stage (probably not the first stage, mind you) in the evolution of replicators.  Why is this weird, quirky structure evidence for intelligent design?

PS: By the way, “‘intelligent design’ ribosome” gets a whole 19 hits on Google Scholar.  I vote we call comparisons of evolution and ID on Google Scholar a “GoogleScope” — sort of like a GoogleWhack.  The GoogleScope factor on this topic is about 9850/19, or 518.42.

Comment #30221

Posted by Ed Darrell on May 15, 2005 04:57 PM (e) (s)

Charlie Wagner,

“Nelson’s Law,” if there is such a thing, has been falsified.  There are schools of economics which study self-organizing economic systems.  Houston has no zoning.  Crystals and polycarbons assemble themselves.  Egg and sperm unite even when parents don’t want them to.

Who was Nelson?  Ozzie?  Half?

Comment #30222

Posted by harold on May 15, 2005 04:59 PM (e) (s)

Sir Toe_Jam

“Knowing that sexual reproduction results in selectable variability: college diploma”

True indeed (not the part about the college diploma, I guess - that typically takes a lot more or a lot less).

For the record, asexual reproduction also results in selectable variability.

And yes, back in another thread, I did mean “the best defense is a good offense”.

Not Buyin’ It -

Still not seeing any answers from you.  I’m just going to add a couple of points.  Please address my earlier post before addressing this one, though.

It’s safe to say that no-one knows exactly how the first ribosomes were formed (by the way, I assume you meant the prokaryotic ribosome, but maybe you meant the eukaryotic ribosome - could you clarify?  I take for granted that with your interest in ribosomes, you know the difference).  Ideas about this are a subject of research for some scientists, who strive to keep their ideas testable.  Pubmed or Google will guide you to a fair amount of work on the subject.  Note that this is related to, but not exactly part of, the theory of evolution; it’s essentially a part of “abiogenesis”.  Even if God magically designed ribosomes, cellular life has been evolving for billions of years. 

But wait!  I just admitted that science might not have a detailed answer for something!  Does that mean I’m endorsing ID/creationism?  No.  See, there are always an infinite number of magical explanations for everything.  This is exactly as true for things that CAN be explained by science as for things that can’t.  Maybe the sun shines because a magical designer is making it happen, and disguising it to look like fusion, etc.  Also, of course, the number of PHYSICAL things that can’t be explained by science will always keep shrinking (but never reach zero). 

Now, if you think YOU know where the ribosome came from, why don’t you say so, and explain how YOUR idea can be scientifically tested?  And if you’re trying to say it was God, why don’t you be a man and say so, instead of playing games?  I changed my mind, you can answer that last question before you finish answering my previous one.

Comment #30223

Posted by not buyin it on May 15, 2005 05:02 PM (e) (s)

Harold,

Nice straw man there.  Where did I bring up God as an explanation for the evolution of ribosomes?

What I’m not buying is anyone’s narrative that requires a leap of faith. 

Unless you can show me how a ribosome could have evolved through mutation/selection it requires a leap of faith to believe that’s how it happened.

Faith is for religion.  Let’s stick to science please.  As far as science is concerned the evolution of the ribosome is an unexplained phenomenon.  Everything in nature having an undirected, purposeless origin is also a matter of faith.  Again, let’s stick to science and leave the faith out of it.

Science requires that we keep an open mind.  Intelligence and design are proven quantities in nature with the emergence of rational man.  It has not been proven that rational man is the first intelligent designer to emerge.  The hubris it requires to assign that unique quality to us puny humans is mind boggling.  What an ego secular humanists have!

Did you know that science doesn’t even know the nature of 95% of the matter and energy in the universe?  The first step on the path to enlightenment is admitting how much you don’t know.  Take that first step Harold.

Comment #30224

Posted by JRQ on May 15, 2005 05:02 PM (e) (s)

Who was Nelson?  Ozzie?  Half?

Paul

Comment #30226

Posted by Ed Darrell on May 15, 2005 05:11 PM (e) (s)

Mr. Finley noted: 

The young-earth view is not essentially Christian either. It is a 17th-century idea owing to James Usher, Archbishop of Armagh, Ireland. In 1654 Usher used Old Testament geneologies to calculate the number of years from creation to the birth of Jesus. The number he arrived at was 4004 years.

Finley’s right.  But dwell on the facts for a while.  Ussher (my favored variant of the spelling) did the calculations as a scientific exercise, and in the paper he notes that this is just the best information he had at hand.  In short, he didn’t say it was the number that was good forever and ever amen.  He said ‘this is the number I calculated, and here are my methodologies.’  To claim this either as a religious insight, or as authoritative, when Ussher proposed it as neither, is rather bizarre. 

Young earthers take 17th century science over 21st century science, even though the scientist who did the calculations warn them against it.

Is there a better demonstration of the evil effects of dogma anywhere?

Comment #30227

Posted by JRQ on May 15, 2005 05:17 PM (e) (s)

not buyin it: As far as science is concerned the evolution of the ribosome is an unexplained phenomenon.

I think you missed this from Nick Matzke’s post:

searching Google Scholar on “origin of the ribosome” gets 9,970 hits, and the first one is:

HF Noller (1993).  “On the origin of the ribosome: coevolution of subdomains of tRNA and rRNA.”  RNA World.  Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, New York, 1993.

The Amazon.com page for the book is here,  and the 2nd edition (2000) of the book is here, and the text is searchable.

THIS is the stuff you need to rebut for anyone to take your claim seriously.  You say you’re “not buyin it”, but it looks to me like you haven’t set foot in the store

Or do mean to tell us you really did reach your conclusion from reading this paper and the 9,969 others?

Comment #30228

Posted by Ed Darrell on May 15, 2005 05:21 PM (e) (s)

Wagner said: 

That’s one of the biggest lies told by evolutionists. For decades, evolutionists were teaching that evolution is a random process, with no direction. But then someone decided that story was flawed. So they invented this new story that while mutation is random, natural selection is not.

Charlie, I take it you never bothered to read Darwin?

Why do you think he called it “natural selection?”  Do you suppose the definition of “selection” has changed that much in the last 140 years?  In every dictionary I’ve ever found, “selection” is an antonym for “random.”

More, I challenge you to cite for me any textbook in biology in the U.S., since 1900, which says “evolution is a random proces.”

When you get to the Library of Congress, and they send you to my old collection of historic textbooks at the Department of Education, when you go in, tell the librarian I sent you.  If you find the book, make sure to note its number.  I want to go back and see what I missed.

Comment #30229

Posted by euan on May 15, 2005 05:29 PM (e) (s)

Who was Nelson?  Ozzie?  Half?

Paul

Worse than that: Charlie Nelson Wagner

Comment #30230

Posted by not buyin it on May 15, 2005 05:37 PM (e) (s)

You boys need to get your stories straight.

Harold admits no one knows how the ribosome evolved.

Nick the geologist thinks he knows.

Russel admits it’s a gap.

Good for Harold and Russel.  Boo to Nick.

In no particular order:

Harold, the structure and function of prokaryote and eukaryote ribosomes is the same.  The set of genes coding for them are not.  However, I think it’s safe to say that since both use nearly identical codon to amino acid translation tables there is a common origin.  The creationists will of course point out that a common designer could account for the common codon definitions and they are of course correct.  A common ancestor or a common designer will explain that.  I tend to go with the universal common ancestor myself but since both explanations are narratives it’s just a personal preference.  The codon translation tables in extant organisms remain the same in either case.

Bouffant and Nick: Keep reading.  The RNA World NARRATIVE is weak.  RNA, don’t you know, is extremely volatile.  That’s why everything today uses DNA for genetic storage.  A cell wall to keep a semi-stable environment for ribozyme chemistry is needed.  Since it requires a cell to build any known cell wall today something else is needed.  A clay substrate has been postulated as a matrix but it hasn’t been shown to be feasible.

Russel: you ask for something built via Dembskian (??) methods.  If by that you mean intelligent design then sure, that’s easy.  The computer you used to ask the question is of intelligent design.  Intelligent design is a known natural phenomenon unless you’re going to tell me that rational man is a supernatural creation of some sort.  I take it your position is that intelligence is a natural phenomenon, right?

Comment #30231

Posted by Pastor Bentonit on May 15, 2005 05:41 PM (e) (s)

Charlie Wagner wrote:

The question is settled. Evolutionists are just going to have to get used to the idea that there is no natural process available to them that can explain the organization and complexity of living systems. Either there is a natural process that is yet to be discovered (an option that I favor) or it’s supernatural.

(my emphasis)

Well well, Charlie W., hit me with your Mensa Card, can you spot the logical fallacy in that statement? Anyone else?

Comment #30232

Posted by Charlie Wagner on May 15, 2005 05:42 PM (e) (s)

Ed Darrell wrote:

Who was Nelson?  Ozzie?  Half?

I’m Nelson. Marshall Nelson

“Nelson’s Law,” if there is such a thing, has been falsified.  There are schools of economics which study self-organizing economic systems.  Houston has no zoning.  Crystals and polycarbons assemble themselves.  Egg and sperm unite even when parents don’t want them to.

Nelson’s Law
In its simplest form, Nelson’s Law states that “things do not organize themselves without intelligent guidance”.
  One must be careful not to confuse organization with order. There’s a lot of talk about ordered systems in the non-living world, snowflakes, tornadoes, etc. but this is not the issue. Order is simply a condition of logical or comprehensible arrangement among the separate elements of a group. Like putting files in alphabetical order or using a sieve to separate items by size. Organization is a much different structure in which something is made up of elements with varied functions that contribute to the whole and to collective functions of the system. Ordered systems can result from non-intelligent processes, as has been seen many times and cited by numerous examples.
  Every experience in our lives supports Nelson’s law. The bicycle I bought will never assemble itself without human input. I have used Heathkit radio equipment for many years. Never once did a kit come to my house and assemble itself without my intervention. My house doesn’t paint itself, my flowers don’t plant themselves and my broken window doesn’t repair itself. Every increase in organization requires outside input. I have cars, televisions, dishwashers etc. in my house. Not one of these machines ever assembled itself from it’s parts without intervention by a higher intelligence. Since living organisms are highly organized biochemical machines, why should I think differently about them? The organization of inorganic chemicals into living cells and the organization of these cells into tissues, organs and organisms required intelligent guidance. This guidance comes from the set of instructions found in the genome. Where these instructions came from remains a daunting problem in biology.

Natural Selection

  I think some people may have misunderstood what I said. Natural selection is non-random in the sense that every variation, every adaptation, every allele does NOT have an equal chance of survival. Those that are beneficial will increase in frequency while those that are deliterious or neutral will either decrease or remain the same. I don’t dispute this.
  However, natural selection can only affect variations, adaptations and alleles that already exist. Therefore, it contributes nothing towards the creation of variation, adaptations and alleles, which are solely the product of random mutation. Natural selection, while it affects the frequency of variation, adaptation and alleles, has no role in their emergence.
  So, being as all of the creative power lies in random processes such as mutation and recombination, it is not unreasonable to declare that evolution itself, according to the MTE is a wholly random process.

Thus spoke Cleanthes to Demea (David Hume):

“Look round the world: contemplate the whole and every part of it: you will find it to be nothing but one great machine, subdivided into an infinite number of lesser machines, which again admit of subdivisions, to a degree beyond what human senses and faculties can trace and explain. All these various machines, and even their most minute parts, are adjusted to each other with an accuracy, which ravishes into admiration all men, who have ever contemplated them. The curious adapting of means to ends, throughout all nature, resembles exactly, though it much exceeds, the productions of human contrivance; of human design, thought, wisdom and intelligence. Since therefore the effects resemble each other, we are led to infer, by all the rules of analogy, that the causes also resemble; and that the Author of Nature is somewhat similar to the mind of men; though possessed of much larger faculties, proportioned to the grandeur of the work, which he has executed…”

Comment #30233

Posted by Russell on May 15, 2005 05:52 PM (e) (s)

Faith is for religion.  Let’s stick to science please… Science requires that we keep an open mind.

Are we to infer that NBI is a scientist? I find that very difficult to believe. So much so, in fact, that…I’m not buyin’ it.

It has not been proven that rational man is the first intelligent designer to emerge.

Hmmmm. I see. So everything that has not been disproven is equally likely - equally worthy of consideration as science. Wow. Has the existence of Zeus ever been disproven?

The hubris it requires to assign that unique quality [ability to make designed things] to us puny humans is mind boggling.

Less boggling to this mind, however, than the hubris required to imagine that the universe was designed specifically for humans, or that we are somehow more special to The Designers’ big plans than trilobites were.

What an ego some anthropomorphic religious folks have!

Comment #30234

Posted by harold on May 15, 2005 05:56 PM (e) (s)

Noy Buyin’ It -

“Nice straw man there.  Where did I bring up God as an explanation for the evolution of ribosomes?”

That’s not what I said, though.  I asked what your explanation for the ribosome was.  And I said “And if you’re trying to say it was God, why don’t you be a man and say so, instead of playing games?” (that’s a paste and copy). 

“What I’m not buying is anyone’s narrative that requires a leap of faith.”

Nor would I suggest that you do so (with regard to ribosomes, that is).

“Unless you can show me how a ribosome could have evolved through mutation/selection it requires a leap of faith to believe that’s how it happened.”

I wouldn’t suggest any such thing, since this terminology implies cellular repr