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The Bible, Creationism, and Prophecy (part 1)
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We don't need to work it out to the nearest decimal point - just to recognise it is so unlikely to be naturally occurring that the alternative must be given credence.
And recognizing it as so unlikely is something humans are very very very bad at. So why exactly would you believe you are any better than anyone else?
We have a whole collection of fallacies for humans inaccurate assessing probability, the most famous of them being the gambler' fallacy.
This enters into all areas of life, including computer science which is what I work in.From what you are saying I gather that even if you heard Moses command each of the ten plagues and the parting of the Red Sea, you would still insist there was nothing to indicate a supernatural cause.
Well at the moment we don't have Moses commanding the ten plagues. We have you claiming that you have accurately assess the probability of a sequence of events so that you can rule out change or coincidence.
If you can actually do that you are a miracle in of yourself and you should probably put your superpowers to better use.
I don't hold anything to be infallibly certain. Infallible means cannot be wrong. There is nothing I believe that I think I cannot be wrong. I'm not that arrogant or naive.You hold some things to be certain, so do you call that infallibility?No, I gave both an unpleasant and a nice one.
Yes but doesn't your conclusion involve the existence of a loving deity?
I mean it is funny few people ever work out that an evil deity exists and is out to get them?I wonder what rational powers you have. If you witnessed the events of the exodus, you would be unable to form an opinion as to them being caused by Moses' God or just a series of coincidences???
Have you witnessed the events of Exodus?
But that is the point. You are the central observer are not in a position to accurately assess the order that they are on. In reality you have no idea what the odds of them happening are.Thanks for that. Interesting - but the samples he uses are NOT in the order I'm speaking of, but much simpler incidences.
How often do you or someone you know or are familiar with pray?Not repeated answers to prayer, not the Exodus events.You're thinking one dropping his toast and butter, another beside him dropping his knife and plate, and the toast landing butter-side up on the plate, with the knife neatly sunk in the butter. Very unlikely, but somewhere in the world at some time...
Well actually the odds of that happening are rather likely given the toast has to land one side up and the knife is most likely dropped near the toast so has a good chance to land in the toast. But if you think that is a million to one shot that might explain all this ... :pac:I'm thinking me dropping the toast and butter, praying for it not to hit the new carpet and getting the plate and knife scenario as before. Same thing you say. Could be. But when 'very unlikely' events like that happen to me several times in answer to prayer, I think I'm being rational in attributing them to One who hears and answers prayer.
Your not.
For a start I'm certain you have prayed for a ton of stuff that never happened and thus you forgot about. Your brain pattern matches between you praying for something and that thing happening. It disregards as unimportant the millions of times this doesn't happen (thus you barely even remember it) but the few times it does happen by coincidence your brain labels that as important and remembers it.
So the odds that you will be praying when one of these frequent one in a million things happnes is quite high. The odds that on some of these you will be praying for something close or even exactly like what is about to happen is also reasonably high.
Secondly our brains are very bad at accurately remembering these thought after this unlikely event happens. There has been studies into this where scientists have given people vague fortune cookie type ideas, faked a significant event some what similar to what they said and then recorded responses. The after the fact responses change to what actually happened. The vague fortune cookie idea is very often (not always but often) replaced with the details of the event. The people seem oblivious to this happening. So someone meets their aunt and says that is so weird, I was told I would meet my aunt when in fact what they were told is that they would meet a tall woman.
So you can swear blind that what you prayed for happened exactly as you said it in the prayer, but your memory is not reliable in this regard. Our brains add in details that were not present in the original thought to make the event seem more significant.
I would explain the evolutionary reasons for this but then you don't believe evolution :pac:As above, I don't see what he means by a miraculous event being what I'm talking about. Are you saying the Exodus events can be accounted for by chance events?
Exodus is rather irrelevant because you didn't witness Exodus, and I've no reason to believe the events are being recorded accurately.
I would certainly be very surprised is Exodus happened as recorded, I would certainly think that is a phenomena worthy of serious study. But the individual events could have very natural explanations (for example gas poisoning can and does turn water red and causes the death of children, frogs can and go fall from the sky).Them happening all at once within a week would certainly raise an eyebrow. But then Exodus wasn't confined purely to the judgement of one person, was it?
Why? Given I wasn't there I've no idea what actually happened during Exodus or what the probability was?I await your figures on Exodus.
If you have no idea the odds of the individual coincidences that happened to you why do you feel confident that they are of Exodus proportion?
If it helps there are plenty examples of unlucky natural disasters following other ones, though often if you look into it they turn out to be related.
I mean what are the odds that 4 planes will be hijacked by Islamic terrorists on the same day? Billions to one?
That is not surprising, you are a theist after all.Seems we disagree with our definitions of what is in the realm of possibility in the real world.I suggest it is the atheist brain that has the problem facing up to supernatural phenomena. It is biased against allowing for such, no matter how unlikely the alternative.[\quote]
You can suggest that but unfortunately for you the science doesn't support you. But then I isn't all science that doesn't support you atheist propaganda
Ok. How often do you ask for things?let's make my miracle one that comes after I ask for it.
You will have to be more specific? What happens once a year? The same miracle over and over or a different miracle?Then figure that happening once a year, every year.I'm not aware of how to do the maths: 1/Million I get, but how is that altered by it having to be asked for before it happened? Then for similar to occur each year? Thanks.
You constantly praying, which I imagine you like most people do, greatly increases the likelihood of a hit
How is that you say? Surely the odds of something unlikely happening at the same time that you are praying for it would be more unlikely.
The problem is that constantly asking for things primes you. You are now in serious pattern matching mode. After all unlikely things are constantly happening to you, and you cannot accurately assess if it is genuinely a one in a million (again the toast analogy would seem to suggest probability ain't your strong suit).
The odds that something close to what you were asking for in a time period before the event will happen are actually pretty high, because you are constantly asking for things and disregarding those that don't happen. So we don't have to match one thing against one thing, we just have to match one of the things you ask for (out of the multidude you did) with one of the unlikely things that are constantly happening to you.
When that happens your brain pattern matches, you forget all the things you asked for that didn't happen and retroactively assess that you asked for one thing and that one thing happened, amazing!
Again this is why humans are terrible at probablity, and why Casinos make millions.
If you only asked for one thing and that one thing happened and was very unlikely then that would be impressive. The problem is that when people believe that this is what happened it turns out that isn't actually what happened. That is why people do scientific research into this area, because a persons recollection of what happened are often out of whack with what actually happened. If you told me you only asked for one thing and that one thing happened I would have to say I don't trust your recognition of the event, given how the human brain works and how humans tend to do this.
When people are actually put through independent study that doesn't rely on their assessment of what happened it never turns out that something unlikely happened. For a start people never just pray for one thing that then happens, thought this is very often what they report back after the fact. Also as I already mentioned people are terrible at assessing if what they asked for is what actually happened. I was told I would meet a tall woman (very likely) turns into I was told I would meet my aunt. They geuinely believe this it seems, it is how our brains work.Yes, I too find the illusions entertaining and enlightening. Just that they do not deal with my sort of miracles.
They do. Its just that when you are in the illusion you don't notice. That is why it is called an illusion.0 -
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... a 'just so' story that 'imagines' intermediate stages ... that have no basis in observed reality ... and gleefully ignores the fact that the CSI for even a 'light sensitive patch' cannot be produced spontaneously without a massive input of intelligence!!!Genghiz Cohen wrote: »
... and my Darwinian quote is perfectly valid ... because it has turned out to be 'absurd in the highest degree' (in the light of modern science) to believe that an eye can be formed spontaneously.0 -
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Improbable wrote: »This clearly represents a misunderstanding of how it works. Think of it this way. If a mutation causes the development of a light sensitive cell on the organism, that organism will be better able to do things than other organisms in the same species that cannot detect light. It may be better at finding food, better at finding a mate, better at avoiding predators as well as a whole lot of other things which I'm probably not thinking of but which are of importance to its procreation.
How can organisms which develop light sensitive cells have any kind of advantage over organisms which don't? If an organism develops a light sensitive cell what advantage does that give it over the organism that doesn't? Its just a light sensitive cell. No big deal. It would need an awful lot of time before it could be anything like as advantageous as a real eye. So during the time it develops into an eye why would Natural Selection keep it as an advantageous trait?Improbable wrote: »Natural selection does not cause the mutations. Natural selection is not an entity, it is a process. The process doesn't care about what you're seeing or what the benefits are because it is not an intelligent process.
I know, that is my point. Mutations are completely random and there is no goal or desired outcome for what arises as a result of any mutation. So if an organism develops a light sensitive cell as a result of a random mutation then what advantage could it have and why is it selected for when it is nothing like a fully developed eye at that stage of its development? If this is how the eye is supposed to have evolved to the structures that we find in most creatures today then do we have any evidence of it or is what your saying just theory? If its just theory then can this theory be tested? If the answer is No to these two questions then why call it Science?Improbable wrote: »Say for example if several organisms from the same species developed a light sensitive cell. Some of them might head towards the light, some might head away from it. If the light was caused by food, the one that swam towards it would do better than the one who didn't.
How can light be caused by food?Improbable wrote: »If it was caused by a predator, then it would do badly. All of these factors and more come into play when talking about evolution by natural selection as well as a myriad of other factors.
Yes, and they are all very speculative and have no hard evidence to back them up.Improbable wrote: »The details and exact minutiae of the process are not easy to understand, but the process of natural selection in the broad strokes is simple.
I agree, I think it is a very simple concept indeed, yet when one asks a very simple question about what it is supposed to explain, one is immediately accused of just not understanding the theory. A very easy get out clause and it is used here a lot.Improbable wrote: »Those mutations which confer a better ability to procreate are selected for by passing on their genes to the next generation more than the normal organism.
Back to my original question: How can organisms which develop light sensitive cells have any kind of advantage over organisms which don't?Improbable wrote: »While those mutations which are detrimental to procreation are selected against by not being able to pass on their genes as effectively to the next generation as well as the normal organism. That's the short version of it.
Mutations which are detrimental to the organism obviously will not get passed on to the next generation because those mutations would have destroyed the organism, hence no next generation. That my friend is a given. What I'm asking is how can mutations which don't have any particular advantage in the very early stages of development be selector for before what they develop into - which would be advantageous for survival and procreation - comes about?Improbable wrote: »Again, natural selection is not evolving the eye on its own. It is in conjunction with mutations which have no regard for natural selection. It is only the evolutionary process which is affected by natural selection. Unless of course we get into the realm of mutation restricting mutations... But you don't have a degree in genetics and I don't think I could really explain that to you in simple terms.
Try me, whats the worst that can happen?Improbable wrote: »Natural Selection does not know the benefits or detriments of anything. In fact, being a process and an entity it doesn't know ANYTHING AT ALL. The creationist problem is that because you assume an intelligent designer, you think that something similar must be at work in the process of evolution. The process of natural selection is a natural process of life and of hereditarily passing on genes and gene mutations.
Don't you think that their is just an awful lot things just dumped on poor old Natural Selection's door that it is supposed to somehow explain? Do you really think that it can adequately explain it all? Even without bringing in the design arguments I fail to see how Natural Selection acting on random mutations can explain it all. Maybe only those people who have already ruled out the possibly of an Intelligent Designer having any input in life's creation and evolution can swallow this very narrow and feeble line of reasoning.0 -
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Soul Winner wrote: »How can organisms which develop light sensitive cells have any kind of advantage over organisms which don't? If an organism develops a light sensitive cell what advantage does that give it over the organism that doesn't? Its just a light sensitive cell. No big deal. It would need an awful lot of time before it could be anything like as advantageous as a real eye. So during the time it develops into an eye why would Natural Selection keep it as an advantageous trait?
Seriously, watch the video. Of course it's not as advantageous as an eye like we have. But some light sensitivity is better than no light sensitivity. It's not an all or nothing process, it's a gradual step by step process.Soul Winner wrote: »I know, that is my point. Mutations are completely random and there is no goal or desired outcome for what arises as a result of any mutation. So if an organism develops a light sensitive cell as a result of a random mutation then what advantage could it have and why is it selected for when it is nothing like a fully developed eye at that stage of its development? If this is how the eye is supposed to have evolved to the structures that we find in most creatures today then do we have any evidence of it or is what your saying just theory? If its just theory then can this theory be tested? If the answer is No to these two questions then why call it Science?
You don't seem to understand evolution by gradual steps... It's a fairly simple process. If an organism develops a light sensitive cell, it is not more advantageous than an organism with an eye like ours. It is simply more advantageous than an organism like itself which has no light sensitive cell. This doesn't come about merely because being able to sense light is intrinsically advantageous. The organisms response to the light (which it can be genetically predisposed to) is also crucial. That's why those with a specific perception of the light would have been better at procreating.
And the "way we find it in most creatures today" makes no sense if you'd seen the video. There are plenty of animals who have different types of "eyes", from pinhole type camera's to simple light sensitive patches, to eyes which are way more advanced than ours.
HERE is a paper you might find interesting.Soul Winner wrote: »How can light be caused by food?
Light bouncing off food. Or maybe it's bioluminescent, or fluorescent. Sorry, shouldn't have assumed you'd understand what I meant.Soul Winner wrote: »Yes, and they are all very speculative and have no hard evidence to back them up.
You can see can you not? If you and a blind person were in the middle of Africa and you ran across a pack of lions, which one of you would last longer? You have a massive advantage over your friend.
Now, maybe you can't see very well, but you can sort of make out general shapes. You won't have as much of an advantage over your friend as you would if you could see perfectly well, but you'd still have some advantage. Is that clear?Soul Winner wrote: »I agree, I think it is a very simple concept indeed, yet when one asks a very simple question about what it is supposed to explain, one is immediately accused of just not understanding the theory. A very easy get out clause and it is used here a lot.
Yes, well when people who don't have degrees in genetics try to argue with those people who do have degrees in genetics about how evolution works, all they're really doing when they argue that there is no proof for evolution is arguing from personal ignorance, which is no argument at all. It's not a get out clause when your opponents really don't understand the theory, and instead of going and posting in the biology forum, they'd rather stay in their safe little corner.Soul Winner wrote: »Back to my original question: How can organisms which develop light sensitive cells have any kind of advantage over organisms which don't?
For the sake of this discussion, let's rate your eyes at 100%. A completely blind person is rated at 0%. Now, you clearly have an advantage over the blind person. If there was a third person, who was rated at 50%, he too would still have an advantage over the blind person, but not as much as you do. And he would have no advantage over you. Maybe he can just make out general shapes. And if there's a 4th person, who is rated at 25%. Maybe he can just make out whether there is light coming from somewhere and tell it's direction. He would still have more information than the completely blind person. How can you possibly argue that being able to see even just a little bit, isn't better than being completely blind?Soul Winner wrote: »Mutations which are detrimental to the organism obviously will not get passed on to the next generation because those mutations would have destroyed the organism, hence no next generation. That my friend is a given. What I'm asking is how can mutations which don't have any particular advantage in the very early stages of development be selector for before what they develop into - which would be advantageous for survival and procreation - comes about?
I have given you plenty of evidence as to how it can be advantageous even in the early stages of development. Why do you still keep claiming that it doesn't confer any advantage?
I'm still not sure you understand the difference between seeing and having an eye and what role each plays in natural selection. Being able to simply detect light is not as good as an eye. But evolution doesn't deal in 0 - 100. It's a slow process. 1% is better than 0%. 2% is better than 1% etc. Yes, there was no "seeing" before the first light sensitive cell appeared. But as soon as it did, natural selection had something to work on, whether for better or for worse.Soul Winner wrote: »Try me, whats the worst that can happen?
You could call me a heretic for not believing the word of your religious leaders and burn me. Not really relevant to the discussion anyway.Soul Winner wrote: »Don't you think that their is just an awful lot things just dumped on poor old Natural Selection's door that it is supposed to somehow explain? Do you really think that it can adequately explain it all? Even without bringing in the design arguments I fail to see how Natural Selection acting on random mutations can explain it all. Maybe only those people who have already ruled out the possibly of an Intelligent Designer having any input in life's creation and evolution can swallow this very narrow and feeble line of reasoning.
Yeah, nice one, don't give any reasoning or logical arguments, just make sweeping accusations of "oh but natural selection can't do it all". Either show some evidence, reasoning, proof, logical argument that natural selection can't do it or admit that your argument is not based on any of those things but is rather based on nothing more than personal belief which in no way imparts any actual truth value to your statement.0 -
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Did you watch the video?
Yes. It makes a lot of assumptions then proceeds to explain everything based on those assumptions. The assumptions are not supported by the evidence and if you want to argue that they are then ID proponents can say that the evidence also supports Intelligent Design. Depends on how you view the evidence. The naturalists say that light sensitives cells formed as a result of a random mutation, i.e Random Mutations did it. But how do they know this? They don't, its just theory. It could just as easily be argued that God did it.
If IDers are to be accused of filling in the gaps with God then materialists can be equally accused of filling in the gaps with random mutations. Neither of the two can be scientifically tested or observed in nature but only ID gets the label of Non-Scientific. Why is that? Showing animals living today that have different types of eyes and using that as evidence of the various stages in the evolution of the eye is just dodging the question and goes against the theory that their eyes are like this because they have evolved to adapt to their surrounding environment. If the theory that their eyes have evolved to adapt to their surrounding environments is true then that is why they look the way they do, it cannot be evidence for the various evolutionary stages of development of the eye. You can't have it both ways so which is it?The most basic "eye" is a light sensitive cell that causes some sort of stimulation to the cell (which is pretty easy considering light is a form of energy).
But how can we test that human eyes evolved from eyes like these? We can't. The theory is therefore non falsifiable and under your own criteria for what can be regarded as science this theory fails as science.The organism doesn't need to know the "benefits" of this, it either provides a benefit or it doesn't. For example a creature that keeps getting eaten when it is out in the open will benefit from a light sensitive cell that causes a sharp rush of electricity in its nervous system if it is bright (thus it is outside).
That has to be the most nonsensical paragraph I've ever read in my entire life. Can you decode what it means for those of us please? Depends on what you mean by "seeing". For example an organism could mutate a light sensitive cell (pretty easy to do given the chemicals that are in a cell), yet a mutation that causes it to effect the nervous system might happen a few generations later. So the first organism can't "see", even though it has a light sensitive cell. But his great great great great great great great great grandson who still has this light sensitive cell (remember most mutations do nothing adverse to the organism) may mutate so that the light sensitive cell is now causing a burst of electricity to effect the nervous system. This organism can now "see", if only very basically.
So even if the light sensitive cells are not conveying any advantage to the organism but are not rejected by Natural Selection either because they are neither causing any beneficial or adverse effects to the organism, that they will somehow eventually all line up to such a degree that an eye with the ability to see will result? That's what Natural Selection acting on random mutations is supposed to be doing. Why is that regarded as a sensible, reasonable and logical explanation while postulating an outside Intelligence is not? An outside Intelligence is a much simpler explanation. Even Dawkins will admit that life has the appearance of having been designed for a purpose. If it waddles like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, then the chances are that it just might be a duck.Light has a ton of energy in it, this energy causes chemical reactions in chemicals. It takes very little to make a cell photo sensitive given the chemicals in already in a cell.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photoreceptor_protein
Proteins which are light sensitive are assemble using various sequences of various types of amino acids. This sequence is specifically coded for in DNA. The information in DNA is what dictates the formation of these proteins not their exposure to light. Their subsequent exposure to light after their initial folding process in the cell will change them but unless they were folded in that way in the first place that reaction would not take place. So how come the information for coding these proteins is already encoded in DNA? How can DNA know that that exposure to light will produce the desired beneficial effect?There is no "why" in evolution Soul Winner, as you really should know by now.
There are loads of "Whys" in evolutionary theory though. Sigh :rolleyes:The very very first photosensitive chemicals would have come about through mutations.
Another faith based assumption with absolutely no evidence to back it up except the evidence that can also be used by IDers to support their conclusions. Again it all depends how you interpret the evidence which in turn is based on your world view which has nothing to do with Science.See above. A light sensitive cell that causes a response in the organism is a very simple thing for evolution to produce. From the very start you have a benefit to the organism.
If thats the case then it is also a very simple thing for an all powerful Creator to produce, yet it is nigh on impossible for humans to produce and we posses the most complex thinking machine in the universe as fas as we know.0 -
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Improbable wrote: »And the "way we find it in most creatures today" makes no sense if you'd seen the video. There are plenty of animals who have different types of "eyes", from pinhole type camera's to simple light sensitive patches, to eyes which are way more advanced than ours.
Again like I said to Wicknight, its either or. The various eyes we see in living creatures today either evolved to adapt to the environments and thats why they look the way they do or they are evidence of the various stages of the development of the eye. Which is it? Can't be both.Improbable wrote: »HERE is a paper you might find interesting.
I read the first page but I need a logon to read the other links
Improbable wrote: »Light bouncing off food. Or maybe it's bioluminescent, or fluorescent. Sorry, shouldn't have assumed you'd understand what I meant.
Appologies for thinking you meant what you said.Improbable wrote: »You can see can you not? If you and a blind person were in the middle of Africa and you ran across a pack of lions, which one of you would last longer? You have a massive advantage over your friend.
That makes sense when talking about sight as we know it now. It doesn't make sense at the cellular level unless you equate mutations that result in light sensitive cells with sight for the organism.Improbable wrote: »Now, maybe you can't see very well, but you can sort of make out general shapes. You won't have as much of an advantage over your friend as you would if you could see perfectly well, but you'd still have some advantage. Is that clear?
Well yes, but again your talking about sight now, not random mutations that result in light sensitive cells, which is a different thing. All I'm trying to do here is point out that using Natural Selection acting on random mutations as an explanation makes a lot of assumptions that are not necessarily supported by the evidence. If the race of mankind was blind throughout all its history and yet survived pretty well using its other senses and faculties and then suddenly a mutation took place in one of the population which lead to a new sense starting to be developed - namely sight - how long do you think that one person will survive in such a group? Assuming that all he could make out was very dark shadows. And assuming also that this trait was passed on through his genes (big assumption but be that as it may) to his pogeny. And then over time his progeny slowly abandoned the use of their other senses whilst developing this new one would theoretically become a disadvantage to them in the group as the others who have already adapted well without the need for sight would still be thriving. This is the other side of the argument and it applies at the cellular level too. Everyone knows that when we loose a faculty like sight or hearing our other senses get stronger. Turing it around, if we suddenly took on the early stages of a new faculty our other faculties would suffer as a consequence hence leading to a reduction in our survival chances.Improbable wrote: »Yes, well when people who don't have degrees in genetics try to argue with those people who do have degrees in genetics about how evolution works, all they're really doing when they argue that there is no proof for evolution is arguing from personal ignorance, which is no argument at all. It's not a get out clause when your opponents really don't understand the theory, and instead of going and posting in the biology forum, they'd rather stay in their safe little corner.
This is the Christianity forum and you are coming in here trying to tell us how it could have happened without the need to invoke a creator. I'm just asking questions about the science behind what you subscribe to. If I knew the answers to these questions I wouldn't be asking them. If you cannot answer them in laymans terms then I suggest you scurry on back to the biology forum where people talk your language and stay out of here.Improbable wrote: »For the sake of this discussion, let's rate your eyes at 100%. A completely blind person is rated at 0%. Now, you clearly have an advantage over the blind person. If there was a third person, who was rated at 50%, he too would still have an advantage over the blind person, but not as much as you do. And he would have no advantage over you. Maybe he can just make out general shapes. And if there's a 4th person, who is rated at 25%. Maybe he can just make out whether there is light coming from somewhere and tell it's direction. He would still have more information than the completely blind person. How can you possibly argue that being able to see even just a little bit, isn't better than being completely blind?
I wasn't arguing that at all. I asked how you can equate an organism that has sight to one that has developed light sensitive cells. I just wanted to know how organisms with light sensitive cells have any kind of advantage over cells that are not light sensitive. You keep using analogies with sight as we know it today which I think is stupid. Organisms that develop light sensitive cells could conceivable loose other traits as a result and therefore reduce the organism's survival chances so it works both ways.Improbable wrote: »I have given you plenty of evidence as to how it can be advantageous even in the early stages of development. Why do you still keep claiming that it doesn't confer any advantage?
All you've done was use sight analogies that do not apply to organisms that start out evolving light sensitives cells. Mutations that cause light sensitive cells to develop can only convey advantage for the organism if other factors are also in place in the organism i.e the ability to use these new cells for some purpose hitherto unknown to either the organism, random mutations or natural selection. Developing light sensitive cells is not the same as developing a new faculty. The faculty - sight of some kind - that will use these new cells is yet to emerge. For any organism to have anything like sight as a faculty it will need more than just light sensitive cells. Just like there are people who have perfectly developed eyes but still cannot see. In order for them to be able to see they need more than just eyes are needed, they also need a part of the brain that deals with seeing to function properly.Improbable wrote: »I'm still not sure you understand the difference between seeing and having an eye and what role each plays in natural selection. Being able to simply detect light is not as good as an eye. But evolution doesn't deal in 0 - 100. It's a slow process. 1% is better than 0%. 2% is better than 1% etc. Yes, there was no "seeing" before the first light sensitive cell appeared. But as soon as it did, natural selection had something to work on, whether for better or for worse.
So there was no seeing at some point just the hardware that made it possible. Great.Improbable wrote: »You could call me a heretic for not believing the word of your religious leaders and burn me. Not really relevant to the discussion anyway.
Christians are specifically commanded not to judge so calling you a heritic would be in direct contravention to the command of Jesus.Improbable wrote: »Yeah, nice one, don't give any reasoning or logical arguments, just make sweeping accusations of "oh but natural selection can't do it all". Either show some evidence, reasoning, proof, logical argument that natural selection can't do it or admit that your argument is not based on any of those things but is rather based on nothing more than personal belief which in no way imparts any actual truth value to your statement.
I've given you logical arguments that theoretically could count against your arguments because they are based on what you your self accept in theory. In particular the idea that an organism which takes on a new faculty (by whatever process) could theoretically become weaker as a result and hence not be in the advantageous position to better procreate than you imagine.0 -
Soul Winner wrote: »Yes. It makes a lot of assumptions then proceeds to explain everything based on those assumptions. The assumptions are not supported by the evidence and if you want to argue that they are then ID proponents can say that the evidence also supports Intelligent Design.
Can you explain which assumptions you are talking about?Soul Winner wrote: »Depends on how you view the evidence. The naturalists say that light sensitives cells formed as a result of a random mutation, i.e Random Mutations did it. But how do they know this? They don't, its just theory. It could just as easily be argued that God did it.
You can say that about anything. How do we know Everest formed by the pushing of two continental shelves together under Nepal. How do we know elves didn't do it?
The idea that eyes evolved is supported by all the evidence (ie the theories match and explain the evidence and vice versa). We have simple photosensitive cells. We have intermediate forms. We have the DNA. We have fossils.Soul Winner wrote: »If IDers are to be accused of filling in the gaps with God then materialists can be equally accused of filling in the gaps with random mutations.
I don't know what you mean by this. Are you disputing that random mutations occur? Because we have evidence they do.Soul Winner wrote: »Neither of the two can be scientifically tested or observed in nature but only ID gets the label of Non-Scientific. Why is that?
Because random mutations can and are observed in nature. God isn't.
That doesn't mean God didn't make the first photocell, But we can form a scientific theory that it was random mutation and then study the predictions of this (which is what we do). We can't form a scientific theory of "God did it" because we can't model God.Soul Winner wrote: »Showing animals living today that have different types of eyes and using that as evidence of the various stages in the evolution of the eye is just dodging the question and goes against the theory that their eyes are like this because they have evolved to adapt to their surrounding environment. If the theory that their eyes have evolved to adapt to their surrounding environments is true then that is why they look the way they do, it cannot be evidence for the various evolutionary stages of development of the eye. You can't have it both ways so which is it?
The reason these simpler eyes are used as examples is counter the Creationist claim that you either have to have a fully functioning human eye or nothing, there is no use to anything between. This is clearly not the case since creatures with much similar eyes are alive today and function fine.
If you find a creature alive today that has a pin hole camera and you find an ancient ancestor of humans that has the characteristics of this eye you can extrapolate that this is the ancestor to our eyes.
That doesn't mean that the animal alive today is our ancestor. It means that our ancestor's eyes worked in a similar fashion.Soul Winner wrote: »But how can we test that human eyes evolved from eyes like these? We can't.
Of course we can't. We can look at the fossil record and we can also look at our DNA.Soul Winner wrote: »That has to be the most nonsensical paragraph I've ever read in my entire life. Can you decode what it means for those of us please?
Ok. If I have a mutation that gives me a benefit I don't need to be aware of this. I just don't get eaten and my children don't get eaten, where as those without it do. There, natural selection. I've no idea I've been selected, I just have by virtue of not dying.
You don't need to know the benefits of having an eye. You just have the benefits.
I don't know what you mean by somehow line up. A light sensitive cell is very very simple structure. Nothing need to line up. You need a mutation to produce a light sensitive cell (which just means a cell that produces electrical current when exposed to light) and a mutation to respond to the increase in electrical charge. In fact you probably don't even need the second bit since an electrical charge will do something.Soul Winner wrote: »So even if the light sensitive cells are not conveying any advantage to the organism but are not rejected by Natural Selection either because they are neither causing any beneficial or adverse effects to the organism, that they will somehow eventually all line up to such a degree that an eye with the ability to see will result?
And once you have a light sensitive cell that some triggers a response in the organism you have an eye.Soul Winner wrote: »That's what Natural Selection acting on random mutations is supposed to be doing. Why is that regarded as a sensible, reasonable and logical explanation while postulating an outside Intelligence is not?
I don't know about "sensible, reasonable and logical". It is consider science because you can model and test it.
You can't model a supposed invisible unknown intelligence (as I keep having to tell you)
We can model a random mutation, we can model the chemical reactions it causes, we can model natural selection etc etc.
That is irrelevant. It is not about which explanation is simplest or easiest to understand. Something being simply doesn't make it true.Soul Winner wrote: »An outside Intelligence is a much simpler explanation.
It is about which explanation can have its accuracy tested. For example quantum physics is far from simple, it still is accurate.Soul Winner wrote: »Even Dawkins will admit that life has the appearance of having been designed for a purpose. If it waddles like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, then the chances are that it just might be a duck.
Life looks like it evolved as part of Darwinian evolution. This examples all of life, not just the bits that look designed well. IDers have no explanation for the mountain of bad or wasteful design that exists in nature.Soul Winner wrote: »Proteins which are light sensitive are assemble using various sequences of various types of amino acids. This sequence is specifically coded for in DNA. The information in DNA is what dictates the formation of these proteins not their exposure to light. Their subsequent exposure to light after their initial folding process in the cell will change them but unless they were folded in that way in the first place that reaction would not take place. So how come the information for coding these proteins is already decoded in DNA?
Mutation of the DNA obviously. That is what a genetic mutation is, a change in the sequence that produces a different protein.Soul Winner wrote: »How can DNA know what that exposure to light will produce the desired beneficial effect?
Again, it doesn't. The DNA mutates, produces a light sensitive protein, the creature with this protein does better, and thus is selected be nature by virtue of it not dying as fast as those without it.
There is no "desired" effect. Evolution is not trying to do something. I really don't know how many times this has to be said to you Soul Winner, it is like very time it is said you you go "Oh ok" and then just ignore this.
No offense but you still seem very far away from grasping evolutionary theory.Soul Winner wrote: »There are loads of "Whys" in evolutionary theory though. Sigh :rolleyes:
Continuing to talk about the desired effect, or talking about evolution trying to produce something shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the process going on here.
The IDers don't have models.Soul Winner wrote: »Another faith based assumption with absolutely no evidence to back it up except the evidence that can also be used by IDers to support their conclusions.Soul Winner wrote: »Again it all depends how you interpret the evidence
Science is not about simply interpreting evidence. As you correctly point out anyone can do that and come to any conclusion they like, it is highly subjective. Which is why that isn't what science does.
Scientists aren't stupid Soul Winner, and they aren't simply trying to find a way to attack Christians (a large number of scientists, particularly when these concepts were being discussed, are Christians).
If it was impossible to tell if any idea was actually accurate or not there would be no point in doing science. If every scientific theory was simply a scientist having a good old think about what the evidence suggests, there would be no point in doing science.
You are right there are a lot of flaws in how IDers approach the evidence, it is entirely subjective. Scientists know this, it is why they don't do it. IDers do it because they know that if they actually had to do science they couldn't support their ideas. You cannot construct a model of this supposed intelligence because no one knows what it is supposed to be.
Rest assured any of the problems you see scientists long ago thought of them.Soul Winner wrote: »If thats the case then it is also a very simple thing for an all powerful Creator to produce, yet it is nigh on impossible for humans to produce and we posses the most complex thinking machine in the universe as fas as we know.
You can produce light sensitive chemicals easily and cheaply out of basic chemical compounds. There is nothing amazing about this, light interacts with most things giving them a burst of energy. We have already created solar cells that are more efficient than the 3 billion year process of evolution and/or the super all powerful Creator of the universe.
This is an example of where ID really falls down. Why if life was designed by super powerful beings are we already, having only been trying for 50 years, producing processes that are more efficient than those found in nature? Are we smarter than God?
With evolution this is perfectly easy to explain, since evolution is only interested in "good enough", improvements on that are only selected by natural selection if they provide an extra benefit. If they don't, if it is good enough, then evolution produces nothing better.0 -
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