What Americans Think about Evolution

[Call_of_the_Wild]

So, a process performs its function...and that somehow makes it smarter than us?

If I place a 3 ton boulder over your head, and say "human! Make the boulder go up.. Gravity, make the boulder go down!" And you get crushed, are you dumber than gravity?

I guess you were so busy trying to offer a clever response that you completely failed to realize that if you start the analogy of with "I", then you are implying INTELLIGENT DESIGN.

Do you spontaneously create heat better than something that's on fire? Or is fire "more smart" than you?

"Mindless blind processes" perform functions. We use science to learn how. Some things we can artificially replicate, some we can improve upon, some we can't.

A process is not "more smart" than we are, based on if we understand or can replicate it. A process isn't intelligent.

One DNA cell is more complex than a space shuttle, and the last I checked space shuttles dont get created from mindless and blind processes.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

Did Peter Parker state that the universe had a beginning in that source?

He stated that "with great power comes great responsibility". Though I think you misunderstood the point here. It doesn't matter if he did claim that if doesn't make it true.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

He stated that "with great power comes great responsibility".

Wow. Now aint that something? What your friendly neighborhood spider said sounds similiar to what Jesus said in Luke 12:48:

"From everyone that is given much, much will be demanded. And from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked."

Hmmm.

Though I think you misunderstood the point here. It doesn't matter if he did claim that if doesn't make it true.

Thats the point, if he claimed it, it would be true...just like when Gen 1:1 claimed it, we found out that it is true.

 

[outhouse]

One DNA cell is more complex than a space shuttle, and the last I checked space shuttles dont get created from mindless and blind processes.

This is called a reply from ignorance.


Because you do not understand how complex nature is and can be, you make the same mistake as many ancient and modern men do, by attributing a deity to that very very large gap in your knowledge about nature. [Due to severe willful ignorance]


The Blind Watchmaker - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

To dispel the idea that complexity cannot arise without the intervention of a "creator", Dawkins uses the example of the eye. Beginning with a simple organism, capable only of distinguishing between light and dark, in only the crudest fashion, he takes the reader through a series of minor modifications, which build in sophistication until we arrive at the elegant and complex mammalian eye. In making this journey, he points to several creatures whose various seeing apparatus are, whilst still useful, living examples of intermediate levels of complexity.

 

[Ouroboros]

One DNA cell is more complex than a space shuttle, and the last I checked space shuttles dont get created from mindless and blind processes.

How do you know the DNA cell is more complex than a space shuttle? What's the argument for that?

What if we compared DNA to the XBox One CPU? Human genome: 3 billion base pairs. Xbox One Main SoC: 5 billion transistors.

By the way, talking about the space shuttle, NASA has used Genetic Algorithms to design parts:

NASA has applied genetic algorithms (GAs) to a number of problems. Examples include, but are not limited to, rocket engine design [Akira and Meng-Sing 2001], wing design [Holst and Pulliam 2001], planet discovery [Laughlin and Chambers 2001], circuit design [Lohn and Colombano 1998], molecular design [Globus, et. al. 1999] and molecular force field parameters discovery [Globus, et. al. 2001]. GAs are stochastic, embarrassingly parallel, and can tolerate failures. Thus, GAs are well suited to cycle scavenging computational environments where computers purchased for interactive use also run batch jobs nights, weekends, and at other idle times.

http://alglobus.net/NASAwork/papers/Cycle-ScavengingGA/paper.html
Genetic Algorithms are basically based on the same idea as evolution. It's a process of random mutations, reproduction of "genes" (code), and selective pressure. And it works.

Rocket engine design. Wing design. Circuit design. And more.

I'm not sure how it can be said that evolutionary theory can't work when the same principle can be used successfully to design parts to space ships?

There are many examples of this. Genetic algorithms are used to optimize data traffic and parallel processing power. How can it not work if it works?

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

How do you know the DNA cell is more complex than a space shuttle? What's the argument for that?
Because dozens of experts in the field makes this claim

What if we compared DNA to the XBox One CPU? Human genome: 3 billion base pairs. Xbox One Main SoC: 5 billion transistors.

By the way, talking about the space shuttle, NASA has used Genetic Algorithms to design parts:

Towards 100,000 CPU Cycle-Scavenging by Genetic Algorithms
Genetic Algorithms are basically based on the same idea as evolution. It's a process of random mutations, reproduction of "genes" (code), and selective pressure. And it works.

Rocket engine design. Wing design. Circuit design. And more.

I'm not sure how it can be said that evolutionary theory can't work when the same principle can be used successfully to design parts to space ships?

There are many examples of this. Genetic algorithms are used to optimize data traffic and parallel processing power. How can it not work if it works?

Lets pretend as if it isn't a fact that one single cell in DNA is not more complex than anything humans have ever built. Tell you what...google "complexity of DNA" and then come back to me.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Lets pretend as if it isn't a fact that one single cell in DNA is not more complex than anything humans have ever built. Tell you what...google "complexity of DNA" and then come back to me.

Are there cells in DNA? Huh, learn something new every day. Guess it's good we have an expert on DNA like you here to enlighten us.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

This is called a reply from ignorance.


Because you do not understand how complex nature is and can be, you make the same mistake as many ancient and modern men do, by attributing a deity to that very very large gap in your knowledge about nature. [Due to severe willful ignorance]


The Blind Watchmaker - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

To dispel the idea that complexity cannot arise without the intervention of a "creator", Dawkins uses the example of the eye. Beginning with a simple organism, capable only of distinguishing between light and dark, in only the crudest fashion, he takes the reader through a series of minor modifications, which build in sophistication until we arrive at the elegant and complex mammalian eye. In making this journey, he points to several creatures whose various seeing apparatus are, whilst still useful, living examples of intermediate levels of complexity.

[youtube]kFArkMULozM[/youtube]
DNA code so complex must have highly intelligent creator - YouTube


Name me one scientists that dispute the COMPLEXITY of DNA? Name me one. Just one. I am not talking about the origins of DNA...but the complexity alone. Name me one. Until then, refrain from speaking to me. Sick of the foolishness on here.

 

[metis]

Lets pretend as if it isn't a fact that one single cell in DNA is not more complex than anything humans have ever built. Tell you what...google "complexity of DNA" and then come back to me.

You're making the assumption that d.n.a. was the original molecule that was involved with reproduction, but the geneticists that I have read believe that it was more likely r.n.a., which a less complex molecule, or maybe even something else that might have been even simpler yet.

 

[Ouroboros]

Lets pretend as if it isn't a fact that one single cell in DNA is not more complex than anything humans have ever built. Tell you what...google "complexity of DNA" and then come back to me.

We'd built systems and computers that analyze and sequence the DNA, which means that our computer technology is exceeding the complexity of the DNA.

Besides, DNA is a part of the cell, not the other way around. And I did study the structure of DNA in class. And computer science as well.

DNA is complex, no doubt about it, but it's not more complex than some things we've built. The Internet is by far much more complex than a single DNA. There are more computers (3 times more) than there's base pairs in a DNA. That makes the total amount of integrated circuits, and just simple resistors in the world, right now connecting to the Internet, thousands, maybe millions of times larger than even the number of molecules in the DNA.

The company BioComp Systems specializes in using genetic algorithms to solve very complex and difficult problems for the industry. They've making bucks by the fact that evolutionary algorithms work.

On another note, aminoacids, and three of the four nucleotides have been produced in laboratories by setting up an environment to let the chemicals self-react. These are the foundation for life. And if we can produce them by letting them "create" themselves in a laboratory, the question isn't anymore if it can happen in nature, but what exact conditions where there when they happened for our life to being. Also, they've found aminoacids in space. They exist (are created) in space. How is that possible if it can't happen?

 

[Simurgh]

We'd built systems and computers that analyze and sequence the DNA, which means that our computer technology is exceeding the complexity of the DNA.

Besides, DNA is a part of the cell, not the other way around. And I did study the structure of DNA in class. And computer science as well.

DNA is complex, no doubt about it, but it's not more complex than some things we've built. The Internet is by far much more complex than a single DNA. There are more computers (3 times more) than there's base pairs in a DNA. That makes the total amount of integrated circuits, and just simple resistors in the world, right now connecting to the Internet, thousands, maybe millions of times larger than even the number of molecules in the DNA.

The company BioComp Systems specializes in using genetic algorithms to solve very complex and difficult problems for the industry. They've making bucks by the fact that evolutionary algorithms work.

On another note, aminoacids, and three of the four nucleotides have been produced in laboratories by setting up an environment to let the chemicals self-react. These are the foundation for life. And if we can produce them by letting them "create" themselves in a laboratory, the question isn't anymore if it can happen in nature, but what exact conditions where there when they happened for our life to being. Also, they've found aminoacids in space. They exist (are created) in space. How is that possible if it can't happen?

thanks for breaking that down so nicely. let's just hope that your eloquence did not go to waste.:yes:

 

[johnhanks]

... one single cell in DNA ...

CotW's understanding of biological science captured in just five little words.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

How do you know the DNA cell is more complex than a space shuttle? What's the argument for that?

That's actually a good question (well, of course it is but I mean especially good), because it hits on a number of related yet vital points.

The first is "How do you know that...DNA...is more complex than...[insert system] ?"

The second, naturally, is how we determine the degree to which anything is complex (i.e., how do we define complexity?).

The third question is that, given there exist a fair number of complexity metrics available, which if any are the most suitable here?

The problem, however, is that complexity has been wedded to Shannon's information theory and his application of entropy in physics to information. Algorithmic and similar computational complexity metrics are more sophisticated, but as they are based around such as algorithms and computers, they are ideal for systems in which the number of elements, generally idealized in terms of bits for a computer itself, determines how complex the system is by possible configurations of the elements. More simply, all elements of the system are treated equally.

This fails completely as any useful measure of complexity for living systems.

For one thing, we find that computing genetic complexity of humans using such a method yields a value that is much lower than many subsystems of the human body that are governed by DNA. The brain, for example, would be massively more complex than the entire person. As this is nonsense, clearly better approaches are required.

Human genome: 3 billion base pairs. Xbox One Main SoC: 5 billion transistors.

Although estimates vary (going as high as 1 trillion), the human brain has around ~100 billion neurons. Far more importantly, these neurons vary in the number of possible connections to other neurons. Pyramidal can have as many as 100,000 dendritic connections to other neurons, and 10,000 in cortical regions is a pretty low number. What determines, or "codes", the neurobiological processes in the brain? DNA. So we wind up with a relatively low number for the genetic complexity of the entire human system, and a vastly larger number using the same metric or a part of that system.

By the way, talking about the space shuttle, NASA has used Genetic Algorithms to design parts

"Design" parts? Gene expression programming, genetic algorithms, evolutionary algorithms, fitness functions, etc., are all fantastic for a wide-range of problems ranging from optimization to NLP.

However, they are idealized models that are most useful when they are least similar to evolutionary processes. We determine parameters such as selection methods, reproduction operators, and indeed the fitness function (with its parameters) itself!

That is why the use of such algorithms in applications that have 0 to do with evolution far exceeds the use of these as models within biology. In fact, fitness functions within computational intelligence/soft computing/AI/etc. are defined differently than within mainstream biology.

I'm not sure how it can be said that evolutionary theory can't work when the same principle can be used successfully to design parts to space ships?

The problem with your analogy is that it suggests someone designed the algorithms. It's akin to saying that the ways in which living systems would respond to their environments was coded into the environments and all living systems in a vast, "fine-tuned", "specified complexity" nonsense of ID. I don't think that's your point, though (or your belief), but I could be wrong. Either way, I would argue that as evolutionary processes are not "designed" there are very severe limits we must place on the ways in which we use computational models and adaptive algorithms based upon living systems (whether artificial neural networks or genetic algorithms), and the systems themselves.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

DNA is complex, no doubt about it, but it's not more complex than some things we've built. The Internet is by far much more complex than a single DNA.

It might be useful to get some idea as to what measures/metrics of complexity are typically used here (and why). There was a famous paper in the 60s called "The architecture of complexity". This paper isn't it (and is from 2007), but it involves the internet: "The architecture of complexity"

This can be compared with e.g.,
"Architectures of Biological Complexity" (for some continuity to the first link as well as contrast with the 2nd)
&

"Complex network measures of brain connectivity: Uses and interpretations"

 

[Ouroboros]

"Design" parts? Gene expression programming, genetic algorithms, evolutionary algorithms, fitness functions, etc., are all fantastic for a wide-range of problems ranging from optimization to NLP.

However, they are idealized models that are most useful when they are least similar to evolutionary processes. We determine parameters such as selection methods, reproduction operators, and indeed the fitness function (with its parameters) itself!

That is why the use of such algorithms in applications that have 0 to do with evolution far exceeds the use of these as models within biology. In fact, fitness functions within computational intelligence/soft computing/AI/etc. are defined differently than within mainstream biology.

Well, CotW claims that nothing useful can come from a process where randomness and selection happens, basically he was earlier rejecting the whole process because "it's impossible" to create something by trial-and-error. I know the GA aren't exactly the same as the evolutionary process, however, the evolutionary process is a form of genetic algorithm, and since we know that genetic algorithms are helpful to do things and work, we can't say that GA doesn't work. It works in many fields of research and design already, even if they don't match exactly.

The problem with your analogy is that it suggests someone designed the algorithms. It's akin to saying that the ways in which living systems would respond to their environments was coded into the environments and all living systems in a vast, "fine-tuned", "specified complexity" nonsense of ID. I don't think that's your point, though (or your belief), but I could be wrong. Either way, I would argue that as evolutionary processes are not "designed" there are very severe limits we must place on the ways in which we use computational models and adaptive algorithms based upon living systems (whether artificial neural networks or genetic algorithms), and the systems themselves.

The only thing I'm trying to get through CotW's head is that "trial-and-error" through a evolutionary or genetic algorithm does work. If he can accept the possibility that God created this Evolutionary Algorithm, I'd be happy enough. I don't fight for abiogenesis much, but I do know evolution is true, and his resistance is based on ignorance. If there was a God-programmer who created the algorithms for this world, it's fine with me. But I do know that this natural evolutionary "algorithm" is in place. It does work. We don't know all the details one exactly how it works, but it does work. CotW rejects that it even works, ever.

So I think you're misunderstanding my goal here. I'm not trying to say that we have copied the natural evolution into software. Not at all. But the basic principles of "mutation, replication, selection" do work because that's what GA does. Exactly how you mutate, replicate, select, crossover, etc, depends on what you're working with (we wrote one for market analysis some years ago and it got a bit complicated, and our computers weren't fast enough, we put that project on ice for now but probably coming back to it, unfortunately, we're not the first to do it. Several companies do this already.)

Do you see what I'm trying to explain to CotW here? It's not to prove that evolution is true because genetic algorithms are true, but to get him to accept that the process of genetic algorithm, be in natural or artificial, does work.

 

[Ouroboros]

It might be useful to get some idea as to what measures/metrics of complexity are typically used here (and why). There was a famous paper in the 60s called "The architecture of complexity". This paper isn't it (and is from 2007), but it involves the internet: "

I will look into it. Thanks.

[Complex network measures of brain connectivity: Uses and interpretations"

Well, CotW didn't compare the complexity of the brain to anything humans built, but DNA. He claimed DNA is more complex than anything we humans have made. Just so we're clear. It wasn't a comparison with the brain, but with DNA and human technology.

 

[idav]

Do you see what I'm trying to explain to CotW here? It's not to prove that evolution is true because genetic algorithms are true, but to get him to accept that the process of genetic algorithm, be in natural or artificial, does work.

I tried to say something similar but I get ignored sometimes. ID can work perfectly fine with evolution, which I have shared with Call. Doesn't matter if God made the template for life and evolution, or maybe aliens, or nature or whatever, doesn't even matter. What matter is that from the point life came to be it evolved without any need for intervention. All theists are looking for is intervention, where and how is up to god not the believers. God of gaps looks for these places that we can keep saying god must have intervened here.

 

[Ouroboros]

I tried to say something similar but I get ignored sometimes. ID can work perfectly fine with evolution, which I have shared with Call. Doesn't matter if God made the template for life and evolution, or maybe aliens, or nature or whatever, doesn't even matter. What matter is that from the point life came to be it evolved without any need for intervention. All theists are looking for is intervention, where and how is up to god not the believers. God of gaps looks for these places that we can keep saying god must have intervened here.

Right. And even people who argue theistic evolution do agree in the principles of evolution, and that it's actually happening. Michael Behe who keeps on arguing for irreducible complexity, still believes that evolution is true and is happening. He just thinks that God intervenes and modify the genes here and there to help it along. I'm even okay with that, even if I don't fully agree, but I have a hard time with the flat-out-all-deniers of evolution. I want them to just take a deep breath and read up on the research a little. God can still fit into the model of evolution, but only if the denier allows himself/herself to actually learn something.

Here's an antenna that was designed using an evolutionary process:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolved_antenna

An example of an evolved antenna is an X-band antenna evolved for a 2006 NASA mission called Space Technology 5 (ST5).[1] The mission consists of three satellites that will take measurements in Earth's magnetosphere. Each satellite has two communication antennas to talk to ground stations. The antenna has an unusual structure and was evolved to meet a challenging set of mission requirements, notably the combination of wide beamwidth for a circularly polarized wave and wide impedance bandwidth. For comparison, a traditional approach to meet the mission requirements might involve a helical antenna design, or specifically, a quadrifilar helix. The ST5 mission successfully launched on March 22, 2006, and so this evolved antenna represents the world's first artificially-evolved object to fly in space.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

We'd built systems and computers that analyze and sequence the DNA, which means that our computer technology is exceeding the complexity of the DNA.

So if we are able to analyze the brain of Albert Einstien, that would mean that we are smarter than Einstein? Fallacious.

Besides, DNA is a part of the cell, not the other way around. And I did study the structure of DNA in class. And computer science as well.

So where would you get the genetic information from? How do you get information from a mindless and blind process? Can a mindless and blind person give you any information? What you have with DNA is codes, information, instructions...how can you get all of this from a mindless process?? And not only that, it is more than just having all the of the "stuff", you have to place every single incredient in a specified order so that you can get the desired result. This is distinct from the cosmic ingredients, which also had to be fine tuned and orchestrated in the right order.

DNA is complex

Thats a freakin understatement.

, no doubt about it, but it's not more complex than some things we've built. The Internet is by far much more complex than a single DNA.

Bill Gates said "DNA is like a software program, only much more complex than anything we've ever devised" (Bill Gates The Road Ahead 1996 pg 228 Revised). And that is coming from a person that made billions off of software programs. Not to mention the fact that in order to build any kind of software progam that is coded, intelligent design is absolutely necessary.

So you just have no credibility.

There are more computers (3 times more) than there's base pairs in a DNA.

The information that is in ALL the chromosomes of one human being...if you typed it out, would fill enough books to fill the Grand Canyon 78 times. (Walt Brown In the Beginning pg 62).

That is the INSTRUCTIONS to make one human being. King David said "I am fearfully and wonderfully made" Psalm 139:14. And he said this without peeking through one microscope.

Now you can sit there and be as intellectually dishonest as you like and down-play it all you want, but so far, not only has science been able to tell us how to get life from nonliving material, but you have to be able to show where does all of this specified information come from?

That makes the total amount of integrated circuits, and just simple resistors in the world, right now connecting to the Internet, thousands, maybe millions of times larger than even the number of molecules in the DNA.

That is a lie, Ouro. One protein molecule has so much information that the entire time since the Big Bang would not give you all of the resources you need to generate that same molecule by chance. The probability is astronimical, and I find it amazing that you believe that this could occur not only be a blind and mindlessprocess, but by random chance. So improbability x improbablity will only give you even more improbability. That is the price of atheism...improbability.

The company BioComp Systems specializes in using genetic algorithms to solve very complex and difficult problems for the industry. They've making bucks by the fact that evolutionary algorithms work.

Are they making bucks because they've found out how to get life from nonlife? No.

On another note, aminoacids, and three of the four nucleotides have been produced in laboratories by setting up an environment to let the chemicals self-react. These are the foundation for life.

Even if you get one amnio acid, that is still far from life, Ouro. It take 75 amino acids to form a protein, at least. Then you need the right bonds between the acids, and since they come in right handed and left handed versions, you need only the left handed ones...then they have to link up in a specifed sequence..in the same way that this very sentence I am typing is worded in a specifed way. These specifications are NECESSARY, and that is just for ONE protein molecule...but a cell would need hundreds of these molecules.

So for every one of those hundreds (at least three hundred) of proteins that are needed, the same improbability is applied for each and every one of them. You may be able to get one, and that is being VERY modest, but what are the chances of you getting at least 300 by a mindless and blind and not to mention RANDOM process? Yet, this is what you believe??

And if we can produce them by letting them "create" themselves in a laboratory, the question isn't anymore if it can happen in nature, but what exact conditions where there when they happened for our life to being. Also, they've found aminoacids in space. They exist (are created) in space. How is that possible if it can't happen?

You have demonstrate how life could have formed without intelligent design. So far, we don't even know how life could have formed naturally with some of the greatest minds on earth on the job. If it is that difficult to make life from nonlife with intelligent design, how much more difficult would it be to create life from nonlife without it?

Not to mention the fact that I am a mind-body dualist, and based on that belief I don't believe you can get consiousness from natural life. I believe the mind is separate body, and there is certainly no good naturalistic reason as to how you can get consicousness from matter...so I just don't think life from nonlife is even remotely possible.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

I tried to say something similar but I get ignored sometimes. ID can work perfectly fine with evolution, which I have shared with Call. Doesn't matter if God made the template for life and evolution, or maybe aliens, or nature or whatever, doesn't even matter. What matter is that from the point life came to be it evolved without any need for intervention. All theists are looking for is intervention, where and how is up to god not the believers. God of gaps looks for these places that we can keep saying god must have intervened here.

Then demonstrate how life can come from nonlife, idav. For people who can't do what is asked of them in this regard, there is so much talking. Prove it.