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Author
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Topic: The Origin of Biological Information
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Micah Sparacio
Member
Member # 6
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posted 06. March 2006 12:11
By compel, I only meant in the context of proof -> proofs are intended to be demonstrations that compel anyone who fully understands them to accept the conclusion.
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David L. Hagen
Member
Member # 323
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posted 06. March 2006 15:19
Doug
As you prepare your revelation, I recommend you include a cogent refutation of:
A Second Look at the Second Law, Granville Sewell
which is explained further at:
Tutorial on 2nd Law, Granville Sewell
In considering how to generate Complex Specified Information:
1) To store information, the information carrier must be able to be configured into any code sequence.
i.e., be independent of any natural law such as crystalization, (and thus not ameanable to any natural law algorithm).
2) To preserve information, the carrier must be able to retain the information to some probability over a desired period of time in spite of the effect of randomizing forces. i.e., in spite of effects described by the 2nd law; and
3) Energy transfer is necessary to store information.
(i.e., think of all the steps that are required to store information on your hard drive, which by the way is probably polished to < 1 nm local smoothness, but contains far less information density than the DNA in a cell.)
If you can show that the codified information within the genome arose by an algorithm based on natural law contrary to Sewell and Dembski, and within the probability of the Universal Probability Bound, then you will have achieved far more than Darwin or all neo-Darwinists combined!
Just make sure your demonstration system starts with only matter and energy and without any Complex Specified Information. i.e., no living cell or equivalent operating self reproducing computer to run the algorithm is allowed.
[ 07. March 2006, 13:57: Message edited by: David L. Hagen ]
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Doug Wedel
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Member # 1901
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posted 06. March 2006 15:27
I have reviewed the papers which Professor Dembski says
quote:
respond to Wolpert's jello objection
Although I don't pretend to be able to follow all the mathematics in these papers, I believe I do get the drift, and am left with a few possible "jello" questions of my own.
I would like to respond first to the paper entitled "Specification: The Pattern that Signifies Intelligence."
Professor Dembski is concerned here with developing mathematical tests that will enable one to determjine whether an event or a number is random or was created by an intelligent being. To this end he uses several 100-digit numbers as examples. Some of them are obviously "designed", such as one containing 100 1's. Others, it's harder to tell. Dembski invokes Kolmagorov complexity (aka Algorithmic Information Theory) as a way of measuring complexity and calculating improbability.
Instead of engaging in wordy discussions, I would like to respond in kind with a 100-digit (decimal) number of my own and ask a few questions about it:
7245870066063155881748815209209628292540917153643
6789259036001133053054882046652138414695194151160
(1) Does this number contain complex specified information?
(1) Is this number random?
(2) Is there any way to tell whether this number is random or instead CSI?
(3) Is this number compressible under the rubric of Algorithmic Information Theory?
(4) Is there any way to tell whether it is compressible?
If anyone would like to offer any guesses, I promise to give the correct answers on my next post ;-)
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Micah Sparacio
Member
Member # 6
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posted 06. March 2006 16:34
I initially said that this string was not random, but I'm withdrawing that claim until I do a more complete measurement.
[ 06. March 2006, 16:49: Message edited by: Micah Sparacio ]
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Micah Sparacio
Member
Member # 6
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posted 06. March 2006 16:41
(2) Is there any way to tell whether this number is random or instead CSI?
Question (2) poses a false dilemma. Dembski's methodology allows for non-random, non-CSI numbers.
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Irving
Member
Member # 535
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posted 06. March 2006 17:41
IF,
quote:
Mimicry with regards to consciousness (i.e. awareness) or with regards to information, or both?
Conciousness. Nature can mimic low-complexity information.
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Irving
Member
Member # 535
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posted 06. March 2006 17:50
Doug,
(1) Does this number contain complex specified information?
Possibly
(1) Is this number random?
You mean randomly generated? Possibly
(2) Is there any way to tell whether this number is random or instead CSI?
Not by itself.
I'll leave 3 & 4 for those who consider it important.
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Micah Sparacio
Member
Member # 6
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posted 06. March 2006 17:51
Doug,
Perhaps you see this as a cop-out, but I'd like to emphasize that Dembski's methodology does not require that one be able to do any of the following things:
1. Identify a random string.
2. Distinguish close cases
3. Avoid false-negatives
In other words, if your string were non-random and matched some detachable pattern, and we in this discussion failed to identify the string as "CSI", not much would be accomplished.
The place to attack Dembski is at the level of false-positives. Do some things exhibit CSI which are not actually designed?
For you string, I currently see no detachable pattern for a specification. Such a pattern might exist, but my being unaware of such pattern wouldn't nullify the fact that there was one, if in fact there was.
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Doug Wedel
Member
Member # 1901
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posted 06. March 2006 18:18
Thanks for your responses -- the 100-digit number is taken from pi starting at the 307th digit (by my count, and assuming no typos ;-).
Therefore, despite the fact that this number has every appearance of full randomness, and resists any and all ordinary compression techniques, the number is in fact highly "nonrandom" and also highly compressible under Algorithmic Information Theory.
Admitting my imperfect understanding of "complex specified information," however, and before drawing any further conclusions, I have to ask you in here for the answer to Question #1: Now that you know that this 100 digit string is from pi, does it fully qualify as CSI?
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David L. Hagen
Member
Member # 323
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posted 06. March 2006 19:23
Doug
quote:
Wedel: “a debate is raging about the origins of biological information.”
Eidel: “Our task is to find an algorithm, a natural law that leads to the origin of information.”
Wedel: “Then I will demonstrate how the problem can be solved algorithmically through random number generation combined with artificial selection.”
If you seek to demonstrate the “origins of biological information” by “natural selection”, you have undertaken a futile logical impossibility.
1) By definition, “natural selection” cannot operate until you have at least that first self reproducing cell.
quote:
Dobzhansky:". . .please realize you cannot use the words "natural selection" loosely. Prebiological natural selection is a contradiction in terms."
1965 The origins of Prebiological Systems and of thir Molecular Matrices, ed SW Fox New York, Academic Press p11.
2) The first functioning reproducing cell requires that biological information be in place together with a method of processing that information: reading, processing and reproducing it.
If you have selected a string of digits from Pi, I understand that to be CSI.
(Not easily recognizing it, has nothing to do with if it is CSI or not.)
Your challenge is to come up with the origin of biochemical CSI by natural (random) processes without “natural selection” - and equivalently without “artificial selection” running on an operating computer.
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Doug Wedel
Member
Member # 1901
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posted 06. March 2006 19:48
Thank you, David Hagen, for your provocative and responses. I have been reading Sewell and am _very_ impressed and will respond more fully to your posts (and to Sewell's ideas) a little later.
Right now, just to followup on the 100 digit number inquiry, I wonder what is to be made first of your statement
quote:
If you have selected a string of digits from Pi, I understand that to be CSI.
combined with another poster, Micah Sparacio's remark
quote:
The place to attack Dembski is at the level of false-positives. Do some things exhibit CSI which are not actually designed?
Question: did an intelligent being design the digital expansion of pi?
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Irving
Member
Member # 535
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posted 06. March 2006 20:55
quote:
Question: did an intelligent being design the digital expansion of pi?
Not sure what you mean by this question? Pi is a specification deduced through mathematics, and not subjected to enumerations via un-guided natural processes (certianly via decimal notation). The question isn't whether an Intelligent Being designed the value of Pi...the question is how does the enumeration of Pi become physically manifested given that there is no environmental selection pressure in an un-guided environment to build such an enumeration. Whether that enumeration is via ink on paper, or transmitted via electronic emission.
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David L. Hagen
Member
Member # 323
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posted 06. March 2006 21:19
Affirming Irvine
The digits of Pi you selected:
1) are an expression of mathematics.
2) are encoded in decimal format.
3) are calculated using a computer;
4) are communicated using computers etc.
Each of these exhibits intelligence which
cannot be derivable from any closed system of natural causes - including the whole universe as the ultimate not just thermodynamically closed but isolated system.
Go back an examine your presuppositions and foundations - else you will waste alot of time effort and good will.
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Doug Wedel
Member
Member # 1901
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posted 06. March 2006 21:29
quote:
"Question: did an intelligent being design the digital expansion of pi?"
Not sure what you mean by this question?
I was striving for logical clarity ;-)
One poster said Pi was CSI.
Another poster was saying that the only way you could disprove or challenge Dembski's notion of CSI
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Doug Wedel
Member
Member # 1901
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posted 06. March 2006 21:34
[SORRY FOR TRUNCATED POST]
... was by pointing to information that fit the definition of CSI that wasn't "designed."
So I'm thinking, who designed the digital expansion of Pi? It's like implicit in plane geometry. But the decimal expansion is only _explicit_ in the formula. Even human beings with all their intellects were mere pencil pushers compared to computers when it came to exploring the depths of Pi. Computers seem to be voyaging into areas of real numbers that are far beyond the reach of human intelligence...but I digress.
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