Intelligent design

[Edge]

Imagine this, however: Imagine that you're a scientist and you're the first to land on Easter Island, where you find these giant statues. At that moment you're faced with a question: What caused these statues? Are these statues the result of Intelligent Design, or are they caused by natural processes? True, you will probably reach your conclusion before you even finish asking yourself the question… the answer is that obvious.

True.

 

On the other hand, ID bashers say that, when faced with something that appears to be designed, Intelligent Design can only be considered a valid hypothesis when they say it can. Intelligent Design for Easter Island statues? Fine. But Intelligent Design for origin of life? Unscientific.

 

That's inconsistent logically.

I can say that I agree to a degree, surely saying that life and DNA is too complex and specified that only another Intelligence designated or planned it is plausible. Yet, well, we may need to understand DNA better. As I said this is a good point.

 

1. Evolution cannot account for the increase in information necessary to produce new species, new features, new structures.

 

2. The feasability of evolution is critically dependent upon a determination of the age of the Earth which isn't even verifiable.

 

3. The Cambrian Explosion shows diversity of life appearing in the fossil record all at once, not bit-by-bit over millions and millions of years.

 

4. Evolution cannot account for irreducibly complex systems. Such systems cannot arise through slight, successive modifications and improvements.

Nice. I always wanted a more detailed answer to that question.

 

Well, I think I'll review everything I have read about ID vs. Evo and make my own conclusions.

[TRoutMac]

Nice. I always wanted a more detailed answer to that question. Well, I think I'll review everything I have read about ID vs. Evo and make my own conclusions.

 

I posted 4 weaknesses. I'm not at all sure that this list is "exhaustive"… I expect there are others. Those are the ones I could think of off the top of my head.

 

If you're interested, check out a book by Jonathan Wells called "Icons of Evolution". It's a detailed scientific critique of some of the most commonly used "icons" (Miller/Urey experiment, Haeckel's Embryos, etc.) used to support evolutionary theory, some of which have long since been debunked and yet school textbooks still use the material. (and you thought I was going to recommend something else by Michael Behe, didn't you!?B))

[Erasmus00]

First of all, the statues and DNA both contain complex and specified information, therefore they are comparable. Specified complexity is complexity which conforms to an independently given pattern. In the case of the statues, that independently given pattern is the known form and characteristics of a human head and face. DNA's independently given pattern is the Universal Genetic Code.

 

Ice cores have complexity that conforms to an independently given pattern (being the pattern of global atmospheric events). It would take a huge stretch of the imagination to claim design for them. Any system that has environmental feedback, in fact, has "complexity" governed by external parameters (the environment). Natural selection is the feedback system that governs DNA.

-Will

[ldsoftwaresteve]

Will:

Natural selection is the feedback system that governs DNA.

But that presupposes DNA and represents only a way to determine successful combinations. It doesn't supply any hint of why the DNA exists in the first place. I believe we're discussing the design of the DNA and that's prior to the point where natural selection would have an effect, isn't it?

 

Something drives the makeup of DNA. Something causes it to change. Natural selection might provide an answer to which new combinations work and which don't but it (natural selection) operates after the fact, if at all.

 

One of the amazing things about the design of the mechanism is that it results in sensory aparatus. Eyes, ears, etc. What is it about existence that causes life to respond to those properties? Perhaps life evolves to become aware of every aspect of existence. Maybe that's part of the design or part of an unbelievably beautiful accident. And maybe we'll never know. But to say one or the other is wrong at this point seems to me to be a bit silly.

 

And to claim certainty in either direction is to perhaps stop us from looking at certain possibilities when it is anything but certain. And so, in my mind at least, TroutMac is being intellectually more honest about the discussion.

 

In the end we're talking about the nature of the Universe and who in their right mind is going to claim they understand it?

[TRoutMac]

Ice cores have complexity that conforms to an independently given pattern (being the pattern of global atmospheric events). It would take a huge stretch of the imagination to claim design for them. Any system that has environmental feedback, in fact, has "complexity" governed by external parameters (the environment). Natural selection is the feedback system that governs DNA.

 

Try this. Grab a book or any product with a UPC barcode on it. Now, compare the pattern of black and white stripes on the barcode with an ice core sample. They look similar, don't they? Both look like a random arrangement of dark or light stripes which vary in thickness. Right?

 

On a barcode, the relative thickness and spacing of dark and light stripes correspond with a number. Together, the series of dark and light stripes encode a SKU number or ISBN number which identifies the product its attached to. This is complex and specified information because the arrangement of stripes follows a set of protocols which exist independently of the barcode and which assign meaning to the stripes. Those protocols are devised, and exist, before the barcode is printed on the package. Then, with the aid of a barcode scanner, we compare that series of stripes against those protocols to derive the meaning.

 

An ice core sample does convey information about past weather events. But, is there a set of protocols set up independently to which every possible combination of light and dark, thick and thin bands correspond? No. There's no independently given pattern. We derive the meaning after the fact[/]. The layers are laid down randomly, and the weather patterns themselves are not following any independently given pattern. Whatever happens happens and we come along afterward and interpret the "barcode", key word being "interpret" because we may not even know whether a given band represents a year, or some other period of time between two weather events.

 

I'll tell you what. You find for me an ice core sample that predicts what weather is coming, and does so reliably, and I'll concede your point. If you could look at an ice core sample, compare it with a code key (the independently given pattern) and then read "rain showers tomorrow, high of 73 degrees" and then tomorrow came and you got just what the ice core predicted, then I'd have to concede your point. But, I don't have to concede your point, because that's not the kind of information ice cores provide.

[paultrr]

One of you're proposed weakness has a flaw in it:

 

3. The Cambrian Explosion shows diversity of life appearing in the fossil record all at once, not bit-by-bit over millions and millions of years.

 

That fact is true. But we have little evidence of the period before this. A lack of evidence, given there had to be such a period is not proof you're position is correct. For one, you're assuming something that evolution in general has never stated. You assume the period before if evolution was true would show one single cell being the origin of all that later diversity. However, nothing in evolution stipulates there was only one cell back then. In fact, the few left behind evidences we do have from that period show many different types of single celled organisms. The reason this fails is that if there was from the start many different organisms then DNA was from the start rather complex in its diversity. From complexity one can get further complexity even following you're own logic which rather shoots this whole reasoning in the foot, so to speak.

 

When evolutionists propose the idea that a single celled organism was the root line they are not saying that one single cell started it all. They are saying that sngle celled organisms were the source of what later evolved. That in itself means evolution started with variance and complexity to begin with. This is all rather like the common assumption used to try and disprove certain cosmology models that the universe should have started with zero entropy. The problem is when you consider modern quantum theory on the vacuum the system never started with zero entropy to begin with. There is no such thing as a zero entropy vacuum state under quantum theory simply because the vacuum always has energy in one form or another. The energy translates as information implying in outright form that this universe started with information to begin with which has a lot of implications when it comes to the subject of how life started.

 

Here information translates as complexity being already built in from something as simple as a vacuum state. This is also one of the areas where all those quotes of odds really does break down. Steven Hawking has likened this fact to the issue that inspite of all the odds quoting if even one of those proposed odds against events or acts takes place there interrelation to all the rest would imply that all the rest would have had to taken place.

 

It may not satisfy the religious human equation in its quest for the answer to why. But if the universe started with basic information it is highly probably such information could have been geared just right on its own to spawn life if the specific conditions were right to begin with which itself given all the possible types of planets would be eventual in a universe the size of ours. Now does that translate to earth being special? Only if one considers that only earth had the conditions just right which again given the size of the universe is highly unlikely by the odds itself.

 

The Problem with Evolution is we may lack information. But the problem with the present ID position is it fully starts with assumptions that do not actually follow the known evidence at present, nor does it really understand what evolution actually teaches which is very common when it comes to christianity in general.

[TRoutMac]

That fact is true. But we have little evidence of the period before this.

 

Indeed. That's the whole point. We have little fossil evidence preceding the cambrian. If life evolved slowly over long periods of time from single celled animals, then we ought to see a gradual progression in complexity and diversity as we move up through the layers. Instead, we see a layer with no fossils followed immediately by a layer with immense diversity and complexity. That is what you call a "weakness" in evolutionary theory. I'll grant you that it doesn't "prove" Intelligent Design. But it sure as shootin' doesn't help evolution any.

 

When evolutionists propose the idea that a single celled organism was the root line they are not saying that one single cell started it all. They are saying that single celled organisms were the source of what later evolved. That in itself means evolution started with variance and complexity to begin with.

 

This is what's so hilarious about the evolutionary position. The more you argue for it, the more it falls apart under the weight of its own absurdity.

 

So, sure… there are many different individual cells, each one unique, but as they replicated, all the cells evolved in different directions. I got that. Now… one little problem. They all share the same DNA structure!!!! You mean to tell me that all of these cells just happened to develop on their own, independent of the other, all "by chance", and yet they all use precisely the same information storage and processing system and, worse yet, the same genetic code? Do you have any idea how preposterous that is? You honestly think that that is a better explanation than Intelligent Design? Beam me up.

 

But the problem with the present ID position is it fully starts with assumptions that do not actually follow the known evidence at present, nor does it really understand what evolution actually teaches which is very common when it comes to christianity in general.

 

What are these assumptions, may I ask? I dare say that those who have faith in evolution don't really understand what it teaches. For one thing, much of the details of evolutionary theory are still in dispute. So if the purveyors of the theory can't even agree on what the theory should teach, then how is it you expect anyone else to have a proper understanding of it?

[Edge]

They all share the same DNA structure!!!! You mean to tell me that all of these cells just happened to develop on their own, independent of the other, all "by chance", and yet they all use precisely the same information storage and processing system and, worse yet, the same genetic code? Do you have any idea how preposterous that is? You honestly think that that is a better explanation than Intelligent Design? Beam me up.

Perhaps, the same structure would be always end up being the same for those cells. I'm trying to understand that concept, maybe there's a law that could tell us that DNA is predetermined. I said perhaps.

What are these assumptions, may I ask? I dare say that those who have faith in evolution don't really understand what it teaches. For one thing, much of the details of evolutionary theory are still in dispute. So if the purveyors of the theory can't even agree on what the theory should teach, then how is it you expect anyone else to have a proper understanding of it?

Is true, many IDers, Creationists and even some Evolutionists get misguided with the concept of evolution. You may go to any creationist anti-evolution website and you can find many strawmans arguments towards the Evolutionary theory from them. Like the 2nd law of Thermodynamics. Which is indeed a fallacy.

[TRoutMac]

Perhaps, the same structure would be always end up being the same for those cells. I'm trying to understand that concept, maybe there's a law that could tell us that DNA is predetermined. I said perhaps. So, don't get mad.

 

Naw, I'm not mad. A little incredulous, but not mad. And yes, I anticipated that response. You have to remember that DNA is just one part of a functionally integrated information storage and processing system which needs all of its parts to function, to replicate the DNA, to read the DNA, to build the proteins called for by the DNA, etc. So you'd need a natural law that demanded DNA and all of its ancillaries to be present from day one. I dunno 'bout you, but that seems like a tall order, to say the least.

 

As I've explained to Boerseun, natural laws certainly do explain why the DNA molecule hangs together. Sugars and phosphates link together in the only way they can link together (due to their shapes, etc) to form the double-helix "backbone". But natural laws cannot explain the sequencing of millions and millions of nucleotide base pairs running up the center of the helix.

 

Think of magnetic letters stuck to your refrigerator and arranged to spell the words "WE NEED MILK". Now, natural laws explain why the letters stick to the refrigerator. But natural laws cannot explain why the letters are sequenced in that way.

[Edge]

But natural laws cannot explain the sequencing of millions and millions of nucleotide base pairs running up the center of the helix.

 

Think of magnetic letters stuck to your refrigerator and arranged to spell the words "WE NEED MILK". Now, natural laws explain why the letters stick to the refrigerator. But natural laws cannot explain why the letters are sequenced in that way.

I was kinda refering to that. The sequence might be already in nature or something like that. I know, sounds well, crazy and in some way could support Intelligent Design as well.

[paultrr]

Indeed. That's the whole point. We have little fossil evidence preceding the cambrian. If life evolved slowly over long periods of time from single celled animals, then we ought to see a gradual progression in complexity and diversity as we move up through the layers.

 

 

 

When is the last time you actually studied the evidence directly. Even going by DNA in the present to known older forms still existant today that is exactly what you do find. As for the lack of preserved evidence one cannot expect single celled organisms to leave much evidence behind.

 

It should also be pointed out that the rapid apperance you mentioned is actually not known to be that rapid in geological terms. The Precambrian era was a period in earth history before the evolution of hard-bodied and complex organisms. Throughout the extent of Precambrian organisms were simple, entirely marine, and for the most part soft-bodied. Soft bodied organisms tend to not lend themselves to preserved evidence.

 

Of the evidence of what we do know:

 

Body fossils typically of cnidarian grade dating from as early as 600 or 610 Ma - e.g. the Twitya fossils are simple cup-shaped animals, possibly similar to the sea anemones of today.

 

The 'small shelly fauna' appear just before the beginning of the Cambrian, ~550 Ma, increasing in numbers and diversity towards the Tommotian. The oldest of these to occur abundantly are Cloudina and the allied genera comprising the family Cloudinidae.

 

Sponges are widely recognised (e.g. Nielsen 2001, pp. 30, 506-507) to be the most primitive of living metazoans, occupying a basal position in metazoan phylogeny, as a sister group to all other Metazoa. The earliest record dated around 570 Ma (Li et al. 1998), and the earliest described species is Paleophragmodictya reticulata from the 555 Ma Ediacara locality.

 

Mineralised skeletons of the 'small shelly fauna' appear just before the beginning of the Cambrian, ~550 Ma, increasing in numbers and diversity towards the Cambrian. The oldest of these to occur abundantly are Cloudina and the allied genera comprising the family Cloudinidae also displaying the simplest structure.

 

The Cambrian is a major division of the geological timescale that begins about 542 Ma (million years ago) at the end of the Proterozoic eon and ended about 488.3 Ma with the beginning of the Ordovician period. The Cambrian is the earliest period in whose rocks are found numerous large, distinctly-fossilizable multicellular organisms that are more complex than sponges or medusoids. Roughly fifty separate major groups of organisms or "phyla"emerged during this period. A radiometric date from New_Brunswick puts the end of the first stage of the Cambrian around 511 Ma. This leaves 21 million years for the other two stages of the Cambrian. This is the period often refered to as rapid.

 

Well-preserved bacteria older than 3460 million years have been found in Western Australia. The first more complex multicelled lifeforms seem to have appeared roughly 600 million years before the present. This places the less complex stages before that period of which nothing is preserved. However, by complexity here, when compared to later stages one does find a continious record of more and more complexity which is exactly the case argued by evolution and not the ID presentation.

 

Soft bodied organisms appeared around 600 and 544 million years ago. These are referred to as Ediacaran or Vendian faunas. Hard-shelled creatures appeared toward the end of that timespan. Which in itself argues for complexity coming with time and again is counter to the ID position.

 

That brings to point one major problem with the ID position in general in that they seem to lack a decent knowledge of what the actual record does show us. In all cases we have simple stages becoming more complex over expances in time all the way up through the preserved record. Granted we may know little of the first less complex stage. But if the rest of the record supports simple to complex its not a leap of faith to assume the rest should follow this pattern. All of these known lifeforms had DNA. If complexity arose out of simplier structures with them we can also know through present data that this DNA structure was itself evolving from simplier to more complex.

 

Its this misinformation and the lack of decent scientific study that has plagued both the ID presentation and even further back the traditional seven day creationsist presentation all along. It is upon that and many other reasons that science tends to reject their presentation as scientific. They across the board have tended to not be honest to the evidence or to even know the exact evidence we do have. They tend to misrepresent facts in their favor, to attempt a numbers game through quoting odds that depend themselves upon certain unknows, and to, almost to a tee, ignore any real scientific method of study or presentation. That is what judges this as not scientific inspite of all the posturing that everyone else rejects them because they start with the "God" or "Designer" equation.

[Boerseun]

This is what's so hilarious about the evolutionary position. The more you argue for it, the more it falls apart under the weight of its own absurdity.

 

So, sure… there are many different individual cells, each one unique, but as they replicated, all the cells evolved in different directions. I got that. Now… one little problem. They all share the same DNA structure!!!! You mean to tell me that all of these cells just happened to develop on their own, independent of the other, all "by chance", and yet they all use precisely the same information storage and processing system and, worse yet, the same genetic code? Do you have any idea how preposterous that is? You honestly think that that is a better explanation than Intelligent Design? Beam me up.

TRoutMac:

Is it more 'preposterous' to say that the reason they all share the same DNA structure is because they all share common origins, i.e. a common ancestor, i.e. evolution, or that the fact the DNA is similar points straight at some form of conscious, Intelligent Designer who sat in a lab somewhere actively designing the stuff?

 

I have a hard time not falling off my chair, rolling on the floor, frothing at the mouth laughing so hard at this.

 

Thanks for a good laugh.

 

Please, beam me up as well. I'd like to sit around the Enterprise with you so that you can entertain me some more.

[ldsoftwaresteve]

Let him without blame cast the first stone.

TroutMac, I have been enthralled by most of your arguments. They are sharp and clean and beautiful and you have kept to the high road for the most part. Thank you.

Paultrr you too have very beautiful posts and thanks for the history lesson.

There have been other good posts too.

TroutMac....

Religion has been responsible for some of the worst attrocities in history because it disarms people by getting them to believe that there are good and decent folks running the show. And sometimes they are neither good nor decent - and common folk (of which I am one) become misled and manipulated and incalculable pain and suffering result. One doesn't have to go back in time very far to find examples of this. Look at the connection the current 'administration' has with the so-called 'moral majority' and only time will show us how deep the corruption has become.

So TroutMac, when you allow any hint of religion into your reasoning chain, you immediately are drenched in the odor of death related to all of those attrocities.

It is not surprising that you are going to be attacked and attacked with righteous indignation. A lot of us are pissed off at religion.

On the other hand, so-called 'scientists' and 'agnostics' have also commited attrocities. Some of them want us to believe that there are good and decent folks running the show but truth is not what they're after. They want power over people and they are just as bad as 'the other side'.

What we don't have and need is a logic based religion that holds up as an image of virtue the look in a child's eyes when it encounters something beautiful and fascinating about existence. Until that becomes the standard of virtue and is linked to the 'heroic' in man, the quest for truth will just be painful. This is not esoteric. I think that the future of humanity rests on top of this issue.

[TRoutMac]

Is it more 'preposterous' to say that the reason they all share the same DNA structure is because they all share common origins, i.e. a common ancestor, i.e. evolution, or that the fact the DNA is similar points straight at some form of conscious, Intelligent Designer who sat in a lab somewhere actively designing the stuff?

 

It's not a question of which is more preposterous, Boerseun, because that implies that both are preposterous.

 

Indeed, it is preposterous to suggest that individual, functional, irreducibly complex one-celled organisms came into existence independently of each other by undirected, natural processes and yet all of them "just happened" to end up with exactly the same information storage system and they "just happened" to end up following the same genetic code.

 

It is not "preposterous" in the least to suggest that a vast array of complex, functional living organisms all of which employ a "universal" information handling system (DNA, etc) and use exactly the same genetic code were designed by a single superior intelligence. You draw that same inference every day when you recognize things which are designed by intelligence.

 

What you're reacting to is simply that you can't directly observe the intelligence that designed life, and because you can't directly observe it, you assume that means it does not and cannot exist. I understand this to an extent, but again, there are plenty of instances we could think of where it would be perfectly reasonable to conclude something was present even if you couldn't directly observe it.

 

Example: If you flew over a remote, uninhabited island and saw rocks on the beach arranged to spell "MY NAME IS BOB", you would be certain, without direct observation, that there was someone on that island. You wouldn't need to see "Bob" to conclude that either he was there presently or had been there very recently.

 

Ultimately, all you're doing is revealing (again) that your conclusions about this issue are restricted by your naturalist presuppositions. Of course, I realize you think that my conclusions are restricted by my presuppositions as well, but I can easily demonstrate otherwise:

 

My "presupposition" is that we don't fully understand the scope of what is "natural" and that we are unable to objectively define "nature" as a result. We can't really "know" where the edge of nature's envelope is. My presupposition is that we, as humans, are not "omniscient". This presupposition "permits" me to intellectually consider and evaluate both explanations of the origin of life, and, whenever I'm faced with a question of a scientific nature, I remain free to invoke natural, "unintelligent" causes wherever appropriate.

 

Your presupposition is that we do know enough about the scope of nature, and that either we know there's nothing outside of nature or we know where nature's envelope "ends". Your presupposition restricts you from intellectually considering both explanations. You can only consider one of the two and there is never an instance where your naturalist presuppositions will permit you to invoke something that is beyond your definition of what is "natural".

 

And yet, with your blatant subjectivity out there for all to see, you claim that it is Intelligent Design that is "unscientific." I've gotta hand it to you… that takes guts.

[Edge]

Complexity in DNA:

 

TRoutMac, let's suppose a specified sequence of letters may create life or resemble the complexity of DNA.

 

Being that sequence: ILOSTFIFTYBUCKSINLASVEGAS

 

Now, let's type randomly:

 

ANJCSGEHDPSMCNXBWTDGFCUAVSNCKDUEFILSOXD

GFQDSBXCFLPURNDHEGGXNDJCHFNJCNDKSLIVNDFHDNDJCUSHSNDJ

TYFHNSBAGZFVXHCJDMFLFINSHWETRJTKYIHF

VNCBXVSFEHDNVJSPHDZXSHBCERMKJFSXCFRUNCHDTBXGSBDVCHFURJFKIDMANSBZVXCUF

IROPLAMQWHSNCBEVZSNXGSHAKWUGABEVSAKZMXKD

ISJDLCMDJSNCMFJDHGHNBVDWEDFTGHNJUIKNBC

XQAZSWFYHUJNCXPLFWGG

TRFDBNMJHGBESXADTGHUJIKOL

PBCXQEXTHJKLFJCNSJQNZJSKSN

JCOENCJDNFJCOWMFNNDCMSKEUSNX

SJCNSXIOXLZMJDKRIFLCPSMMAMXDMC

JFMGKDIJSMXNZBAHSJWUEMDKCVFC

FEKDMC FMCJDMENCHDYEUSJXNSHWMXKDLCSLAPAAPXSKEM

DJCUDMWNSJXMSJCOSPAXMCNDHEUDJSNCHDKS

IWBVCRTHJIKODQXSAPLOMRFYHIDSXZAFVGNBXSCDEYIOMFAVGNKOPS

DRGYHNVCWEUJLIMNBVCXZEDUHGW

POLDSAMNTGRWDEFPLOKJINHTWZADC

GNJIOMTEQSFHBGTYPLMQADFTHNWX

ZIKLM...

 

I actually typed that at random, not seeing the keyboard and it was way more longer... just cut it to a necessary point... I just took out the random numbers and punctuation signs that came off from the typing... since we are only dealing with letters.

 

I bolded sequencedly the letters needed to make the word: ILOSTFIFTYBUCKSINLASVEGAS

 

 

Seems gibberish, but I would be willing to guess that natural selection would take the unneeded information to just get the important sequence... I don't know what does everyone think about that analogy

[TRoutMac]

Seems gibberish, but I would be willing to guess that natural selection would take the unneeded information to just get the important sequence... I don't know what does everyone think about that analogy

 

That's not bad… interesting exercise. It reminds me of another scenario which I'll use to illustrate how it doesn't work, though. (what a stick in the mud I am, huh?) The salient point is that to get life you need the sequence "ILOSTFIFTYBUCKSINLASVEGAS" but you need it ALL AT ONCE. In essence, (and I mean no offense) you "cheated" by removing the letters you didn't want and, here's the kicker, you used your intelligence to do it!

 

Now, for the illustration. Imagine I'm a judge, and you're a criminal, and I'm going to sentence you. Imagine that I issue a very unconventional sentence: You can either stay in jail for ten years, or, if you choose, I'll give you a coin to flip and if you get 1000 heads in a row, you can go free. But notice that, under the terms of the sentence, even if you were to get 999 heads in a row and then you got tails on your next flip, you'd have to start over. The question is, should you accept the ten years, or take the coin?

 

How does that relate to your analogy? Well, to get out of jail, you need 1000 heads consecutively (or do your ten years) and to get life, you need "ILOSTFIFTYBUCKSINLASVEGAS" consecutively. You don't get the luxury of picking up where you left off. You don't have any function until you get exactly the right sequence in its entirety. Since there's no life without the entire correct sequence, there's no way to "collect" as you have done in your example only the letters that will eventually complete the sequence.

 

Now, you might point out that if you missed that sequence by, say, one letter, I would still be able to "read" the message and so your 'typo' is therefore tolerable. Well, not really… that's only true when the reader of the message is also intelligent and can 'figure out' (in most cases) what the author intended.

 

Extreme example:

The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it.

 

Unfortunately, the molecular machines in a cell which "read" the DNA are not themselves intelligent. So they can't figure out what an incorrect code "should have" been.

 

I'm glad you brought that up, though… it's a neat exercise. A good way, it turns out, to argue for Intelligent Design!! (relentless, ain't I?)

[paultrr]

It is not surprising that you are going to be attacked and attacked with righteous indignation. A lot of us are pissed off at religion.

On the other hand, so-called 'scientists' and 'agnostics' have also commited attrocities. Some of them want us to believe that there are good and decent folks running the show but truth is not what they're after. They want power over people and they are just as bad as 'the other side'.

What we don't have and need is a logic based religion that holds up as an image of virtue the look in a child's eyes when it encounters something beautiful and fascinating about existence. Until that becomes the standard of virtue and is linked to the 'heroic' in man, the quest for truth will just be painful. This is not esoteric. I think that the future of humanity rests on top of this issue.

Part of my point is that also. As I have mentioned evolution as a theory has areas we do not have a full answer on that relies upon anything but assumption based upon knowns. The area of where and how life first began is one of those aspects. I can think, like Hawking, of a few areas in both physics and cosmology where we have this problem also. I have no problem admitting that science does not have the answer on everything at the present and that perhaps the Designer question is not as dead as some would like it to be. And we do have areas where assumption based upon worldviews comes into play like it or not.

 

However, inspite of all this I have no trust of any religious branding or association when it comesto something being presented as science. Religion has down through history proven itself to lie and bend the truth if it fits religions needs. The worst disservice to this whole ID debate is when religious leaders like Pat Robertson get on TV and annouce that God is going to judge a group of people because they do not agree with him or ID's stance being taught as science. That tells me these guys do not actually care any better than the Catholic church during the dark ages about truth and if they had their way their would be no real religious freedom or even freedom in this country if they had their collective way which ought to bother every American citizen to the core especially when we have a confessed so-called evangelical of simular background in the White House at present which is a whole other debate in itself.

 

That supporting remark in itself is enough to get the whole ID proposal ranked as crackpot since known scientists with decent credentials have been labeled such for far less remarks and connections. If the ID idea ever wants to get even a marginal acceptance by the scientific community its best course is to divorce itself from religion in general and to learn to do the real research to present an idea in proper peer reviewed format.

 

Right now between the religious connection and assumptions and the lack of solid research evidence it is simply wrong to have such taught in any science class in any public school in this country as if it was proven science. However, mention of such as an alternative point of view in my opinion is not wrong in a public school. I know when I was in school while evolution was taught, we still openly discussed other view points.