Ewert, Dembski, and Marks have a forthcoming paper: “Algorithmic Specified Complexity and the Game of Life” – It appears to be behind paywalls though. Can anyone provide a copy?

Please note, any comments not directly addressing the math or mechanics of this post will moved to Guano (thanks Neil and Alan)

My earlier post:

1. In Conway’s Life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life
2. There is the Glider-Producing Switch Engine http://conwaylife.com/wiki/Glider-producing_switch_engine
3. It is coded by 123 “On Cells” but requires a space of 67×60 in a specific configuration.
4. That’s 4,020 bits, > UPB.
5. It contains well matched parts : 4bli,3blo,2bee,1boat,1loaf,1ship,1glider http://wwwhomes.uni-bielefeld.de/achim/moving.html
6. It occurs naturally out of randomly configured dust : http://wwwhomes.uni-bielefeld.de/achim/moving.html
7. It can evolve from a much smaller entity (“time bomb” – 17 active cells): http://conwaylife.appspot.com/pattern/timebomb

Possible criticisms:

Information is hidden somewhere
This is under “standard” Life rules (B3/S23) which means there is precious little exogenous information:

1.Any live cell with fewer than two live neighbours dies, as if caused by under-population.
2.Any live cell with two or three live neighbours lives on to the next generation.
3.Any live cell with more than three live neighbours dies, as if by overcrowding.
4.Any dead cell with exactly three live neighbours becomes a live cell, as if by reproduction.

(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life#Rules)

These are not self-replicating
This is not actually a requirement of Specified Complexity and it does send off some of its parts into the life universe.

Also interesting – some musings on how big a life universe might have to be to support self-replicating life: http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/prisco20140915

It’s a quicky:

1. In Conway’s life: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life
2. There is the Glider-Producing Switch Engine http://conwaylife.com/wiki/Glider-producing_switch_engine
3. It is coded by 123 “On Cells” but requires a space of 67×60 in a specific configuration.
4. That’s 4,020 bits, > UPB.
5. It contains well matched parts : 4bli,3blo,2bee,1boat,1loaf,1ship,1glider http://wwwhomes.uni-bielefeld.de/achim/moving.html
6. It occurs naturally out of randomly configured dust : http://wwwhomes.uni-bielefeld.de/achim/moving.html
7. It can evolve from a much smaller entity (“time bomb” – 17 active cells): http://conwaylife.appspot.com/pattern/timebomb

Thoughts?

Here’s Barry’s latest:

Fred, Bob and Saber-Toothed Tigers

I’ve saved the web page in case he ‘disappears’ it, as he tends to do.

Barry is making the case that some irrational beliefs may cause outcomes that are still beneficial and so are not selected against (religion, anyone?).

He does this in reply to Piotr’s comment:

“As far as I can see, thought processes which allow us to understand the world and make correct predictions (and so are empirically “true”) are generally good for survival.”

Please note “GENERALLY good for survival”

gen·er·al·ly
ˈjen(ə)rəlē/
adverb
1.
in most cases; usually.

(from google search)

Barry, its time for you to learn about ‘distributions’. Do you think the correctness of belief is orthogonal to taking an action that is likely to improve survival chances?

I think given this and yesterdays comment:

“Your comment is classic.

ID Supporter: You can’t make a dog from a finch.

Darwinist: Yeah, but some finches are really really different from each other. I have now refuted your point.”

(Dogs don’t give birth to finches, Checkmate evolution!) – You should actually take some biology and logic classes. Spend less time on your apologetics and ‘rules of logic’ and actually learn something about biological origins.

H/T Patrick at AtbC:

http://www.lulzcode.com/idbots.html

Executive Summary:

Barry Arrington doesn’t understand ID. KF talks about math and design detection but never does it. ID exists as an amorphous miasmic anti-evolutionary argument. It is the North Korea of the internet

Barry Arrington doesn’t understand ID.
in now epic thread Barry told us what would convince him ID was wrong:

The science bomb that will destroy my belief in ID: A single example of natural forces observed to have create Orgel’s CSI.

Now as IDists can’t actually measure CSI (they don’t appear to understand it at UD) this was troublesome, but a close examination of Dembski’s CSI contains the term P(T|H), which is described by him as

Moreover, H, here, is the relevant chance hypothesis that takes into account Darwinian and other material mechanisms.

So Barry wanted a demonstration of CSI being made by natural forces, whilst Dembski defines CSI as only to be ‘counted’ in the absence of them. Barry doesn’t understand CSI. I asked him if he thought that “CSI=FSC=FSCO/I”. He never responded.

KF talks about math and design detection but never does it

KF’s behavior is perhaps the most odious of the moderators there. Rather than have an actual discussion, he creates multiple one-off posts with closed comments, which means that associated critique is never attached to the post itself. This effectively allows him to perpetually reboot once destroyed arguments as if they are new and unassailable. This just shows us the strong connection between creationism and ID – creationists are still rolling out “2LoT” and “If we came from Monkeys” today.

All of KF’s posts are basically reformations of Hoyle’s tornado in a junkyard arguments: Complex things cannot spontaneously generate. Of course this has *nothing* to do with life and does not consider P(T|H). KF has yet to do any credible math pertaining to an evolutionary narrative. Sadly telling.

ID exists as an amorphous miasmic anti-evolutionary argument

The general trend at UD is for the IDists to tell us what they think evolution can’t do rather than what ID can do. It is gapism in its purest form. The target moves from PCD to abiogenesis to the first cell and they want a complete history of the evolution of life with pictures and an index of all the mutations as they happened. Given the ‘Jesus this’ and ‘God that’ that happens at UD, I wonder if they have the same high bar for other ‘historical’ events.

It is the North Korea of the internet

They silently ban, delete accounts, place in moderation, mark up others posts and post themselves with comments disabled. This degree of message control is a symptom of their arguments being completely noncompetitive when there is a free and fair exchange of ideas.

I think that popular consensus is that it *is* designed. Let’s look at the design detection tools on offer (both ID and conventional) and see which were used in this particular design inference.

Open for comments for a while before I add my two penneth.

http://ncse.com/files/pub/creationism/The_Wedge_Strategy.pdf

Governing Goals

To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies.
To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by God.

http://www.uncommondescent.com/about-2/

Uncommon Descent holds that…
Materialistic ideology has subverted the study of biological and cosmological origins so that the actual content of these sciences has become corrupted. The problem, therefore, is not merely that science is being used illegitimately to promote a materialistic worldview, but that this worldview is actively undermining scientific inquiry, leading to incorrect and unsupported conclusions about biological and cosmological origins. At the same time, intelligent design (ID) offers a promising scientific alternative to materialistic theories of biological and cosmological evolution — an alternative that is finding increasing theoretical and empirical support. Hence, ID needs to be vigorously developed as a scientific, intellectual, and cultural project.

At its (theistic) core, ID and creationism is angry with materialism / philosophical naturalism. Denyse, as “News”, is quick to assault any mainstream science she can find through her powers of misunderstanding. KF advocates (but can’t defend or explain) immaterial process that enable minds and contemplation. And yet, like our own WJM, they are all functional materialists.

Continue reading →

Over at Uncommon Descent KirosFocus repeats the same old bignum arguments as always. He seems to enjoy the ‘needle in a haystack’ metaphor, but I’d like to counter by asking how does he know he’s not searching for a needle in a needle stack?

There is then of course much smugness and back-pating, along with “Notice some chirping crickets?”

Well, let’s see what happens in an environment where crickets aren’t moderated or banned…

William has taken exception to the current state of science and its ‘overreach’.

He claims, “IMO, all that is left of materialism/physicalism/naturalism is really nothing more than a hidden (even subconscious) anti-theistic agenda.”

This is a thread for William to guide us in a detailed exploration of the alternatives, their mechanisms, how we might test them and how we might benefit from them.

KairosFocus, he who shall not be real-named (Henceforth KF), habitual censor over at Uncommon Descent, perpetually crows about his long-standing challenge:

provide a 6,000 word feature-length article that justifies the Darwinist tree of life from its OOL roots up through the Cambrian revo — as in Darwin’s Doubt territory — and other major formation of body plans up to and including our own origins, and we will host it here at UD, one of the leading ID blogs in the world. We are perfectly willing to host a parallel post with another site. Only, you must provide thesis and observation based evidence that solidly justifies your conclusions in light of inference to best explanation, the vera causa principle and other basic principles of sound scientific induction. Also, you must actually argue the case in outline, a summing up if you will. You must strive to avoid Lewontin’s a priori evolutionary materialism, and if you would redefine science on such terms you will have to reasonably justify why that is not a question-begging definition, in a way that is historically and philosophically soundly informed. Of course, you may link sources elsewhere, but you must engage the task of providing a coherent, non-question-begging, cogent argument in summary at the level of a feature-length serious magazine article . . . no literature bluffs in short.

[some format lost because I can’t be arsed]

KF is of course free to set the bar for his personal satisfaction at whatever pathetic level of detail he requires, but given that he’s often accused of being a massive hypocrite I’m sure he’ll be happy to provide us with a corresponding ID narrative.

Continue reading →

Hey folks. I thought given some of the wonderful intellects we have here it would be fun to have an “ask an expert” thread. Don’t get hung up on if you’re an expert or not, if you want to ask a question or supply an answer, have at it!

I was flying into LAX two nights ago and I could see the moon (nearly full) being reflected in a body of water. I began thinking about how the light of the sun had bounced off of the moon and the water create the image in my eyes, like a game of photonic billiards. Which brings me to my question:

If photons are being reflected (“bouncing”) off of the face of the moon, shouldn’t the edges of the moon appear dimmer because the angle should be less favourable to bouncing photons my way?

Over in the ID Quiz thread at Uncommon Descent, Mark Frank asks;

“Here’s quiz on ID for you ID proponents:
On page 21 of “Specification: The Pattern That Signifies Intelligence” William Dembksi defines the context dependent specified complexity of given as
Consider the context of the bacterial flagellum.
1. What is ?
2. What is the function ?
3. How is  estimated?
4. What is ?
5. How is estimated?
6.  is meant to be a probability. Under what conditions might the answer exceed 1?”

This seems a fair question, asking IDists to use their own proposed methodology to detect design, empirically.
But instead of heartily embracing this opportunity to show the power of ID, he is set upon.
Joe moans that

“Really Mark? Then tell us how to determine the probability wrt unguided evolution. If you know the answers to your questions you should be able to do that.”

Sorry Joe, it’s your methodology, do your own work, if you can.
KirosFocus has a length moan from large numbers and incredulity, finishing with;

“We cannot stop such from those tactics but we can expose them and red ring fence off those who insist on such tactics.”

STOP. RIGHT. THERE.
If you can’t employ your own design detection methodology it is no ones fault but your own.
Either the methodology is unusable,
OR non of you are smart enough to use it,
OR you’re all secretly supports of Darwinian evolution and are making ID look as ridiculous as possible.

All Mark Frank has asked is for you to employ your own methodology. You can’t. ID is intellectually bankrupt, and only addressing the required calculations will change that.

[Edit: symbols latexed by Lizzie]