This OP may change over time. But for now…
- Devolution
- Rejecting common descent
- Failure to address how designs are actualized
- Materialism and Naturalism
“Devolution” is evolution. Stop trying to convince people that evolution and devolution are opposites.
Present the case for common descent. Address the subject of why IDists ought to accept common descent. Stop trying to convince people that ID and common descent are incompatible.
The designs that the science of intelligent design detects had to be actualized somehow. If the design that was detected is not an instance of an actualized design then it is a mistake to infer that it is designed. Tell us how designs are actualized without appealing to acts of special creation by a supernatural designer. There needs to be an alternative to God as The Designer who actualized his designs by something other than natural processes or there will always be a cloud over the claim that ID is a “strictly scientific” theory.
It’s not clear to me how introducing the immaterial into science would work. As things stand right now I see appeals to the non-material or the non-natural as unscientific and at odds with claims that ID is a strictly scientific theory.
Thoughts?
ETA: Mung has special powers, Gregory.
Thanks! I wasn’t planning to unless, directed, specific mutation, guided by the blind, dumb luck of natural processes have some other plans… You know what’s like… You can’t predict anything unless it had already been predetermined by natural processes…
From the article:
” 0 MORE
How Can the Universe Expand Faster Than the Speed of Light?
As dark energy causes the universe to expand ever-faster, it may spur some very distant galaxies to apparently move faster than the speed of light. This Hubble Deep Field Image shows some of the most distant galaxies ever observed.
Credit: UDF, Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Beckwith (STScI) and the HUDF Team
Paul Sutter is an astrophysicist at The Ohio State University and the chief scientist at COSI Science Center. Sutter is also host of the podcasts Ask a Spaceman and RealSpace, and the YouTube series Space In Your Face.
How can the universe expand faster than light travels?
It seems like it should be illegal, doesn’t it? Over and over (and over and over) we’re told the supreme iron law of the universe: Nothing — absolutely nothing — can go faster than the speed of light. Done. Nothing further needs to be said about the issue.
And then come the astronomers, always excited by the chance to mess up your comfort zone. They come barging in with a simple observation: Some galaxies are moving away from us…wait for it…faster than the speed of light. What gives?
The big picture
First off, it’s important to note that we live in an expanding universe. Every day the galaxies get farther apart from each other — on average. There are slight motions on top of that general expansion, leading to instances such as the Andromeda Galaxy heading on a collision course for the Milky Way. But in general, in the biggest of pictures, the galaxies are getting farther away from each other.
A key feature of this expansion is how uniform it is. Imagine a bunch of folks standing around the edges of a stretchy piece of fabric, tugging at it. Let us assume they’re choreographed well and are able to walk backward and pull at the same rate. You, standing in the middle, would correctly observe that your “universe” is expanding: any objects placed on that fabric would slowly move away from you.
Because stretchy stuff is stretchy, the objects on the fabric close to you would appear to move away with some speed, but the farther objects would appear to move faster. Even though the folks doing the pulling are moving at a constant speed, the apparent stretch changes with distance. I swear this is true; you can even try it for yourself at home!
Now, let’s jump to the universe. It’s as if a bunch of folks are at the edge of the cosmos, gently tugging at the fabric of space-time, stretching it.”
“Gently tugging on the fabric of space-tim, stretching it” – pretty much what I said.
What good fortune!
Not really, everyplace is the middle.
Yup! Cherry picking in January… You forgot the best part !
“…Yes, the movement of that galaxy can be interpreted as a “speed”: you can measure the distance to it, wait awhile (to be fair, a really, really long while), and measure it again. Distance moved divided by time equals speed, and I guarantee you that the speed you measure can be faster than light.
No, this isn’t a problem.
The notion of the absolute speed limit comes from special relativity, but who ever said that special relativity should apply to things on the other side of the universe? That’s the domain of a more general theory. A theory like…general relativity.
It’s true that in special relativity, nothing can move faster than light. But special relativity is a local law of physics. Or in other words, it’s a law of local physics. That means that you will never, ever watch a rocket ship blast by your face faster than the speed of light. Local motion, local laws.
But a galaxy on the far side of the universe? That’s the domain of general relativity, and general relativity says: who cares! That galaxy can have any speed it wants, as long as it stays way far away, and not up next to your face.
It goes deeper than this. Concepts like a well-defined “velocity” make sense only in local regions of space. You can only measure something’s velocity and actually call it a “velocity” when it’s nearby and when the rules of special relativity apply. Stuff super-duper far away, like the galaxies we’re talking about it? If it’s not close, it doesn’t count as a “velocity” in the way that special relativity cares about.
Special relativity doesn’t care about the speed — superluminal or otherwise — of a distant galaxy. And neither should you”
Good night!
So you are suggesting that Timothy s analogy of stretching some material and from the middle all things appear to be moving away from you equally doesn’t apply then right? Because in his analogy there is only one middle. So I wonder why he used an analogy that doesn’t apply?
I wonder what analogy does apply?
phoodoo,
I love when they use analogies is science that are not at all applicable. It keeps people from asking questions that also aren’t applicable.
Not at all, space is stretching, whatever point you choose space is stretching in all directions. That is true from every point.
It applies, but metaphors are not for everybody.
It does keep people from asking questions , mostly the ones who understand the analogy.
J-Mac’s and phoodoo’s approach to scientific evidence reminds me of William Hearns Mearns’ poem:
“Last night I saw upon the stair
A little man who wasn’t there
He wasn’t there again today
Oh, how I wish he’d go away…”
timothya,
What’s that got to do with your completely irrelevant analogy?
I have always found the stretching balloon analogy to be silly. Is the balloon in the middle empty? Are there edges? Is it round? Because in any of those scenarios, not all objects are distancing from other objects equally, and all are not the middle.
I’d prefer to soften that to say the following: for IBE, posited causes must be necessary to models; these models must have empirical results we can measure.
ETA: One example is fitness. We don’t measure it directly; instead, we eg count living descendants.
I see this thread as about what ID can posit as a cause for the appearance of design while still claiming to be scientific. My point is that the answer to that question lies in the practices of scientists, not in something outside of science.
However, as I’ve posted in other threads, I don’t think ID is trying to do science; it does math which it believes takes priority over science.
Like a balloon you mean?
Or like a piece of fabric?
Or like neither of these?
To answer your questions, “It doesn’t matter.” and to respond to your statement, “You are wrong.”
Your intuitions about geometry are wrong. It doesn’t matter the number of dimensions you consider, if you uniformly stretch the medium, then every position will view itself as the centre of the expansion. I encourage you to work through this for yourself.
Imagine a co-ordinate system in three dimensions. Over a time period, the space is stretched two-fold. You might consider the expansion as centred on the origin (0,0,0), cuz it’s obvious that all points are now twice as far away from the origin as they were before: the point (1,2,1) is now at (2,4,2), that’s twice as far from the origin.
But this is true for every single pair of points that you might choose. Try it out for yourself, pick any two points: (a,b,c) and (x,y,z) were sqrt((x-a)^2+(y-b)^2+(z-c)^2) apart, now they are sqrt((2x-2a)^2+(2y-2b)^2+(2z-2c)^2) apart. That’s twice as far (if you can factor…)! Notice that, unlike the Lorentz transformation, this isotropic transformation preserves angles.
So, any observer will (from their perspective) view themselves as the centre of the expansion.
This is grade school math.
colewd,
Ask John West why he closed the “ID in humanities & social sciences” section of the summer program. SSH doesn’t need IDism & IDT is unimpressive because lowercase ‘intelligence’ is already assumed. IDists ignore design theory that doesn’t suit their ideology & which would sink their ‘movement’ if they ever acknowledged it.
A strange predicament this USAmerican ‘think tank’ finds itself now in; it’s proponents & supporter must openly lie, avoid & hide because they have ‘Expelled Syndrome’ due to the DI’s strategic approach.
DNA_Jock,
Haha..oh its wrong is it. So the analogy is the stretchy fabric being pulled from all sides? And so the point that is on the very outer edge, its perspective is exactly the same as the point in the middle huh? Oh, ok, show me the math on that one.
Or no, no, its a balloon. And a point in the exact center of the balloon, its sees everything moving away from it, exactly in the same way that a point on the north pole sees points right next to it moving away. Ok, yea sure Jock. It doesn’t matter what analogy you use.
Why would we only need to choose 3 points Jock? We have points in all directions, remember?
Who is the comedian, Baby-Jock?
Anyway, any analogy will do. Its like a bowl of cottage cheese, dumped on the ground, all points are the middle.
Common descent is the idea that various groups of animals descended from a common ancestor which was present on the ark some few thousand years ago, and those animals did not themselves likewise descend from a common ancestor because they were specially created not too much time before the great flood and would not have had time to diversify enough before the flood to become the separate “kinds” that were on the ark.
If it helps you understand one aspect of expansion /stretching of space itself
Likewise, if you understand the principle there is no need for analogy.For some the idea that space is not static is hard to visualize.
Yes , that is the nature of analogies. Similar in some aspect, not similar in others.
Too bad it is pointless to explain how analogies and metaphors work with some metaphor or analogy.
I’m beginning to realize just how much like J-mac your commentary is. Astonishing. Same vacuous content, less ellipses and quantum mechanics. You must be so proud.
Gregory,
Is there strategic approach to replace Darwinism in the science curriculum? Is that why they avoid teaching it in social sciences and humanities?
Should there be an alternative to Darwinism?
Ancestors, two of each kind. Except for fish, they go back to creation. There is no specification how many comprised the original created ones.
We don’t know how The Designer created the first animals,they could be identical. After the Fall everything might change, either way, it is compatible with ID.
Think that would depend on the design and The Designer, really nothing can be eliminated or entailed .That of course is also compatible ID. That is the beauty of ID, all possibilities are accommodated except the lack of an initial Designer.
Mung,
Your definition works with Sal’s Flower 🙂
http://www.sci-news.com/genetics/article01036.html
Yes.
Step 1: Persuade the scientists that you have a better basis for biology.
Step 2: Allow the scientists to keep the curriculum up to date.
The failure of ID is because they have aimed at the curriculum, instead of aiming at the science. But, of course, that is because they do not have the science.
Neil Rickert,
I am not sure they have failed. Natural selection is not longer considered the real cause of novel features in biology. This was a huge blow to Darwinism. The latching on to Theobald 2003 was very telling where he pitched common descent without a change mechanism.
This is twice misinformed:
1. The changes in how natural selection’s role in evolution is viewed are due to the scientists working on evolution, not to the ID bullshit.
2. Natural selection is still considered as a participant “cause” of novel features in biology, only the role of mutational biases, random drift, and of sub-optimality leading to higher complexity have started to be better understood. Again, worked out by scientists, and none of that has anything to do with the ID movement.
I don’t see how advancing beyond Darwin is a “blow,” let alone why would it be important if there was a “blow” to “Darwinism.” Whatever you might mean by that. What’s important is that science advances. I would be very worried it “Darwinism” was everything we had about evolution after close to 160 years. That would mean that we have learned nothing, and that “Darwinism” wasn’t even a starter. Yet, it sparked an explosion of very productive scientific research areas. So much work has been produced that, of course, we have surpassed Darwin’s original understanding. If such a triumphant outcome constitutes a “blow,” then I wish my own research suffered similar “blows.”
What does “Theobald 2003” mean? Why would it be wrong to focus on, say, the evidence for common descent, rather than on the mechanisms? Do you think that every single scientific article (if Theobald 2003 is such a thing) should cover everything about evolution? If so, why?
And again, what does ID have to do with any of it? For example, the roles of circumstances, limitations, random drift, sub-optimality, mutational biases, were done by scientists active in the field. For example, the “Spandrels paper,” which is about limitations/random-drift/stuff-other-than-adaptation was written by Gould and Lewontin, and neither of them is an ID bullshitter. Mutational biases has been the work of Nei (if I remember correctly), not an ID bullshitter either. So, what makes you think that the advances in evolutionary theory are due to ID?
Well, so what? Don’t you get that whatever happens in evolutionary biology you are standing on the outside looking in?
Whatever radical changes are yet to come none of them at all will involve the need for anything like your purported Intelligent Designer!
So, sure, stand at the window your entire life waiting for the day when the Intelligent Designer becomes relevant in actual biology rather then the strawman that you all at UD pretend biology is. You’ll be waiting a long long time.
Entropy,
Here is a 1998 public debate with the then DI head challenging the NCSE. The statement that the DI has had no influence in how evolution is taught is naive. Every debate needs two sides to shake it out.
colewd,
Your questions are skewed. Darwin isn’t a key thinker in SSH. Are you not aware of this? Some (especially psychologists & biological [read: culturally impoverished] anthropologists) try to make Darwin into a social scientist, but they don’t get far because he wasn’t.
The issue is really about ‘evolutionism’ in SSH, rather than ‘Darwinism’. Yet you & most wacky IDists & creationists use a warped vocabulary & expect others to warp their own vocabularies in order to speak with you. IDists at the DI even think ‘Darwinism’ is a science, not an ideology! Sorry, but these people are simply not clever to believe & say such things.
https://evolution-institute.org/toward-a-new-social-darwinism/
Social Darwinism? Avoid teaching it? Do you not see any alternatives? If not, that’s the same situation of John West & the Discovery Institute; myopic villification of Darwin & misplaced blame, blame, blame. Until I set them straight, they were trying to blame Darwin for mechanistic thinking that came out of Descartes! The DI & IDM over-blame Darwin & haven’t looked closely at other sources for the ‘culture war’ they are fanning for activistic profit in Seattle.
I am not sure that there is an edge, but to humor you, let’s suppose that there is. I will reduce the number of dimensions to two, since you want to discuss a “stretchy fabric” and I worry that you have trouble with higher dimensionality.
Let us consider four locations; three on the “Western” edge of our fabric, called Portland (0,10), Seattle (0, 11) and Vancouver (0,12) and one location to the East of these, called Spokane (1,11) [numbers in brackets are (x, y) coordinates]. There are no negative coordinates, so three locations sit on the edge, whatever that is. Sitting in Seattle, we see Portland one unit to the South, Vancouver one unit to the North, and Spokane one unit to the East. To the West is (according to phoodoo, who thinks that this matters) only the great void of nothingness. Doesn’t matter.
Now the fabric is stretched two-fold, uniformly.
Portland is now at (0, 20), Seattle (0, 22), Vancouver (0,24) and Spokane (2,22).
(The center of our co-ordinate system is somewhere west of San Jose, not that it matters one iota!)
Sitting in Seattle, Jeff Bezos notes that Portland is two units to the South, Vancouver two units to the North and Spokane is two units East.
Clearly Jeff Bezos is the centre of the expanding universe.
I did not choose three points. I did (for the sake of illustration) choose three dimensions. I could choose any number of dimensions. I did choose any pair of points. Thus my illustration works for ANY two points; thus it works for all points. Points in all directions, even. Hence my sly reference to the Lorentz transformation, which is NOT isotropic.
😀
E4typos
Try and focus Bill. You’re claim was that ID was behind what the role that natural selection is considered to have in the evolution of new features, not about ID influences in how evolution is taught.
While I doubt that this debate had any influence in how evolution is taught, I’m sure it had no influence on what the role of natural selection is considered to be in the evolution of new features. The only thing that counts in science is the scientific findings, and it’s those finding that have changed the view of the role of natural selection.
Clear?
Entropy,
Ok lets go with this. What changed in the scientific findings to modify the claim of natural selection as the explanation of complex adaptions.
DNA_Jock,
I wonder why you think Timothya
Gee, imagine a mathematician who thinks the center doesn’t matter.
Is there a center to the universe? Oh, it doesn’t matter. And when Timothya referenced standing in the middle of the stretchy fabric, to you it doesn’t matter if he said the middle, because its all the same anyway (but you think Timothya didn’t get that).
So start with one dimension why don’t you? You have a stretchy one dimensional ruler, with all points on the ruler beginning at 0. The ruler is then stretched in two directions, one positive direction and one negative direction. Now one end of the ruler is at plus two units, and one end of the ruler is at negative two units. And one point still sits at zero. That’s the middle Jock. You can’t claim all points are the middle, right, because there is only one middle, and to one ends perspective, the other end has moved four units, and to the other ends prospective the far end has also moved four units. But to the middle, both ends have only moved two units, NO point has moved four units. Get it??
Do the same thing with your stretchy fabric. One point remains the middle, which is why Timothya was forced to say stand in the middle. Do the same thing with your balloon. One point is the middle. So what do we do to mask this fact, we pretend the 3 dimensional balloon is only two dimensions, and there is no middle. Everything is moving away from everywhere else on your balloon, only if you pretend the balloon doesn’t have a center.
Its why none of the analogies work, and why if you try to call a universe expanding from one point (yet without a middle), to an edge that doesn’t’ exist, it becomes pure mathematical nonsense.
Now instead of a line imagine it is a circular rubber band, Mark zero, stretch the band two units each way, zero is center ,same distance either direction you measure. Two units left of zero is the same distance either way you measure, it is the center. Two units right of zero is the same distance either way you measure, it is the middle, every point on the circle is the middle.
Is space more like a circle or a line?
A circular band in one dimension or two?
See the problem?
Okay phoodoo. Let us suppose that the universe has a centre. Let us suppose that it is expanding uniformly “away from” that centre.
Here is the thing that timothy and I are trying to get you to understand. Wherever you stand, the universe will appear to be expanding uniformly “away from” wherever you happen to be standing. You will erroneously conclude that you are at the centre of the expansion, wherever you happen to be.
So when you claim “I, Jeff Bezos, am the centre of the universe” you are (almost, heh) certainly wrong
[It is left as a exercise for the reader to find the centre of the observable universe. 😉 ]
.
Well over 500 breeds of dogs are the perfect example of common descent from wolf where the loss of gene and anatomical functions can be easily identified…
Devolution by Mike Behe…
All the speculative science is based on the big bang model… Cosmologists like to talk about the supposed evidence that seem to support it, but ignore the inconvenient one, such as that the universe had a beginning. Cosmic Microwave Background doesn’t support big bang, or at least not as a spontaneous, undirected event…There may be no center or middle of the observable universe, but why does the universe have the direction with the anisotropic “footprints” pointing to the Earth?
Why would blind dumb luck do that? Why leave evidence of direction and a sense of the center of the universe? WHY POINT TO LIFE? To fool atheists that it has intelligence?
Yes rulers are three dimensional, not one. Just as rubber bands are. Perhaps you meant something else.
J-Mac,
I would agree with this. Taking animals and showing how they can look different by slowing degrading the gene pool is a good example of devolution.
This is why common descent is not such an obvious conclusion. If you can go from a wolf to a chihuahua and have not progressed even one step towards novel function , I see no evidence that more degraded gene pools will do it.
If it makes you feel better we can say the earth is definitely not the center of the Milky Way Galaxy.
If one is some kind of creationist, he has to believe in some type of common descent within kinds or he is going to run out of space on the Noah’s Ark…
If this is the common descent within ‘kinds’ Behe believes in, it not only is compatible with ID. It is compatible with currently available scientific evidence…
I personally still have a problem with bird kinds…as THERE are more than one kind of birds…some so called flightless birds may not be birds at all unless someone can prove how they lost keels and gained Ferrari like speeds…
J-Mac,
One has to believe in Noah’s Ark to be a creationist??
All major and even minor religions have some kind of the flood and boat of people and animals surviving it embedded in their culture… There are too many of them scattered all over the world for it to be a fluke…
Several tribes have been found within the last 50 years that had not had contact with the civilization… Can you guess what one the their stories was?
Can you guess how many of them were atheists or agnostic?
J-Mac,
I believe in parables.
I don’t believe in Noah’s Ark.
I wonder if I am a creationist.
Creationism is a broad term…
Some creationists like you wouldn’t believe in Noah’s Flood even if the Ark were found… So, what’s the point arguing? Who am I to judge?
I expose falsehood and try to present logical explanations with as much evidence as possible… It takes faith either way…Which one is more reasonable?
Maybe it just happens that floods occur all over the world.
Probably wherever the observer is
The quadrupole and octupole align somewhat with the Ecliptic and Equinox. The dipole does not
Doesn’t anyone who attributes the creation of the universe to a creator god qualify as a creationist?
Degeneration is just fine to mention without importing the ideology. It seemed Mung was mocking ‘devolution’ in the OP, which is used in political science, not biology, as something like: “the surrender of powers to local authorities by a central government.” Now you’re trying to validate it as a non-biologist who has little clue what he’s talking about. Cute.
This is how people pervert their own language. It’s happening in front of our eyes with phoodoo. Behe is an incredibly naive philosopher (along with Axe & several other leaders of the IDM) & his embrace of IDism has made him a pariah for good reasons. Incredibly pretentious claims he couldn’t defend with actual evidence.
The Abrahamic theists he continues to insult with his low-brow philosophy & ideological IDism that drive his quasi-scientific conclusions are what he sweeps under the rug; simply a cost of associating with the DI & apparently his desire to be a leader of the IDM.
Send him around the world to fool others who haven’t been fooled yet by the DI’s slick PR machine & sciency claims. Michael Behe has chosen to be a fool for Johnson’s tricksy ideology. Sad.
If that is true you could be both an evolutionist and creationist