I thought I would give a comment by a poster with the handle “ericB” a little more publicity as it was buried deep in an old thread where it was unlikely to be seen by passing “materialists / evolutionists”.
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Calling all evolutionists / materialists! Your help is needed! Alan Fox has not been able to answer a particular challenge, but perhaps you know an answer.
The issue is simple and the bar is purposely set low. The question is whether there exists one or more coherent scenarios for the creation of a translation system by unguided chemicals.
The translation system in cells indicates intelligent design. I would submit that, regardless of how many billions of years one waited, it is not reasonable to expect that unguided chemicals would ever construct a system for translating symbolic information into functional proteins based on stored recipes and a coding convention.
[I realize people have thoughts about what happened earlier (e.g. that might not need proteins, for example) and what happened later (e.g. when a functioning cell provides the full benefits of true Darwinian evolution). For the purposes here, attention is focused specifically on the transition from a universe without symbolic translation to construct proteins to the origin of such a system. Whatever happened earlier or later, sooner or later this bridge would have to be crossed on any path proposed to lead to the cells we see now.]
One of the key considerations leading to this conclusion is that a translation system depends upon multiple components, all of which are needed in order to function.
+ Decoding
At the end, one needs the machinery to implement and apply the code to decode encoded symbolic information into its functional form. (In the cell, this is now the ribosome and supporting machinery and processes, but the first instance need not be identical to the current version.) Without this component, there is no expression of the functional form of what the symbolic information represents. The system as a whole would be useless as a translation system without this. Natural selection could not select for the advantages of beneficial expressed proteins, if the system cannot yet produce any. A DVD without any player might make a spiffy shiny disk, but it would be useless as a carrier of information.
+ Translatable Information Bearing Medium
There must be a medium that is both suitable for holding encoded information and that is compatible with the mechanism for decoding. Every decoding device imposes limitations and requirements. It would be useless to a DVD player if your video was on a USB thumb drive the DVD player could not accept instead of a suitable disk. In the cells we see, this is covered by DNA and ultimately mRNA.
+ Meaningful Information Encoded According to the Same Coding Convention
One obviously needs to have encoded information to decode. Without that, a decoding mechanism is useless for its translation system purpose. If you had blank DVDs or DVDs with randomly encoded gibberish or even DVDs with great high definition movies in the wrong format, the DVD player would not be able to produce meaningful results, and so would have no evolutionary benefit tied to its hypothetical but non-functioning translation abilities. In the cell, this information holds the recipes for functional proteins following the same encoding convention implemented by the ribosome and associated machinery.
+ Encoding Mechanisms
This is perhaps the least obvious component, since the cell does not contain any ability to create a new store of encoded protein recipes from scratch. Indeed, this absence is part of the motivating reasons for the central dogma of molecular biology. Nevertheless, even if this capability has disappeared from view, there would have to be an origin and a source for the meaningful information encoded according to the same coding convention as is used by the decoding component.
(For the moment, I will just note in passing that the idea of starting out with random gibberish and running the system until meaningful recipes are stumbled upon by accident is not a viable proposal.)
So there has to be some source capable of encoding, and this source must use the same coding convention as the decoding component. To have a working, beneficial DVD player, there must also be a way to make a usable DVD.
+ Meaningful Functional Source Material to Represent
It would do absolutely no good to have the entire system in place, if there did not also exist in some form or other a beneficial “something” to represent with all this symbolic capability. If you want to see a movie as output, there needs to be a movie that can be encoded as input. If you want functional proteins as output, there needs to be access to information about proper amino acid sequences for functional proteins that can serve as input. Otherwise, GIGO. Garbage In, Garbage Out. If there is no knowledge of what constitutes a sequence for a functional protein, then the result produced at the end of the line would not be a functional protein.
+ Some Other Way To Make What You Want The System To Produce
If we supposed that the first movie to be encoded onto a DVD came from being played on a DVD player, we would clearly be lost in circular thinking, which does not work as an explanation for origins. Likewise, if the only way to produce functional proteins is to get them by translating encoded protein recipes, that reveals an obvious problem for explaining the origin of that encoded information about functional proteins. How can blind Nature make a system for producing proteins, if there has never yet been any functional proteins in the universe? On the other hand, how does blind Nature discover and use functional proteins without having such a system to make them?
The core problem is that no single part of this system is useful as a translation system component if you don’t have the other parts of the system. There is nowhere for a blind process to start by accident that would be selectable toward building a translation system.
The final killer blow is that chemicals don’t care about this “problem” at all. Chemicals can fully fulfill all the laws of chemistry and physics using lifeless arrangements of matter and energy. Chemicals are not dissatisfied and have no unmet goals. A rock is “content” to be a rock. Likewise for lifeless tars.
The biology of cells needs chemistry, encoded information, and translation, but chemicals do not need encoded information or biology. They aren’t trying to become alive and literally could not care less about building an encoded information translation system.
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I’m hoping ericB will find time to respond to any comments his challenge might elicit.
Presented with some phenomenon, we could ask ourselves much more than “did someone do that”.
A spider’s web does not self-assemble. It takes a spider to build it. No doubt some arachnologists could look at a web and identify which species of spider made it. Are cobwebs artificial or natural? Doesn’t seem a very interesting question on its own. Much more can be learned or looked into, what web is made of, how does a spider produce the different silks it uses, how does a spider produce its particular web design without having to be taught. Where and how is that ability encoded in the spider embryo.
Archaeological artefacts like stone tools and weapons can reveal much under close scrutiny. Archaeology has developed hugely since Tutankhamen’s tomb was found. All sorts of scientific investigative techniques can be brought to bear, very productively on material already in museum stores. Investigation does not begin and end with “did someone do this?” We can look at who, when, how the artefact could have been made. We can compare finds and sites and build up a pattern of a particular group of people, geographically and in time.
And in biology, investigation into the where, when and how is on-going. Evolutionary theory depends on the relatedness of all living organisms and the idea that there is an unbroken chain of viable organisms not much different from each preceding and subsequent generation. Scientists are working on pieces of the problem now. No need to stop to consider “could that happen by evolutionary processes”, they just get on with trying to find bits of the puzzle.
And if evolutionary theory was demonstrated to be wrong in some way? We’d have to look for a different explanation. But that day hasn’t yet dawned.
ETA: I came across this piece by social scientist, Dan Sperber. Might be worth a read. It says “do not quote” on the PDF so I’ll just point you to the final paragraph on page 15.
People are wary these days of making predictions about what people might achieve in the future, as many such assertions from the past look pretty silly now. Regarding creating new life forms, that is a daunting task, notwithstanding Craig Venter. I don’t know of anyone denying the theoretical possibility out of hand.
And people have speculated that the first living organisms could have got here from elsewhere, Wikipedia has plenty to say. It would be great if Mars or the SETI project threw some evidence of life elsewhere. That would put some meat on the bones of speculation. Nobody can prove the non-existence of life elsewhere scientifically or philosophically. But speculation is cheap, fun and harmless.
cubist seems to have a problem with the concepts of negation or taking the complement of a set. Most who are comfortable with math and/or logic have no objections to the idea that given a set S, it is meaningful and useful to be able to talk about the set “Not S”. If that is uncomfortable or objectionable to cubist, I don’t plan to undertake to try to persuade him of the meaningfulness and value of basic mathematics or logic.
So, if a interplanetary probe rounds a corner and sees what everyone else in the world will immediately recognize as alien artifacts and/or technology, you really think the scientists are going to say, “Now hold on. Don’t go too fast. We cannot conclude that these objects are the product of design until we can form a hypothesis of how the whatzit-in-question was manufactured, and test that hypothesis of manufacture. Since we can’t do either of those yet, we cannot infer that it is Artificial.” Do you really propose to defend this?
So, for example, when there were competing hypotheses about how the pyramids were constructed, with no hypothesis yet prevailing, scientists were unable to infer that the pyramids were artificial? Same question for any other object whose method of origin is not yet determined. Do you really propose that inference of the Artificial would not be made until after a particular hypothesis of manufacture has been vindicated?
Possible early but rejected Independence Day movie script excerpt: “Sorry, sir, but even though that may look like an alien spacecraft to your untrained nonscientific perceptions, since we don’t know how this was manufactured, we really cannot infer even that this is Artificial at all. Until we know how it was made, that would be rash and unscientific.”
BTW, what did you think of Lizzie’s comments on the thread I linked to in my previous post?
Yes, they are. Scientists are like that. Skepticism goes with being a scientist.
No, scientists won’t say that. They are skeptical, but they are not pedants about ordinary word usage. “Artificial” is not a technical term, so saying that an observed object is artificial does not really commit one to any particular scientific position.
I want to look more closely at the problems in Allan Miller’s translation proposal. But on the way, some confusion should be cleared up. Allan seemed to try to imply that there might be some unending regress of demands to explain prior states.
The hyperbole (e.g. “with sequences and selection coefficients”) is false and unwarranted. More to the point, an unending regress is not possible. Even before Alan Fox posted it here at TSZ, the challenge has had a defined started point that is freely granted as a given. By definition, no explanation is required for the starting point or anything that would precede it.
Although the starting line hasn’t moved at all, the real problem here is that Allan doesn’t want to start with the starting point the challenge provided, and instead insists upon starting at the point that Allan thinks immediately preceded the translation system. This would attain by mere assumption that this advanced hypothetical state ever existed without the aid of proteins that would only become possible later. Notice his own description.
Notice Allan’s acknowledgement that his preferred starting point already has an organism that reproduces with the aid of “a functional and useful … transcription system” that Allan considers “essential”, and that the replication of the freely granted RNA(/DNA) world lacks this. If this advanced transcription system is indeed “essential” to his plan, then the plan is worthless if unguided natural processes cannot be expected to arrive at that “essential” advanced state on their own.
To identify a feature as “essential” provides no assurance that natural processes can or will produce it. On the contrary, it merely identifies a potential point of failure for schemes that claim the sufficiency of unaided natural processes.
Yet, Obstacle #4 among the identified obstacles of the challenge explicitly discussed the obstacle of moving from the freely granted RNA(/DNA) world of replicating strands to Allan’s preferred assumption of an organism with a type of cellular reproduction (plus the other functionality Allan has indicated in various posts concerning his assumed starting point). This is a transition that natural selection at the RNA(/DNA) world stage would have hindered, as the obstacle discusses.
To bypass this obstacle by moving the starting point to the other side would be equivalent to running a competitive obstacle course and choosing for yourself a starting point that bypasses the earlier obstacles.
Nevertheless, even in the Tough Mudder challenge (which is not strictly a competition), people are allowed to bypass the obstacles that they don’t want to undertake. Allan is clearly not wanting to tackle that part of this challenge. Therefore, I am going to return to looking at some illustrative problems in the steps he has proposed.
The Triplet-Reading System
The translation system as it currently exists in cells needs the ability to consider an mRNA strand one codon (or triplet of nucleotides) at a time. The sequence must be advanced just sufficiently to allow matching against the exposed codon. The advancement must pause until the matching counterpart anti-codon comes along and binds with the codon. Once the system is ready to process the next codon in the sequence, the sequence must advance again just far enough to expose the next triplet for binding with its match. Thus, whether in the current or historical triplet-reading system, being able to read one triplet after another involves coordinating advancement with the matching process. Thus, even this aspect of translation is itself a triplet-reading system.
I responded…
When RNA folds into three dimensional structures (e.g. to form a ribozyme or whatever), there is never a need to read three nucleotides at a time in order to be able to fold. Notice that Allan’s response also acknowledges that “‘triplets’ only become relevant on binding the tRNA, and moving on.”
It is an unwarranted assumption to merely assume “that even a mere length-control counting system” that implements a triplet-reading system would exist at all. Notice the nature of Allan’s justification, which shows up again in his followup post.
If one assumes that one is going to build a system for reading a sequence (e.g. to provide “length-control counting”), it is observed that doing so in triplets will work best, whereas as other ways of trying to do this task would not work or would work very poorly.
Yet no justification whatsoever is provided that the blind chemical processes would undertake to build any such system at all. All the reasoning is retrospective. It starts from what would be needed for the finished system to work and provide whatever benefits are imagined, with the tacit implication that it is therefore reasonable that nature would do it this way (rather than other ways) — but without addressing the real possibility of simply not creating any such system at all.
When the issue of possible failure is seriously considered, the fact that some other configurations would not “work” and that only one would really work well only adds to the challenge rather than making it less. It narrows, rather than broadens, the target that a blind, uncaring search would have to stumble upon. “Failure,” i.e. configurations that don’t “work” as the scientist imagines, is an entirely acceptable outcome from the perspective of chemicals.
If the chemical configurations never create a triplet-reading system for sequentially reading through an RNA sequence three nucleotides at a time, it is futile to speculate how natural selection might have seized upon the advantages it could offer — once it is functional.
The problem of depending on this type of backward reasoning and justification applies throughout the proposal. The issue of assuming the origin of a triplet-reading system is simply a good illustration of a more general problem.
I think you have been watching too many sci-fi movies, Eric, and you utter “design” like a mantra. I’ll try to consider what my reaction to finding (or more likely hearing a report) an apparently alien artefact on Mars, say. I think it would be a mix of apprehension and curiosity. What, when, who and how would be immediate questions, especially are “they” still around. And if this artefact were some kind of vehicle, lots of information might be gleaned from a close look. I’m trying to hypothesize on whether we could guess an alien’s size from the size on the cabin. But then these aliens might be gaseous or electronics embedded in silicon. This really is idle speculation. I think we can cross this bridge when we have some object for consideration as a possible alien artefact. Somehow, I doubt your glib assumption that “design” and the nature of the maker of the artefact would necessarily be immediately obvious.
Saying that an observed object is artificial — even informally — actually does indicate that one has ruled out a whole class of potential scientific positions. As soon as something is acknowledged to be Artificial, that immediately implies it would be unreasonable to appeal to purely unguided natural process explanations.
That is the key issue of relevance. At what point do people (including scientists) rule out unguided natural process explanations, and why?
cubist’s response implies that scientists work like this.
1. “Form a hypothesis of how the whatzit-in-question was manufactured”
2. “test that hypothesis of manufacture.”
3. Depending on whether the hypothesis passes the tests, conclude that the “given whatzit is or isn’t the product of Design”.
Yet, no reasonable scientist is going to appeal to geology or other natural process explanations to try to explain an alien spacecraft, even if he doesn’t have a clue exactly how someone made it.
The key question is whether one needs to wait until one knows how X was made before one can conclude it is Artificial. I claim that is obviously absurd on the face of it. No one, not even scientists, needs to know how X was made before they will be willing to acknowledge it is Artificial.
What matters is whether X is not reasonably attributable to unaided natural processes. That is both a necessary and a sufficient condition in order to justify an inference to the fact that something is Artificial.
You don’t think, considering that aliens and their artefacts might be so, well, alien that they are so outside what we might imagine that one would need to poke around and pull it apart before being able to conclude anything about the artefact. Even using “alien spacecraft” as a phrase sounds like a bad sci-fi novel. It wouldn’t necessarily be a shiny metal saucer with go-faster stripes, would it?
That rather makes my point, doesn’t it. You are basing your concept of aliens on a movie!
The first pulsar that was discovered was initially called an “LGM” (short for “little green men”). What was thereby ruled out?
I’ve indicated this consideration is both the necessary and sufficient condition for justifying an inference that something is Artificial. This same relationship can be seen when making the inference is not justified. If one could reasonably explain something as the result of unguided natural processes, then without any other special information an inference to someone being responsible (i.e. to intelligent agency at some level) would not be justified.
Here Lizzie makes a similar point in relationship to drawing the inference from biology (my emphasis added).
If I have understood Lizzie correctly, we are agreed that the justification for inferring design depends upon whether or not the observed effect can be reasonably attributed to an unguided natural process, such as what unguided evolutionary processes would create.
If you see that your outdoor lawn furniture is wet after a morning in which it may have been raining, no inference to intelligent agency is needed.
But if you go into your home and all of your indoor furniture is soaked even though there are no natural sources of water available that could account for this, then one infers someone was involved — even if one doesn’t yet have a clue how it was done.
Eric, I can’t help wondering if you have in your mind the idea that there is some inherent quality “design” that can be assigned by looking at something such as a bacterial flagellum. Maybe we could make some assessment on the likelihood of all the parts assembling at once and ask ourselves, how could that possibly happen?
It’s designed!
But someone or something then must have designed it! Then the questions immediately come to mind. Who or what designed flagella? How did they get their design into the bacteria that have them? When and how often was this done? Design isn’t an explanation. It is a suspicion, a question, or wishful thinking unless you take the next step and find a candidate for the Designer and an idea of his/her/its/their methodology.
Swing and a miss, ericB. The “negation” operator is a perfectly good ‘tool’ in the ‘toolbox’ of mathematics, just as the “complement of a set” is a perfectly good ‘tool’ in the ‘toolbox’ of the mathematical sub-field called set theory. In the context of mathematics, both of these ‘tools’ are quite useful… but you’re not using these ‘tools’ in the context of mathematics. Instead, you’re trying to apply them to the RealWorld, and in the context of the RealWorld, either/both of these ‘tools’ can be problematic.
In the context of mathematics, you can always be certain that you’re taking all the relevant factors into account, because in math, you can exclude any Factor X by declaring Factor X to be excluded. In the context of the RealWorld, you can’t exclude any Factor X by declarative fiat
Hm. Looks like when I made a point of mentioning the problematic nature of the negatively-defined ‘junk drawer’ category called Invertebrates in a previous response, my point sailed right over ericB’s head.
At this point, it’s worth noting that that already have been a few instances of ET phenomena that were deemed to be the result of intelligent agency. I won’t name any of them right now, because I’m curious to see if ericB knows about (or can find on the internet) any of these earlier instances of putative ET technology, and how ericB will respond to them…
Gee, ericB, I dunno. It’s not like any scientists have ever, in the past, tried to study things that were considered to be products of intelligent agency, so of course there’s no historical track record which might be relevant to answering this question…
Yes, yes. Pay no attention to all the documentation which the ancient Egyptians left, much of this documentation literally carved in stone.
Independence Day? The movie in which a human hacker somehow managed to penetrate an extraterrestrial computer network, not one of whose protocols the human had any previous knowledge of? Yeah, ericB, any idea which was rejected from such a film is obviously stoopid and unrealistic and unscientific. Yeah. You betcha. Sure thing.
Okay, I’ll be the pedant.
Given a set X and a subset S, it is meaningful to talk about not S. By context, we understand that to be the subset of X that consists of elements that are not in S.
If we remove the larger set X, and the context it provides, then no it is not meaningful to talk of “not S”. In fact, that leads straight to the Russell paradox.
Sorry, that is not true. People infer an unknown object is designed when they pattern match it with a mental template of an already known to be designed similar object. It has nothing to do with thinking about if natural processes are insufficient.
That’s why the ID claim “you’d know an alien space ship if you saw it” is so bogus. People visualize the space ships they’ve seen in SF movies as their mental template and go “gee, that looks like a space ship!”. In reality no one has any clue what a real alien space ship would look like.
OMFSM
Is that really how the aliens were defeated in that movie? Ugh, it’s even more pointless rah-rah than I thought way back when it came out. Guess I didn’t miss anything by not paying to go see it, eh?
I have more to say about what it implies that EricB chose that movie as his killer example, but honestly, it would just be rank speculation on my part, so I’ll refrain. But I’ll be over here laughing to myself. Independence Day. Hee hee.
Thanks for explaining, Neil.
Another way to say it would be that any mathematical operation requires a particular set of preconditions and axioms in order to yield a valid result. If you apply Mathematical Operation X in a context which lacks one or more of the preconditions & axioms which make Mathematical Operation X a valid thing, you kan haz FAIL in the 55-gallon-drum size available at Costco.
Like DNA and RNA and Proteins and the Genetic Code.
Any sufficiently advanced alien species wishing to make contact with us lowly earthlings would surely make their spaceships conform to our expectations.
Neil:
But surely the set X is a subset of all sets. It follows that it is meaningful to talk of not X, and by extension, not S (S being a subset of X).
Not that I’m a pederast. I’m not.
The Russell paradox illustrates the problems that leads to.
Does the Russell Paradox resolve the paradox?
You’re the one who appealed to it, right?
Nope. No human designs are anywhere close to those things, only in the most superficial of analogies.
It’s the ignorance based false-matches (“but it looks designed to me!!”) that keep tripping up the IDiots.
The axioms of set theory, the Zermelo Fraenkel axioms, are carefully crafted so as to disallow talk of an unrestricted “set of all”. And that avoids the paradox.
I was not just being a pedant. The complaint with ericB’s “negative” definition was that it was too unrestricted so that you didn’t know what your were talking about. And that’s analogous to the kind problem that leads to the Russell paradox.
Neil Rickert:
So there is no unrestricted set of all S?
Neil Rickert:
But we can’t do that, right?
No more than we can talk of “not X.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axiom_of_choice
The axioms of set theory are usually written as ZF (for Zermelo-Fraenkel). If you add the axiom of choice, the you get ZFC.
It doesn’t actually matter for what we are discussing. What is allowed for subsets is not dependent on AC (the axiom of choice). Russell’s paradox is also not dependent on AC. You are just dragging the discussion way off topic.
Neil Rickert:
You introduced set theory, right, in order to “refute” ericB?
Some people even thought that given your response they did not have to give any further thought to the matter.
wikipedia:
To refute? No. Only to show why his comparison with set theory complements was not very useful.
if those things are designed then why are they so messy and utterly unlike what humans would actually design?
Multiple layers of overlapping interacting codes? No human designer aims for such things, yet that same mess is “evidence” of design to you.
Very strange.
In order to seriously consider your suggestion and evaluate it, we have to look for categories of discriminating cases. We can consider your suggestion using the same method I applied earlier when I wrote about Artificial vs. Natural and The Relevant Distinction.
Consider a grid of four quadrants. On one axis put the question, “Does this match a mental template of an already known to be designed similar object?”, with the answers Yes and No. On the other axis put the question, “Is it reasonable to attribute this to unguided natural processes?”, or if you prefer to be more equivalent, “Does this match a mental template of the range of the kinds of effects that I’ve known natural processes to be capable of?”, with Yes and No. (If a version of the latter expression is used, it is worth noting that this doesn’t mean, “I’ve seen that particular rock before, etc.”, just as the other axis doesn’t mean, “I’ve seen that particular designed object before.”)
Two quadrants are unhelpful because they give indistinguishable results. If Yes it matches a mental template for designed objects and No it doesn’t match a mental template of unguided natural process effects, then both suggest Artificial. Flip the answers and both indicate a presumption that it is Natural (i.e. there is no clear reason to infer design or intelligent agency from the observed properties of the object).
The discriminating cases have to come from the remaining quadrants.
Suppose that Yes it does match a mental template of something known to be designed AND Yes it does match a mental template of something known to be reasonably attributed to unguided natural processes. This is the same quadrant I considered earlier with the example of diamonds, which could be naturally or artificially produced. Anytime we use artificial means to produce something that can also be produced by unguided natural processes, that case would fall into this quadrant. It is the quadrant where we mimic a natural process effect through artificial, designed means.
In that case, it would be a mistake and incorrect to use the fact that it matches a mental template for an object known to be designed. That fact is irrelevant and that distinction is inappropriate, since it can also be produced by unaided natural processes. The fact that it does match a mental template of a known-to-be-designed object or effect would not give us the warrant to infer, “Someone did this.” The design inference is not justified precisely because the relevant consideration tells us that unaided natural processes could account for it.
This is exactly the point I was making when I quoted Lizzie’s observation in my previous post. When either explanation works, the default assumption leans toward unaided natural processes. This is necessary since intelligent agency could potentially mimic many natural processes.
What about the last quadrant where No, the object or effect does Not match a mental template of something known to be designed AND No it doesn’t match a mental template of something we could reasonably attribute to natural processes? Suppose that this is currently an empty quadrant.
If it remains perpetually empty, it provides no additional discriminating cases and every discriminating case is in the previous quadrant. All of those cases decide in favor the distinction I’ve proposed as the relevant distinction.
What if this last quadrant doesn’t remain perpetually empty and we eventually encounter something that doesn’t match either set of mental templates? It is both Unlike anything we have ever designed AND it is Not something that we can reasonably attribute to the range of effects produced by unguided natural processes. While any inference would have to be quite tentative, nevertheless the most reasonable inference in this case is to infer design. Two considerations both point in that direction.
1. By definition, this is a case where we cannot reasonably attribute the object or effect to unaided natural processes. That alone is a sufficient basis that would lead to the inference that the best explanation is that it is Artificial.
2. The fact that it is Unlike any mental template we have of a designed object that we have known before is also consistent with the inference of design, and thorton has described the reason.
An alien space ship (or some other alien technology) that looks like no designed object we know of (and also not like anything that could be attributed to unaided natural processes) is exactly the sort of object or effect that would go into this category. If we use thorton’s suggested criteria, we would get an answer of No for “Does this match a mental template of an already known to be designed similar object?” and it would lead us to make the wrong inference. If we were to encounter any such cases, the correct inference for any technology that is thoroughly alien to us (i.e. unlike anything of ours) would be that it is Artificial despite being unlike anything we’ve designed ourselves.
BTW, this also points out that my position has not been correctly understood. I have not been arguing in this way…
Being able to recognize the technology (e.g. as being like something we already know to be designed) is not the basis of the distinction or the argument. Rather, the inference goes in a different manner.
and
Therefore, do not remove the larger set X. In our context, we are talking about the universe (literally) of material objects and integrated systems of material objects.
[Even if it was a bit pedantic, thanks for the side observation. I’m going to try to stay focused on the main thread itself. I have too much trouble as it is finding enough spare time to keep up with the most relevant posts.]
How do you know it’s an alien space ship (or some other alien technology) if it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before? How do you determine it couldn’t be from natural causes if it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before?
You just demonstrated my exact point. You only assume it must be some sort of technology because it superficially matches some already seen human technology. That’s the same mistake IDers make all the time when they argue that since DNA code is like human computer code then DNA must be designed. They make a false pattern match.
At the risk of being a bit pedantic myself, saying that an observed object is artificial and meaning it seriously (even if stated informally), and not just as a jest, actually does indicate that one has ruled out a whole class of potential scientific positions, namely that one does not consider it reasonable to attribute it to unguided natural processes.
A more serious example might be one where we received pulses in a pattern representing the prime numbers in sequence. Calling that Artificial would mean that we don’t seriously consider unguided natural processes a reasonable candidate for explanation.
Of course, since science is always tentative, it might be that next year we discover a way for natural processes to send the prime numbers in sequence as interstellar signals. (“Who knew??”) That is why we talk about making justified inferences rather than “proof” in any absolute and final sense.
BTW, supposing that Little Green Men were capable of sending out pulsar-like signals, that would be another example where we would not be warranted to infer that it is Artificial on that basis alone, if it is also possible for unguided natural processes to produce the signals as well. The relevant distinction is not, “Could Little Green Men do this?”, but rather, “Could unguided natural processes do this?”
BTW, as an aid to anyone who is having trouble understanding the point of including the hypothetical Independence Day movie reference, this is an example of reductio ad absurdum.
Here is a more complete statement of the point…
About cases where we cannot tell exactly what it is, e.g. it doesn’t look like anything we would think of as an alien spacecraft, see my previous posts from this evening. The point here is that the suggestion that scientists cannot recognize something as Artificial until after they know how it was made is quite obviously absurd.
Tsk tsk. You’re still making the same basic logic error. You’re still ruling out all natural causes by the unwarranted assumption that any alien designed object will look close enough to a human designed one for you to pattern match.
No matter how you spin it it’s still your subjective “looks designed to me!”. That’s just not going to cut it with claiming “Design” for biological life.
It has been the general strategy of the followers of ID/creationism to deliberately keep themselves totally ignorant of all science.
If you don’t look, then you can’t imagine any counterexamples to your beliefs; therefore your assertions are true. You then make your beliefs air tight by accusing your enemies of doing precisely what you yourself are doing.
On websites like UD and AiG, you see systematic distortions of science bent to comport with sectarian beliefs. Now all you have to do is convince yourself that you have found the Truth that all scientists tell lies about; then Darwinist, evolutionist, secular atheists become exactly the evil soul destroyers you always heard about in church.
If a scientist points and says “look”, you don’t look lest you loose your soul.
I suspect he has come into the lion’s den to preach ID/creationism, the history of which he knows nothing, and the sound bytes of which he simply recites without comprehension.
This is incorrect. The case that was being discussed was one that by definition did not match either already seen human technology, or the unguided products of natural processes.
As I said, that category might remain perpetually empty. However, if we did encounter something that does fit that category, then by definition it must not match either set of patterns. When you claim it does match either of them, you are making a mistake about categories and thinking of an inappropriate example that belongs in one of the other categories.
Notice I wasn’t claiming we understand the function of the object. I was referring to your own statements about how, if an alien space ship were encountered, it might not look like anything we imagine. Here is what you said yourself.
So, your own example of an alien space ship or some other alien technology unlike what we imagine could potentially be something that could make the last quadrant non-empty. If that were to happen, the question becomes, “What should we infer about it? What is the relevant basis of distinguishing Artificial from Natural in such a case?”
You asked how we would recognize that it is not the produce of unguided natural processes. The answer is the same one I’ve always given. It is not by similarity (e.g. not “because it superficially matches some already seen” example), but because of dissimilarity, namely because “it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before” including anything that we’ve ever known unguided natural processes to produce.
Within the set of material stuff, it is not reasonably placed into the subset of the Natural (i.e. stuff produced by unguided natural processes), and so we make a reasonable inference that it belongs to the complementary set of Artificial stuff.
Notice that, by definition, we are not talking about cases where it might be reasonable to attribute it to natural processes (e.g. where we find it plausible to believe it could be produced just from law + chance acting on matter and energy). If it were reasonable to do so, that would simply mean that the example belongs to a different quadrant of cases.
The point of the exercise is this. If we did find something that belonged to the category as defined, which rule about inferring the Artificial is the right one to use. Your suggestion of basing the judgement on whether it matches our preconceived images of designed things we’ve seen doesn’t give the most reasonable conclusion. It would lead us to infer natural processes for something that is Artificial just because it is unlike our known designed objects.
In contrast with the potentially vast differences between human technology and some hypothetical alien technology, science is based on the assumption that the physical and chemical laws we study are consistent throughout the universe. What we learn about what unguided chemicals can do on Earth tells us about how the laws operate elsewhere as well. That is yet another reason why it is more reliable to base an inference of of dissimilarity with the effects of unguided natural processes that it would be to try as you suggest to base it off of similarity to our own technology.
So, when you accuse me of basing the inference to Artificial off of some kind of similarity, you are not yet understanding the position I’ve been advocating all along.
That fourth quadrant (not matching either set of patterns) and the third quadrant I examined (where both sets of patterns are matched) both show that the most relevant distinction is to infer Artificial for those things that cannot be reasonably attributed to unguided natural processes.
Still with “It looks designed to me!!” 🙄
What part of
“your subjective “looks designed to me!” is just not going to cut it with claiming “Design” for biological life.
don’t you understand?
Let’s imagine a possible world without a Designer. Let us imagine that it has laws of physics and environmental conditions that cause carbon based life to arise. Unless one has evidence for a “vivifying principle”, this is perfectly plausible. Now, let us say that in this world we encounter silicon based life for the first time, which is nothing like we have seen before. Should we then conclude that the silicon based life is designed?
Back to this Earth. The assertion that we do not know natural causes to be responsible for anything like life is begging the question.
Ah, those perfect humans designers. Maybe it wasn’t designed by humans.
Far be it from any intelligent designer to layer the coding or have codes that interact, humans in particular. Really?
Mike Elzinga,
lion’s den. really? lol
If I understand you correctly, I’m not aware that anyone is making that assertion.
I don’t know whether you’ve been following the whole conversation. I’ve pointed out repeatedly that this present challenge does not and cannot exclude the possibility that there could be other forms of life, even intelligent life, that might have developed due to natural processes without the aid of design. If anything, it has been some of the regulars of this site that have vigorously scorned any such suggestion.
What I have been saying is that we are not warranted to infer merely from the properties of X that it is Artificial unless we find it unreasonable to attribute those characteristics to unguided natural processes. That isn’t a blind assertion. Whenever people make the inference that an object or arrangement is Artificial using only its observed properties, they do so based upon the observed consistent limitations on what unguided natural processes accomplish due to how they operate. We infer Artificial for those effects that are not reasonably within the reach of unguided natural processes.
Mountain Climbing and the Error of Camp-Comparison Reasoning
[The scene opens with a bright, young entrepreneur (Hurray!) entering the office of an investment banker (Boo! Hiss!). The banker sitting behind the desk is idly twirling his long, dark mustache. On the stand in the corner rest his black cape and top hat. The entrepreneur takes a seat, his eager smile fairly sparkling.]
—Entrepreneur: “Well, what do you think of our proposal? Can we count on your backing? It will be a grand thing when our climber reaches the top of the mountain.”
—Banker: “I’m afraid that we must decline. Though your confidence is great and you are obviously quite sincere, you have not allayed our severe skepticism about the prospects for success.”
—E: “But why not? Look at this map. You see that we have clearly marked a proposed progression of several locations for camps at increasing elevations on plausibly suitable plateaus. We’ve clearly indicated how at each stage, each camp is higher and more advantageous when compared with the one before. Each camp then provides the basis for moving farther up the slope. What more could you reasonably expect?”
—B: “It might very well be that each successive camp would be advantageous, if it is ever reached. But if your climber cannot make it from any one camp to the next, the supposed advantages that would be obtained by reaching the next camp will mean nothing at all. The source of our skepticism derives not only from the inherent difficulties of the terrain and altitude. We’ve done some checking on Chemy, your proposed climber, and believe there are multiple issues that you’ve not adequately addressed that stand as obstacles to his unaided success.”
—E: “What do you mean? What obstacles?”
—B: “To begin with, the first obstacle is that Chemy doesn’t care at all about reaching the summit. It’s come to our attention that he doesn’t in any sense share your ambition for that goal. He would be completely content to merely remain at the level of any of those camps or even on the valley floor for the rest of his existence.”
—E: “Well, that may be true, but nevertheless, he does wander about continually with no goal at all in mind. Why shouldn’t we expect his aimless wanderings to eventually take him up and up to each next camp and eventually up to the summit?”
—B: “That brings me to the second obstacle. We’ve noticed that whenever he comes to an unmarked fork diverging into uphill and downhill paths, he is far more likely to just follow the gradient and take the downhill path rather than the uphill path. The principle exception, of course, is when he encounters the helpful High-Go-Signs that catalyze his resolve and move him to take what would have otherwise been a very unlikely path. It has not escaped our attention that your successful trial run experiments are always careful to be sure the needed motivational High-Go-Signs are present to catalyze his movements in the directions you desire. But what will happen in the wild where none of your trainers are present to make such arrangements on his behalf?”
—E: “The only reason we artificially provide those signs is simply for the sake of time. We are confident that given sufficient time Chemy will discover a way, using only the natural materials available, to make for himself whatever High-Go-Signs are needed for our mission to succeed.”
—B: “Except that he isn’t trying to make your mission succeed, as I’ve pointed out. What makes matters worse is that there are innumerable possible signs that might be attempted, the great majority of which would not be helpful toward your intended goal or even for any purpose at all.”
—E: “Yet it could happen that some might be helpful. He could get lucky and create a series of signs that eventually lead him to our goal. Once the right High-Go-Signs exist and are placed appropriately, they will surely work to lead him in the right directions.”
—B: “If the right High-Go-Signs come to exist at all. Even you would have to acknowledge there is certainly no assurance that it is reasonable to trust to luck on that scale, and multiple reasons to question such faith. If I were to bury a doubloon somewhere in Australia, is it likely that Chemy could find it within his lifetime by digging randomly? What’s more, digging holes in dirt is far easier than the actual effort that typically would be required to make effective High-Go-Signs.”
—E: “We don’t believe the difficulty of making the needed effective High-Go-Signs is nearly as bad as you suppose. Why, we’ve found that there are some possible High-Go-Signs that are surprisingly simple.”
—B: “That certainly doesn’t show that every effective High-Go-Sign can be arbitrarily made to be that simple. What Chemy will need is not just any High-Go-Sign, but a series that would specifically navigate this mountain to the summit.
“Furthermore, that requirement is complicated by the third obstacle — Chemy is blind. That’s why every High-Go-Sign must be done in braille, which he reads through contact rather than at a distance.
“More importantly, he cannot see the path ahead or foresee and consider the consequences of taking one path or another. Even if he were able and willing to undertake the arduous and lengthy task of creating High-Go-Signs to catalyze his movements, he would not have any notion of what paths to facilitate to take him toward the goal (even supposing that he cared about the outcome) rather than take him into dead ends. Given the innumerable possible choices, even you would not seriously suggest he could possibly try them all. Thus, even assuming he could make any High-Go-Signs, the comparative few that he could hope to attempt would be particularly expensive and time consuming guesses to make while trusting literally to blind luck.”
—E: “Ah, but that is where you are missing one crucial consideration. We are not trusting only to blind luck or to purely random walks. Chemy learns from his wanderings with the result that he tends to naturally select some paths more so while becoming less likely to take other paths.”
—B: “Yes, we’ve known about that as well, but in this case we question whether you will find the actual operation of his natural selections as truly helpful to your intended goal as you seem to assume. As you know, Chemy does not care at all about your ultimate goal, which also means that the selections he makes cannot reflect any direct preference for the fulfillment of your ultimate goal itself. The fourth obstacle is that he has his own sense of what makes for a more efficient way to wander about.
“What we notice most of all, is that he never considers the future consequences of heading in any direction while making these natural selections. Even if a path through barren and difficult terrain might ultimately lead to one of your imagined camp sites, his actual natural path selections are dominated instead by the immediate considerations alone. Long term potential means nothing, while the immediate disadvantages of a path are strongly influential in selecting against that path.
“From what we actually observe, this natural path selection process of his does not result in anything like the scale of bold, sacrificial, and innovative moves up the mountainside that your plan requires. If anything, he is at risk of becoming settled into convenient and comfortable local ruts, with the most necessary upward paths blocked by stretches of near term great difficulty and strong disadvantages.
“So, in summary, we do not find that you’ve addressed our serious concerns about the obstacles that Chemy would need to overcome in order to actually successfully move upward from one of your proposed camps to the next.”
—E: “I’m sorry to hear that. Nevertheless, despite all of that, we do believe firmly that there exists a sufficiently smooth path somewhere on that mountainside going all the way to the top, even if we do not yet know exactly where it is. We firmly believe that Chemy would be able to stumble upon that path, without aid or guidance or even any intention to find it. We also believe firmly that Chemy would in fact create whatever is needed on his own, again without aid or even a plan to do so, and that he would reach the summit within the expected time constraints.”
—B: “I have no doubt your faith is not only firm but also quite sincere. But who is this ‘we’ that you refer to?”
—E: “Oh, there is a group of us. We call ourselves The Skeptics.”
—B: “Really? Duly noted.”
That’s still not true no matter how many times you assert it.
If the County Fair gave a prize for the most inane non-applicable analogy you’d score the Blue Ribbon for sure. 🙄
When are you going to read Life’s Ratchet and look at this video?
Real science refutes your little scenario of high road/low road. Your little “Chemy” is a fiction.
Ignorance of the facts is no excuse. Deliberate, intransigent ignorance of the facts is malicious intent.
You have no excuse and no argument.
You work harder at being ignorant than you would if you just sat down with some good textbooks and actually learned something.
It is not by similarity (e.g. not “because it superficially matches some already seen” example), but because of dissimilarity, namely because “it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before” including anything that we’ve ever known unguided natural processes to produce.
– EricB
In direct counter to your paragraph above, I said “Let’s imagine a possible world without a Designer. Let us imagine that it has laws of physics and environmental conditions that cause carbon based life to arise. Unless one has evidence for a “vivifying principle”, this is perfectly plausible. Now, let us say that in this world we encounter silicon based life for the first time, which is nothing like we have seen before. Should we then conclude that the silicon based life is designed?”
Well? Should we?
I also brought it back to this world by saying that the assertion that we do not know natural causes to be responsible for anything like life on Earth is begging the question.
However, if your hypotheticals don’t apply to life on Earth, then that’s fine and dandy, and we can all move on to another post.
Evolution can’t achieve goals? What if there are no goals? Radical concept for some, I grant you.
If this whatzit genuinely is “unlike anything [we]’ve ever seen before”, it must necessarily be unlike anything we’ve ever known guided processes to produce. So if you want to argue that not like the product of any known UNguided processes is a valid reason to conclude “yep, it’s Artificial”, fine. I, in reply, will argue that not like the product of any known GUIDED processes is a valid reason to conclude “yep, it’s Natural”. How do you propose to resolve this impasse, ericB?
Given a whatzit that genuinely is “unlike anything you’ve ever seen before”, what on Earth would make you think it’s a “reasonable inference” to place that whatzit in the category “Artificial”, rather than in the category “I got no friggin’ idea” ?