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Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Mon Aug 08, 2011 4:13 pm
by ant
I don't believe science and religion are reconcilable. I believe the reasons you use to harmonize them would fail if investigated in more detail. In fact, I nearly guarantee it. It has been the case countless times in countless discussions. The precedent is quite large. Sorry to doubt you, but I don't think you're any different.

You are being overly presumptuous. My reconciliation of the two has nothing to do with balancing, comparing, or contrasting evidence. It is clear to me (and should be to you too) that the objective of science is to produce evidence provided by the natural world. Matters of theology are based on faith.

A scientist that is compelled to arrive at absolute truth often is inspired by a wondrous awe and reverence for the complexity and order of nature. He is bold enough to say, "There is an explanation for this and I aim to investigate it." That is an admirable quality. However, it holds true that scientists realize immediately after the solution to one of nature's mysteries is solved, there is another immediately available to ponder.

Although religion's objective is not to find a natural explanation for everything, it too has a reverence and respect for the natural world. I choose not to scoff at the religious man who is satisfied with "worshiping" that which he does not claim to understand completely - God/Nature. Leave the work of science to science. Leave things of faith, to a theologian. Neither should feel he has to out do the other.

Here is what Einstein said about the scientist. Perhaps a "true" scientist. Needless to say, I find myself in agreement with it:

"His religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection.

This feeling is the guiding principle of his life and work, in so far as he succeeds in keeping himself from the shackles of selfish desire. It is beyond question closely akin to that which has possessed the religious geniuses of all ages."



Then Kurt would have a mistaken expectation. The description of our world through math still requires axioms. Which have reliance on induction. Which, while reliable, is not an absolute source of answers. The proofs could all be mathematically perfect, yet false, depending on axiomatic integrity.[/quote]

You amplified the point I was trying to make about science earlier. Thanks
At some point, science must rely on faith about things yet unseen. or that which can never be proven (e.g. quantum physics).

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Mon Aug 08, 2011 5:22 pm
by Interbane
You are being overly presumptuous. My reconciliation of the two has nothing to do with balancing, comparing, or contrasting evidence. It is clear to me (and should be to you too) that the objective of science is to produce evidence provided by the natural world. Matters of theology are based on faith.
To have a belief that you rely upon for psychological health is great. To believe that it can provide answers based on faith that are comparable with answers based on evidence is false. When I consider the comparison of religion versus science, I always get stuck on parts within the bible. The bible, or whichever holy book you prefer, is the source of religious content, even when you choose to modify that content to fit your beliefs. But to harmonize it, you must ignore certain parts of the bible. To me, that isn't harmonization but cherry picking.


You can have a complete understanding of science and also the realization that it's answers are much more reliable than those of religion. At the same time, you can be religious. The only way to truthfully reconcile the two is to ignore a great deal of your chosen religion. There is a point that you draw the line, and everything under that line is re-interpreted in a harmonic way.
At some point, science must rely on faith about things yet unseen. or that which can never be proven (e.g. quantum physics).
There is faith in each hypothesis. What is great about science is that faith is rightfully understood to only be a temporary bandaid. If a hypothesis is to have any merit, experiments must be performed. Faith is replaced by evidence. Also, science is based on induction, which means there cannot be anything such as proof. Proof implies certainty, and there is no certainty through induction. It is not faith we use to bridge the gap, but doubt. There is a modicum of doubt in every theory, the possibility that it's wrong. To turn the doubt upside down, and have faith in a theory is to blind yourself to it's shortcomings, or to the possibility that it's incorrect or at least not entirely accurate. That would be turning science into religion. A mathematical proof is only certain to the extent of it's axioms. More simple math problems, and some propositions, are analytic thus can be considered absolutely true by virtue of the definitions of the constituent terms.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2011 11:09 pm
by ant
johnson1010 wrote:Ant,

here's one of those abiogenesis videos i referenced earlier.

http://dotsub.com/view/720518f1-8879-44 ... a75db27591
I looked at it.
This theory goes against the tide of the second law of thermodynamics. Therefore, it is a hopeless theory.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 5:46 am
by Dexter
ant wrote:
johnson1010 wrote:Ant,

here's one of those abiogenesis videos i referenced earlier.

http://dotsub.com/view/720518f1-8879-44 ... a75db27591
I looked at it.
This theory goes against the tide of the second law of thermodynamics. Therefore, it is a hopeless theory.
I don't think so, we're talking about an open system. Otherwise, how do you get decreasing entropy anywhere? Examples are all around you (and within you).

And keep in mind these theories are conjectures. Compare them to the alternative -- Yahweh thought DNA was cool so he made some.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 9:41 am
by johnson1010
This theory goes against the tide of the second law of thermodynamics. Therefore, it is a hopeless theory.
People LOVE to invoke the second law of thermodynamics.

As pointed out, it does reference a closed system. The earth is no closed system. What would our planet be like without the stupendous input from the sun? Radiationg is flooding over and through the whole planet on a scale that is hard to imagine.

Closed system? No. We are absolutely flooded with energy. The whole solar system is still an open system. Starlight comes in from billions of lightyears. That is input.

The overall net loss of order, though, is the progress of time and expansion of the universe following the big bang. What could be more orderly than a singularity?

Our star is in an ordered state, but is burning off fuel at a tremendous rate, turning matter into energy. There's your slide toward entropy. Life on this planet uses a miniscule amount of that total energy and transforms it into continuous chemical processes. But it doesn't make even a tiny dent in the overall trend toward entropy.

You really only have to think about this for half a second to see where your application of the SLoTD is off base. If it applied as a limiting factor to life, then nothing anywhere would be ABLE to reproduce. We don't need to conduct an experiment to see that happen.

Of course it DOES apply, but not in the way you imagine. Life is a part of that system, but not the entirety of that system. Imagine your body as a closed system. What does that mean? Just you. Nothing, and i mean NOTHING else can be introduced. No air. No liquids. No Food. No heat. What happens to that closed system? It shuts down. It is broken down by the micro-organisms which infest your bowels even now. Degraded, disintegrated, destroyed, entropy.

But our bodies are meant to take input to continue. Just like the planetary system of earth. Without input from the sun, it is a cold husk.

The sun, without input from additional matter, will burn off it's fuel in a few billion years time, and it too will die and take everything with it.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 2:14 pm
by ant
johnson1010 wrote:
This theory goes against the tide of the second law of thermodynamics. Therefore, it is a hopeless theory.
People LOVE to invoke the second law of thermodynamics.

As pointed out, it does reference a closed system. The earth is no closed system. What would our planet be like without the stupendous input from the sun? Radiationg is flooding over and through the whole planet on a scale that is hard to imagine.

Closed system? No. We are absolutely flooded with energy. The whole solar system is still an open system. Starlight comes in from billions of lightyears. That is input.

The overall net loss of order, though, is the progress of time and expansion of the universe following the big bang. What could be more orderly than a singularity?

Our star is in an ordered state, but is burning off fuel at a tremendous rate, turning matter into energy. There's your slide toward entropy. Life on this planet uses a miniscule amount of that total energy and transforms it into continuous chemical processes. But it doesn't make even a tiny dent in the overall trend toward entropy.

You really only have to think about this for half a second to see where your application of the SLoTD is off base. If it applied as a limiting factor to life, then nothing anywhere would be ABLE to reproduce. We don't need to conduct an experiment to see that happen.

Of course it DOES apply, but not in the way you imagine. Life is a part of that system, but not the entirety of that system. Imagine your body as a closed system. What does that mean? Just you. Nothing, and i mean NOTHING else can be introduced. No air. No liquids. No Food. No heat. What happens to that closed system? It shuts down. It is broken down by the micro-organisms which infest your bowels even now. Degraded, disintegrated, destroyed, entropy.

But our bodies are meant to take input to continue. Just like the planetary system of earth. Without input from the sun, it is a cold husk.

The sun, without input from additional matter, will burn off it's fuel in a few billion years time, and it too will die and take everything with it.
You are regurgitating, at a very elementary level, the 2ndLOTD.

At the very heart of all this is much more.

All this theory indicates is that randomness rules. Proteins do not consist of a haphazard chain of peptides. Rather, they are very specific sequences that have special properties needed for life. Arriving at a useful, life giving configuration of amino acids from the bazillion worthless combinations is a monstrous information retrieval problem of which seems ridiculous to dismiss as a "Oh well, what we basically have to say about that is that we are just fortunate that it all fell in to place." That's mailing it in sick to your employer.

Also, the specialized nature of the information content of a protein in it's highly specific amino-acid sequence results in a huge decrease in entropy. A random, uncontrolled injection of energy and information wont do the miraculous job of achieving consciousness.

Where does the information, even at it's most primeval level come from?
What is responsible for the semantic content of the information? Information is meaningless unless it is semantic.

The information comes from the environment, you say? Well, yes, that's a given. That begs the question, how did the information become a part of the environment?

Abiogenises explains nothing, for it fails to address how information in the environment became semantic information.

I say echo the saying, "The universe seems to have known we were coming"

:P

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 3:00 pm
by Interbane
Arriving at a useful, life giving configuration of amino acids from the bazillion worthless combinations is a monstrous information retrieval problem of which seems ridiculous to dismiss as a "Oh well, what we basically have to say about that is that we are just fortunate that it all fell in to place." That's mailing it in sick to your employer.
With the vast number of constituent particles to build from, it's not a matter of If but When. In which case, yes, we are fortunate it happened.
Abiogenises explains nothing, for it fails to address how information in the environment became semantic information.


The difference between "information" and "semantic information" is nothing more than complexity. As complexity increases, meaningless or useless proteins are discarded or remain unused. Meaning, they fail to effect replication, or fail to fill the niche of a complementary protein. The "semantic" part arises naturally, an emergent property, but not because of some "phenomenon". It has emerged because the "non-semantic" information is basically useless information, the "error" in trial and error.

You're pulling on strings to find a problem here. I don't see one. If you want a gap into which you can stuff god, the creation of the laws of physics is a much better place to start.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 3:13 pm
by johnson1010
All this theory indicates is that randomness rules.
The first combinations are random. Their success is definitely not random. They are good at what they do, so they out-perform those that are not so good at what they do. As a result they proliferate.

The random aspect has a very small role to play in comparison to the very deterministic properties of these chemicals which dictate how successfully they operate.
Proteins do not consist of a haphazard chain of peptides. Rather, they are very specific sequences that have special properties needed for life.
Or rather, the peptides have qualities that make them the most likely candidate for the reactions that would lead to life. There is a difference in intent here.

Life needs these peptideds. Vs. These peptides enable life. (as we know it)
Also, the specialized nature of the information content of a protein in it's highly specific amino-acid sequence results in a huge decrease in entropy. A random, uncontrolled injection of energy and information wont do the miraculous job of achieving consciousness.
First, your valuation of the information in an amino-acid sequence is subjective. What is huge about it? That it enables life? If the earth crashed into the sun it would disappear in an indistinguishable "poof" compared to the roaring blaze that drives that engine. Compared to entropy output of the sun, life's effect is miniscule and un-important.

Second, there's nothing miraculous about it. We are chemical machines with very complex selective abilities.

Take any codon. 3 empty slots that only fit a corresponding set of round or square pegs. There is no magic in the choice of which set of molecules gets to snap into place with that codon to form a protein. It can only go one way. That is a purely mechanical, or chemical selection process.

The exact same thing governs our intellect, but on a much more expansive, adaptive and versatile scale.

Where does the information, even at it's most primeval level come from?
What is responsible for the semantic content of the information? Information is meaningless unless it is semantic.


Check out the video again. The most prolific proto-DNA was the one that was just most adept at making copies.

That's it.

That first combination is random, though you have to factor in the natural tendancies of the materials you work with. You wouldn't say that hydrogen bonding with oxygen to make water is random. it is a function of the properties you are working with. The same with the basic chemicals of life. They naturally attrract to one another.

BECAUSE they naturally attract to one another, they are more readily found together, with more variations, which means that if ever a more complex combination of chemical components that was longer than simply A+B ever arrived, it is more likely to simply add one on to that string than to spring up all on it's own. In other words, if you have a ton of A+B's laying around. getting to A+B+C is a lot easier than jumping from Z to X+Y+Z.

But once that random connection is made, then the properties of that group function to determine it's "fitness", or reproductive viability.

THAT is not random. That is competition. Once this reproductive process is set up, carrying nothing with it other than the internal content to be copied (in other words, we don't have any kind of organelles or processes involved at this point, just some combination of pre-life molecules) then the process of random interaction with the environment adds new letters to the proto-dna until some better combination comes along which is more efficient at replicating. This process leads to better combinations which slowly begin to take on the functions of life.

There are lots of random combinations which are non-starters, and those don't re-produce or make copies of themselves very well. But what you are looking at already, though just a chemical compound and not life, is already a slowly emerging step by step process that would not fall together randomly all at once.

Small random variations (or chemically induced connections) are added and they reproduce based on their purely mechanistic, chemical attributes.
That begs the question, how did the information become a part of the environment?
The properties of the elements define how they combine, which in turn defines how the resultant chemicals combine. Etc...
Abiogenises explains nothing, for it fails to address how information in the environment became semantic information.
It seems to address this very specifically in a very reasonable way.
I say echo the saying, "The universe seems to have known we were coming"
No. The universe was not in the right configuration to make US. WE are the products of the universe's configuration.

People are not the end product of existence. We are simply possible in this universe.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 3:19 pm
by johnson1010
You're pulling on strings to find a problem here. I don't see one. If you want a gap into which you can stuff god, the creation of the laws of physics is a much better place to start.
I do think this is god's best life-line.

Though that too seems inordinate.

Re: Don't give creationists the attention they crave

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2011 3:30 pm
by ant
In which case, yes, we are fortunate it happened.

Oh, I agree, we are "fortunate" consciousness arose from our primordial soup theory :lol:

The difference between "information" and "semantic information" is nothing more than complexity.

Uh, yeah. Try saying ORGANIZED complexity. My guess is that you believe the complexity of a snow flake and the complexity of life are comparable. They are not.

You're pulling on strings to find a problem here. I don't see one. If you want a gap into which you can stuff god, the creation of the laws of physics is a much better place to start.[/

I don't consider it a problem. I consider it miraculous.
Yes, yes, I've read Dawkin's take on the god of the gaps. Call it what you like. To me, it's a mystery that I ponder with a sense of reverence.