THis was a debate i had with an information scientist (trypho) THe debate was first about entropy and then it moved to how to mathematically differentiate between order and design. : link to the thread is here. (You need to register to view the thread)
here was my first rebuttal:
I think there’s a bit of confusion here since the definition of entropy can vary from field to field. To address some people’s claims that entropy is proof against evolution, First I’d like to point that information entropy and thermodynamic entropy are two different things. Second I would like to point that the second law of thermodynamics is one of the most misquoted of the physical laws.
The second law makes no claims that “disorder” is the natural state of things. Entropy is not equivalent to disorder. Furthermore, people who claim that things naturally “disorganize” themselves obviously haven’t being observing the world around them. Put oil and water in a container and they naturally separate themselves. You mix one compound with another compound you get another compound. And the new compound shouldn’t naturally deconstruct overtime. It would remain as it is until another chemical reaction breaks the it. …order though is different from design.
a.)
/ / / /
/ / / /
/ / / /
b.)
- -//\\ - - ll\\ - - //ll
- //__\\ - ll \\ - // -ll
//- - - \\ -ll -\\// - ll
We know that letter a is ordered since the characters are laid out in a predictable pattern. Such patterns occur naturally. Letter b however seems designed. Most often we perceive something as designed if it conveys meaning. To someone who can’t read roman alphabets, letter b is just an ordered collection of characters arranged in straight lines and diagonals. To us however we know it reads AM and therefore there is a high probability that it was purposely arranged that way. Unfortunately some people extend this interpretation of meaning to objects that have no objective meaning –they look at the sunset and they see some sort of higher purpose or something like that. And then god enters the picture
Nobody is arguing against the complexity of DNA.
trypho you took IT, you probably know that it’s extremely improbable to generate even a simple working program by randomly generating characters. Analogously it’s also near-impossible to generate a complete DNA string by chance alone (at least with our current understanding of how things work). However if instead of single characters we generate random words then your chances improve a bit. And if instead of single words you generate chunks of code then your chances improve even more.
I’m not making specific suggestions on how DNA could have formed I’m merely stating what evolution has been suggesting ever since it was first introduced but seems to just be flying over the heads of lesser theists. Complex things gradually arise from more and more simple things. Nobody is saying that atoms spontaneously combined and formed the first cell as we know cells to be or that sometime ago a lungfish gave birth to a frog….
THis was his reply
Quote:
| Originally Posted by Jaywalker a.) / / / / / / / / / / / / b.) - -//\\ - - ll\\ - - //ll - //__\\ - ll \\ - // -ll //- - - \\ -ll -\\// - ll We know that letter a is ordered since the characters are laid out in a predictable pattern. Such patterns occur naturally. Letter b however seems designed. Most often we perceive something as designed if it conveys meaning. To someone who can’t read roman alphabets, letter b is just an ordered collection of characters arranged in straight lines and diagonals. To us however we know it reads AM and therefore there is a high probability that it was purposely arranged that way. Unfortunately some people extend this interpretation of meaning to objects that have no objective meaning –they look at the sunset and they see some sort of higher purpose or something like that. And then god enters the picture |
I agree that both of them are ordered. But as Ischarmoochie said, the no. of steps to describe pattern (a) is very small compared to that of pattern (b). Regarding the sunset illustration, it is still debatable if it indeed has no objective meaning.
Quote:
| Nobody is arguing against the complexity of DNA. |
Thank you. At least we agree that the DNA is complex.
Quote:
| trypho you took IT, you probably know that it’s extremely improbable to generate even a simple working program by randomly generating characters. Analogously it’s also near-impossible to generate a complete DNA string by chance alone (at least with our current understanding of how things work). However if instead of single characters we generate random words then your chances improve a bit. And if instead of single words you generate chunks of code then your chances improve even more. I’m not making specific suggestions on how DNA could have formed I’m merely stating what evolution has been suggesting ever since it was first introduced but seems to just be flying over the heads of lesser theists. Complex things gradually arise from more and more simple things. Nobody is saying that atoms spontaneously combined and formed the first cell as we know cells to be or that sometime ago a lungfish gave birth to a frog…. |
Are you trying to argue that just because the chance for each successive step is high then the overall chance must be high too? I say that such inference is based on faith and not science. Suppose we are to consider the chances of an untrained rat successfully getting out of a maze. Let's say that the rat would have to correctly pass 100 gates/doors successively to be able to go to the exit. Of course, when the rat is on the 50th gate, the chance of getting through the 51st gate is relatively high, and when the rat is on the 51st gate, the chance of getting through the 52nd is also comparatively high. But does that mean that the chance of getting from the 1st to the 100th gate is high too? "Gradual" or not, the probability is still the same.
And this was my rebuttal which practically ended our debate since he didn't reply anymore:
Quote:
| Originally Posted by trypho I agree that both of them are ordered. But as Ischarmoochie said, the no. of steps to describe pattern (a) is very small compared to that of pattern (b). Regarding the sunset illustration, it is still debatable if it indeed has no objective meaning. |
I don’t know if you brought up information entropy just to say what you think information is or whether you’re going to use it as argument for design
-if it is the latter then I’d like to know whether you define ‘design’ as inversely proportional to the information entropy or directly proportional to it. If it is inversely proportional (correct me if I’m wrong) then pattern (a) should look more ‘designed’ than pattern (b) but obviously it does not. If it is directly proportional then pattern (b) should look more designed than pattern (a) –consistent with how we view the two patterns. But using the same argument would lead us back to the same problem above. A random string of characters should look more designed than the two patterns.
-If not, then I’d like to know if you think design is reducible to a mathematical formula. And if you do what would the formula be? How would you mathematically differentiate between mere order and design?
Quote:
| Are you trying to argue that just because the chance for each successive step is high then the overall chance must be high too? I say that such inference is based on faith and not science. Suppose we are to consider the chances of an untrained rat successfully getting out of a maze. Let's say that the rat would have to correctly pass 100 gates/doors successively to be able to go to the exit. Of course, when the rat is on the 50th gate, the chance of getting through the 51st gate is relatively high, and when the rat is on the 51st gate, the chance of getting through the 52nd is also comparatively high. But does that mean that the chance of getting from the 1st to the 100th gate is high too? "Gradual" or not, the probability is still the same. |
There was an experiment before by Richard Dawkins(author of the blind watchmaker) wherein he tried to make a program generate a line from hamlet “Methinks it is a weasel” by generating random sequences of characters. The estimate on how long it would take for the computer to produce the string was a million million million million million years. (27^28 possible combinations) Needless to say generating the string in a single step is impossible. However the experiment is not comparable to the evolutionary model…
The aforementioned experiment was meant as a caricature for how creationists view evolution. Dawkins presented a second experiment in which instead of regenerating a whole string every time, combinations of characters which closely matched the line from hamlet were kept as they were and were reused after every successive regeneration. After just 43 generations and about half an hour the exact line has been generated
Our DNA is not a complete rewrite compared to the DNA of a chimp or even a mouse. Just relatively minor misspellings which just hammers the point that Human DNA was not made from the ground up as it is. It evolved from DNAs of other organisms
There’s a difference between a couple of coins tossed in the air organizing themselves into a pattern resembling your initials after falling down and molecules organizing themselves through chemical reactions. The latter doesn’t depend on probability to form a complex pattern. It is part of the way nature works. There are such relatively feasible chemical explanations for how the first cell may have been produced
Mordecai may argue that the pattern resembling your initials contains ‘specific information’. Of course we have to define if specificity can exist if the object the ‘information’ is specifically intended for doesn’t exist yet. If no one on earth can read and write in english then the text in this entire thread is no different from a random generation of roman characters. I say the probability of generating any group of characters is always 100 percent.
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