Criticism of Both Flavors of Creationism

I do not see why this could not readily be rephrased, “The criteria for judging the pattern’s natural selection signal is seen in the adaptation of existing structures and physiology. Can you show that this is a false positive? Adaptation is clearly observed and genetic relationships are also observed.”

We have hundreds of millions of years. Mountain ranges have formed in less time.

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Your discussion is hard to follow because of all the word salad, but your central claim seems to be that if, in your opinion, known causes are unlikely, that’s evidence favoring separate creation. That implicitly makes creation the default hypothesis of any test.

No, what you observe is a bullet hitting the side of the barn. Any animal would have some set of genes. You assume that the animals and genes you see are a bullseye. You have no evidence of any such thing.

That assumes ID, so your argument is circular.

How do you distinguish purposeful design from non-purposeful non-design?

Define “purposeful arrangement” and we’ll talk.

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What units are “purposeful arranged parts” measured in? None. It isn’t an empirical measurement.

I am saying that Behe didn’t create a specification, so there is nothing to create.

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Natural selection is the process for fixing changes in a population. I don’t see a problem with the statement but it is not a replacement for Behe’s method of inferring design. Behe’s method is much broader.

If you have an adaption requiring 15 AA substitutions assuming 30% of the AA in each position work you will need about 1.4 x 10^6 changes x 10^6 years per change you reach unrealistic waiting times.

Mountain ranges are not sequences :slight_smile:

The prediction is if the shooter is really a sharp shooter we will see a tightly distributed group of bullet holes indicating aiming. Unless of course he has had too many beers :slight_smile:

If we have no idea who the shooter is but observe bullet holes spelling the words “Texas sharp shooter” then we can infer design.

It’s an empirical joke.

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Show us one that’s been empirically demonstrated, Bill. I’ve spent much of my career studying how single-residue changes alter protein function, so it’s obvious that you just made that up.

You snuck in the fallacy again there. I saw the switch from “have” in your premise to “need” in your conclusion, but there’s absolutely nothing resembling need involved.

Please stop doing that.

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Or it could mean that some random yahoo simply clamped the barrel of the gun in place, and fired off “a tightly distributed group of bullet holes” at some semi-random part of the wall, without aiming at all. :rofl:

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These estimates came from the Behe Lynch discussion.

What I wrote was reasonable based on the Behe Lynch discussion and the models for fixing changes in a population.

I do think the evidence is showing separate origins but this is separate from ID as a default hypothesis. What Behe has surfaced is that arrangements in general extremely are challenging to explain by the four forces.
If you can explain an observation ( tested hypothesis) by the forces of nature then design is not needed as a default hypothesis.

This is the point of discussion. The argument that life is possible without extreme precision is difficult.

The comment was simply that we can infer purpose from living organisms. Purpose meaning a function or group of functions for which we can assign a reason.

Can you give me an example of non-purposeful non-design?

An arrangement (of parts) that performs a function where we can assign a reason for that function.

More word salad. For one thing, it includes your confusion of the mechanism of difference with separate creation vs. common descent. You have no idea what evidence of separate origins would even look like.

The greatest difficulty lies in figuring out what you can possibly mean by “extreme precision”.

That isn’t what “purpose” means. And you now need to define “reason”.

Sure; Mus musculus.

Sorry, the ambiguity of “reason” makes that definition useless.

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So you have no idea whether they have been empirically demonstrated. Why not dive into the evidence and come up with numbers that are?

Again, you have no empirical basis for your assumptions, so no, what you write is not reasonable.

How is the known polymorphism of human MYH7 compatible with “models for fixing changes in a population”? Why do you keep reiterating you false assumption of no polymorphism, when one of the most functionally complex proteins known to man has no such constraint?

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Your separation of common descent with mechanism seems illogical. Common descent implies an ancestral relationship so as a minimum you are proposing the mechanism of reproduction as one of the mechanisms.

A cell that can self replicate with an error rate of 10^-9 is an example of extreme precision.

A reason means the “why” of the function. Why do chickens lay eggs? To provide food for other animals and to reproduce more chickens.

Mike Behe’s use of purpose is not ultimate purpose it is the specific purpose of the function.

How do you support the claim Mus musculus is non-purposeful non-design.

Hopefully I have removed the ambiguity.

And yet somehow Michael Behe disagrees, why is that?

He thinks some times intelligent design is required to explain certain features like flagella, but still thinks that idea is compatible with the evidence for common descent(that is the patterns in the shared and derived characteristics).

So why is it you want to say entire organisms must have been created de novo, rather than having evolved from common ancestors but with intelligent design interventions here and there?

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The evidence that supports this is the large quantity of de novo genes. I also do not see how splicing patterns can get modified without direction and coordination with the rest of the gene changes. We all believe in some level of common descent. The debate is how much does it explain of life’s diversity.

It’s like the work that’s been done to show that there is ancestral relationship between the prokaryotic and eukaryotic cell. They are so different that it does not make sense other than two separate designs with separate purposes.

When and where were you “educated”?

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I think that we can add “implies” to the list of words for which Bill has unconventional, personal definitions.

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That doesn’t explain why you don’t say they are just the product of intelligent design interventions along certain lineages, like Behe does with the flagellum and stuff like that. That life evolved and shares common descent, but that the intelligent designer intervened to create certain things along the way, such a flagella, or new genes.

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Word salad again. Reproduction is not a mechanism of mutation, though many mutations do happen during genome replication.

No, an error rate of 10^-9 is an example of extreme precision. The cell is not an example.

This is equivocation on the meaning of “why”. Chickens certainly do not lay eggs to provide food for other animals either.

How do you support the claim that it isn’t? As far as I can see, nobody designed Mus musculus, or at least there is no evidence that anyone did. What is its purpose?

You have only increased it.

And there you have it: the evidence for design is whatever makes sense to Bill, and that’s as far as he can take it.

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Incorrect. If natural selection does not exist, it remains the fact that the ultimate fate of any allele will be either fixation or elimination.

This is one of the most fundamental concepts in evolutionary theory. It is telling that you do not understand it, and it is probably not coincidental that you also reject that theory.

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