@scd,
I have to agree with @Faizal_Ali on this one.
You can a perfect, flawless diamond, made in a laboratory under exact conditions.
Or you can find a rare natural diamond that is almost as flawless.
Is the artificial diamond a “real diamond”? Or does it just LOOK like a real diamond?
The problem with poorly constructed and poorly presented arguments for design in biology is that they allow these equally dismal counter-arguments to live on, as they regularly do at here at PS.
Please elaborate.
No one to date has made anything but poorly constructed and poorly presented arguments for “Design” in biology. Every one relies on ignorance based personal incredulity. That includes ridiculous “it’s too improbable to evolve!!” bogus calculations, the alphabet soup of vaguely defined terms like IC, CSI, FSCI; and the false dichotomy “evolution can’t explain feature XYZ therefore life must be Designed!”
ID would have shriveled up and died a decade ago if not for the religiously motivated DI efforts to keep it on life support.
Okay… he has our attention … I’m sure we’ll just be fascinated all to pieces to see what @Upright_BiPed has to say!
robots are objects. Things physically identical to robots are objects.
if its still a objec then why something that is physically identical to a Rembrandt isnt a Rembrandt?
sure that its artificial. but its still a diamond, right?
because you are talking about aspecific paint. but both are still paints. the same is true for a robot and something that its physically identical to a robot.
you are talking about aspecific objec, but both are still objecs. the same is true for a Rembrandt and something that its physically identical to a Rembrandt.
Some women would say no. Some men would say no.
Most Jewelers would say no.
Hey, maybe try saying it one more time. I’ve heard that if you repeat the same falsehood enough times, God magically makes it true!
you know what? say that you are right. now… do you think that something that is looks identical to a robot can evolve naturally?
In what sense do you mean “can”?
If you mean is it logically possible or conceivable, then I would say “yes.”
If you mean can we reasonably expect that some of the descendants of the organisms that currently inhabit the earth will look identical to the robots that we currently build, then I would say “No, don’t be stupid.”
@scd, your argument is based on analogies that require a person to determine “likeness”, but then you start changing things.
We assume a watch sitting on the ground is designed because watches are all very similar and every one we’ve seen has been human-created. So far, so good, I don’t think anybody objects.
But then you say, “what if the watches reproduced?” . Well, the problem is that’s nonsensical with respect to everything we currently know about watches. Watches are inanimate, rigid, composed of metal, plastic, and glass with few, if any moving parts. The thought of a watch that could reproduce essentially means it’s not a watch any more. It is also so different from all the watches we currently know about, that its usefulness for determining design would be completely lost.
I think the watch/motor analogies are just so fraught with issues that I would suggest that ID folks put them in the “don’t use this as an argument” list. The similarities between watches/motors and biochemical machinery are significantly fewer than the differences. The fact that a wrist watch is designed by a human has, quite literally, no relevance to whether a biological “machine” was intentionally designed.
That’s where all their attempts at arguments belong. Assuming they’re actually trying to convince people capable of rational thought on the subject, that is. They seem to be making good money without that segment of the market.
so if you will find a self replicating watch you will conclude design or a natural process? please give me a simple answer.
The answer is, I simply don’t know. It is very hard to imagine what a self-replicating watch might look like. It might look more designed, it might look more natural, it’s impossible to tell without an actual example.
so if you will find a self replicating watch on a far planet. and someone ask you to decide if its the result of design or not, and a correct answer will give you 1 million dollar, what your answer will be in that case?
It would entirely depend on investigating it to see what properties it has and other behaviors. I have a hard time imagining something that self-replicates without being organic and life-like. In fact, I’m not sure what would remain watch-like. The only context I have for self-replication is biological organisms. So, my answer is, show me a self-replicating watch and I’ll make an educated guess as to whether it was designed or natural. I hope I pick the right one because I could use the $1 million, but I’m not entirely sure I will know how you know the answer either. 
But you aren’t aware of the nature of biological complexity, which reflects the iterative process that produced it. It’s nothing like the complexity of the watch.