Is the Wikipedia page on Intelligent Design biased?

Prediction: Bill will not understand the difference. Explanation: creationism’s effect on the brain.

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I just gave a detailed description of what I think CD explains and what it does not. I stated that your use of the term is often incorrect,which seems to mislead your understanding.

I will admit that CD can be both a prediction and an observation, depending on context. In the context of explaining differences, CD explains why similarities and differences fit a NH pattern.
Your original question (rephrased) was: “How did these differences come to be?” You did not ask “Why do these difference fit a particular pattern?” CD answers the later, not the former. If that was not what you intended to ask, then this emphasizes the importance of using terms correctly.

Indeed you have, many times, and no one agrees with you.

That is beside the point. Human design is not the question, nor is it required to follow a NH as is design by evolution.

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If you were to continue to read the discussion that I cited at TSZ amoung the record 5000 comments would be a discussion on why computer families like apple generate a nested hierarchy. This was before Winstons paper where he showed how Java script programs generate a nested hierarchy.

Could you have taken a biased poll :slight_smile: What if you included @stcordova, @Paul_Nelson1, @Agauger, @AJRoberts, @Giltil, @gpuccio, @Marty, @thoughtful, , @Meerkat_SK5, @Eddie.
Regardless, you are trying to make an ad populum argument here. Can you describe a population genetics model that will generate the amount of genetic change in the Howe diagram and still end up with functioning animals?

Human design will and does follow a NH when efficiency (reuse of components) is a design objective and reuse of components is the rule rather then the exception…

Speaking for myself, I cannot be bothered trawling through 5000-odd comments to find this particular discussion, particularly as I know, as somebody who has been using computers since the days of the Apple IIe, that the claim that “computer families like apple generate a nested hierarchy” is patently false.

Features have crossed computer family boundaries with promiscuous abandon, on so many levels. From storage media (5-1/4" floppies → 3-1/2" floppies → HDDs → SSDs), to form factors (e.g. laptops and All-In-One units), to CPU (Apple has shared CPUs with first the Amiga, and then Windows PCs) to peripheral connectors (most recently the USB-C connector).

To claim that there is any nested hierarchy in all this is ridiculous.

No it won’t. Because NH is an unnecessary constraint that actually restricts the amount of “efficiency (reuse of components)” that can be employed, by requiring that this reuse happen only in ‘descendant’ designs of the design that originally introduced a feature.

From this it is clear that Bill Cole doesn’t understand what ‘Nested Hierarchy’ means. This will however come as no surprise to many.

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Sure.

Genes are found that appear in humans and zebra fish and not chickens and mice. Genes are found in humans and chickens but not in zebra fish and mice. These are likely designed patterns and are not likely the product of reproduction.

A pattern will fit a tree (nested hierarchy) better then the null hypothesis if there are similarities and differences in contents you are comparing.

QED?

More word salad. No, it will fit a tree if the similarities and distances are organized in a nested hierarchy, as we would expect if they evolved on a branching tree.

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This is not what I stated.

If there is a group of objects with similarities and differences they will fit a tree better then the null (no tree).

Then you agree that the claim that “computer families like apple generate a nested hierarchy” is false?

Let’s add gene loss to the things that Bill Cole doesn’t understand.

It’s quite simple really. You just put a population of organisms into an environment where a gene does not give an adaptive advantage any more, then mutation and genetic drift will likely see that gene lost. There is nothing in Evolutionary Biology that states that ‘all genes that were ever gained will be kept forever’. Therefore some genes will be lost. Therefore it is not unexpected that at least some genes will be lost by chickens and mice, but not by humans and by zebra fish.

Only if you don’t understand evolution.

This statement is so incoherent as to be “not even wrong”. To make it even sufficiently coherent as to be even evaluated as true or false, you would first have to specify what null hypothesis you are contrasting with a nested hierarchy. Then you would have to specify a metric-of-fit. Then you would have to see what patterns fit NH better than H0 by this metric. Only then would you be in a position to make your claim as anything other than a bald assertion of faith.

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No most all groups with similarities and differences will fit a tree better then the null (no tree)

What evidence have you got for this absurd claim Bill?

Because, as computer features ubiquitously appear across multiple computer families, they clearly do not “fit a tree better then the null (no tree)”.

In fact I think now would be a good time to ask you to demonstrate that you in fact understand what a “Nested Hierarchy” actually mean.

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http://dx.doi.org/10.5048/BIO-C.2018.3.f4

This article by Winston Ewert compares a nested hierarchy or tree to the null which which is independent unrelated components in figure 1. If there is any relationship it will fit the tree better then the null.

In my experience a tree or nested hierarchy is a diagram which can be used to understand cause or causes. It is a tool used in the scientific method along with fishbone diagrams, pareto charts and other tools to help find the cause or causes of an observed output especially the variation of that output.

That is not an article, but rather a single page showing three diagrams.

Thank you for confirming that you do not in fact understand what a nested hierarchy means. I can therefore dismiss any further claim you make about the subject as being uninformed.

Addendum:

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I have read this before but thanks for posting it.

Do you have any experience using tree diagrams beyond evolution? Maybe this is why you lack perspective with what information you are getting from their structure.

Here is the whole paper:
https://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2018.3/BIO-C.2018.3

Yet is clear that you have not understood it. Otherwise you would be able to state what one was rather than waffling all around the topic with:

I’ve come across them now and then. But everything you have said on this thread makes me think that you have no understanding of nested hierarchies in any context, which makes your following comment simply risible:

Good. Now please quote where, in its twenty seven pages, it gives support for your claim that:

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If you have not used them you lack perspective of what they do and their role in determining cause. Have you ever used or built a fishbone diagram in order to examine the cause of a problem? How about a Pareto chart?

Table 3 on page 10 will show you that a set of Java script programs fit a tree better then the null.

Irrelevant blather. Neither a fishbone diagram nor a Pareto chart is a nested hierarchy, and this is not a description of a nested hierarchy:

Also irrelevant, as “a set of Java script programs” “most all groups with similarities and differences”.

Addendum: I am also not at all sure that the single-level hierarchy shown in Figure 4 is an appropriate Null Hypothesis, as I could imagine a large number of data structures that would not fit this layout well, but don’t approximate well to a nested hierarchies either.

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The nested hierarchy is defined by features in common AND features defining the uniqueness of the branches. It is not enough to point to modules in common.

What you are refusing to acknowledge is that a tree, technological or otherwise, forbids adding a feature to the tip of all branches. The moment you add USB capability to them all, any hierarchy is done. Over. Finished. No if, buts, or what. Now if you can demonstrate that it is actually impossible to add USB to both Apples and Windows because they are independent branches, that might be a good test case. Does the technological nested hierarchy preclude adding G5 networking to both Android and Apple?

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Hi Ron

If there are no design iterations nothing will be added.

What needs to be explained is the vast differences in morphology and overall DNA structure including gene sets. The pattern of the similarity does not appear to be a big help here.

They are all different tools to help isolate cause. Many times they are used together on the same project. In the case with the Howe we are using both a set of trees and a Venn diagram to look at the data.

What alternative null do you suggest?

May I take this as an acknowledgment that innovation across branches precludes a nested hierarchy?

I did not stipulate that the addition of USB could not be by design. Quite the opposite. Design is a aspect of why technology does not follow a nested hierarchy.

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Hi Ron
A “nested hierarchy” in itself is not a strong claim. You can have various levels of fit to a tree against the null hypothesis. The activity you are discussing in certain cases could actually result in a stronger fit.

IMO the end game here is a population genetic model if a natural mechanism exists that can explain the differences in animal morphology and genetic makeup. If at the end of the day none exists then separate origins needs to be considered.