Sponges on ancient ocean floors 100 million years before Cambrian period

[Agauger (Ann Gauger)]

@Patrick
Thanks. Just a comment. I am in the middle of a move and have a big project for work so my responses will be delayed. For example most of the time I have no access to internet except my phone.

[Mung]

@Patrick

I am also very interested in the precise definition of information as I am coming at it from the Information Theory side.

@Patrick Would you be amenable to creating an OP setting forth the many different precise definitions of information that are used within information theory if I promise to stay out of it?

Or, might I be allowed to participate on a very limited basis to request references? IOW, I won’t debate anything.

[Timothy_Horton]

@Agauger

Thanks. Just a comment. I am in the middle of a move and have a big project for work so my responses will be delayed. For example most of the time I have no access to internet except my phone.

While Dr. Gauger is busy, anyone else from the ID camp want to offer up a precise definition of information as it pertains to biological entities? It would be great if you could also provide ID’s method of quantifying the biological information so we can tell if / how much it changes over time.

[swamidass (S. Joshua Swamidass)]

@Patrick

I hope the new thread with Dr. Mercer won’t distract Dr. Gauger for providing that precise definition of information as it applies to biological entities.

@Timothy_Horton

I hope the new thread with Dr. Mercer won’t distract Dr. Gauger for providing that precise definition of information as it applies to biological entities. I’m interested to hear about the different “kinds” of information and how the different “kinds” were injected into a genome. Hopefully this won’t be like the YEC definition of “kinds”, changing every day depending on the circumstances.

I am also very interested in the precise definition of information as I am coming at it from the Information Theory side.

@Agauger doesn’t do information theory. I expect she means it in more general sense. I’ve never heard her make an information theory argument before.

[T_aquaticus]

@Michael_Callen

What are the arguments then? Fish did not evolve into fish? Seems like a good, potential example to me.

We start with fish and then have transitional fossils leading to tetrapods. We have transitional fossils between early mammals and earlier tetrapods. We have transitional fossils throughout the mammal clade, including whale transitional fossils and hominid transitional fossils. All of these transitional fossils and precursors yet creationists claim there is no fossil evidence for vertebrate evolution. I don’t see how finding more transitional fossils would change their mind.

[swamidass (S. Joshua Swamidass)]

Zeno’s paradox @T_aquaticus .

[T_aquaticus]

@swamidass

Zeno’s paradox @T_aquaticus .

I take credit for coining Gish’s Law:

G=T+1

G=Gaps
T=number of transitional fossils

Gaps is a measure of uncertainty in evolution. Therefore, the more transitional fossils we have the less certain we are of evolution.

[Patrick]

@Agauger

have a big project for work so my responses will be delayed.

I’ll help you with the work project. I am sure I can write an perfectly acceptable ID argument for just about anything. Gravitation waves - ID, OOL - ID, new human fossil - ID, Let me know what you need.

[Agauger (Ann Gauger)]

@Patrick
How about a sure fire way to convince amusing freethinking atheists that ID is true (when there is a formalized description of testable ID ideas work with)?

[T_aquaticus]

@Agauger

How about a sure fire way to convince amusing freethinking atheists that ID is true (when there is a formalized description of testable ID ideas work with)?

Speaking as an atheist, ID would be more convincing if it wasn’t just an argument against evolution. When scientists discuss evolutionary pathways they don’t spend 99% of their time trying to disprove ID/creationism, and then at the end of the talk say “Therefore, it had to evolve”. A positive argument for ID/creationism would certainly be helpful.

Application to real world biology would also be helpful. For example, a methodology that can distinguish between mutations produced through design instead of natural processes would be most useful. You could then apply this method to something like the human and chimp genomes and demonstrate which differences are due to natural mutagenesis and which were caused by an intelligent designer.

[Agauger (Ann Gauger)]

Yes!! I agree. Working on it.