Darwin's Black Box

Catasprohic?

Surely you mean Catasrophic?

Cataphrisco?


Nah. What it means is Ï haven't thought this through or there's stuff I don't know"


Evolution is nature's sleight of hand. It looks miraculous, till you find out how it works.
Then it looks amazing.
 
I don't have a link for this, but I remember seeing a contest for a series of machines that work as a mousetrap, that start out very simple, but over many iterations becomes a modern mousetrap.

If I remember correctly, the first 'trap' was just a heavy piece of metal balanced very precariously. If a mouse bumped into it, the piece would topple and crush the mouse. Obviously not very efficient, but effective, and sligthly better than no trap at all.

I forget all the iterations from that simple beginning to a mousetrap that is 'irreduciably complex', but each succesive version did make 1 change from the previous one, and it was more effective than the previous version.

So, what seems 'irreduciably complex' has been shown, once again, not to be.

As others have pointed out, until we have a test for what is irreduciably complex, it is _not_ a scientific hyphothesis.
 
Soapy Sam said:
Catasprohic?

Surely you mean Catasrophic?

Cataphrisco?


Nah. What it means is Ï haven't thought this through or there's stuff I don't know"


Evolution is nature's sleight of hand. It looks miraculous, till you find out how it works.
Then it looks amazing.
Click to expand...

The typo Gods have frowned upon me. I meant Catastrophic.
 
roger said:
I don't have a link for this, but I remember seeing a contest for a series of machines that work as a mousetrap, that start out very simple, but over many iterations becomes a modern mousetrap.

If I remember correctly, the first 'trap' was just a heavy piece of metal balanced very precariously. If a mouse bumped into it, the piece would topple and crush the mouse. Obviously not very efficient, but effective, and sligthly better than no trap at all.

I forget all the iterations from that simple beginning to a mousetrap that is 'irreduciably complex', but each succesive version did make 1 change from the previous one, and it was more effective than the previous version.

So, what seems 'irreduciably complex' has been shown, once again, not to be.

As others have pointed out, until we have a test for what is irreduciably complex, it is _not_ a scientific hyphothesis.
Click to expand...
roger, here's a variation of what you describe.
And another.
 
MDK said:
The point is that that's the simpliest a mousetrap can be in order to work, and if you were missing one of those parts you would not have a useful trap. Right I hope that makes sense, because it's what I mean by irreducibly complex :) Anyway if we were to imagine a moustrap evolving by Darwins theories it would require all three parts to simultaneously come into existence. If only one or two of the parts came into existence, the moustrap would be useless so would not survive the moustrap equivalent of "survival of the fittest" ;)
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Truth in Advertising Note: I kinda scanned this thread and didn't read the links provided, so apologies if I'm going over well-trodden ground here. I thought about this and wondered what was the simplest trap-type "machine" that nature manufactures. There are any number of carnivorous plants (Venus flytrap, sundew, pitcher plant) that trap insects and digest them. And nature manufactures other trapping machines. Here's one:

Of course, this one isn't irreducibly complex. But why should a natural mouse-trapping machine be irreducibly complex? Why and how would natural selection have fostered the development of a mouse-trapping machine during the Permian era, when there wasn't anything remotely resembling a mouse to be caught in the first place?
 
The most interesting thing about the ID arguments, IMO, is the precarious logic of them. Logically, "irreducible complexity" is a universal assertion. We only need to present evidence of a single different coagulation cascade scheme to refute such a universal assertion. In this case, as with the "eye" case, we have an abundance of evidence from which to chose. To wit:

The evolution of vertebrate blood coagulation as viewed from a comparison of puffer fish and sea squirt genomes.


"The blood coagulation scheme for the puffer fish, Fugu rubripes, has been reconstructed on the basis of orthologs of genes for mammalian blood clotting factors being present in its genome. As expected, clotting follows the same fundamental pattern as has been observed in other vertebrates, even though genes for some clotting factors found in mammals are absent and some others are present in more than one gene copy. All told, 26 different proteins involved in clotting or fibrinolysis were searched against the puffer fish genome. Of these, orthologs were found for 21."

This recent paper demonstrates that puffer fish, who have a nicely working coagulation cascade, thank you, have a very different one from mammals. How different? At least twenty-one of twenty-six proteins are different. And yet, they work. Several clotting factors are missing altogether from puffer fish. And yet, this cascade works.

This is quite clearly NOT an example of irreducible complexity.

Cheers,
 
Bill Hoyt wrote:
Logically, "irreducible complexity" is a universal assertion.
Click to expand...
I disagree. It's more of a "god of the gaps" assertion. Just because the blood clotting question was solved with a naturalistic answer, doesn't mean all their assertions get killed at the same time. Then you have to separately prove that the eye has a scientific explanation, then the flagellum, ad nauseum.

But this is OK with me - let them define their god by the gaps in our current knowledge. As we learn more, the role for their god will continue to dwindle.
 
CurtC said:
I disagree. It's more of a "god of the gaps" assertion. Just because the blood clotting question was solved with a naturalistic answer, doesn't mean all their assertions get killed at the same time. Then you have to separately prove that the eye has a scientific explanation, then the flagellum, ad nauseum.

But this is OK with me - let them define their god by the gaps in our current knowledge. As we learn more, the role for their god will continue to dwindle.
Click to expand...
I also think the overall argument is a "god of the gaps" argument. But let me expound on my point a bit more. Each claimed irreducibly complex organ or system is a universal assertion. When Behe says "the flagellum is irreducibly complex", he sets himself up horribly. He claims, as did MDK about mousetraps, that there is only one good design. That is utter nonsense. A mousetrap can simply consist of heavy-duty flypaper placed outside a mousehole. Neither spring nor bait needed. That one counter-example is sufficient to refute. When IC is trotted out for flagellum, there are several clear counter examples. The IC flagellum is instantly refuted.

The "god of the gaps" part is usually dormant during the first phase of IC, and is sprung afterwards. "See it can't happen the way the pointed-headed scientists say. Therefore, goddidit."

Cheers,
 
roger said:
I don't have a link for this, but I remember seeing a contest for a series of machines that work as a mousetrap, that start out very simple, but over many iterations becomes a modern mousetrap.

If I remember correctly, the first 'trap' was just a heavy piece of metal balanced very precariously. If a mouse bumped into it, the piece would topple and crush the mouse. Obviously not very efficient, but effective, and sligthly better than no trap at all.

I forget all the iterations from that simple beginning to a mousetrap that is 'irreduciably complex', but each succesive version did make 1 change from the previous one, and it was more effective than the previous version.

So, what seems 'irreduciably complex' has been shown, once again, not to be.

As others have pointed out, until we have a test for what is irreduciably complex, it is _not_ a scientific hyphothesis.
Click to expand...

I posted my thoughts on this argument in this post.
 
One other aspect of the IC question is; How much knowledge is enough? When can we say we fully, or adequately understand any phenomenon?

I suspect the answer is personal, like all knowledge.

Must we explain the behaviour of a tree frog in terms of quantum mechanics before we can say we understand it? Hardly

There must be appropriate levels of explanation for each thing, but that level may well vary, not just from thing to thing, but from person to person. Understanding is one of Interesting Ian's "secondary" properties, not intrinsic to the event, but to the observer thereof.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

A comment on the form, rather than content of this thread;-

Can we avoid casual accusations of trollism / woowooism, at least until a new poster establishes an 'identity'? It seems to me MDK asked a question about a theory he freely admitted to not understanding fully, in a place where he might expect to get help understanding the question. This is (supposedly) what we are meant to encourage here. Some of the responses seem to me needlessly belligerent.

I've said it before. I think we need an FAQ section at JREF, where someone asking a question can be referred before being thrown in the bear pit. We may be putting off potential members.

Perhaps if people are below the magical 50 posts they should be permitted an extra degree of tolerance? The assumption of an avatar might be viewed as a coming of age, after which new blood becomes fair game?
 
Soapy Sam said:
Can we avoid casual accusations of trollism / woowooism, at least until a new poster establishes an 'identity'? It seems to me MDK asked a question about a theory he freely admitted to not understanding fully, in a place where he might expect to get help understanding the question. This is (supposedly) what we are meant to encourage here. Some of the responses seem to me needlessly belligerent.

I've said it before. I think we need an FAQ section at JREF, where someone asking a question can be referred before being thrown in the bear pit. We may be putting off potential members.

Perhaps if people are below the magical 50 posts they should be permitted an extra degree of tolerance? The assumption of an avatar might be viewed as a coming of age, after which new blood becomes fair game?
Click to expand...
Well, lets look at the evidence, Soapy,

o MDK enters the forum by starting a thread to congratulate Randi, puts in a total of three posts
o MDK then begins a thread on Behe and puts in a total of four posts
o In the second thread, MDK presents the IC argument and asks for comments to help his understanding
o Several posters reply. MDK includes a comment on another forum thread which caused him to laugh at evolutionary "propoganda". He also raises the science-is-faith red-flag: " Faith seems to be in our human nature, so we're just as prone to it as religious types, and I'm of the opinion, at the moment, that this is one case of faith in science."
o More nice and informative posts, some now providing links. The second link provided is an excellent refutation of Behe's IC arguments.
o MDK replies. He very quickly resorts to the subject/motive shift: "That's the thing isn't it, what would we replace it by, and is that the reason we don't want to debunk it? "
o The reply continues and includes this gem: " I've still not seen anything though that has actually shown Behe's (and I'm thinking now that it probably was his book that I was reading) examples to be wrong." Now the second link provided was the TalkOrigins FAQ link on Behe.

Yes, the jury is still out, but every time the foreman's head pops out of the jury room, he's frowning. And MDK's gone missing for almost a week.
 
Soapy Sam said:

Can we avoid casual accusations of trollism / woowooism, at least until a new poster establishes an 'identity'? It seems to me MDK asked a question about a theory he freely admitted to not understanding fully, in a place where he might expect to get help understanding the question. This is (supposedly) what we are meant to encourage here. Some of the responses seem to me needlessly belligerent.
Click to expand...
I haven't been openly belligerent yet, but have been drifting towards that position. It was the bit about the "missing link" that makes me suspect MDK's motive. That is an ancient anti-evolutionary argument, and one utterly without merit. No clarification on that from MDK.
 
arcticpenguin said:

I haven't been openly belligerent yet, but have been drifting towards that position. It was the bit about the "missing link" that makes me suspect MDK's motive. That is an ancient anti-evolutionary argument, and one utterly without merit. No clarification on that from MDK.
Click to expand...
Quite. I have another point to make on the subject of the "missing link", but I was waiting for MDK to say something. Most annoying.
 
arcticpenguin said:
Still waiting for MDK to explain what he meant by "missing link".
Click to expand...

Missing link? He's running for Governor here in California, I think.
 
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