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Kristine Posts: 3061 Joined: Sep. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 20 2010,20:08    Quote (afarensis @ May 20 2010,19:40) Low and behold another email. This one full of gross mischaracterizations of natural selection - and an insulting account of "cavemen" to boot:     Quote Darwin was definitely right about natural selection. To be fair, being right about that is no Nobel Prize winning accomplishment. The weaklings die and the strong survive. I think our cave man ancestors were familiar with that one. (Rog hits Grog over the head with a rock and kills him, then they both get eaten by a hungry tiger. Survival of the fittest... nothing profound about that.) Seriously, natural selection does not have any kind of creative power at all. All it does is kill of the runts. *Headdesk* So, to use their own comic book version, whose child went and hunted the tiger - Roc or Groc's? Because which one of them had children? And which one was the swingin' bachelor back at the cave? They always forget - everything dies. Natural selection kills everything. It isn't "death" that is the essential factor, it's differential reproduction. And being "fit" in this cartoonish caricature has nothing to do with happiness. A lot of animals never reproduce, and they're not walking around with long faces, thinking "I'm stupid and weak, and my genes will never be passed on." As long as your sibling reproduces, you essentially do; once again creationists have no clue what long time spans we are talking about when we are talking about adaptations. Arg! -------------- Which came first: the shimmy, or the hip? AtBC Poet Laureate "I happen to think that this prerequisite criterion of empirical evidence is itself not empirical." - Clive "Damn you. This means a trip to the library. Again." -- fnxtr

Timothy McDougald Posts: 1036 Joined: Dec. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 20 2010,20:49    Quote (Kristine @ May 20 2010,20:08) Quote (afarensis @ May 20 2010,19:40) Low and behold another email. This one full of gross mischaracterizations of natural selection - and an insulting account of "cavemen" to boot:     Quote Darwin was definitely right about natural selection. To be fair, being right about that is no Nobel Prize winning accomplishment. The weaklings die and the strong survive. I think our cave man ancestors were familiar with that one. (Rog hits Grog over the head with a rock and kills him, then they both get eaten by a hungry tiger. Survival of the fittest... nothing profound about that.) Seriously, natural selection does not have any kind of creative power at all. All it does is kill of the runts. *Headdesk* So, to use their own comic book version, whose child went and hunted the tiger - Roc or Groc's? Because which one of them had children? And which one was the swingin' bachelor back at the cave? They always forget - everything dies. Natural selection kills everything. It isn't "death" that is the essential factor, it's differential reproduction. And being "fit" in this cartoonish caricature has nothing to do with happiness. A lot of animals never reproduce, and they're not walking around with long faces, thinking "I'm stupid and weak, and my genes will never be passed on." As long as your sibling reproduces, you essentially do; once again creationists have no clue what long time spans we are talking about when we are talking about adaptations. Arg! I think creationism - of any stripe - can be summed up in the phrase "I can haz equivocation?" -------------- Church burning ebola boy FTK: I Didn't answer your questions because it beats the hell out of me. PaV: I suppose for me to be pried away from what I do to focus long and hard on that particular problem would take, quite honestly, hundreds of thousands of dollars to begin to pique my interest.

sledgehammer Posts: 533 Joined: Sep. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 20 2010,22:08    Quote Nowhere in the vast field of engineering is there any such thing as "the percentage of the time that corrupted data is helpful instead of harmful." It's ALWAYS harmful. Always. Copying errors and data transmission errors never help the signal. They only hurt it. BZZZT! Wrong. Random noise added to a signal before digitization by an Analog-to-Digital Converter actually improves the resolution of the resulting digital representation by "dithering" the quantization levels. That's just engineering.  In physics, thermal noise can prevent a system from getting stuck in a local minimum (potential well) and significantly affect the outcome of a process by allowing it to sample a wider range of possible states. -------------- The majority of the stupid is invincible and guaranteed for all time. The terror of their tyranny is alleviated by their lack of consistency. -A. Einstein  (H/T, JAD) If evolution is true, you could not know that it's true because your brain is nothing but chemicals. ?Think about that. -K. Hovind

Henry J Posts: 5786 Joined: Mar. 2005 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,01:18    It appears to me that calling a genome a "signal" is a misleading analogy. When a deliberately sent signal is vital to some goal, then degrading of that signal is harmful. But a genome isn't a deliberate signal, and there isn't a goal that depends on 100% accuracy of its transmission, especially not to all of a large number of descendants. Henry

Timothy McDougald Posts: 1036 Joined: Dec. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,07:47    Wohoo! Another email. This one tries to apply the work of Barbara McClintock: Quote DNA generates new adaptations the exact same way. It obeys the rules of grammar.  It actually re-arranges itself like a computer program that rewrites itself on the fly. Now here's the kicker: This is not new. And it's not even theory. It's fact. It's actually more than 60 years old. It's only new to those who are hearing it for the first time. It was discovered by biologist Barbara McClintock in 1944. She was decades ahead of her time and she received the Nobel Prize for this discovery in 1983. Her picture is now on a U.S. Postage Stamp and she's one of the greatest scientists in the history of biology. Her discoveries were so radical, so contrary to Darwin, that for 20 years she mostly kept this to herself. Some historians think that she was afraid of being cast out by the existing orthodoxy of the time. But even now, people ask me, "Why didn't they ever teach this to me in biology class?" Good question. I'll just say, it's not because her findings haven't been verified. And it's also not because the "random mutation" model works. It actually doesn't. I've been debating this online for 5 years and I have yet to have one person send me a link or refer to a book that says, "Here is the actual experiment that proves random mutations drive evolution." Combined with the work of James Shapiro (also see this). -------------- Church burning ebola boy FTK: I Didn't answer your questions because it beats the hell out of me. PaV: I suppose for me to be pried away from what I do to focus long and hard on that particular problem would take, quite honestly, hundreds of thousands of dollars to begin to pique my interest.

Quack Posts: 1961 Joined: May 2007 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,10:20    Quote (sledgehammer @ May 20 2010,22:08)   Quote Nowhere in the vast field of engineering is there any such thing as "the percentage of the time that corrupted data is helpful instead of harmful." It's ALWAYS harmful. Always. Copying errors and data transmission errors never help the signal. They only hurt it. BZZZT! Wrong. Random noise added to a signal before digitization by an Analog-to-Digital Converter actually improves the resolution of the resulting digital representation by "dithering" the quantization levels. That's just engineering.  In physics, thermal noise can prevent a system from getting stuck in a local minimum (potential well) and significantly affect the outcome of a process by allowing it to sample a wider range of possible states. That was news to me. Very interesting. I presume being relevant for physics, it is relevant for chemistry too - and maybe for genetics in ways not encouraging for creationists? Just speculating. -------------- Rocks have no biology.               Robert Byers.

Schroedinger's Dog Posts: 1692 Joined: Jan. 2009 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,11:15    Quote (Quack @ May 22 2010,16:20) Quote (sledgehammer @ May 20 2010,22:08)   Quote Nowhere in the vast field of engineering is there any such thing as "the percentage of the time that corrupted data is helpful instead of harmful." It's ALWAYS harmful. Always. Copying errors and data transmission errors never help the signal. They only hurt it. BZZZT! Wrong. Random noise added to a signal before digitization by an Analog-to-Digital Converter actually improves the resolution of the resulting digital representation by "dithering" the quantization levels. That's just engineering.  In physics, thermal noise can prevent a system from getting stuck in a local minimum (potential well) and significantly affect the outcome of a process by allowing it to sample a wider range of possible states. That was news to me. Very interesting. I presume being relevant for physics, it is relevant for chemistry too - and maybe for genetics in ways not encouraging for creationists? Just speculating. It is also relevant in audio productions. Most studios now make their takes in 24 bits/48000hz, or more, then have to process everything down to 16 bits/24000hz for commercial audio cd production. In doing so, we usually run through a series of dithering/anti-dithering processes. this is most notably due to the fact that a modern production chain will quite often be numeric and yet start from a digital workbench. The alteration of audio signals is not something I could detail with 100% expertise, but adding white noise before a frequency shrinking can actually smooth the conversion... -------------- "Hail is made out of water? Are you really that stupid?" Joe G "I have a better suggestion, Kris. How about a game of hide and go fuck yourself instead." Louis "The reason people use a crucifix against vampires is that vampires are allergic to bullshit" Richard Pryor

qetzal Posts: 311 Joined: Feb. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,12:21    Quote As a communication engineer I know - with 100.000000000% certainty - that this is impossible. Nowhere in the vast field of engineering is there any such thing as "the percentage of the time that corrupted data is helpful instead of harmful." It's ALWAYS harmful. Always. Copying errors and data transmission errors never help the signal. They only hurt it. Excellent disproof by sledgehammer. But empirical disproofs aren't even needed. This is simply logically false. The only way that modifying data can ALWAYS be harmful is if you assume the data starts out PERFECT. But as any competent engineer knows, data is rarely (if ever) perfect. Of course, we know what kind of person assumes that all organisms were initially created perfect.

Henry J Posts: 5786 Joined: Mar. 2005 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,12:34    Quote Quote And it's also not because the "random mutation" model works. It actually doesn't. I've been debating this online for 5 years and I have yet to have one person send me a link or refer to a book that says, "Here is the actual experiment that proves random mutations drive evolution." The experiment? The experiment? Try over a century of research by tens (or is it hundreds?) of thousands of researchers looking for contradictions and not finding them, in spite of there being plenty of places where contrary evidence would be expected if theory were wrong. Or am I missing the point? Henry

Reed Posts: 274 Joined: Feb. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,15:51    Quote (Henry J @ May 21 2010,23:18) It appears to me that calling a genome a "signal" is a misleading analogy. When a deliberately sent signal is vital to some goal, then degrading of that signal is harmful. But a genome isn't a deliberate signal, and there isn't a goal that depends on 100% accuracy of its transmission, especially not to all of a large number of descendants. Henry Agreed, the whole analogy is bogus. It seems to me it's largely based on a failure to understand how messy and plastic biology is, in contrast to things that are actually designed. A bit ironic coming from people who claim to be experts in "design detection". ID proponents like to go on about how genomes are "code", but unlike real, designed computer code, we observe that flipping a few bits frequently has no noticeable effect, and when it does have an effect, the resulting function is frequently similar to the original. Signals that are actually designed don't work like that, because they had designers who had specific goals and were concerned about maximizing efficiency. It's worth emphasizing that this is an observation, not a hypothetical argument. Blast a colony of bacteria with radiation, and if they don't all die, you'll get a lot of mutations, most neutral. Blast a computer with radiation, and eventually some bits will flip and the program will stop doing what it was designed to do. (aside, voyager 2 just experienced a radiation induced bit flip: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-151 )

fnxtr Posts: 3504 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 22 2010,19:47    Quote (Schroedinger's Dog @ May 22 2010,09:15) (snip) It is also relevant in audio productions. Most studios now make their takes in 24 bits/48000hz, or more, then have to process everything down to 16 bits/24000hz for commercial audio cd production. In doing so, we usually run through a series of dithering/anti-dithering processes. this is most notably due to the fact that a modern production chain will quite often be numeric and yet start from a digital workbench. The alteration of audio signals is not something I could detail with 100% expertise, but adding white noise before a frequency shrinking can actually smooth the conversion... How are you on video, SD? I was in Future Shop today browsing their screens/monitors/TVs/whatever the hell they're called these days.  "I, Robot" on 2 different screens: one looked like film; one had that 2D, videotape look, like daytime soaps. Any idea why? also, I hope the healing is coming along with no complications. -------------- "[A] book said there were 5 trillion witnesses. Who am I supposed to believe, 5 trillion witnesses or you? That shit's, like, ironclad. " -- stevestory "Wow, you must be retarded. I said that CO2 does not trap heat. If it did then it would not cool down at night."  Joe G

Schroedinger's Dog Posts: 1692 Joined: Jan. 2009 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,01:49    Quote (fnxtr @ May 23 2010,01:47) Quote (Schroedinger's Dog @ May 22 2010,09:15) (snip) It is also relevant in audio productions. Most studios now make their takes in 24 bits/48000hz, or more, then have to process everything down to 16 bits/24000hz for commercial audio cd production. In doing so, we usually run through a series of dithering/anti-dithering processes. this is most notably due to the fact that a modern production chain will quite often be numeric and yet start from a digital workbench. The alteration of audio signals is not something I could detail with 100% expertise, but adding white noise before a frequency shrinking can actually smooth the conversion... How are you on video, SD? I was in Future Shop today browsing their screens/monitors/TVs/whatever the hell they're called these days.  "I, Robot" on 2 different screens: one looked like film; one had that 2D, videotape look, like daytime soaps. Any idea why? also, I hope the healing is coming along with no complications. I look gorgeous on video, thanks for asking. The healing is going just fine, thanks. I'll only keep a slighlty redder area of skin, nothing a  beard-trimming can't hide...:) As for the video stuff, new flatscreens can double the standard frequency from 60hz to 120hz, in order to give a "smoother" image and movement. But I can't for the life of me figure out why they would do this. Personaly, I hate it and totally agree with you. Any movie you watch in 120hz looks like it's been filmed with a camcorder. -------------- "Hail is made out of water? Are you really that stupid?" Joe G "I have a better suggestion, Kris. How about a game of hide and go fuck yourself instead." Louis "The reason people use a crucifix against vampires is that vampires are allergic to bullshit" Richard Pryor

Quack Posts: 1961 Joined: May 2007 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,02:43    Sorry guys, nitpicking maybe, but something happens inside of me when I read about hz - or other units. Hertz That's the way that I am, can't help it. -------------- Rocks have no biology.               Robert Byers.

midwifetoad Posts: 4003 Joined: Mar. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,09:22    I used to wonder why special effects look cheesier on DVD movies than they did on the big screen. I've decided it is an artifact of scanning and sharpening of the image. It increases any contrast difference between background and the composited foreground elements. -------------- Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

fnxtr Posts: 3504 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,11:18    Quote (Quack @ May 23 2010,00:43) Sorry guys, nitpicking maybe, but something happens inside of me when I read about hz - or other units. Hertz That's the way that I am, can't help it. Must have been a radioactivity-induced bit flip. 1101000 ->1001000 hz -> Hz. Happy now? edit: binary goof -------------- "[A] book said there were 5 trillion witnesses. Who am I supposed to believe, 5 trillion witnesses or you? That shit's, like, ironclad. " -- stevestory "Wow, you must be retarded. I said that CO2 does not trap heat. If it did then it would not cool down at night."  Joe G

fnxtr Posts: 3504 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,11:19    Quote (midwifetoad @ May 23 2010,07:22) I used to wonder why special effects look cheesier on DVD movies than they did on the big screen. I've decided it is an artifact of scanning and sharpening of the image. It increases any contrast difference between background and the composited foreground elements. It always looked like a depth-of-field issue to me.  On digital video everything is in focus at once.  Unlike real life. -------------- "[A] book said there were 5 trillion witnesses. Who am I supposed to believe, 5 trillion witnesses or you? That shit's, like, ironclad. " -- stevestory "Wow, you must be retarded. I said that CO2 does not trap heat. If it did then it would not cool down at night."  Joe G

midwifetoad Posts: 4003 Joined: Mar. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,12:18    Doing a bit of Google on the subject, I see edge enhancement (digital sharpening) listed as a frequent flaw. This could make foreground objects stand out against matte painting or green screen backgrounds. -------------- Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

Quack Posts: 1961 Joined: May 2007 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,16:37    Quote (fnxtr @ May 23 2010,11:18)   Quote (Quack @ May 23 2010,00:43) Sorry guys, nitpicking maybe, but something happens inside of me when I read about hz - or other units. Hertz That's the way that I am, can't help it. Must have been a radioactivity-induced bit flip. 1101000 ->1001000 hz -> Hz. Happy now? edit: binary goof Happy as a lark... -------------- Rocks have no biology.               Robert Byers.

Henry J Posts: 5786 Joined: Mar. 2005 (Permalink) Posted: May 23 2010,22:25    hz -> Hz? Heinz Hertz?

fnxtr Posts: 3504 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,03:02    Quote (Henry J @ May 23 2010,20:25) hz -> Hz? Heinz Hertz? Only if it gets in your eye. -------------- "[A] book said there were 5 trillion witnesses. Who am I supposed to believe, 5 trillion witnesses or you? That shit's, like, ironclad. " -- stevestory "Wow, you must be retarded. I said that CO2 does not trap heat. If it did then it would not cool down at night."  Joe G

Schroedinger's Dog Posts: 1692 Joined: Jan. 2009 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,04:45    Ok, my appologies for the cap mistake. won't Happen aGain, evER! -------------- "Hail is made out of water? Are you really that stupid?" Joe G "I have a better suggestion, Kris. How about a game of hide and go fuck yourself instead." Louis "The reason people use a crucifix against vampires is that vampires are allergic to bullshit" Richard Pryor

Quack Posts: 1961 Joined: May 2007 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,06:15    Quote (Schroedinger's Dog @ May 24 2010,04:45) Ok, my appologies for the cap mistake. won't Happen aGain, evER! Coming from you, I really believe it! But seriously, such mistakes are easy to make but I am afraid I have an eye for typographical mistakes. According to Wikipedia, a mistake is an error. -------------- Rocks have no biology.               Robert Byers.

dogdidit Posts: 315 Joined: Mar. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,08:28    Quote (Quack @ May 23 2010,02:43) Sorry guys, nitpicking maybe, but something happens inside of me when I read about hz - or other units. Hertz That's the way that I am, can't help it. Yup. Physical units named after individuals are spelled out in lower case, but capitalized in abbreviation. Thus: hertz -> Hz newton -> N watt -> W OTOH units not derived from names (proper nouns) are lower case wheter spelled out or abbreviated: foot -> ft meter/metre -> m Not entirely sure why, but dem's da rules. -------------- "Humans carry plants and animals all over the globe, thus introducing them to places they could never have reached on their own. That certainly increases biodiversity." - D'OL

fnxtr Posts: 3504 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,13:20    Quote (dogdidit @ May 24 2010,06:28) Quote (Quack @ May 23 2010,02:43) Sorry guys, nitpicking maybe, but something happens inside of me when I read about hz - or other units. Hertz That's the way that I am, can't help it. Yup. Physical units named after individuals are spelled out in lower case, but capitalized in abbreviation. Thus: hertz -> Hz newton -> N watt -> W OTOH units not derived from names (proper nouns) are lower case wheter spelled out or abbreviated: foot -> ft meter/metre -> m Not entirely sure why, but dem's da rules. then theres the multiplication prefixes.... re: edge sharpening. That would also explain why backgrounds come more into focus, giving the flat, direct-to-video appearance. Tangentially: I really hate digital cameras and wish they hadn't taken over so fast. That annoying shutter delay makes me want to give them all flying lessons, down by the sea. GRRR! -------------- "[A] book said there were 5 trillion witnesses. Who am I supposed to believe, 5 trillion witnesses or you? That shit's, like, ironclad. " -- stevestory "Wow, you must be retarded. I said that CO2 does not trap heat. If it did then it would not cool down at night."  Joe G

Bob O'H Posts: 2564 Joined: Oct. 2005 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,14:10    I recently read a blog post talking about things that were a few nm out to sea. Eventually I worked out why I was so confused. -------------- It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

midwifetoad Posts: 4003 Joined: Mar. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,15:11    Quote That annoying shutter delay makes me want to give them all flying lessons, down by the sea. GRRR! Most on cheaper cameras. The SLRs are as fast as film cameras and are rapidly closing in on detail and lattitude. I have a little Canon point and shoot that has no perceptable shutter delay. For high contrast situations, you can atobracket exposures and combine them into one image in Photoshop. You can have full detail in highlights and shadows with no compromise. -------------- Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

Kristine Posts: 3061 Joined: Sep. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,17:41    Quote (dogdidit @ May 24 2010,08:28)     Quote (Quack @ May 23 2010,02:43) Sorry guys, nitpicking maybe, but something happens inside of me when I read about hz - or other units. Hertz That's the way that I am, can't help it. Yup. Physical units named after individuals are spelled out in lower case, but capitalized in abbreviation. Thus: hertz -> Hz newton -> N watt -> W OTOH units not derived from names (proper nouns) are lower case wheter spelled out or abbreviated: foot -> ft meter/metre -> m Not entirely sure why, but dem's da rules. So, 01100010 01101001 01101110 01100001 01110010 01111001 00001101 00001010  or 01000010 01101001 01101110 01100001 01110010 01111001 00001101 00001010 ? -------------- Which came first: the shimmy, or the hip? AtBC Poet Laureate "I happen to think that this prerequisite criterion of empirical evidence is itself not empirical." - Clive "Damn you. This means a trip to the library. Again." -- fnxtr

Henry J Posts: 5786 Joined: Mar. 2005 (Permalink) Posted: May 24 2010,20:58    Quote So, 01100010 01101001 01101110 01100001 01110010 01111001 00001101 00001010??or 01000010 01101001 01101110 01100001 01110010 01111001 00001101 00001010 ? The first one sounds like a capital idea. Henry

Quack Posts: 1961 Joined: May 2007 (Permalink) Posted: May 25 2010,02:25    All I can say is µF or µH looks much better than µf or µh. ... ETA: For the uninitiated, microfarad or microhenry. -------------- Rocks have no biology.               Robert Byers.

midwifetoad Posts: 4003 Joined: Mar. 2008 (Permalink) Posted: May 25 2010,09:01    Quote browsing their screens/monitors/TVs/whatever the hell they're called these days.  "I, Robot" on 2 different screens: one looked like film; one had that 2D, videotape look, Display demos in retail stores are fed from a common source. Differences in appearance are often bogus, because there are so many possible settings for color balance, brightness and contrast. Sets are often set to an unnatural level of color saturation to get your attention from across the room. They could also be jiggered to direct sales to the most profitable models. -------------- Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

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