Antievolution.org :: Antievolution.org Discussion Board The Critic's Resource on Antievolution

Antievolution.org Discussion Board > From the Panda's Thumb > After the Bar Closes... > The Magic of Intelligent Design

Pages: (9) < 1 2 3 4 5 [6] 7 8 9 >

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,10:16    Hi Reciprocating Bill, You wrote...   Quote Before you go, I'd appreciate your thoughts on the quoted post, above.  Including my request vis the fastball. I'm sorry, I usually try to address comments in the order they were received.  In my confusion, I skipped over yours.  Again, sorry. I'm not going anywhere.  I was just giving Creek Belly a heads up that I thought we were getting to a point where the arguments are becoming forced. As for fastballs and Libet.  I just did a google search on "fastball Libet" and got a lot of good looking hits.  Try it. I think our differences are becoming forced too.  BTW, calling me "TP" for short is fine.  I think Libet threw scientists a curve ball (pardon the pun) thirty years ago.  Think about it.  The first reaction was to deny and challenge the reality of experimental data.  Experiments were run to challenge Libet, not to support an explanation of it. Libet's results survived the challenge.  Then there was the scramble to come up with good-sounding explanations for the data that couldn't be refuted.  They come up with some.  Life is good again, books have been updated to reassure psychology students their teachers might know something. Conservative answers are generally easier to support.  That doesn’t mean they are correct.

k.e Posts: 1948 Joined: Mar. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,10:24    . Quote Some people automatically dismiss such things as "woo". I am not some people. I always support the Dao of Woo. Dharma or the laws of the universe count out all unnecessary unnecessaryness provided you are male, over the age of 21 and speak a language all others form a arbitrary line,we will decide -------------- The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

k.e Posts: 1948 Joined: Mar. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,10:40    On a less flippant note TP. My comment regarding Deep Blue Vs Human was more to do with scale. You seem to be arguing that our brains are quantum computers. For that to be true the processing power available from such a device of that size would be orders of magnitude larger than Deep blue. Have you done a power and thermal budget for your quantum brain? Where does the energy come from, are they solar powered? Tin Hats TP? What effect on individual electron spin in a human brain would say an NMR machine scan of the brain have on consciousness? In sleep state how does your quantum computer power down and then power back up and still remember its phone number? -------------- The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

Reciprocating Bill Posts: 4265 Joined: Oct. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,11:03    Quote (Thought Provoker @ Sep. 30 2007,11:16) Hi Reciprocating Bill, You wrote...       Quote Before you go, I'd appreciate your thoughts on the quoted post, above.  Including my request vis the fastball. I'm sorry, I usually try to address comments in the order they were received.  In my confusion, I skipped over yours.  Again, sorry. I'm not going anywhere.  I was just giving Creek Belly a heads up that I thought we were getting to a point where the arguments are becoming forced. As for fastballs and Libet.  I just did a google search on "fastball Libet" and got a lot of good looking hits.  Try it. I think our differences are becoming forced too.  BTW, calling me "TP" for short is fine.  I think Libet threw scientists a curve ball (pardon the pun) thirty years ago.  Think about it.  The first reaction was to deny and challenge the reality of experimental data.  Experiments were run to challenge Libet, not to support an explanation of it. Libet's results survived the challenge.  Then there was the scramble to come up with good-sounding explanations for the data that couldn't be refuted.  They come up with some.  Life is good again, books have been updated to reassure psychology students their teachers might know something. Conservative answers are generally easier to support.  That doesn’t mean they are correct. TP - Your take on Libet describes ordinary self-correction in science. Everything you describe went right, so far as I can tell. Of course individual scientists often overvalue their own ideas, and upon finding themselves corrected thusly aren't happy. So the world goes 'round. But your response doesn't go to my observation that new theory needs to demonstrate added value vis empirical work, which these quantum notions have not (yet) vis cognitive processing, a sense of volition, etc., before the models with which they compete can be be declared obsolete. Declaring victory out of hand in the absence of any constructive research is one of ID's worst (and most obnoxious) habits.   Baseball is full of "ballistic" behaviors (literally and figuratively); it provides a good illustration of the issues involved. Not surprising that it arises in many similar discussions.  I've read some of Wegner's and Bargh's work, and it likely came up there, and lodged in my brain pan. (And, 'tis the season, as October approaches and my boys are in.) -------------- Myth: Something that never was true, and always will be. "The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you." - David Foster Wallace "Here’s a clue. Snarky banalities are not a substitute for saying something intelligent. Write that down." - Barry Arrington

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,11:44    Hi K.E., You wrote... Quote You seem to be arguing that our brains are quantum computers. For that to be true the processing power available from such a device of that size would be orders of magnitude larger than Deep blue. Maybe you haven't understood the magnitude of woo being presented here.  This isn’t just human brains.  Microtubules are present in practically everything we think of as living.  If Hameroff is right, quantum computers in microtubules explains why life appears to be aware if its surroundings.  From this Hameroff paper (essay?)…. To gauge how single neuron functions may exceed simple input-output activities, consider the single cell organism paramecium. Such cells swim about gracefully, avoid obstacles and predators, find food and engage in sex with partner paramecia. They can also learn; if placed in capillary tubes they escape, and when placed back in the capillary tubes escape more quickly. As single cells with no synaptic connections, how do they do it? Pondering the seemingly intelligent activities of such single cell organisms, famed neuroscientist C.S. Sherrington (1957) conjectured: “of nerve there is no trace, but the cytoskeleton might serve”. If the cytoskeleton is the nervous system of protozoa, what might it do for neurons?

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,12:23    Hi Reciprocating Bill, You wrote... Quote But your response doesn't go to my observation that new theory needs to demonstrate added value vis empirical work, which these quantum notions have not (yet) vis cognitive processing, a sense of volition, etc., before the models with which they compete can be be declared obsolete. Declaring victory out of hand in the absence of any constructive research is one of ID's worst (and most obnoxious) habits. There have been empirical experiments performed, there will be more.  The Many Worlds quantum interpretation is a metaphysical construct and, therefore, is not a scientific answer.  We have known for a long time that there is no such thing as solid matter.  E=mc^2 shows that mass IS energy.  Particles ARE wavefunctions.  General Relativity, EPR effects and GHZ states are reality, not woo.  There is no such thing as randomness, just interconnected quantum effects.  There are evolutionary advantages for life to directly use of this feature (e.g. efficient photosynthesis).  Empirical evidence shows that life is directly using quantum effects. There are other unanswered scientific questions.  For example the "hard" question of consciousness. Hypotheses are needed.  There is only so long that we can wait for an answer to present itself.  Mercury's unexplainable orbit was an example of this.  Sometimes a paradigm shift is needed.  I suggest it already has occurred.  It has just taken us a long time for us to fully accept how illusional our macro view of reality really is. If you haven't figured it out by now, I am not your typical ID proponent.  It might not even be appropriate to label me an ID proponent since I am a vocal critic of the ID movement. Labels aren't important, ideas are.

Reciprocating Bill Posts: 4265 Joined: Oct. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,12:41    Quote (Thought Provoker @ Sep. 30 2007,13:23) Hi Reciprocating Bill, You wrote...   Quote But your response doesn't go to my observation that new theory needs to demonstrate added value vis empirical work, which these quantum notions have not (yet) vis cognitive processing, a sense of volition, etc., before the models with which they compete can be be declared obsolete. Declaring victory out of hand in the absence of any constructive research is one of ID's worst (and most obnoxious) habits. There have been empirical experiments performed, there will be more... There are other unanswered scientific questions.  For example the "hard" question of consciousness. Hypotheses are needed.... I am referring to empirical investigation in the domain of neuroscience (and the issues we were discussing vis volition). There has been none working from predictions based upon quantum notions of consciousness, so it is grossly premature to declare work within the current framework obsolete - particularly given that work continues apace within that framework. Of course, quantum physics itself has had a secure mathematical and experimental foundation for decades. As you and others have discussed, it is the interpretation of quantum physics that remains at issue. The "hard problem" is, well hard, conceptually as well as empirically - e.g. we aren't even sure what a solution to the hard problem of consciousness and the corrollary problem of Bretano's intentionality will even look like. I like Hilary Putnam's exceptionally clear thinking on the latter. Quantum speculation has been no more successful solving the hard problem than any other. The book by Strawson I referenced earlier provides an interesting snapshot into struggles with that problem. -------------- Myth: Something that never was true, and always will be. "The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you." - David Foster Wallace "Here’s a clue. Snarky banalities are not a substitute for saying something intelligent. Write that down." - Barry Arrington

creeky belly Posts: 205 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,12:55    Quote It is my opinion that we live in a universe were if something can happen, it does.  When I was learning about Maxwell's equations I could understand, and calculate, how a collapsing magnetic field creates an electrical field and how a collapsing electrical field creates a magnetic field.  It all made sense except for one thing, how and why did it start? This wasn't a religious "why" (at least I wasn't thinking in those terms).  This was an engineering/scientific "why".  The only answer that made sense to me was, because it can.  In the 30+ years since then, I haven't come up with a better answer. But you must know how it starts: you have particle annihilation, oscillating and translational charge distributions, and transitional levels in atoms. In fact, the CMB was the result of the first electrons bound to nuclei when the temperature dropped below 3000K. The origin of photons and the EM force came from the symmetry breaking of the Electroweak force. This is essentially what's been probed for the last 30 years in high energy physics. Is this the sort of answer you were looking for?       Quote The RecA protein is directly involved in finding and fixing errors in DNA.  RecA protein has the same physical structure as microtubules. That's very interesting, but it's not quantum error correction. Here are some resources from a quantum computing class I took a few years back. Here's some intro for QEC. Here's a follow up. If they were somehow able to determine that microtubules had functionality like this, it would be an interesting result. That, and seeing if enzymes really function as a shielding for decoherence in DNA.  These were the experiments I was alluding to.       Quote I understand this is the way of science.  I suspect other ID proponents can only wish they had the amount of scientific support for their ideas as Orch OR has (meager as it is). At least it's actually being settled in the lab. I'm having trouble accessing the Italian's experiment with the cultures, but I'm very interested in their setup and results. (The university is having trouble authenticating with the online journal)

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,13:49    Hi Reciprocating Bill, You wrote...   Quote I am referring to empirical investigation in the domain of neuroscience (and the issues we were discussing vis volition). I guess it is time to take this to the next level. It isn't neuroscience that needs quantum mechanics as much as it is quantum mechanics that needs neuroscience. Penrose didn't just decide to meddle in biological science on a whim.  He needed to consider biological science in order to complete his understanding of quantum physics. E=h/t is fine for unobserved phenomon.  It explains why decohence happens quickly for macro objects and not for micro objects.  It also explains why decoherence happens in messy, noisy environments.  However, quantum mechanics has its "hard problem" too.  It is the measurement problem.  And this problem is also hard. Some people just assume the measuring device is, somehow, interfering with the results.  That is only part of the problem.  Quantum delayed measurement experiments have delayed the choice of measurement until after all of the measuring devices have taken measurements.  The choice still influences the quantum results. Referring back to the opening post.  The three special coins are influenced by whether heads or tails are called.  In the example I gave the callers were touching the coins when the choices were made.  So to further understand the nature of the special coins the callers intentionally close their eyes and flip the coins and don't touch them while they land and settle on the table.  The callers wait before they even choose whether they call heads or tails.  Even in this situation, the GHZ "magic" still occurs. Consciousness causes quantum collapse Now you might understand the rock and the hard place quantum physicists are trapped between.  The Schrödinger's cat thought experiment introduced the role of the conscious observer in an attempt to show how ridiculous the implication of the Copenhagen interpretation was.  Ridiculous or not, the Schrödinger's cat experiment is still both dead and alive.  And if Penrose is correct, the objective reality of the interconnectedness of quantum effects with consciousness collapses into the state of being really real.

Reciprocating Bill Posts: 4265 Joined: Oct. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,14:25    Quote (Thought Provoker @ Sep. 30 2007,14:49) Hi Reciprocating Bill, You wrote...     Quote I am referring to empirical investigation in the domain of neuroscience (and the issues we were discussing vis volition). I guess it is time to take this to the next level... A very interesting next level, although one where the better part of valor (for me) is to allow those with more familiarity with the esoterica of quantum mechanics to push that discussion forward. I'll be an avid observer, and therefore will nevertheless determine the outcome of the discussion. -------------- Myth: Something that never was true, and always will be. "The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you." - David Foster Wallace "Here’s a clue. Snarky banalities are not a substitute for saying something intelligent. Write that down." - Barry Arrington

creeky belly Posts: 205 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,14:40    Quote Consciousness causes quantum collapse Now you might understand the rock and the hard place quantum physicists are trapped between.  The Schrödinger's cat thought experiment introduced the role of the conscious observer in an attempt to show how ridiculous the implication of the Copenhagen interpretation was.  Ridiculous or not, the Schrödinger's cat experiment is still both dead and alive.  And if Penrose is correct, the objective reality of the interconnectedness of quantum effects with consciousness collapses into the state of being really real. The article you think seems to raise more questions than it can answer. There was no waveform collapse until conscious beings evolved? Are detectors conscious? Why is the notion of decoherence with neighboring systems not enough?

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,15:10    Hi Reciprocating Bill, I will get to Creeky Belly in a moment, but I wanted to respond to this first...   Quote A very interesting next level, although one where the better part of valor (for me) is to allow those with more familiarity with the esoterica of quantum mechanics to push that discussion forward. I'll be an avid observer, and therefore will nevertheless determine the outcome of the discussion. The scary part of this is that since the subject crosses multiple scientific disciplines you might be as qualified to participate in this as anyone else,  maybe even more so since you picked up on your ability to influence by quietly observing.  Do you want to guess who Salvador Cordova suggests is the "ultimate observer"?

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,15:25    Hi Creeky Belly, You wrote... Quote The article you think seems to raise more questions than it can answer. There was no waveform collapse until conscious beings evolved? Are detectors conscious? Why is the notion of decoherence with neighboring systems not enough? Let's take them one at a time.  Penrose offers the Waveform Collapse (he calls it Objective Reduction) has a time limit.  It will collapse regardless of whether anyone is observing or not. Schrödinger's cat is dead or alive in 10^-31 seconds whether anyone is observing or not.  Actually, the fact that the cat is a conscious observer complicates things.  This is why Penrose usually uses mechanical weights in his examples (did the weight fall or not?). Mechanical devices are not conscious, but they have mass which influences things.  Penrose's proposed FELIX experiment uses a mechanical mirror in superposition to test his decoherence calculations. Decoherence can result from interference from neighboring mass.  That is why Penrose-Hameroff spend the effort to explain how the microtubule structure keeps tubulin dimers isolated from neighboring systems.

Reciprocating Bill Posts: 4265 Joined: Oct. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,15:27    Quote (Thought Provoker @ Sep. 30 2007,16:10) Hi Reciprocating Bill, I will get to Creeky Belly in a moment, but I wanted to respond to this first...     Quote A very interesting next level, although one where the better part of valor (for me) is to allow those with more familiarity with the esoterica of quantum mechanics to push that discussion forward. I'll be an avid observer, and therefore will nevertheless determine the outcome of the discussion. The scary part of this is that since the subject crosses multiple scientific disciplines you might be as qualified to participate in this as anyone else,  maybe even more so since you picked up on your ability to influence by quietly observing.  Do you want to guess who Salvador Cordova suggests is the "ultimate observer"? I'm acquainted with QM at a "Scientific American" level (and I mean the older, more substantial SciAM of the '70s and '80s), and I can Google with the best of them. Unlike DaveTard, I don't imagine that qualifies me for anything much more than dorm room bull sessions, and I'm a little old for those. But if thats what this is, I'm in.   One point vis the relationship between quantum mechanics, consciousness, and evolution: One thing that is apparent to us all (or at least should be) is that certain arrangements and functional relations of matter/energy/message are conscious, including (but not limited to) that ongoing in some brains. Natural selection has clearly found those arrangements. I don't see that a finding that quantum effects are implicated in and necessary for consciousness (in microtubules or whatever) threatens that finding in the least. I don't see that quantum effects in consiousness place discernible obstacle before the mechanism of natural selection, or that it calls for new mechanisms in evolution.   Thomas Nagel in "The View From Nowhere" (alas, I seem to have lost my copy) makes this point, although somewhat to reverse effect: He argues that the fact that natural selection accounts for the origination of conscious brains does NOT explain why these arrangements of matter are capable of consciousness.  I would add, nor does NS "care." -------------- Myth: Something that never was true, and always will be. "The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you." - David Foster Wallace "Here’s a clue. Snarky banalities are not a substitute for saying something intelligent. Write that down." - Barry Arrington

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,15:42    Hi Reciprocating Bill, See, I said you were qualified.  That was a good observation, IMO. Once you get past the no randomness part, the rest doesn't challenge standard evolutionary thinking very much at all.  At best, it accelerates and amplifies the process.  This is why I brought up Vernanimalcula guizhouena.  You could think of it as super-charged natural selection that could allow life to be interconnected with (i.e. aware of) nearby quantum effects.  "Nearby" includes nearby in both space and time. It isn't the label that is important, it is the idea.

creeky belly Posts: 205 Joined: June 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,16:04    Quote Decoherence can result from interference from neighboring mass.  That is why Penrose-Hameroff spend the effort to explain how the microtubule structure keeps tubulin dimers isolated from neighboring systems. Not only mass, but thermal noise. It's not particularly evident that the microtubules can remove the thermal coupling from the dimers, when the temperature noise dominates at 300K. I'm still trying to obtain the Italian group's paper.

qetzal Posts: 311 Joined: Feb. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,18:23    Quote (Thought Provoker @ Sep. 30 2007,11:44) Hi K.E., You wrote...     Quote You seem to be arguing that our brains are quantum computers. For that to be true the processing power available from such a device of that size would be orders of magnitude larger than Deep blue. Maybe you haven't understood the magnitude of woo being presented here.  This isn’t just human brains.  Microtubules are present in practically everything we think of as living.  If Hameroff is right, quantum computers in microtubules explains why life appears to be aware if its surroundings.  From this Hameroff paper (essay?)…. To gauge how single neuron functions may exceed simple input-output activities, consider the single cell organism paramecium. Such cells swim about gracefully, avoid obstacles and predators, find food and engage in sex with partner paramecia. They can also learn; if placed in capillary tubes they escape, and when placed back in the capillary tubes escape more quickly. As single cells with no synaptic connections, how do they do it? Pondering the seemingly intelligent activities of such single cell organisms, famed neuroscientist C.S. Sherrington (1957) conjectured: “of nerve there is no trace, but the cytoskeleton might serve”. If the cytoskeleton is the nervous system of protozoa, what might it do for neurons? We did this one already. It doesn't hold up. See my previous comment here.

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,19:26    Hi qetzal, First of all, I was talking about awareness, not learning. Two, your article was a counter balance, it made the learning point equivocal not dead.  We are talking about single celled organisms here.  Your example is the equivalent of saying it wasn't taught to play checkers because it always loses. Here is a 2006 reference... Previous attempts to condition a 1-celled organism, paramecium, by either classical or instrumental procedures, have yielded equivocal results. The present experiments were designed to determine whether the use of positive reinforcement provided by DC electrical stimulation at the cathode, which had previously been shown to be attractive to paramecia, could be used to train these organisms in a discrimination learning task. The results indicate that such learning did take place. We have all seen the kind of activity that occurs in a drop of pond water.  It is hard to watch and not question how single-celled life can do what it does.

qetzal Posts: 311 Joined: Feb. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Sep. 30 2007,21:03    Quote (Thought Provoker @ Sep. 30 2007,19:26) Hi qetzal, First of all, I was talking about awareness, not learning. Two, your article was a counter balance, it made the learning point equivocal not dead.  We are talking about single celled organisms here.  Your example is the equivalent of saying it wasn't taught to play checkers because it always loses. Here is a 2006 reference... Previous attempts to condition a 1-celled organism, paramecium, by either classical or instrumental procedures, have yielded equivocal results. The present experiments were designed to determine whether the use of positive reinforcement provided by DC electrical stimulation at the cathode, which had previously been shown to be attractive to paramecia, could be used to train these organisms in a discrimination learning task. The results indicate that such learning did take place. We have all seen the kind of activity that occurs in a drop of pond water.  It is hard to watch and not question how single-celled life can do what it does. Re 'two,' I disagree. My point is (and was in the previous thread) that Hameroff makes unsupportable claims. He states unequivocally that paramecia can learn. The reality is that the data is arguable AT BEST, and the specific example he cites is wrong. When somone overstates the evidence on a claim that I CAN check, I am less likely to believe them on claims that I can't. Re 'first of all,', awareness* is easily explained by classical mechanisms. If you choose to believe that it's really due to quantum computing by microtubules, that's up to you. But there's no need whatsoever to invoke such things to explain how protozoa behave. *Note added in edit: I mean "awareness" as exemplified by the behavior of single-celled organisms. I don't mean to claim that human consciousness is easily explained by classical mechanisms.

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,08:15    Hi qetzal, You wrote... Quote I mean "awareness" as exemplified by the behavior of single-celled organisms. I don't mean to claim that human consciousness is easily explained by classical mechanisms. We may be finding ourselves on opposite sides of the fence from the usual ID positions.  Typical ID proponents generally consider humans special; I don't (unless the idea of the evolutionary equivalent of runaway cancer makes the cancer "special"). I don't see a clear demarcation for awareness in living organisms.  Humans are aware, chimpanzees are aware, worms are aware.  Life, in general, is aware.  Some even argue that plants are aware. My embrace of the concept of common descent is potentially another thing that sets me apart from typical ID proponents.  If awareness is an inherited trait, what is the common ancestor that first exhibited awareness?  I suggest an animal with a pair of light-sensitive pits linked to a hormonal signaling system has inherited this awareness trait and natural selection has already begun improving its effectiveness.  The Vernanimalcula guizhouena is precambrian. I suggest human consciousness is only the tip of the iceberg of the "hard problem". A dispassionate analysis of the situation would suggest that the awareness trait is wide spread in living organisms on Earth and, therefore, appeared extremely early on the evolutionary tree, possibly at the Origin of Life regardless of how incredulous it seems. It would be ironic if "Darwinists" started responding with an argument from incredulity.

k.e Posts: 1948 Joined: Mar. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,08:18    TP here is a simple question. What is ID? -------------- The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

k.e Posts: 1948 Joined: Mar. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,08:45    And another before I forget. Deep Blue had some special features that made it more analogous to a human brain than a general purpose computer, what were they? -------------- The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,09:35    Hi K.E., You asked...           Quote What is ID? "ID" is the abbreviation for the term "Intelligent Design".  It is a populous movement run primarily by the Discovery Institute and its fellows which includes Wells, Dembski and Behe.  It is mostly, if not entirely, religiously motivated but has attempted to present Intelligent Design as some sort of scientific concept. The capitalization makes it a proper noun and, therefore, distinguishes it from what people would think of as "intelligent design".  The ID Movement leaders take advantage of this confusion by playing a shell game of what means what depending on the audience they are addressing.  For example, when addressing religious organizations the ID Movement leaders count on the presumption that Intelligent Design implies an Intelligent Designer which implies an Intelligent Creator which implies God.  However, when such implications would be detrimental to the movement (e.g. legal depositions), the movement leaders focus on things like innocuous questions and ID alternatives like "space aliens who seed the Earth, time travelers, and telic organizing principles in nature". While I believe the ID movement leaders are intentionally engaging in a shell game to further their agenda that was spelled out in the Wedge document, there are ID proponents who actually and earnestly see some potential scientific value in thinking outside the status quo box.  Some of these ID proponents even disagree with the tactics employed by the ID movement leaders.  I refer to these as ID Scientists even if they, themselves, agree ID has not yet reached the threshold of being called science. Presuming you are asking this question for the purpose of understanding my position on this... I am a vocal critic of the ID movement.  However, I can understand and even support the ideal behind ID science.  My discussions on Telic Thoughts (this thread is a sample) hits two birds with one stone.  It forces thinking about the true motives of the ID Movement leaders since I am taking them at their word that ID isn't about religion and present a purely scientific alternative that presumes most, if not all, of their "scientific observations" and provides an realistic answer for them. It also disarms those who claim it is unreasonable to ask ID proponents to provide a scientific hypothesis with a "pathetic level of detail" when I have provided just such an animal. Finally, it is constructive enjoyment for me.  I like to argue.  I am a debater.  I can take either side and present realistic, non-hypocritical arguments in support.  It is constructive, because it forces me and others to research actual science. It provokes thought on both sides of the question. Do I believe all of this is true?  What does that matter?  I am not even a scientist by trade.

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,09:48    Hi K.E., You wrote... Quote Deep Blue had some special features that made it more analogous to a human brain than a general purpose computer, what were they? Come in from off the sidelines and tell us.

Richardthughes Posts: 11178 Joined: Jan. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,09:54    Deep blue isn't a good example IMHO. It's just brute force AI / search. It doesn't "strategize" but just goes so far down the exponential tree as to see the best possible futures. That being said, if our noggins were quantum computers, the "chess problem" would be no problem. Big search = no time. The wave function collapses and I move my pawn... -------------- "Richardthughes, you magnificent bastard, I stand in awe of you..." : Arden Chatfield "You magnificent bastard! " : Louis "ATBC poster child", "I have to agree with Rich.." : DaveTard "I bow to your superior skills" : deadman_932 "...it was Richardthughes making me lie in bed.." : Kristine

k.e Posts: 1948 Joined: Mar. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,10:49    Earlier TP Typed:   Quote ...My embrace of the concept of common descent is potentially another thing that sets me apart from typical ID proponents.   Quote It is populous movement run primarily by the Discovery Institute and its fellows which includes Wells, Dembski and Behe.  It is mostly, if not entirely, religiously motivated but has attempted to present Intelligent Design as some sort of scientific concept.   Quote I am a vocal critic of the ID movement   Quote I can understand and even support the ideal behind ID science. So you support Creationism in a cheap tuxedo ....but you are not sure ......then you are .....fine. All I can say TP is I'm sorry for asking a stupid question. I see you don't think it is a conservative culture war on anti-Strausians. .....So fill us in, where you think Judge Jones got his facts wrong. On Deep Blue the analog I was alluding to was the fact that practically all of the power of the system was in 480 LSI dedicated parallel concurrent chess move processing units or 'hardwired nodes'. Not unlike the human brain. That made the system highly efficient. If certain tasks are performed by dedicated processing units with unnecessary baggage then immense power can be packed into a small space. It could be argued that the human mind's intelligence is not an actual function of processing power but the software it runs. The cleverest part of that software is that it thinks it knows what someone’s is thinking by a form of self aware mimicry (including the ability to project back to oneself the thoughts of our own ego). We read minds, just like Rothchild did with Behe at Dover. Behe made a huge faux pas and was trapped when he speculated on the witness stand he could read the mind of god. Talk about jumping a shark. Culture itself is the result of human playfulness and competition. Kasparov was convinced that the IBM team cheated on one game, when he offered up a piece he thought no machine (or its algorithms) could resist. The fact that it took 3 years before IBM released the computer move logs didn't help. Human brains have specific functional areas that are essentially 'hardwired' special processing units, this helps divide the problem of survival into smaller parallel tasks and prevents thinking out of our ases. The proposal you promote 'quantum consciousness' seems to me at this stage to be wishful thinking the scale is too small. -------------- The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

k.e Posts: 1948 Joined: Mar. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,10:53    Quote The wave function collapses and I move my pawn... -------------- The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions.These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.Haldane

Richardthughes Posts: 11178 Joined: Jan. 2006 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,11:03    Quote (k.e @ Oct. 01 2007,10:53) Quote The wave function collapses and I move my pawn... I IZ IN UR BOX PROVING UR SHROEDINGER RONG. -------------- "Richardthughes, you magnificent bastard, I stand in awe of you..." : Arden Chatfield "You magnificent bastard! " : Louis "ATBC poster child", "I have to agree with Rich.." : DaveTard "I bow to your superior skills" : deadman_932 "...it was Richardthughes making me lie in bed.." : Kristine

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,11:20    Hi Richardthughes, You wrote... Quote Deep blue isn't a good example IMHO. It's just brute force AI / search. It doesn't "strategize" but just goes so far down the exponential tree as to see the best possible futures. That being said, if our noggins were quantum computers, the "chess problem" would be no problem. Big search = no time. The wave function collapses and I move my pawn... In formalized debate circles there is a tactic called a "negative spread".  The affirmative side has the burden of forwarding a proposal.  The negative side defends the Status Quo.  The negative will generally argue the proposal's disadvantages ("It is too <fill-in-the-blank>"). For example, if the affirmative is proposing a new law, the negative could argue it is too strict compared to the status quo.  The negative could also argue it is too loose compared to the status quo (i.e. promotes anarchy).  The "negative spread" tactic is to argue every possible disadvantage in an attempt to swamp the affirmative.  This usually results in the negative arguing in opposing directions.  "Too strict" AND "Too loose" This is an inevidable outcome of debating on forums.  You are arguing the quantum mechanical brain would be too perfect while Creek Belly is arguing the quantum mechanical brain would be too imperfect without error correction. Did the 1993 version of Deep Blue think like a human or not? That being said, which "chess problem" are you refering too?  Penrose suggested a "chess problem" that differentiated algorithmic thinking from type of non-algorithmic thinking possible with quantum computers. The 1993 version of Deep Blue was purely algorithmic.  Deep Blue incorrectly moved the pawn by taking the rook.  (link) Humans can easily see the mistake using non-algorithmic thinking.  This suggests humans have built-in access to quantum computations. AI researchers are designing in quantum computers.  Any bets this will result in the "surprising" development of human-like behavor of AI machines?

Thought Provoker Posts: 530 Joined: April 2007 (Permalink) Posted: Oct. 01 2007,11:33    Hi K.E., You wrote...   Quote I see you don't think it is a conservative culture war on anti-Strausians. .....So fill us in, where you think Judge Jones got his facts wrong. I was fascinated by the Dover case.  I thought Judge Jones' handling of the case was excellent.  Judge Jones' opinion was spot-on in my opinion. As for fighting the Culture War.  I think my method has a better chance at being effective.  When 10% of the population circle the wagons, it just makes it that much easier for the 90% to wipe them out.   Quote The proposal you promote 'quantum consciousness' seems to me at this stage to be wishful thinking the scale is too small. I find it interesting you consider a proposal that includes three major scientific fields of study (cosmology, quantum physics and biology) and encompasses all life on Earth to be on a scale that is too small.

Pages: (9) < 1 2 3 4 5 [6] 7 8 9 >

Track this topic	Email this topic	Print this topic

© 2002-2009 Antievolution.org Powered by Ikonboard 3.0.2a © 2001 Ikonboard