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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 17:19
Post by Schroedinger's Dog
Quote
lastyearon, you seem to be unaware that science as we know it would not exist but for the “Christian stuff.”

Well, somehow, he's kind of right. Without the "Christian stuff", we'd probably be 500 to 1000* years ahead of where we are now...



*these numbers are being pulled straight off my ass, but I remember seing an estimate about the scientific "dark age" caused by religion which was somewhere within these numbers.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 17:14
Post by midwifetoad
Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Aug. 31 2010,11:20)30 August 2010
On the Vastness of the Universe
by Half-vast Barry Arrington  :D
Quote 22
lastyearon
08/31/2010
11:03 am
This is a science blog, no? Why all the Christian stuff?

23
Barry Arrington
08/31/2010
11:21 am
lastyearon, you seem to be unaware that science as we know it would not exist but for the “Christian stuff.”
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 16:59
Post by DiEb
Another take on the Horizontal No Free Lunch Theorem. R0b made I comment along these lines, I think...
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 16:20
Post by Tracy P. Hamilton
30 August 2010
On the Vastness of the Universe
by Half-vast Barry Arrington  
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 15:16
Post by midwifetoad
You missed the sign in three foor high neon letters that said, "Don't Push This Button"?
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 14:53
Post by Schroedinger's Dog
Quote (midwifetoad @ Aug. 31 2010,15:35) Quote markf could you please go out tonight and look up at stars and planets??? ,,, then could you reach down and pick up a grain of sand???,,, and then could you look at the grain of sand??? and Then could you look at the stars again??? repeat a few times,,, and then let this thought sink in,,, If that grain of sand did not exist, out of all the grains of sand in the universe, you would not exist!!!

http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelli....-362853

I thought BA was on the wagon.
hey Midwifetoad! tard landmines are strictly forbiden! I just clicked the link and then had to waist a few minutes at my neurones' funerals!

Bad Toadey!
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The Bathroom Wall

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 14:50
Post by Kattarina98
Quote (Schroedinger's Dog @ Aug. 31 2010,08:08)For those who can read french or have a good translator, I found this interesting bit about debate tactics:

debate logics
  Quote Mon père et ma mère déclarent que la tisane d'excréments d'oies est bonne pour les migraines.


Haha! This is you:
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 14:35
Post by midwifetoad
Quote markf could you please go out tonight and look up at stars and planets??? ,,, then could you reach down and pick up a grain of sand???,,, and then could you look at the grain of sand??? and Then could you look at the stars again??? repeat a few times,,, and then let this thought sink in,,, If that grain of sand did not exist, out of all the grains of sand in the universe, you would not exist!!!

http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelli....-362853

I thought BA was on the wagon.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 14:32
Post by Kattarina98
Quote (DiEb @ Aug. 31 2010,09:12)Just for archiving: I added this comment to B. Arrington's post..
  Quote Just for something completely different: The thread on the new paper of R. Marks II and W. Dembski <i>A Search for the Search</i> doesn't allow for commenting. I suppose that there is quite an interest in discussing this paper here at Uncommon Descent. Can't the thread be opened for comments? Or can another post be created for the discussion? Thanks!
You might consider posting it on Corny's blog. He doesn't censure comments.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 14:12
Post by DiEb
Just for archiving: I added this comment to B. Arrington's post..
Quote Just for something completely different: The thread on the new paper of R. Marks II and W. Dembski <i>A Search for the Search</i> doesn't allow for commenting. I suppose that there is quite an interest in discussing this paper here at Uncommon Descent. Can't the thread be opened for comments? Or can another post be created for the discussion? Thanks!
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The Bathroom Wall

AE Public Forum - Tue, 2010-08-31 13:36
Post by Louis
Quote (Schroedinger's Dog @ Aug. 31 2010,14:08)[SNIP]

Does it show that I'm bored today?
Noooooo. No. No. No. Not at all. Perish the very thought. No.

Well.

Maybe a bit.

Louis
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 23:35
Post by Wesley R. Elsberry
Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ Aug. 30 2010,06:09)I took some notes during Dembski's lecture at UCSD back on 2001/04/25. Dembski ran through his "search for a search" idea there.

      Quote

    Quote

So what about the Darwinian mechanism?
Dembski at this point mentioned NFL, and asserted that DM suffers from a "displacement problem".

If we are told that a buried treasure exists on an island, how do we find it?  Blind search doesn't work; can't dig up every spadeful of an island to find the treasure.

So, the DM is equivalent to finding the tresure map that leads to the treasure.  But you have to pick the *right* treasure map out of the collection of treasure maps.  This search is even more intractable than the original search.




I think Dembski is way off base here.  The "treasure map" is Dembski's analogy to a fitness function for a problem.  In biology, there is no "search" for the fitness function; it is inherent in the configuration of the environment.  For a GA solving a TSP, for example, a fitness function is provided, not searched for, and the biology shows no such "search" process as Dembski discusses.



That's from an email I sent out on 26 Apr 2001.

And that's still the case, so far as I can tell, with the current work. Dembski and Marks go to a great deal of trouble to tell us that environments have information, and that algorithms exploit that information in order to find solutions relevant to that environment. If one doesn't provide an algorithm with the fitness function that is the stand-in for an environment, the algorithm can't find a solution. It's one big "Duh".
  Quote (DiEb @ Aug. 30 2010,08:38)There are two possible ways to argue with cargo cultists: the first is to dismiss the whole cult ( It's one big "Duh"), the second is to show problems within the practice. In this venue, I try to show to them that they got their signals wrong....

English may not be your native tongue, so some distinctions in colloquial English may be appropriate.

A dismissal is consistently bereft of supporting argument. One often dismisses a position as an effort-saving measure, where one doesn't actually produce an argument as to why that position is not worth considering, but trusts that one's audience will agree as to the worthlessness of the position in question.

An assessment, on the other hand, is a summary of the effect of previously-given argumentation.

I've quoted my post that you took the quote from. The post does not support terming "It's one big 'Duh'," as a dismissal. The context argues that it is, in fact, an assessment.

I'll note that you don't have to agree with an argument to recognize that one has been given.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 23:25
Post by Pilchard
O'Leary Quote The fact is that monkeys and humans do not behave similarly in key ways, as should be obvious. Otherwise, why are they in our zoos and we are not in theirs?Has she not seen Planet of the Apes?
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 20:30
Post by fnxtr
Quote (Henry J @ Aug. 30 2010,10:18) Quote That's a pretty big target and lots of ways to get there.
Dinner, movie, chocolate, flowers, wine, jewelry, that sort of thing?
Small town + bored teenagers.  Heat and serve.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 17:40
Post by dvunkannon
Quote (tsig @ Aug. 30 2010,12:52) Quote (dvunkannon @ Aug. 30 2010,10:54)Googling about, I stumbled across a reprint of Michael Polanyi's "Life's Irreducible Structure"

http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1970/JASA12-70Polanyi.html

Direct from 1968, the mother lode of all ID thinking.

Gotta love this quote:

    Quote It is this physical indeterminacy of the [DNA] sequence that produces the improbability of occurrence of any particular sequence and thereby enables it to have a meaning-a meaning that has a mathematically determinate information content equal to the numerical improbability of the arrangement.


if Michael Polanyi can slide from 'meaning' to Shannon information to -log2 p (in the pages of Science, no less), how are you going to stop all of his followers?

Well worth the read to see all of the tropes on display.
I see that Dr D squared stold all his ideas from M. P.
Quote Only be sure always to call it please 'research'.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 17:18
Post by Henry J
Quote That's a pretty big target and lots of ways to get there.
Dinner, movie, chocolate, flowers, wine, jewelry, that sort of thing?
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 16:52
Post by tsig
Quote (dvunkannon @ Aug. 30 2010,10:54)Googling about, I stumbled across a reprint of Michael Polanyi's "Life's Irreducible Structure"

http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1970/JASA12-70Polanyi.html

Direct from 1968, the mother lode of all ID thinking.

Gotta love this quote:

  Quote It is this physical indeterminacy of the [DNA] sequence that produces the improbability of occurrence of any particular sequence and thereby enables it to have a meaning-a meaning that has a mathematically determinate information content equal to the numerical improbability of the arrangement.


if Michael Polanyi can slide from 'meaning' to Shannon information to -log2 p (in the pages of Science, no less), how are you going to stop all of his followers?

Well worth the read to see all of the tropes on display.
I see that Dr D squared stold all his ideas from M. P.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 16:01
Post by fnxtr
Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ Aug. 30 2010,04:09)I took some notes during Dembski's lecture at UCSD back on 2001/04/25. Dembski ran through his "search for a search" idea there.

    Quote

  Quote

So what about the Darwinian mechanism?
Dembski at this point mentioned NFL, and asserted that DM suffers from a "displacement problem".

If we are told that a buried treasure exists on an island, how do we find it?  Blind search doesn't work; can't dig up every spadeful of an island to find the treasure.

So, the DM is equivalent to finding the tresure map that leads to the treasure.  But you have to pick the *right* treasure map out of the collection of treasure maps.  This search is even more intractable than the original search.




I think Dembski is way off base here.  The "treasure map" is Dembski's analogy to a fitness function for a problem.  In biology, there is no "search" for the fitness function; it is inherent in the configuration of the environment.  For a GA solving a TSP, for example, a fitness function is provided, not searched for, and the biology shows no such "search" process as Dembski discusses.



That's from an email I sent out on 26 Apr 2001.

And that's still the case, so far as I can tell, with the current work. Dembski and Marks go to a great deal of trouble to tell us that environments have information, and that algorithms exploit that information in order to find solutions relevant to that environment. If one doesn't provide an algorithm with the fitness function that is the stand-in for an environment, the algorithm can't find a solution. It's one big "Duh".
If you survive long enough to get laid, your genes get to stay in the game until the next round.  

That's a pretty big target and lots of ways to get there.

I have a hard time seeing how Dr2's number-juggling has any connection with reality.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 15:56
Post by Kattarina98
Quote (carlsonjok @ Aug. 27 2010,18:44)... We get an interesting glimpse into Barry's second job as the treasurer of MichelePAC, ...
ID followers know that scientists are just arrogant elitists without a clue. But now we find out that B. Arrington despises specialists in general - or why did he develop Bachmann's site without the help of a graphic designer? This is the crappiest site I've seen for quite some time.
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Uncommonly Dense Thread 3

AE Public Forum - Mon, 2010-08-30 15:54
Post by dvunkannon
Googling about, I stumbled across a reprint of Michael Polanyi's "Life's Irreducible Structure"

http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1970/JASA12-70Polanyi.html

Direct from 1968, the mother lode of all ID thinking.

Gotta love this quote:

  Quote It is this physical indeterminacy of the [DNA] sequence that produces the improbability of occurrence of any particular sequence and thereby enables it to have a meaning-a meaning that has a mathematically determinate information content equal to the numerical improbability of the arrangement.


if Michael Polanyi can slide from 'meaning' to Shannon information to -log2 p (in the pages of Science, no less), how are you going to stop all of his followers?

Well worth the read to see all of the tropes on display.
Categories: AE Public BB
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