cypress

I watched about 3/4 of it. Nothing stood out as inaccurate as far as I could see, but, as expected from a documentary, the information and explanations are one-sided. It is also a bit out of date as others have noted. It is not a balanced presentation of the facts, but if you were to go looking for all the facts, this would not be a terrible choice for a slightly dated view of the sceptic only position. If you were able to obtain a discussion from the warmists view on these same topics you may be able to make some informed inferences.

Interesting speculation but it is outside science.

How so? While there is no known way to test the idea that the material brain causes the mind, the concept of dualism is a scientific area of research with testable activity ongoing.

Therefore this can not be used as an argument against evolution by Natural selection. Science tries to make models of the physical world which can ne testified.

True and these researchers are making use of this process.

I always thought from the beginning of this thread that if there is indeed a intelligent design process then it should be outside of science so it is definitely absurd to argue against evolutionary processes using this argument. It doesn't mean that we know all evolutionary mechanisms and there are no loopholes here. We should allow both kind of investigations.

Why should it be outside of science? Seeding from alien intelligence is one testable scientific area of study consistent with this thread just as John noted previously.

People, it's pretty clear he means getting the hot molecules out of room temperature sea water and using them for energy, or rather that that can't be done.

 

Yeah, and then maybe he could write a Nature article about it:

As the article noted, there has been reasonable arguments offered that Maxwell's Demon would not violate thermal entropy laws, but my understanding of the resolution is that it would require at least an equal amount of energy to acquire the information and operate the demon. This experiment indicates that a device may be able to raise potential without imparting equal or more energy into the particle as the researchers state, but they do not address the energy cost of acquiring the particle data, processing the inputs into information and operating the demon in the process. Furthermore the paper says that information is converted into energy but was unclear on how was the information destroyed.

On this basis I have some questions.

Could you describe for me the source of the energy used to acquire the information and operate the feedback controller?

How much energy was used to construct the apparatus? How long must it operated to recover this energy investment? Will it ever recover this energy cost?

What was the total decrease in information in this system? How did it occur?

These questions not withstanding, my question dealt with conversion of information entropy to thermal entropy, while this experiment seems to address a slightly different notion of conversion of information to energy. If the experiment acquires and then destroys information, what is the net information entropy change in that cycle? Wouldn't it be zero? If not, what was the net change in thermal entropy and information entropy? What about after including the demon?

But still you can't ignore that hypothesis.

If there is no one to defend it, I don't see why not.

According to your terminology generation of information is nothing but eliminating all other possibilities and this is exactly what the physical brain is capable of doing. Even in computers the newly generated information is stored in memory before it is sent as the output. So the newly generated information is stored in brain and it clearly demonstrates the generation of new information.

It has been objectively established that information is stored and recalled from the brain, but it is not established that information is generated in the brain. It is believed that information is generated by the mind but it is not known if the mind is a manifestation of the material brain or not. It is not testable.

Again this is your problem not ours it is on you to show that in some instances biological systems require information source from somewhere else. You asked for how thermodynamic entropy substitutes for information entropy and we have demonstrated it and it is on you to show the instances where it fails.

This is a joint problem. It has not been established that the mind is separate from the material brain but it is also not established that the mind is a manifestation of the material brain alone.

I will return to your comments in your previous post next chance I have.

Here is the entire issue in a nutshell. The specific routes to spontaneously generated complex molecules in a pre-biotic world have not been established. Those arguing against you see zero problem with this: the unknown and its elucidation are what make science exciting. What we see, as in this example, is one portion of a multi-step process. Spontaneous generation of simple peptides was at one time unknown to science. There is no reason (i.e. no scientific principles prohibiting) other steps building upon these simple peptides. Your argument, at the end of the day, is merely a God of the Gaps approach. Not convincing in the slightest.

There is a difference though between something that is unknown by a particular set of postulated processes and not possible by citation to a particular set of postulated processes. When someone suggests that it may yet be possible to extract warm water from the ocean, extract heat energy from it and deposit the colder water back into the ocean and use that heat as the sole source of power, most scientifically trained persons would respond that thermal entropy laws prevent what you describe from occurring. Should this person accuse us of taking a God of the Gaps approach?

My argument is that entropy laws apply to order of all kinds, when acted on by random and deterministic processes alone. Biopolymers are very long irregular sequences that are independent of the chemic properties. Though they are irregular, they are also very specific sequences in that they fit in a rare set of sequences that form biologically active tertiary structures amongst a huge number of permutations and thus represent very low relative molecular and information entropy and cannot be formed by random and deterministic processes except by importing pre-existing order. My argument is the same argument used against the heat engine above.

Several have pointed out that biological systems increase thermal entropy continuously and this is the source of molecular and information order. I may be wrong, but thus far it has not been demonstrated that thermal order substitutes for molecular and information order. Perhaps our friend with the heat engine above will argue that information order can substitute for the thermal order his machine lacks.

You can create an activity series from this data by understanding what a metal activity series is. Did you know that in electro chemistry element to ion oxidation reduction reactions follow an order from most active lithium to least active gold? This means that the lesser active metal ion will oxidize a more active elemental metal. From this, and the data, you should be able to construct an activity series from each of the two result sets. If one of the two activity series is internally inconsistent then that data set must be wrong. If they are both internally consistent but one does not match the activity series posted online or in your chemistry text then the one that does not match is wrong.

The Prius isn't the car one would target for replacement, which I thought would be blindingly obvious, but apparently isn't. It wasn't the example I gave, so thanks for moving the goalposts of the argument (yet again).

 

 

I can't get the numbers you cite, so I will ask, AGAIN, for you to show your work.

You indicated the cost of operating an electric car now is lower than a gasoline car, not the group of the less efficient gasoline cars. The Prius is the most comparable gasoline car to the Volt. I have not move the goal post, but I am quite certain you have. Use the calculator it returns results that are very similar to mine. Use 48-51 mpg $2.00 gas .36 KW-hr/mi $0.12 KW-hr. Adjust the operating costs to be more realistic. leave the efficiencies as is or move them slightly lower to be more realistic.

It was "major overhaul," and they weren't my words — you used the term first. I quoted you when I used the term (which is why the phrase was in quotes)

 

I offered Spain and Germany because you didn't see "ANY major overhaul of economies outside the US" (emphasis added). Two is greater than zero. Giving even one example rebuts your claim. Now you change the conditions of the argument and complain that I only gave two! Moving those goalposts again.

If one consults my entire paragraph so my words are in context, it is clearer that I was addressing the entire energy market outside the US. Two countries is not a cross section of the energy market outside the US. I have not deviated from that intended meaning.

Yes, my claim was that electric power is cheaper than gasoline. I didn't claim that the TCO was less, and the fact the electric cars currently cost more doesn't change the fact that the power costs less. The statement is still correct. Those goalposts getting heavy yet?

You said, "Electricity is cheaper than gasoline for operating cars, for example". In context, operating cars is a significant modifier. Operating cars with electricity as the primary source is cheaper than operating cars with gasoline is actually a more reasonable way to interpret your words.

I have no problem with the timelines or your estimates of it but I disagree with your claim that known evolutionary processes can not account for it.

OK, I'll begin in my next post to demonstrate where experimental evidence supported by population genetic modeling illustrates the problem. Perhaps you will be able to offer evidence that overcomes the obstacles I raise. Is we proceed you can bring in the objections you summarized in your post.

If there is a resonable evidence against your hypothesis then you have to withdraw that hypothesis.

Reasonable scientific evidence, yes, philosophical arguments, no.

Well it is not my hypothesis. This hypothesis was claimed by biologists who discovered the evidence that many of the genes involved in photosynthesis had different evolutionary histories.

Since they are not here to make their case, you will have to make it for them or agree to drop this line from your argument.

Yes I never gave you an evidence for the stepwise evolution of multi-component structures but it does give us the basic glimpses of how it might happen which keeps the mechanisms of evolution based on darwinian terms unpunctured.

Then yours is a philosophical argument. We should stick to evidence.

Most biologists agree that we might never be able to show the evidence requested by Michael Behe. I suppose you understand the complexity of the task involved here.

To posit that all observed diversity is a result of evolutionary processes is a grand claim, some say it is an incredible claim. I think I have some small understanding of the complexity of the task these bombastic individuals embraced. In science one should take care when making claims they can't demonstrate.

We have to take this seriously and put a dynamic system under observation and see what the hell is going on here rather than just quarreling with each other.

There are a lot of researchers looking into what is going on. Others are summarizing and debating what the research means. I think we are in the debate.

Well it was you who raised the issue and its your claim and we are quite happy to show you that your claim is wrong or flawed. We have disproved it by giving quite reasonable arguments.

Ok I'll address this now.

Arguments based on reason alone generally take place in philosophy. I have asked for evidence and demonstration. What you described from neuroscience could be processing and storage of information as opposed to generation of the information. In computers, thermal and electrical energy is used to process and store information, but the information itself is derived and inserted by the program and systems design which come from the designer. What objective process has been offered to determine if it is the material brain alone generating information from energy? The trouble with using biological systems to attempt to argue the ability of material only processes is that it has not been demonstrably established that biological systems have material as the sole source.

Well ofcourse embryonic development doesn't invovle genetic mutation pathways and don't think that I was that stupid to give this as an evidence for an evolutionary pathway.

I don't think you are stupid, or I would likely not respond to your post at all.

This was my response to your request for examples of snapshots of evolutionary progression.

The less developed forms of the ancestors can be seen in embryonic development

People see in things what they want to see. It is a form of conformational bias.

"It is now firmly established that ontogeny does not repeat phylogeny.", George Gaylord Simpson and William S. Beck, Life: An Introduction to Biology, 1965

"The theory of recapitulation has had a great and, while it lasted, regrettable influence on the progress of embryology.", Gavin R. de Beer, Embryos and Ancestors, 1951

"Surely the biogenic law is as dead as a doornail.", Keith Stewart Thomson, "Ontogeny and Phylogeny Recapitulated," American Scientist, May-June 1988

Cypress...I thought I told you to acknowledge my post...Yes I did...Why didn't you do that?...I was sure you would have something to say after reading those 3 web-pages completely.

 

You must acknowledge everything before posting. If you do not have time now, wait until you do have time then post otherwise people will get angry and shout at you for ignoring their posts. Your will also end up being bombarded with repeated information and and comments asking if you actually understand what you are talking about.

I'm sorry ProcuratorIncendia, The links are interesting, but I don't see anything relevant in your post requiring a response. If you were to address the issues I raised directly with an explanation and use the links for support, it would be more helpful.

Carbonyl Sulphide mediated prebiotic peptide formation

 

The above link is to a paper concerning spontaneous synthesis of peptides in aqueous solution via en vitro non-enzymatic catalysis. If you're not a member of the magazine, the abstract should be enough. It shows that spontaneous, natural polymerization of amino acids is not outside the realm of possibility. Carbonyl sulphide is abundant in waters surrounding volcanic thermal vents.

Having now had a chance to review this article I am not sure if there is any significance to the fact that di and tri-peptides can be formed in oxygen free water in the presence of Carbonyl Sulphide and other specific additives. I don't see how this addresses any of the issues I raised here. Could you explain your line of thinking on this issue more clearly?

In your summary you described these di and tri peptides as "complex" but surely they are not on the same level as the biologically active polymers including proteins, RNA and DNA of which I referred. How do we justify the extension of tri-peptides to several thousand and in some cases hundreds of thousands of units long?

I'll address the other two articles later.

I should have added to my previous point that because of the range of electric cars, they are best used for commuting, which means that the gasoline mileage to which they are compared should be even lower than the average.

Gasoline hybrids like the comparable Prius are more efficient in city than the number I previously used. The Prius gets 51 mpg on city streets, so gasoline mileage basis should be raised further.

130% more expensive? Show your work, please. If we either subtract that from the gas or add the price to the electricity, electricity still cheaper. $1.19 + 0.50 = $1.69

Here is a handy online calculator. It gets results very similar to the ones I previously calculated.

To recharacterize my example of two countries as the only two is disingenuous. But wind and solar already account for more than 15% of Spain's electrical power and 8% in Germany. The fossil fuel infrastructure took many decades to install and expand (it has never really stopped), so they averaged less than 1% of the current infrastructure per year. In reality, it serves as a caution that delay is costly. Even disregarding AGW, oil won't last forever.

Obviously fossil fuel won't last forever, but that was not the point to which I objected. The time it takes to build an energy infrastructure was also not an objection of mine. You characterized energy production outside the US as undergoing a "massive overhaul" (your words), and then you offered Germany and Spain as your sole evidence. I did not mischaracterize your evidence I simply read it back to you.

Spain's solar initiative seems to be in crisis though so the story is mixed even for what I assume is your best example of countries investing themselves in alternative energy.

Plug-in electric cars will almost certainly drop in cost from the economies of scale. They're brand new.

But your claim was that for operating cars, electric power is cheaper now, but when all costs are considered, and full accounting of actual cost is made (regardless of who pays the cost), the statement is incorrect.

The topic is a debate about whether or not evolution has been verified through observation. Assuming it has not been verified when the scientific consensus is that it has; that is a fallacy

There does seem to be a modest consensus opinion among those trained in science that they believe diversity occurred by evolutionary processes but I am not sure there is a consensus that the processes are scientifically validated to produce all observed biological diversity. Most scientists when questioned, admit that the known processes are not. You are trained in chemistry, what are you willing to admit?

In the 1920's -1930's eugenics was the scientific consensus. That concept went horribly wrong in the late 30's and 40's. I don't think it is wise to judge correctness of reasoning by consensus, do you?

Cypress, will you address the articles the articles I cited above? They are all examples of new structural information arising spontaneously with simple inputs under simple and natural conditions. I realize the conversation has strayed toward an argument over "informational entropy" however I believe my examples are relevant.

Yes I will. I believe your post is thoughtful and the references are worth comment. I will return to them when I have a chance to review them carefully. I appreciate any time you might allow.

OK, so based on those numbers most people in the UK would be delighted to use electricity. Petrol here is about £1.20 per litre that's about $1.90 per litre or $6.80 per us gallon.

When transportation or road (use) taxes are included as I have done in my US example, it helps make electricity appear more competitive as you have noted. I should have backed them out, since taxes would be applied to electricity for transportation use as well. Thanks for pointing out my error. When I back out use tax, I get electricity at about 130% more expensive.

As crude oil gets less common and more expensive you will end up with the state of affairs where electricity is cheaper.

There are other major problems with electric vehicles*, but the cost of the energy isn't a big one.

 

*( The cost of energy for heating the car in cold weather is a major one which nobody looks at)

In the future relative energy costs will change no doubt, but this discussion is about today.

The problem with "I don't see" is that it is appeal to ignorance. It's amazing that the efforts of e.g. Spain and Germany to install solar power has escaped your notice.

The efforts of two counties hardly rises to the description of "massive overhaul". I would describe it more as a drop in a bucket. When outside the US, the percentage of total energy generated by fossil fuel has dropped by 5-10%, I would call that the beginning of an overhaul.

That's the problem with pulling numbers out of dark places. The Chevy Volt is rated at .36 kWh/mi, and that's a first-generation device (i.e. we might expect improvement in cars over time). Right now the CAFE standard for cars is 27.5 mpg, and yet you chose something much higher; the 42 mpg car isn't the target for initial replacement. $0.18 per kWh is much higher than the average cost of $0.12 and one would generally charge up at night, when the cost is lower than average. If we use real representative examples, it costs $1.19 for the Volt to go a gallon's worth of 27.5 miles at $.12 per kWh of electricity.

 

If we use a less conservative example and replace a 20 mpg car and charge at night when electricity is $0.10 per kWh, that's only $0.72 per equivalent gallon.

When we use a automobile that is an apple to apples comparison its not so attractive. A Prius is technologically performance and space wise similar to the Chevy volt but costs about $15,000 less to purchase. At 48 mpg and and removing highway use tax we get $2.00 per gallon (If the government decides to subsidize electric cars by not adding road tax, that is fine, but it is an artificial savings). Using $0.12 per KW-hr and 360 W-hr/mile I get the Prius at 30% less expensive to operate not including the tremendous additional initial outlay and it is turtles all the way down for the electric car. Anybody wanting to replace their standard car now with something more efficient, should purchase a hybrid and continue to use gasoline as the primary power source.

You can’t understand how it has evolved because your scale of how it works is wrong.

These multi-component structures require multiple neutral mutations to occur on both the interacting proteins which are very rare in nature but not so rare if we look at it in a scale of millions of years. Because most multiple mutations are screened off by NS.

 

Such a time scale is quite enough to accumulate information over time.

I don't think my time scale is off, though I have not spoken much about it in threads where you participated. I do agree selectable mutations are rare (research seems to confirm this) and I agree that multi-component structures require multiple neutral, unfavorable and selectable mutations by known evolutionary processes (also confirmed by research). Finally, I agree that time allows for additional probabilistic resources to provide opportunities for rare combinations to occur. However, there are two problems with making an appeal for more time.

The first issue is that evolutionary processes are also constrained by time. The geologic clock provides standard measures of the time available for these events to occur. Humans and chimps are posited to have evolved from an ape-like ancestor around 7 million years ago. Whales from a land dwelling mammal over a period of 10 million years about 50 million years ago. Both of these transformations are thought to require many thousands of substantive simultaneous or near simultaneous (even if interdependent) evolutionary pathways of tens and hundreds of steps (neutral, detrimental and selectable) based on observed and presumed genetic differences. Do you agree with these estimates and timelines? If you do do you begin to see the issue? I will contend that even a few million years is not enough time based on the measured progression of known evolutionary processes.

If you don't agree with let's take some time to agree on these points before proceeding.

I do agree that self-organization is a problem in biology.

Thank-you for that, acknowledgment is rare at this site. I don't do it as often as I would like.

No I am claiming that individual subsystems evolved independently through NS and later it might be possible that they are incorporated to the genome through Horizontal Gene Transfer in which these same individual protein complexes are used in rather different ways to produce a new function in multi-component protein complexes.

Ok we can investigate this hypothesis as well to see if it has observable support at the level where you posit these transfers are supposed to occur.

No, substitutions were made to the antibody also and their mutants were tested for different specificity. The antibody binding sites did change in some cases.

Antibody binding sites are not derived by evolutionary mechanism though as I mentioned before. To extend it as an analog for evolutionary processes is flawed. It is an interesting study of antibody to peptide binding selectivity and may well have application in immunology but I don't find this relevant to the question we are discussing.

I think Immunoglobulins are a perfect example of multi-component proteins interacting with each other. Yes the antibodies are produced using recombination of different existing peptides but it doesn’t mean that single substitutions have no role to play; in fact these single substitutions might open a whole lot of new possibilities. The antibodies are produced by linking variable regions of different peptides and the variable regions themselves might be under single substitutions and also the peptides of antibodies may co-evolve.

 

Yes the organism which carries these genes will not have the antibody in the first place but they will have the wide range of resources to produce the required antibody

They may be interesting examples of protein interactions but the processes by which these binding sites are formed are not good analogs of evolutionary processes.

We can reverse engineer it only if the previous information is conserved for example in the link which I earlier gave to you showed how it was possible for insects to develop all their abdominal legs by tweaking their genome.

 

If the parts are evolved to such extent that they are co-related in such a way that removing one part makes the entire system to fail so in this case we can not do reverse engineering and know the function of the independent part as its previous information is lost or in the sense transformed.

 

And also too much selection on populations seem to indicate that it is on the verge of extinction. Do some research on Huia birds.

 

So if you want an evidence for 4 or more selectable steps in such short period of time you wouldn’t probably get it as NS will screen it off.

First of all I reject your supposition because it follows from evolutionary theory that properly ordered backward pathways must result in organisms that are reproductively competitive in some way, but still, surely you don't believe that all or even most pathways from the recent past as short as 4 or 5 steps should be lost.

This is in response for your request for how thermodynamic entropy substitutes for information entropy.

 

I quote since it is the collective work of many biologists.

 

“I suppose you know how neurons work. The neurons will have an active potential or the membrane potential in the form of Na+ and K+ ions. When we extract information our sense organs the nerve fibers will produce an action potential i.e. influx of Na+ and out flux of K+ ions. This action potential is coupled with Ca+ ions which activates a protein there by phosporylating some regulatory proteins which acts as a feedback given to the DNA of the neurons for the incoming signal .

 

And also these Ca+ ions stimulate the synaptic vesicles to release the neurotransmitters.

These synaptic vesicles are situated in the pre-synaptic region and they release these neurotransmitters to the receptors at the post-synaptic membrane. The action potential at the other end of the post synaptic membrane depends on the

 

1. The type of gate the neurotransmitter interacting with the receptor opens up .i.e. the type of ion entering the neuron membrane.

 

2. The number of neurotransmitters which signifies the strength of the signal.

 

The feedback signal which was sent to the DNA makes sure that these membrane proteins are synthesized and transferred to the end regions of the neuron to produce the synaptic branches or synaptic nodes or basically synaptic connections.

 

These synaptic connections determine the various ways in which the neurotransmitter reacts with the receptors in the post-synaptic membrane producing a specific signal. This is nothing but fine tuning.

 

So the neurons receive all signals which are impinged on it and transform it into a single output. This output signal’s action potential is coupled to the release of Ca+ ions which regulates the movement of contractile proteins actin and myosin and they control all your locomotion from speech to the letters which I am typing here now.

 

The incoming signal from the sense organs is fine tuned by the development of synaptic branches or synaptic connections to produce a specific output signal.

 

This is learning and this is in your terminology eliminating the other possibilities. This is acquiring information.

 

This was the work of Kandel and his researchers on learning and memory.”

 

Out of the various possible ways one can regulate the movement of actin and myosin the brain a physical device gives directions on how to regulate the movement of actin and myosin by eliminating all other possible regulations and there by generating information.

 

The thermodynamic entropy is nothing but the uncertainty in the dispersal of energy and physical devices like brain can effectively decrease the dispersal of energy of its molecules which is nothing but information represented physically by acquiring energy from outside and releasing heat to the surroundings there by increasing the net entropy of the system and the surroundings.

 

Do some research in molecular neurobiology.

I will come back to this topic as it is my second issue and we may have better dialog if we stick to one at a time.

The examples are right in front of you the fact that the information in the genomes is conserved and one can see when each genome has diversified.

 

You can see the snapshots from the development of the embryos.

Biological systems contain with them pre-existing information encoded in the DNA sufficient to account for growth, development, management of cell function and reproduction and do so without any apparent net decrease in entropy. The issue comes in when one posits that new forms are derived by increasing the order and content of older forms. I don't see how embryonic development is an analog for posited evolutionary progression, it certainly does not duplicate or follow any genetic mutation pathway. Your claim above that these past pathways are lost certainly contradicts this new posit.

You were talking about entropy. Was my answer incorrect with respect to entropy?

Your answer addressed thermal entropy only. You did not demonstrate that the net increase in thermal entropy offsets net decreases in molecular and information entropy, so you answer is either incomplete or incorrect. Can you validate a irreversible thermal cycle (one with a net increase in thermal entropy) drives/results in an net increase in molecular and information order?

The idea that all biological diversity is explained by evolutionary theory is a conclusion, not the fundamental premise, which is simply that species are not fixed — they evolve. When we can investigate biological diversity, it is consistent with evolution, just when we investigate trajectories, it confirms gravity.

The claim that evolution accounts for some of the observable adaptations amongst the population within a species is accepted but it is not the topic. How is the posit that evolutionary processes account for observed diversity substantially different by describing it as if it were a conclusion? If it is a conclusion, should we then call it speculation or presupposition since it is not verified?

With gravity the observed trajectories confirm the claim, or conclusion, if you prefer that word, that an attractive force draws all mass together. With evolutionary theory there are no observations that confirm known processes generate all biological diversity.

This tread addresses the absence of evidence for all biological diversity by known evolutionary processes.

I didn't claim you were positing a creator.

That is the common meaning when one accuses another of making a "God of the Gaps" argument.

So you agree that your are using the term "functional information" in a way inconsistent with the scientific literature. Hence my understandable confusion.

No, I believe I am being consistent.

So "functional information" is merely a red herring, and we can discard that part of the discussion and continue. Yes?

No, it is significant in that my examples were of systems that contain functional information (the milling machine for example) to avoid having to endlessly discuss random strings of noise that were adequate to use in testing communication systems but are not suitable for this context.

After all inputs and outputs are considered, there is no net decrease in entropy. The Sun is a great provider of net entropic increase. A local system can decrease entropy so long as the global system increases it, and the Sun certainly provides for us.

 

I know you've claimed we need to account for the "source of low entropy information" delivered to organisms, but you have not established that this is even necessary. The Sun does not have to deliver us low-entropy bricks of magical Entropilite. It merely delivers energy, while increasing net entropy.

Biological systems require an information blueprint to replicate and to manage and control cell processes. The information is necessary.

Funny, if you replace "pollution" with "CO2," it sounds like what's going on right now.

Really? I don't see any evidence that CO2 mitigation will experience productivity gains that will offset the large increases in energy costs that will occur with a switch away from petroleum for transportation.

Considering that the "major overhaul" is already happening outside of the US, I think this is false.

I'm not seeing any major overhaul of economies outside the US. China and India are building coal fired plants at an incredible rate. The net change in CO2 production outside the US is barely noticeable. It would be hard to argue it is an overhaul.

Again, false. One does no need to rely on conjecture, since it's already happening. Electricity is cheaper than gasoline for operating cars, for example, even for green sources that are currently moderately more expensive.

I would like to see the calculations for this. If we compare similar performing vehicles I get the gasoline car at 42 miles per gallon and the electric car at .6 KW-hr/mile. Using Gas at $2.60 per gallon ( I paid $2.57 today) and electricity at $0.18 /KW-hr (I just looked at my bill), I get electric at about twice as expensive as gasoline.

You said intent was necessary for function, back in post #219. It's only logical that something cannot be a function if it was not the original intent of the designer. Or is intent not necessary for function?

I am sorry to say that you misinterpreted what I said in #219. First of all I have not referenced "original intent" and have not been concerned with it. Now you too are changing my words and meanings. In #219, I was referring to Mr. Skeptic's use of the word intent as distinct from my use and commented further on his use of it and the difficulty with that use.

How can you determine a change in information entropy if you don't know the multitude of functions for which that information can be used? For example, a change in the information might harm certain functions, but significantly improve other, unknown functions.

Cumulative change is derived using calculus. As I noted before, absolute values for entropy are not required to derive cumulative change. Surely you are aware of this, as it is common practice. Since information formulas require an understanding of the probability of the described outcomes, I'm not sure where you are going with your concerns as the considerations you describe don't seem to figure into measures of total information content and information entropy. Quite frankly, I don't see any relevance to your questions.

This is all very interesting, but it contradicts the very first scholarly definition of "functional information" that I found.

 

http://www.pnas.org/content/104/suppl.1/8574.full

 

"Degree of function" is a component of the formula. The formula is not the same as the general formula for quantity of information. And most importantly, the formula only measures functional information with respect to a specific function, not all possible functions. One cannot describe how much functional information a system has without specifying which function we are talking about.

 

You're using non-standard terminology. If you wish for us to understand your arguments, use accepted terminology, and be precise and specific with your explanations. If you want to use your own personal definitions and hypotheses, please be aware of rule 10.

I don't see the contradiction and I believe I have used the term functional and information in an appropriate sense and with proper equations but unlike the article you identified, I have not attempted to isolate functional information alone and measure the information content according to a single specified function. I feel I am being quite precise in that my argument is concerned with the total change in information entropy as a result of deriving a system that also contains functional information. My specific argument does not rest on measurement of the amount of functional information alone. Since my argument is not limited to a single function or even just the functional information, I am having difficulty understanding why you are so focused on it. I would prefer you address the issue I raised which is the change in information entropy that must occur in generating new and additional information and most importantly the source of the increased order that must come into the system or pre-exist in the system. My argument is about all the information and the order contained within the system and the inputs and outputs.

I continue to be interested in your complaint about my use of the words function and functional information, but if you will be more clear and precise about your issue, I can address that specific point.

If you could describe from evolutionary theory the source of all forms of order that allows for the decrease in system entropy after all inputs and outputs are concerned I would be grateful.

If this is the case then why do you think that complex functions having multicomponent proteins can't arise using natural processes.

They don't arise by observed evolutionary processes and I think they don't because the observed processes lack the necessary capability to derive the information required to facilitate change at this scale. Other more capable processes seem to be required. I do not know if some unknown natural processes can or can't generate these systems but thus far, no natural system has been observed with this capability.

And also it is natural selection which selects these peptides and conserves their selectivity by inducing normalization selection or functional constraints. I mean that out of the variety of different selectivities possible evolution by NS selects those confirmations which provide a benefit to the organism.

The research offered did not address natural selection. All selection in the research was done by the researchers. If you meant that natural selection is known to select for alterations in the biologically active peptides, then I would not disagree since it is established that natural selection is capable of adapting existing function to environmental changes. If you are suggesting that natural selection acts on biologically active peptides to form components of the complex multicomponent protein systems, I would be suspicious of that claim.

The paper indicated that different antibody binding sites arised by single amino acid substituions.

Am i missing something or can you describe what process you are talking about.

If I understood the paper correctly, the substitutions were made to the peptide sequences but the antibody binding sites remained unchanged. However what I intended to say was that because the research involved an antibody and because antibodies are derived by processes that are not similar to evolutionary processes, the antibody is not a good analog to gene derived protein binding sites.

Well you can not expect evo by NS to produce a mouse trap at one go. The individual subsystems are not basically designed with an intent to build the overall complete multi-molecular system. The subsystem provide an evolutionary advantage or a function to the organism priorly which is in no way related to the evolved new function.

Yours is the traditional description of evolutionary progression which require stepwise pathways where the forward steps are advantageous over the previous steps given the environmental conditions in place when each step occurs and propagates. But if this were the case, then we should have observed several short 5-10 step evolutionary pathways in the 70 year search, and more to the point, researchers should be able to reverse engineer multitudes of these past pathways.

Well lack of evidence does'nt mean that the process does not works. No one has disproved it that it will never work by that way.

I'm not so sure. Devices that violate entropy laws also lack evidence that they function as described and those who promote them make this same argument on the basis that one cannot disprove the claim since improbable events can occur. In the evolutionary narrative, natural selection is ascribed capabilities similar to that of Maxwell's Demon. It is assigned a fitness function that slopes smoothly upward but no one ever bothers to explain what physical law allowed for this specific shape of function that allows it to override entropy laws as applied to order of all kinds.

The article clearly indicates that there are a series of neutral muations followed by a single big substitution which changes the confirmation between the peptides and if anyone wants to look at an evolutionary pathway of 4 or more selectable steps then they need those neutral mutations as it seems that the history of the organism or a population determines its future existence. So what we only see are the snapshots of evo by NS acting on the organism and conserving or accumulating the design.

Describing the alterations as an evolutionary pathway with selectable steps is incorrect since the antibody - peptide pairings do not appear to be biologically active and seem to be artifacts of the the research. Im fine with the idea of neutral steps in an evolutionary pathway but I don't know of any examples of snapshots of evolutionary progression as you have described. This article is interesting but it is clearly not an example of an evolutionary pathway.

But the poetry wasn't part of the original intent of the designer of the system.

Your example is hypothetical, were it an actualized or real example, would we know or even need to know the intent of the designer in order to calculate information content? Would it matter what the designer's intent was? I don't see any component in the formulas for intent. The measure of information does not seem to be a function of designer's intent.

Does this mean we'd have to discover every possible function of a piece of information before we could quantify how much functional information it contains? That seems impossible.

Determining every possible (energy, molecular, or information) state or outcome and then comparing the set of states that contains the current state but are otherwise probabilistically indeterminate from the current state to all the possibilities is perhaps one method of calculating the absolute value of entropy and then from that calculating the measure of absolute internal energy or molecular configuration or information, but I am not convinced that it is the only method. As you noted, the absolute entropy of a system is very difficult to determine, thus it is more useful to discuss changes in information entropy and changes in information. Should we say that entropy is not a useful concept since we don't know the absolute value of entropy in the universe? Clearly this is not the approach that is being taken.

Also, how constrained is "function"? We could say that "functional" information creates a functional system... but how functional must it be? For example, the human genome encodes certain functional information that results in allergic reactions, which can kill you. Also, suppose a gene that metabolizes something important is mutated and now merely uses up the cell's energy. Couldn't we call that its "function"? If not, why not? We can't argue that it's not functional because it doesn't benefit the cell, because the genes that cause your anaphylactic shock certainly are functional, but they kill you. We can't argue that it's not functional because it doesn't make anything, because it could quite possibly be making some complex protein the cell doesn't need.

I am surprised to learn that you don't understand what it means for a system to be functional vs. damaged or have diminished function. This question was raised before and answered. The answer resulted in Skeptic's attempt to change the meaning of my use of the word intent. But I am having difficulty understanding the relevance of the line of question in the first place. The information formulas do not contain a variable for degree of function so I am your critical approach makes no sense. It seems more of a diversion from the primary issue which is change in information entropy at the system level.

Damage or improvement to function only enters (indirectly) into the the measure if the change that results in damage or improvement represent changes in the probability of the set of outcomes that includes the actualized outcome, but since it is the probability that is important and not the degree of function of this outcome set, we need not consider degree of function. Random noise introduced into a closed ordered systems (including information sets) when integrated over the number of interactions, results in reduction in order and an increase in probability of the set of indistinguishable states. This is the very meaning of the entropy law. The only known ways to increase order of a system is to introduce additional order into the system or remove disorder from the system.

So, who draws the barrier for function?

Since function is not a component of the equations, as I described above, it seems irrelevant to the issue. Anyone can but it will make no difference. Physical laws simply don't care who defines what, they are what they are.

So then the amount of functional information is equal to the amount of regular information? That doesn't make sense.

The total amount of information is equal to the amount of information regardless of its kind. As described above there seems to be no need to split it out in order to make my point about entropy laws as applied to all order in this universe including information and molecular order.

What about the energy required to generate the mass of the universe and to displace the volume that the universe displaces? The energy balance seems to consider gravitation and kinetic energy but I don't see an accounting of internal energy (enthalpy).

I would also be interested in your response to this question I posed to you earlier.

If we should be concerned about 3-4 degree effects and since we know that natural forces are capable of effects between +6 and -12 degrees, if planning to avoid climate change is as critical as some suggest, would it not make more sense to attempt to override these far more potent natural drivers?

Right, but that doesn't answer the question. Suppose, perhaps, I have milling machine instructions that can also function as rather excellent poetry, or descriptive text that also functions as the key to an encryption algorithm. The amount of "functional" information is different depending on the purpose for which I use the information; for example, some of the milling machine instructions might make terrible poetry, but a large chunk in the middle has won several awards from literary journals.

Information that simultaneously describes multiple outcomes or states is more informative than information that describes only one by virtue of the formula. Your example of functional information that also describes poetry contains more information than an alternate instruction set that describes the milling machine outcome.

Given the vagueness of your definition, I'd suggest a formula. Could you perhaps try?

Previously offered. Here it is once again. Information is a description of state or outcome. The amount of information, I = -logP where P is the probability of the set of outcomes or states described by the information. The formula is unchanged regardless of the kind of information being measured.

Gravity makes grand claims as well, but we do not do experimentation to confirm that it explains the trajectory of every object in freefall. You see a rock fall, or has fallen, but cannot actually prove that it was gravity that acted upon it. Yet it is not unreasonable to accept that it did, because of other experimentation. However, it is not guaranteed that any historical incident involving gravity will leave sufficient evidence that would confirm Newton's equation, because there is no guarantee that evidence will persist. It is an unreasonable demand to require it.

We have done and continue to do several experiments to confirm that the theory of gravity explains observed trajectories, and every time the experiment is done properly, the theory is confirmed. Near my home is a Gravitational Wave Observatory. It has existed for about 20 years now. The purpose is to confirm the presence of gravitational waves as predicted by the modern theory of general relativity as applied to gravity. Thus far they have not succeeded. The theory of gravity does make grand claims and but it's grandest claims are confirmed while some of the implications are still yet to be understood.

Evolution, the idea that idea that all biological diversity is explained by evolutionary theory, its fundamental premise, the basic idea, has yet to be demonstrated, and this is very different than the case of gravitational theory who's basic idea is confirmed, and is in fact confirmed daily by students across the world.

Your attack on evolution is reminiscent of the "god of the gaps" argument. It is intellectually bankrupt.

You are changing my argument and committing a logical fallacy, which is unusual for you. I am not saying that because evolution has not been confirmed therefore there is a creator who made life and caused all diversity. Is there something wrong with admitting where we are at with a theory,and on that basis, suggest that other avenues be explored?

If on the other hand I am wrong and there have been numerous four and greater step evolutionary pathways verified, I would like to review them. If someone has verified that material processes alone acting on a system do generate higher molecular and information order as measured by probability and entropy when inputs and outputs are considered (sorry pioneer, crystals are not examples of this, I bet if you went through the equations you would see why) I would be interested in that verification also.

When a backyard engineer offers a design for an engine that violates entropy laws as applied to thermodynamics, we dismiss him, we don't say, "wait perhaps some day he will show how entropy laws don't apply to his device", but when the subject is molecular order and the information encoded into the sequences of molecules unencumbered by the deterministic nature of chemical bonding affinities many here wish to give the idea that formation of these sequences can occur spontaneously over time by natural processes without due consideration or even an inkling of source for the massive increase in molecular and information order, a pass. They want to imagine that thermodynamic order, the distribution of energy among the discrete states can magically be substituted for molecular order, the distribution of molecules among spacial dimension, or information order, the distribution of syntactical characters amongst the discrete set of characters containing the information, but they don't want to have to demonstrate that it is acualized.

Even if one were to accept that burden of proof, how could one support the claim in light of your failing to provide adequate definitions of terms like functional information, or intent? Is a waterfall functional?

I have provided adequate definitions for functional information by way of formulas, descriptions, and examples and I described what I intended when I chose the word intent. The fact that Skeptic chose a meaning other than I intended is on him to explain. I predict skeptic will continue to shirk the responsibility, but to insist that I prove a claim I that was thrust upon me by a poster who chose a different meaning seems silly. Skeptic made the claim that function does not require intent and I called him on it. He will, in all likelihood, not answer the call but instead continue to shift the burden to others or change up what he meant by intent as he did in his most recent post.

"Not been demonstrated" is an easy claim when you are free to move the bar of what you consider to be a demonstration, or hold evolution to a different standard than other aspects of science, or make claims implying that evolution violates the laws of thermodynamics or nonexistent laws of information theory.

The real issue is that Evolutionary theory makes an incredible grand claim that it explains all of biological diversity and the reality is that advocates of the theory, despite the hundred and fifty plus years attempting to do so, are unable to demonstrate this grand claim. Others are fond of pointing out that incredible claims require incredible evidence and this evidence seems to be missing.

cypress, could you point me to some peer-reviewed literature in which the definition of "functional information" is discussed? Perhaps that will answer our questions.

Help me understand the precise question you have. Provide me more information so I can narrow down my search. Help me focus on the precise issue rather than all of the possible issues that exist. Show me where you don't get that an an instruction manual or the programming in a computer control system are examples of functional information, whereas a weather report eliminates alternatives, and is therefore information, but it is not directly functional. With good understanding of your specific issue I may be able to help you.

We believe that electrons have a spin moment because empirical measurements indicate that the electron has an intrinsic angular momentum and an intrinsic magnetic field. What is not known is the precise cause of these intrinsic properties. Magnetism of a substance seems to be the result of alignment of the angular moments of the electrons that are unmatched by electrons with an opposite "spin".

One popular explanation is that the electron's mass and spin have an electromagnetic origin. If the spin has electromagnetism as its origin, then we could say that spin is a result of the angular momentum of the electromagnetic field. Furthermore the electron would be the smallest magnet.

if the electron is an electromagnetic field with an angular moment (as opposed to a photon which seems to be a traveling electromagnetic field) and has apparent mass due perhaps to its standing nature, if the angular moment stops, it would cease to be an electron.

On the contrary, the thread is entitled "Evolution has never been observed," and you have taken up the banner of that contention, so any claim about design is what needs to be supported. Plus, your defense using the claim that we can assume functional design is yet another logical fallacy, using circular logic.

The discussion regarding intent was independent of the broader thread context which as you noted is Evolution has never been observed. My contention that evolution (the idea that evolutionary processes account for all observed biological diversity) has not been established, is the what I need to support. Skeptic on the other hand claimed that function does not require intent. He offered no support for his claim and I'm fairly certain that he never will. Only to illustrate the challenge skeptic is facing with his speculation, did I responded as I did.

I am quite willing to support the claims I make including that evolutionary theory has not been demonstrated. Two of the many issues that have been described here are one, the incongruence evolutionary theory has with the wider sense of entropy laws and the tendency to disorder of all physical systems under the influence of random processes for all kinds of order when inputs and outputs are included, and two, the fact that evolutionary pathways greater than 3 steps have not been confirmed despite the rigorous experimental attempts to discover them and the fact that if the theory is correct as posited, there would have to be millions and millions of pathways many thousands of steps in length.