Morphing Flight: Beyond Irreducible Complexity

www.apologeticspress.org ^ | Jan1,2011 | by Jerry Fausz, Ph.D.

[kimtom]

Researchers and observers have long recognized that birds and various other flying creatures change the positioning of their body structures in flight in order to perform specific maneuvers or adjust their aerodynamic profile to accommodate changing flight conditions. This adaptive orientation of body shape has been dubbed “morphing” in the popular literature. The words “morph” and “morphing” are actually digressive forms of the word “metamorphosis,” which derives from the Greek “meta” (to change) and “morfe” (form). This is an apt description of the ability that birds possess to change the form or geometry of their bodies for increased maneuverability, as well as for stable flight in a wide variety of ambient conditions.. ...This capability has always been respected and often mimicked by aircraft engineers to the extent that it has been technologically possible to do so. Furthermore, bird observations have often inspired technological advancement in aircraft ......

[celmak]

"Personally I hold the view that neo-Darwinism implies intelligent design"

to say this in a government high school would get you fired.

[CottShop]

[[No, criticizing a theory on the basis of a priori probability estimates, which is what ID folk, do is not science: a priori probability estimates are neither falsifiable nor verifiable.]]

Which is antoher fancy way of stating “Mathematicval odds against evoltuion are devestating, so We’ll just ignore them and ridicule thsoe who attempt to use them as beign unscientific- but hte problem is that it wasn’t the ‘ID Folks’ who did the improbability odds i nthe first place, it was the world’s leading scientists in several symposiums/conferences throughout hte years-

Demski’s mathematics clearly show that anyhting over 10 to the 1050’tth power is mathematically impossible, A single cell evolvign from chemicals is calculated at odds of 10 to the 4,478,296’th power- thsi is scientifically devestating to the idea of evoltuion, and so of course the only recourse left is to ridicule methematics as ‘not beign ‘REAL science’ and ridiculing htose who point ot such such scientific evidence as being ‘unscientific’

Even when hteir own scientists coem out with devestatigfn evidence against the hypothesis of macroevolution, they dismiss it- You can’t argue with folsk liek that

[kimtom]

“...”

I am glad you are not taking MY words apart.....

[CottShop]

Basically I think he’s tryign to say that ‘complexity is a reality in the universe, but it coudl have happened naturally, with a nudge here and htere by an intelligent designer- Basically complexity theory is wordy diatribe describign theistic evolution fro m what I can gather-

[CottShop]

not sure hwat you mean by that? Did I take soemone’s words apart?

[CottShop]

did he not ridicule ID scientists as beign unscientific? The probability estimates he was dismissing are the mathematical probability estimates laid out by leadign mathematical scientists and professors and he’s telling us we shouldn’t do that because ‘it’s not science’- that is a purjorative remark- espcecially when it was secular scientists that came up with the probability estimates showing that it is impossible- It grinds against the hypothesis of macroevolution, and therefore we’re cosntantly eign told it’s ‘not real science’ and that ID scientists and advocates aren’t ‘real scientists’ and ReaderDavid did just that in his statements-

[kimtom]

“..because ‘it’s not science’...”

Actually, I get this from many theistic and typical evolutionist.

They DON”T own the facts, They are NOT smarter than I (though they may be expertise in their fields) and I can see the evidence for myself.

We are all Bias.....but which side would you rather be on, the other side of eternity?

[kimtom]

post 22 and 19.

check your key strokes :)

[CottShop]

[[check your key strokes :)]]

No time for that- too busy, too little time unfortunately, my mistakes are far too many to go through- I do apologize for the horrendous spelling sowem fo which is due to condition, while the rest is due to sloppiness

[kimtom]

“[[check your key strokes :)]]

No time for that- too busy, too little time unfortunately, my mistakes are far too many to go through- I do apologize for the horrendous spelling sowem fo which is due to condition, while the rest is due to sloppiness
..”

Well, it is what you SAY that counts anyhow... :)

[CottShop]

[[We are all Bias.....but which side would you rather be on, the other side of eternity? ]]

I’m on the only side that is supoported by the facts- creation- Eternity is fasr too long to gamble on some godless hypothesis which contradicts it’s own laws of nature-

[[I am glad you are not taking MY words apart.....]]

I guess I do have a habit of puttign someone’s words into different contexts- But basically, the complexity theory is nothign but an attempt to rule God out of the equation (or to delegate Him to an inconsequential role) regardign creation and irreducible complexity-

I wasn’t familair with Kolmogorov so whgat little reasearch I’ve doen it appears that his theory is quite a bit different than Sahannon’s law- or shannon entropy- Both are a means of measuring infomration,

William Demski seems to have refuted the idea that complexitiy doesn’t need an itnelligent designer in his ‘specified complexity’ theory in his No Free Lunch: Why Specified Complexity Cannot Be Purchased without Intelligence

[CottShop]

I’m not sure, I’m gonnah ave otl ook into this more later tonight- but the argtument of kolomonov and folskl iek Shallit seem to be that there is in ‘icnrease in information’ when a cell splits-

To simplify, Wells said “duplicating a gene doesn’t increase information content any more than photocopying a paper increases its information content.”

Shallit seems to say that htere is an increase in information because now you have two sheets of paper (even though they have the very same ifnromation content) because it takes more commands to describe the photocopied information (Not sure how he coems up with htis idea)

the following appears to be key to discounting kolmonov compelxity and oen I’ll hjave to think more abotu tonight

“A useful measure of biological information must account for the function of the information, and Kolmogorov information does not necessarily take function into account”

[CottShop]

here’s the link http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/10/jonathan_wells_hits_an_evoluti026791.html

Forgot to includei t in last post for the quote I posted

[kimtom]

“...But basically, the complexity theory is nothign but an attempt to rule God out of the equation ..”

ah, which is the goal.

So, evolutionist need intelligence (design) to counter God, so the come up with equations (math-intelligent) to explain the complexity in design(?)

Philosophical arguments, which scientist do use, cannot be won is the ID debate. But their hope is in Math, like genome was to Biology.

In this case God is in the details......... ;0

[kimtom]

have to look at it tonight...”

ok

the paper illustration is a good one, you can increase info, but really it is only duplicating, not creating new......

[editor-surveyor]

The statistically determined total improbability of evolution certainly has nothing to do with Kolmogorov.

Impossible is a real world state.

[CottShop]

[[you can increase info, but really it is only duplicating, not creating new......]]

ThaT’S what I got too from just a quick cursory look at it

[[So, evolutionist need intelligence (design) to counter God, so the come up with equations (math-intelligent) to explain the complexity in design(?)]]

Yes, but they either ascribe the intelligence to nature, or to God just ‘helping hte process of macroevolution over the more difficult humps’ (in other words, it’s no longer macroevolution, but God superceeding natural laws- but only on a limitted basis because apparently He was too lackign in power to actually create everythign fully formed, and apaprently He liekd watchign things suffer and die when they kept tryign to becoem ‘more complete’ with every new mutation

[[Philosophical arguments, which scientist do use, cannot be won is the ID debate.]]

Exactly- the whoel process of Macroevolution is based on philisophical beleifs, but when an ID scientist itnerjects belief, well then, ‘they aint bein scientificable’

[[but really it is only duplicating, not creating new......]]

Which was the flaw in the kolomogrov model of complexity- it simpyl didn’t mimic biological life- it’s fien when you use it for somethign in which new information isn’t added to the equation, however, however, evoltuion absolutely requires the aquisition of new “Non species specific information’ (my term)- the only way for one species to evolve into another is via the gainign of information NOT specific to that species, and hte only way for htis to happen is via lateral gene transference (whcih can and does happen, but only between one species KIND- bacterai are able to laterally transfere their genes- A Spider moneky and a spider are not able to do so)

from the Article I linked to in previous post [[In rough terms, Shannon information or Kolmogorov information measure complexity, but not specification.]]

Reader David i nthis thread seemed to be extrapolating kolmogorov complexity out to include irreducible complexity. I don’t know if Reader David conciders mere duplications to be a mechanism for ‘creating’ ‘irreducibly complex structures’ in nature or not? It’s pretty clear though that it isn’t- No NEW FUNCTION alien to the particular species or cell has been created by mere duplication-

From the Article [[Specified complexity is a much better measure of biological complexity than Shannon complexity or Kolmogorov complexity because it recognizes the highly specified nature of biological complexity.

This is a point that Shallit must resist recognizing because it’s much harder to generate specified complexity via Darwinian processes than mere Shannon complexity or Kolmogorov complexity]]

The bottom line so far appears to be ‘Both Shannon theory information and kolgoromov comoplexity are irrelevent when discussion irreducible complexity as it pertains to the biological process

Below you will find a question posed by Mike Egnor (who was cited at hte ned of the article previously linked to) which asks a simpel question on a science blog of all places, and he gets no answers- He asked “How much new specified information can random variation and natural selection generate?”

At the end he states “I searched for an actual measurement of the amount of new information that a Darwinian process can generate, and I got an article on ‘cattle faeces’. I love little ironies.”

[[http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/02/egnors_unanswered_questions003233.html]]

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[CottShop]

according to William Demski- Math Genius, he claims “Probabilities by themselves, however, are not information measures. Although probabilities properly distinguish possibilities according to the information they contain, nonetheless probabilities remain an inconvenient way of measuring information.”

All quotes will be fro mthe following link: http://users.fred.net/tds//anti/william.dembski/wd_idtheory.htm

He then goes on to explain why in terms that cause a mini-stroke in my brain

Basically he coems ot hte same conclusio nas the previous articles I linked to concluded- that duplicates, while beign ‘more’ information, are NOT NEW Specified Complexity Information- they are mere duplications

“For an example in the same spirit consider that there is no more information in two copies of Shakespeare’s Hamlet than in a single copy.”

“The obvious difference between the two scenarios is of course that in the first the information follows no pattern whereas in the second it does. Now the information that tends to interest us as rational inquirers generally, and scientists in particular, is not the actualization of arbitrary possibilities which correspond to no patterns, but rather the actualization of circumscribed possibilities which do correspond to patterns.”

kolmogorov and apparently reader david beleive that mere duplication of random configurations of informaiton are enoguh to qualify for the title of Irreducibly Complex Information- however, a string of randomly assembled letters has nothign about it htta is irreducibly complex, it could lose any letter and still be nothign more than an incoherent conglomeration of random letters whereas if a guided set of letters were to lose it’s key irreducibly complex parts, it woudl cease being a viable word or sentence (much lkie most of my posts)

In demski’s example that follows, you’ll note that one event doesn’t contain the information that an observe needs in roder to derive a conclusion other than ‘It hits the wall randomly’ whiel the secodn scenario has the information necessary for an observer to make an intelligent observation abotu hte skills of the archer

“To see this, consider a third scenario in which an archer shoots at a wall. As before, we suppose the archer stands 50 meters from a large blank wall with bow and arrow in hand, the wall being so large that the archer cannot help but hit it. And as in the first scenario, the archer shoots at the wall while it is still blank. But this time suppose that after having shot the arrow, and finding the arrow stuck in the wall, the archer paints a target around the arrow so that the arrow sticks squarely in the bull’s-eye. Let us suppose further that the precise place where the arrow lands in this scenario is identical with where it landed in the first two scenarios. Since any place where the arrow might land is highly improbable, in this as in the other scenarios highly complex information has been actualized. What’s more, since the information corresponds to a pattern, we can even say that in this third scenario highly complex patterned information has been actualized. Nevertheless, it would be wrong to say that highly complex specified information has been actualized. Of the three scenarios, only the information in the second scenario is specified. In that scenario, by first painting the target and then shooting the arrow, the pattern is given independently of the information. On the other hand, in this, the third scenario, by first shooting the arrow and then painting the target around it, the pattern is merely read off the information.”

Kolmogorov seems to be applyign hte third scenario- painting the bullseye aroudn the landing point (or the assembly of letters) and making a hindsight comclusion that the archer ‘must have meant to hit that exact spot and hterefore the ‘after the fact added information’ amounts to irreduciblyu complex information (but the fact is that this added info could be removed and the arrow woudl still have been in that same spot whether it was itnentioned or not)- Kolmorogov is readign a pattern by adding information that wasn’t htere to begin with it seems - Fabricatign information after the fact adds nothign to our knowledge abotu what the archer intended- Demski nails it with hte following statement

“The fact that the target in the third scenario constitutes a pattern makes no difference since the pattern is constructed entirely in response to where the arrow lands. Only when the pattern is given independently of the arrow’s flight does a hypothesis other than chance come into play.”

Basically Kolgoromov saw where the arrow landed, painted a bullseye aroudn it, and claimed “See- that is naturally occurign naturally designed irreducible complexity”

I’m not exactly sure, but it seems the kolomogorv is saying that a species becoems iurreducibly compelx after you remove every non essential part and leave just thosep arts absoltuely necessary forl ife- goign any further woudl result in death (like removing the heart, or brain, or lungs etc) A species can live without ears, nose, eyes, limbs etc etc etc and thsoe parts are not necessary forl ife, therefore they can be removed and are not vital to the overal ‘irreducible compelxity’ of the species- It then seems to me that kologoromov’s conlcusion is that since it’s already made and living, and it (the specimen) can be reduced to it’s simpelst irreducibly compelx parts, then nature ‘must have doen it’- must have produced the irreducibly compelx parts (He’s essentiually paintign a bullseye aroudn where hte arrow landed, and concluding that naturem ust have been responsible for producign hte irreducible complexity it seems)

[CottShop]

From what I understand of hte issue, it wouild be akin to findign a computer (havign never seen one or known about one, or even thinkign that man could be capable of desinging such an instrument) and then disecting it. discoverign htat many parts can be removed and it still will function, discoverign htat removing certain parts will cause it’s ‘demise’ and then coming to hte conclusion that nature must have been the deswigner of the irreducibly complex parts (as well s the non essential parts), and determining without any cvause to think so, that there is no evidnece that man was able to design it (even though man’s fignerprints are found in all manner of designs throughout hte world)

This scenario involves approachign hte issue with an aa priori conclusion (paintign the bullseye around the arrow after it has landed)