A Tiny Mathematical Proof Against Evolution [AKA - Million Monkeys Can't Type Shakespeare]

Nutters.org ^ | 13-Dec-1995 | Brett Watson

[Southack]

There is a recurring claim among a certain group which goes along the lines of "software programs can self-form on their own if you leave enough computers on long enough" or "DNA will self-form given enough time" or even that a million monkeys typing randomly on a million keyboards for a million years will eventually produce the collected works of Shakespeare.

This mathematical proof goes a short distance toward showing in math what Nobel Prize winner Illya Prigogine first said in 1987 (see Order Out of Chaos), that the maximum possible "order" self-forming randomly in any system is the most improbable.

This particular math proof deals with the organized data in only the very first sentence of Hamlet self-forming. After one examines this proof, it should be readily apparent that even more complex forms of order, such as a short story, computer program, or DNA for a fox, are vastly more improbable.

So without further adue, here's the math:

[js1138]

The math for this very thread deals with that very issue, and I'm the one who started this thread.

OK, I went back and read the math, and as I said, the concept eludes you.

[Southack]

"But if it can happen, then we have the possibility of self-replication."

Nonsense. We KNOW that self-replication can happen because we see it in everyday life, so no one is worrying herself to sleep wondering if self-replication is "possible".

It is.

But that isn't the issue...

[Southack]

"OK, I went back and read the math, and as I said, the concept eludes you."

That's sad, as such a statement can only mean that you didn't understand either the math or the simile involved.

[js1138]

We KNOW that self-replication can happen because we see it in everyday life, so no one is worrying herself to sleep wondering if self-replication is "possible".

You're right. The issue is whether natural selection occurs.

[Southack]

"You're right. The issue is whether natural selection occurs."

Here are some thoughts for you to ponder:

1. Does "natural selection" ALWAYS, without fail, lead to evolution,

2. Can "natural selection" explain how the first two life forms came into existence, and

3. Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated?

[js1138]

1. Does "natural selection" ALWAYS, without fail, lead to evolution,

Natural selection has no direction. It appears to lead towards greater complexity for the same reason that a drunkard's walk starting from a wall appears to move away from the wall -- you cannot go through the wall and you cannot get simpler than chemical elements. The bulk of living things is believed to be composed of bacteria -- which continue to evolve without becoming noticably more "complex". Increased complexity is not a "goal" of evolution

2. Can "natural selection" explain how the first two life forms came into existence, and

We shall see...

I believe there is no arbitrary boundry between living and non-living. Those who believe there is have been continually surprised -- first by microscopic organisms, then by viruses, then by prions. You could, as some on this thread have done, assert that anything without a cell wall is not living. That's a cool way to end the discussion. 3. Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated?

What do you mean by "animated"? Is there a difference between animate and inanimate matter? Why is this question different from question two?

[Southack]

1. Does "natural selection" ALWAYS, without fail, lead to evolution, - Southack

"Natural selection has no direction. It appears to lead towards greater complexity for the same reason that a drunkard's walk starting from a wall appears to move away from the wall -- you cannot go through the wall and you cannot get simpler than chemical elements. The bulk of living things is believed to be composed of bacteria -- which continue to evolve without becoming noticably more "complex". Increased complexity is not a "goal" of evolution"

But the question was NOT about complexity. Rather, the question was whether "natural selection" ALWAYS led to evolution.

[Southack]

3. Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated? - Southack

"What do you mean by "animated"? Is there a difference between animate and inanimate matter? Why is this question different from question two?" - js1138

By animated, I mean "living". Is there a difference between animated and inanimate matter? Good question. Why is that question different? Simple. It is different because we percieve there to be a difference between a dead person from that of a living one, even if they share the same or very similar DNA matter.

[js1138]

I would have to say that dead people are, in general, not completely dead. There are degrees of dead, starting with loss of consciousness, leading through cellular suffocation, ending, perhaps, with the degradation of all DNA.

Whether DNA or RNA is "alive" is a function of its immediate environment more than it is an absolute state.

[TC Rider]

..or even that a million monkeys typing randomly on a million keyboards for a million years will eventually produce the collected works of Shakespeare.

Hasn't AOL proven the fallacy of that argument?

[Southack]

"Whether DNA or RNA is "alive" is a function of its immediate environment more than it is an absolute state."

If that's true, then you are saying that by changing the immediate environment, the completely dead can become completely alive.

[Southack]

3. Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated?

[js1138]

If that's true, then you are saying that by changing the immediate environment, the completely dead can become completely alive.

You certainly have a black and white approach to things. How does your mathematical mind cope with quantum theory and schroedenger's cat?

Without getting into postmodernism and deconstruction, it is possible to view viruses as either alive or not alive, depending on what definition is useful at the moment. If you think there is an absolute dividing line between living and non-living, you are in for some shocks in the next few decades.

[Southack]

You seem to be trying desperately to avoid my questions by asking lots of your own questions.

Are you afraid of the answers?

Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated?

[Doctor Stochastic]

And before Wöhler's synthesis of urea in 1828, the claim was that "no organic molecule can be produced without life."

[js1138]

3. Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated?

Can you realize what an incredibly stupid question this is. Can you give me a single example of what you mean by animated DNA vs inanimate DNA?

[f.Christian]

"Random impulses contain no messages, but non-random impulses do, according to some particular language convention. As Wilder-Smith puts it, "Sometimes a great deal of erudition is needed to derive from non-random sequences the language convention bearing the message. This high art is regularly practiced in deciphering ancient documents written in unknown languages, for the frequency of certain letters and their sequences in a document sometimes betray the language convention, which information then yields the meaning or intelligent message hidden in the composition." Should our searches of the universe with radio telescopes pick up the right sorts of signals, then scientists can claim to have evidence for extra-terrestrial intelligent life. Despite ongoing attempts for almost 40 years, no such signals from outer space have ever been detected. However, it seems that scientists have been looking in the wrong place. "The base sequences of the genetic code, that is the order in which adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine appear in succession to one another, is certainly by no means random," states Dr. Wilder-Smith. "[T]he sequencing of the whole long biologically active DNA macromolecule is certainly and totally non-random in nature.... But over and above the non-randomness of the DNA sequencing, hard work on the part of Crick and Watson and many others following them revealed that this non-randomness of the sequencing is contingent upon a language convention.... What other conclusion is possible from these facts but that behind such non-random genetic sequences governed by a language convention, intelligence or at least an intelligent source must with certainty lie?"

"Wilder-Smith suggests that ETI scientists step away from their radio telescope searches for non-random sequencing and instead take a close look into an electron microscope at some suitably prepared genetic code sequences, where they will see exactly that for which they have been looking. "In many cases," he says, "the non-random sequencing may be directly perceived!" In so looking, if they grasp what they are looking at, and if they are truly honest and not wholly self-serving, they will admit that "an intelligent source must be the initiator of this fact of nature" and that "information and intelligence are behind all biology and the genetic code...."

"True science, in the hands of honest and true scientists, supports the assumption that God exists and is the Intelligence... the Master Planner---the Designer responsible for all creation and for life."

[js1138]

I don't think anyone has ever said the sequences in living things are random.

[js1138]

Signing off for a while...

[Southack]

"Can you realize what an incredibly stupid question this is. Can you give me a single example of what you mean by animated DNA vs inanimate DNA?"

No, the question is perfectly valid. An example of animated DNA is found in every living organism. Inanimate DNA is found in every dead organism.

Now, are you through asking ridiculous strawman questions?

Are you ready to answer my initial questions?

Can "natural selection" explain how inanimate DNA becomes animated?