Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.

I guess I could have just thrown it away. But I was worried that 
somebody might, you know, read it...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.

> I guess I could have just thrown it away. But I was worried that 
> somebody might, you know, read it...

  One of the most common tactics used by all kinds of denialists,
young-earth creationists and the like is to try to come up with
objections or exceptions to a well-established scientific theory,
and then from that claim that the theory is completely false.

  True valid objections or contradictions with the theory are usually
extremely rare. In most cases they have an explanation that is completely
in accordance with the theory and do not even require any special
exceptions to be made. (In most cases these seeming contradictions are
nothing more than misinterpretations of the described phenomenon, often
done deliberately even after they are fully explained.)

  Even in the extremely few cases where a truly valid objection is
made, that doesn't mean that the theory is automatically false. Usually
it simply means that the real reason for the apparent contradiction
(which might be very simple) has not been found yet or, even more
rarely, the theory needs some fine-tuning to account the new data.

  For example, the newtonian theory of gravity is not wrong *per se*.
It's just that it applies (and pretty accurately at that) only at
normal everyday scales and velocities. It's only when you go very
small, very dense or very fast that it starts to deviate noticeably.
Newtonian gravity was insufficient to explain *all* phenomena, but the
theory that replaced it (ie. general relativity) doesn't actually contradict
it in those circumstances (ie. low velocities, everyday scales), but in
fact it can be reduced to the newtonian formulas.

  Likewise there are some observations made that seem to contradict
general relativity (such as the pioneer anomaly, the flyby anomaly
and the orbital velocities of stars in galaxies). However, these
unexplained contradictions do not mean that general relativity is
automatically false. It just means that either we have not yet found
the reason for them (which at least in the two first cases might be
mundane), or general relativity requires more fine-tuning to account
for them (something which so far seems unlikely).

  Anyways, these denialists and creationists seem to think that even if
there are hundreds and thousands of experiments that confirm a certain
theory, if you present a few dozens that seem to contradict it, that
means that the theory is completely false.

  What's funny is that this kind of thinking does not go only against
the scientific method, it actually goes against common sense and
everyday human experience.

  For example, if you take a stone with your hand and let go of it,
it will fall down. Take a pencil, same thing. Take a thousand different
objects, and the same thing. They all fall down. Hence the conclusion is
that all objects fall down. Moreover, you can make experiments to see
how fast they fall down: Do they all fall down at the same speed? Can you
devise a formula that will predict how long it will take for the object
to hit the ground?

  Then someone comes and says: "Hey, look at that bird. It's in the air
and it's not falling down. Or how about that helicopter. It isn't falling
down either. Clearly all these experiments and formulas of yours are
bollocks. It's all a big lie."

  The scientific way of thinking about that claim is, of course: "Hmm,
what is it that makes the bird and the helicopter keep in the air and
not fall down? Let's find out. Let's observe and do some experiments."
Then you study the phenomenon and see that it doesn't actually contradict
your experience of objects falling down. It's just that there's another
explanation for them not falling down.

  The creationist way of thinking seems to be: "Hah. These two examples
clearly show that the theory of objects falling down is bollocks. That's
enough for me."

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 23/12/2011 04:12 PM, Warp wrote:
> Orchid XP v8<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>> Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.
>
>> I guess I could have just thrown it away. But I was worried that
>> somebody might, you know, read it...

>    The creationist way of thinking seems to be: "Hah. These two examples
> clearly show that the theory of objects falling down is bollocks. That's
> enough for me."

"Quod enim mavult homo versus esse id porteous credit."

For what a man wishes to be true, that he more readily believes.

Nobody is lobbying Congress to say that the second law of thermodynamics 
is wrong. (And there are actual, valid scientific difficulties with that 
one.) Nobody is calling for Maxwell's equations to be taken out of the 
school curriculum because "a growing [but unamed] body of scientists 
doubt the validity of it". Einstein's theories of relavitivy claim that 
all sorts of mind-bending things are supposed to be possible, yet nobody 
objects.

And yet, the second you say that The Holy Bible is wrong... suddenly 
this crap happens.

It's not that these people misunderstand science or aren't good at 
logical reasoning. It's that they don't *care* about science - they just 
desperately want everyone to believe in the Bible. Scientists start from 
the facts, apply logic and end up with a conclusion. These people dearly 
want a particular conclusion, and will invent any spurious chain of 
logic which leads to the desired conclusion.

Rational debate is futile. These people do not care about being 
rational. They only care about making everybody believe their story. 
Because it doesn't really /matter/ what the truth is, so long as they 
can go along happy in the knowledge that they were right, and everyone 
believes them.

Rational debate may, however, work on innocent people who have 
mistakenly fallen for this BS...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:01:39 +0000, Orchid XP v8 wrote:

> On 23/12/2011 04:12 PM, Warp wrote:
>> Orchid XP v8<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>>> Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.
>>
>>> I guess I could have just thrown it away. But I was worried that
>>> somebody might, you know, read it...
> 
>>    The creationist way of thinking seems to be: "Hah. These two
>>    examples
>> clearly show that the theory of objects falling down is bollocks.
>> That's enough for me."
> 
> "Quod enim mavult homo versus esse id porteous credit."
> 
> For what a man wishes to be true, that he more readily believes.
> 
> Nobody is lobbying Congress to say that the second law of thermodynamics
> is wrong. (And there are actual, valid scientific difficulties with that
> one.) Nobody is calling for Maxwell's equations to be taken out of the
> school curriculum because "a growing [but unamed] body of scientists
> doubt the validity of it". Einstein's theories of relavitivy claim that
> all sorts of mind-bending things are supposed to be possible, yet nobody
> objects.
> 
> And yet, the second you say that The Holy Bible is wrong... suddenly
> this crap happens.
> 
> It's not that these people misunderstand science or aren't good at
> logical reasoning. It's that they don't *care* about science - they just
> desperately want everyone to believe in the Bible. Scientists start from
> the facts, apply logic and end up with a conclusion. These people dearly
> want a particular conclusion, and will invent any spurious chain of
> logic which leads to the desired conclusion.
> 
> Rational debate is futile. These people do not care about being
> rational. They only care about making everybody believe their story.
> Because it doesn't really /matter/ what the truth is, so long as they
> can go along happy in the knowledge that they were right, and everyone
> believes them.
> 
> Rational debate may, however, work on innocent people who have
> mistakenly fallen for this BS...

Last night we watched the 2009 "Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless 
People" - very good.  I particularly liked the bit where Robin Ince was 
talking about how, if you reject the Theory of Evolution, you really are 
rejecting the scientific method, and as such, shouldn't really be 
'believing' in anything like medicine because those use the same method 
to be validated.

"Oh, you don't feel well?  Too bad you don't believe in the scientific 
method as a valid way of approaching the world - medicine probably would 
be useful, but since you reject the scientific method, you can't have 
medicine.  I'll go find an old witch doctor to wave a twig over your head 
- I hear that works in some cases!"

:)

Jim

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On 12/23/2011 11:00, Jim Henderson wrote:
> "Oh, you don't feel well?  Too bad you don't believe in the scientific

http://www.answersingenesis.org/assets/images/articles/2005/12/1218doonesbury_lg.gif

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   People tell me I am the counter-example.

Post a reply to this message

> Last night we watched the 2009 "Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless
> People" - very good.  I particularly liked the bit where Robin Ince was
> talking about how, if you reject the Theory of Evolution, you really are
> rejecting the scientific method, and as such, shouldn't really be
> 'believing' in anything like medicine because those use the same method
> to be validated.

I think that logically they should also try top get rid of all animal 
testing of drugs. It hampers companies in making money and it is useless 
anyway as man is not in any way related to e.g. mice.
Then again, it is hard for me to understand their logic, if it exist at all.

> "Oh, you don't feel well?  Too bad you don't believe in the scientific
> method as a valid way of approaching the world - medicine probably would
> be useful, but since you reject the scientific method, you can't have
> medicine.  I'll go find an old witch doctor to wave a twig over your head
> - I hear that works in some cases!"
>
> :)
>
> Jim


-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the floor.

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On 12/23/2011 15:17, andrel wrote:
> anyway as man is not in any way related to e.g. mice.

Sure he is.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2352-just-25-of-dna-turns-mice-into-men.html

Indeed, each type of animal has specific types of similarities. Guinea pigs 
(and pigs in general) have very similar blood chemistries, which is why it's 
easy to get diseases from undercooked pork and why "guinea pig" is slang for 
"subject of an experiment".

Rabbits have very similar eyes and skin, which is why makeup testing uses 
rabbits.

Chimpanzees have very similar immune systems, which is why you always hear 
in fiction about evil biotech weapon companies having monkeys in cages.

Mice are because peopl ehave developed a strain of white mice that are 
genetically very similar, so you can do repeatable experiments on generic 
animal type stuff (i.e., the 95% or so of DNA we share with all mammals).

> Then again, it is hard for me to understand their logic, if it exist at all.

Well, put it this way. They don't spend money on animal testing because they 
don't like animals.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   People tell me I am the counter-example.

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On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 00:17:46 +0100, andrel wrote:

>> Last night we watched the 2009 "Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless
>> People" - very good.  I particularly liked the bit where Robin Ince was
>> talking about how, if you reject the Theory of Evolution, you really
>> are rejecting the scientific method, and as such, shouldn't really be
>> 'believing' in anything like medicine because those use the same method
>> to be validated.
> 
> I think that logically they should also try top get rid of all animal
> testing of drugs. It hampers companies in making money and it is useless
> anyway as man is not in any way related to e.g. mice.
> Then again, it is hard for me to understand their logic, if it exist at
> all.

Well, of course, that would be part of the rejection of the scientific 
method which would invalidate those who reject it from being eligible for 
modern medical treatments.

I also liked the "Trial by a jury of your peers?  Nah, you get a faith-
based trial." :)

The logic is ultimately pretty simple, though - if reality gets in the 
way of the 'accuracy' of their religious beliefs, then clearly reality 
has got it wrong.

Jim

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On Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:05:23 -0800, Darren New wrote:

> On 12/23/2011 15:17, andrel wrote:
>> anyway as man is not in any way related to e.g. mice.
> 
> Sure he is.
> http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2352-just-25-of-dna-turns-mice-
into-men.html
> 
> Indeed, each type of animal has specific types of similarities. Guinea
> pigs (and pigs in general) have very similar blood chemistries, which is
> why it's easy to get diseases from undercooked pork and why "guinea pig"
> is slang for "subject of an experiment".
> 
> Rabbits have very similar eyes and skin, which is why makeup testing
> uses rabbits.
> 
> Chimpanzees have very similar immune systems, which is why you always
> hear in fiction about evil biotech weapon companies having monkeys in
> cages.
> 
> Mice are because peopl ehave developed a strain of white mice that are
> genetically very similar, so you can do repeatable experiments on
> generic animal type stuff (i.e., the 95% or so of DNA we share with all
> mammals).
> 
>> Then again, it is hard for me to understand their logic, if it exist at
>> all.
> 
> Well, put it this way. They don't spend money on animal testing because
> they don't like animals.

Methinks you missed the ironic twist in what he was writing, particularly 
given his background. :)

Jim

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On 12/23/2011 9:12 AM, Warp wrote:
>    Anyways, these denialists and creationists seem to think that even if
> there are hundreds and thousands of experiments that confirm a certain
> theory, if you present a few dozens that seem to contradict it, that
> means that the theory is completely false.
>
>    What's funny is that this kind of thinking does not go only against
> the scientific method, it actually goes against common sense and
> everyday human experience.

Actually, in my experience, its worse than that. Usually the papers they 
quote fall into one of several categories:

1. A laundry list of objections, based on how evolution contradicts 
their beliefs, with no science in it.

2. Something that might be mistaken for science, until you ask someone 
who knows the specific subject better, whether it be thermodynamics, 
statistics, genetic mutation, etc.

3. Stuff they just didn't understand, or intentionally misquoted, which, 
when examined, actually says the exact opposite.

In category #2 is, for example, "junk DNA". A good article on just what 
that really means is here:

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/05/junk_is_what_junk_does.php

Basically, the short version is 23% = 868,000 copies of a virus fragment 
that simply endlessly copies itself, called SINE,(or at least 20-50% of 
the copies can) + 1.6 million copies of a fragment of that fragment, 
called SINE, that can only replicate by hijacking LINE's replication 
function. A bunch of the genes are also "retrotransposons", which just 
move from place to place, sometimes into places that break things 
(another fragment from viruses). And, well, there is a video from some 
conference that PZ went to, where he goes into more depth. But, there is 
a lot of what he describes as, "they are the plastic boxes and styrofoam 
packing peanuts of the functional elements of the genome." And then, of 
course, the copy function in DNA works real badly, so we have a stupid 
number of fragments tacked onto the end of every functional sequence, so 
that, when copied, we only lose the mess off the end, not a critical 
piece of genetic material.

And, then there is the joke of how genes themselves get encoded. Imagine 
50 feet of rope, with multiple sections colored red, some of them feet 
apart. To "read" the working bits, we strip off all the blank parts, and 
patch back together the 3 inches of red parts.

So, if 65% of the entire genome is this shit, how the hell does "every 
gene have a purpose"? lol

As I said, the problem isn't just that they have some objection, its 
that they have completely stupid objections, which have no basis, at 
all, in reality. And, what science they attempt to do (the closest any 
of them ever tried was Behe and his horribly wrong math), has about as 
much to do with reality as early movies, like, "Them", had to do with 
the real effects of radiation. lol

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On 12/23/2011 10:01 AM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> On 23/12/2011 04:12 PM, Warp wrote:
>> Orchid XP v8<voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>>> Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.
>>
>>> I guess I could have just thrown it away. But I was worried that
>>> somebody might, you know, read it...
>
>> The creationist way of thinking seems to be: "Hah. These two examples
>> clearly show that the theory of objects falling down is bollocks. That's
>> enough for me."
>
> "Quod enim mavult homo versus esse id porteous credit."
>
> For what a man wishes to be true, that he more readily believes.
>
Trying to reconstruct it, so not sure I have it right, but here is 
another: "Absurdum est ergo verum est"

Its is absurd, therefor, it is true.

Seems to be the ruling principle of much of creationism, and most of 
religion.

Post a reply to this message

On 12/23/2011 4:17 PM, andrel wrote:
>
>> Last night we watched the 2009 "Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless
>> People" - very good. I particularly liked the bit where Robin Ince was
>> talking about how, if you reject the Theory of Evolution, you really are
>> rejecting the scientific method, and as such, shouldn't really be
>> 'believing' in anything like medicine because those use the same method
>> to be validated.
>
> I think that logically they should also try top get rid of all animal
> testing of drugs. It hampers companies in making money and it is useless
> anyway as man is not in any way related to e.g. mice.
> Then again, it is hard for me to understand their logic, if it exist at
> all.
>
The logic is two fold:

1. Just because they are not human does not mean that the specific 
organ(s) being examined do not react to drugs in the same way as with 
humans. A kidney is a kidney, or at least fairly close.

2. Isolated tissues do not include interactions with other substances 
produced by the body, that may happen to be in the blood, or which get 
reprocessed, post processed, or have different effects, on different 
organs. Unless you use a living organism, of some sort, to run tests, 
you cannot know if the drug that kills cancer in liver doesn't cause 
brain cancer, or that the heart medication doesn't cause kidney failure.

The result isn't perfect, but, in reality, we know what like 10% of the 
nuerochemicals in the brain actually do, probably 30% of what most of 
the stuff floating around in our blood stream does to "major" tissue 
groups, but not so much to others. What seems like a great benefit, like 
taking a lot of Vitamin E, to X, Y and Z, and turn around and have some 
crazy effect some place else, because we just don't know enough to be 
sure what a large enough dose would do. We only, generally, know what it 
does at *normal* levels.

The whole point of animal testing is to see if it has a lethal effect, 
immediately, or over time, as a result of some unknown effect, on some 
tissue that wasn't tested, or worse, that after floating through 4-5 
different tissues, the body itself doesn't introduce changes to its 
chemical composition which reverses the effect, negates it, increases it 
unexpectedly, or turns it into something else entirely.

Its not perfect, by any means, but short of injecting prisoners, as test 
subjects (in which case you are going to run out of them pretty fast), 
there really isn't any other options. Those claiming otherwise are not 
recognizing the limitation of the tests we can do, and why they exist, 
nor how many more cases of, "Woops, it turns out that in humans this 
does something bad!", you would get, if you didn't weed out the more 
obvious glitches, interactions, and possible errors, even before it went 
to clinical trials. Mistakes are lethal. Right now, such a mistake is a 
1-2 every 5 years, and often they *had* warnings, which some guy working 
for the company ignored. Without being sure that it won't do something 
that can't be tested with a single, isolated, tissue type... It might be 
2-3 per year instead, for all anyone can be certain of. But, it would 
increase, because you can't test *every* tissue, or how the drug changes 
*between* them, using a petri dish.

Post a reply to this message

On 24-12-2011 5:08, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> On 12/23/2011 4:17 PM, andrel wrote:
>>
>>> Last night we watched the 2009 "Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless
>>> People" - very good. I particularly liked the bit where Robin Ince was
>>> talking about how, if you reject the Theory of Evolution, you really are
>>> rejecting the scientific method, and as such, shouldn't really be
>>> 'believing' in anything like medicine because those use the same method
>>> to be validated.
>>
>> I think that logically they should also try top get rid of all animal
>> testing of drugs. It hampers companies in making money and it is useless
>> anyway as man is not in any way related to e.g. mice.
>> Then again, it is hard for me to understand their logic, if it exist at
>> all.
>>
> The logic is two fold:
>
> 1. Just because they are not human does not mean that the specific
> organ(s) being examined do not react to drugs in the same way as with
> humans. A kidney is a kidney, or at least fairly close.
[snip]
I am not sure you got the irony either. I start doubting my ability to 
get any message across :( .
Anyway the point is that there are good reasons to test drugs in animals 
before you use them on humans. Only, these reasons only make sense if 
you think the two species are related.

In fact it was meant to just second Jim's opinion. I find it hard to 
think of any treatment or modern equipment that not somewhere along the 
line made use of a technique that implicitly used the relationship 
between all living things.
In the lab we routinely add markers like GFP (green fluorescent protein, 
a jellyfish gene) to a gene to see when that other gene is switched on. 
The result is checked by PCR, another technique that uses a protein from 
a bacterium to replicate DNA from another species. If you look at any 
drug developed in the last decades they all are contaminated by 
evolution. Either in the development, the research that was done to 
understand the mechanism of the disease, or in production. The same 
holds for many non-pharmacological treatments as well. One of my 
research subjects is inherited cardiac arrhythmia, diagnosis uses the 
sort of evolutionary contaminated methods mentioned above. On top of 
that 'inherited diseases' as a concept is hard to grasp in a creationist 
universe. (which, unfortunately, does not make them less likely to pass 
on such a disease)

The, small, other point was that I am surprised that tea party-like 
persons in the US do not seem to use creationism as a way to pass 
legislation that makes it easier and more profitable to create new 
drugs. While there must be a fair amount of people believe the one and 
advocate the other. Either because of the reasoning above, or I simply 
missed it because it was not reported in the papers here.


-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the floor.

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Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> It's not that these people misunderstand science or aren't good at 
> logical reasoning. It's that they don't *care* about science - they just 
> desperately want everyone to believe in the Bible.

  Of course creationists care about science. It's just that they like only
those branches of science that can be twisted to seemingly support their
arguments, while despising the branches of science which can't.

  In other words, they engage in blatant cherry-picking. These creationists
have no idea whatsoever what, for example, the laws of thermodynamics really
mean or how radiometric dating works, but nevertheless they consider the
latter a hoax and a lie, while the former is good and well-established
science, just because they can use the former to attempt to justify their
claims but the latter contradicts them. (I have never heard any argument
whatsoever why they believe the laws of thermodynamics to be accurate and
good science, while at the same time denigrating many other branches of
science. They just are, because they say so. No explanation needed. If
nothing else, this is a double standard.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On Fri, 23 Dec 2011 11:55:50 -0800, Darren New wrote:

> On 12/23/2011 11:00, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> "Oh, you don't feel well?  Too bad you don't believe in the scientific
> 
> http://www.answersingenesis.org/assets/images/
articles/2005/12/1218doonesbury_lg.gif

Good one.  I never was much of a fan of Doonesbury, but I liked that 
one. :)

Jim

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On 12/23/2011 19:28, Jim Henderson wrote:
> Methinks you missed the ironic twist in what he was writing, particularly

I got well and truly POE'd.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   People tell me I am the counter-example.

Post a reply to this message

On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 10:01:39 -0800, Darren New wrote:

> On 12/23/2011 19:28, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> Methinks you missed the ironic twist in what he was writing,
>> particularly
> 
> I got well and truly POE'd.

Power Over Etherneted? ;)

Jim

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On 12/24/2011 4:20 AM, andrel wrote:
> The, small, other point was that I am surprised that tea party-like
> persons in the US do not seem to use creationism as a way to pass
> legislation that makes it easier and more profitable to create new
> drugs. While there must be a fair amount of people believe the one and
> advocate the other. Either because of the reasoning above, or I simply
> missed it because it was not reported in the papers here.
>
Well, in point of fact they are probably not animal rights advocates, 
that tends to be leftist (which irritates the hell out of me, since why 
the hell we seem to need both the gullible and stupid, along side the 
smart and skeptical, on the side that promotes environmental causes, 
animal rights, etc., is just incomprehensible). Second point, the 
majority of them deny, or ignore, how much evolution effects such 
research, and generally assume on some idiot level that having a map 
means you know the name of every road, who lives in every house,  every 
job they do, and, to use the sort of stupid metaphor they might, which 
church everyone one of them attends. What we have is a lot of lines, on 
a sheet of paper, with a few labelled, and while we may know where the 
guy on Dopamine A works, part time, we may have no damn clue where he 
goes on the weekends, what sports he likes, or what he does on Sundays.

In short, they point out that we have a map, but they don't get that by 
"map" we mean the equivalent of, "Using a blurry satellite photo, taken 
from space, so we know where the fuzzy line are, which define the 
general shape."

So, of course they don't promote creationism as a solution. To them 
whether or not evolution or creation is true has **nothing at all** to 
do with research, other than that one is some vast conspiracy being used 
to make some cabal of professors rich (that they are not rich, doesn't 
even occur to them, since we are also talking about idiots that either 
belong to, or kiss the ass of, the 1%, and 'big pharma').

Post a reply to this message

On 12/24/2011 4:20 AM, andrel wrote:
> I am not sure you got the irony either. I start doubting my ability to
> get any message across :( .

Oh, and, in my own defense, I post commentary on at least three blogs 
that have drive by stupid on them all the time, so I am afraid I have 
blown out more irony meters that you have ever owned, and my current one 
is only working part time, and held together with a paper clip, and 
chewing gum. ;) lol

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On 25-12-2011 3:31, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> On 12/24/2011 4:20 AM, andrel wrote:
>> I am not sure you got the irony either. I start doubting my ability to
>> get any message across :( .
>
> Oh, and, in my own defense, I post commentary on at least three blogs
> that have drive by stupid on them all the time,

It is good to be reminded that on the internet there is always some 
place where you might be perceived as a drive by stupid.

-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the floor.

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On 25-12-2011 0:34, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sat, 24 Dec 2011 10:01:39 -0800, Darren New wrote:
>
>> On 12/23/2011 19:28, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> Methinks you missed the ironic twist in what he was writing,
>>> particularly
>>
>> I got well and truly POE'd.
>
> Power Over Etherneted? ;)

problably not. If it was Andy i might go for Pipe Organ Encounter but he 
isn't, so I have no clue what he did mean.


-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the floor.

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On 12/25/2011 1:15, andrel wrote:
> problably not. If it was Andy i might go for Pipe Organ Encounter but he
> isn't, so I have no clue what he did mean.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poe%27s_Law

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   People tell me I am the counter-example.

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On Sun, 25 Dec 2011 09:45:08 -0800, Darren New wrote:

> On 12/25/2011 1:15, andrel wrote:
>> problably not. If it was Andy i might go for Pipe Organ Encounter but
>> he isn't, so I have no clue what he did mean.
> 
> http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poe%27s_Law

Yeah, I found that after posting. :)

Jim

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On 12/25/2011 2:10 AM, andrel wrote:
> On 25-12-2011 3:31, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>> On 12/24/2011 4:20 AM, andrel wrote:
>>> I am not sure you got the irony either. I start doubting my ability to
>>> get any message across :( .
>>
>> Oh, and, in my own defense, I post commentary on at least three blogs
>> that have drive by stupid on them all the time,
>
> It is good to be reminded that on the internet there is always some
> place where you might be perceived as a drive by stupid.
>
Sorry. Lets just say that its a reflex action. :( And one that, I am 
embarrassed to admit, I have called others on, more than once, when I 
wasn't so certain the person in question wasn't asking an honest, but 
poorly worded, question, instead of asserting complete gibberish. We 
don't get the former often enough sadly.

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Patrick Elliott <sel### [at] npgcablecom> wrote:
> Sorry. Lets just say that its a reflex action. :( And one that, I am
> embarrassed to admit, I have called others on, more than once, when I
> wasn't so certain the person in question wasn't asking an honest, but
> poorly worded, question, instead of asserting complete gibberish. We
> don't get the former often enough sadly.

In the Yahoo! Answers Religion & Spirituality room, certain questions are asked
so often (as in several times per day) that they are considered "drinking
questions."  When one of these questions was posted, the regulars answered with
"drink!"  The questions often try the maxim that there are no stupid questions.

Some questions earned the pinnacle status of double-drink question.  Examples:
"Why do atheists come to the Religion section?"  "Why do Catholics worship
Mary?"  "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"  That last
question really belongs in the Biology room, but young-Earth creationists aren't
known for keeping their domains straight.  Bottoms up twice!

I don't hang out there much any more, so I don't know if they still do the
drinking game.  I have no doubt, though, that the same questions are still being
asked, over and over again, with not a thought given to the Search button.

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On 12/27/2011 4:55 PM, Cousin Ricky wrote:
> Some questions earned the pinnacle status of double-drink question.  Examples:
> "Why do atheists come to the Religion section?"  "Why do Catholics worship
> Mary?"  "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"  That last
> question really belongs in the Biology room, but young-Earth creationists aren't
> known for keeping their domains straight.  Bottoms up twice!
>
Yeah, its right up there in the logic level with, "If motorcycles where 
based on bicycles, why are their still bicycles?", and similar 
stupidities. Not just wrong category, but just.. like why they hell not? 
Just because some of them got smarter meant that somehow the original 
niche they filled disappeared? Brainless...

Usually, when those come up, on the blogs I go to, its some, "true 
believer (tm)", trying to refute our horrible insistence on believing in 
evolution, based on a laundry list of things they just can't believe we 
could have possibly ever heard before. The "Drink!", thing is probably 
more civilized. On the blogs, the usually result is a brief attempt to 
explain, followed by, when the person proves impervious to that, a rapid 
decline into, "Go look it up yourself, or at least try reading a damn 
book that wasn't published by Answers In Genesis!", and then name calling.

We are the.. pit bull population, to some other people's attempts are 
enlightened discussion. But then, we a) do get converts, who, every 
place else they went, found someone patting them on the back, and 
treating their clueless gibberish seriously, and b) the people running 
the blogs have been shanghaied into enough "debates", in which they had 
15 minutes to address one stupid assertion, semi-completely, out of the 
endless fount of nonsense, half backed claims, outright lies, and 
blatant misrepresentations that the creationist spewed in the same 15 
minutes they had, that no one, from the blog owner, to the people that 
post there, have *any* patience at all with people showing up with no 
interest in learning, and a long list of objections that they mentally 
photocopied off of what *we* call, "The list of worst claims, arguments, 
and objections ever invented.", but which creationist sites insist on 
labeling, "Unanswered questions, ideas that can't be refuted, and things 
you should ask any biologist, museum owner, or other conspirator in the 
spreed of the evils of Evolution."

Basically, you come to our bar with this sort of thing, and you won't 
find many drunks, but you might find yourself dodging thrown bottles. ;) lol

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Cousin Ricky <rickysttATyahooDOTcom> wrote:
> "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"  That last
> question really belongs in the Biology room, but young-Earth creationists aren't
> known for keeping their domains straight.  Bottoms up twice!

  I have seen many videos with titles like "ultimate proof of the existence
of God!" and the like, and which then proceed to try to disprove evolution.

  I'm like: "Wait, I thought you were going to prove the existence of God
rather than discuss biology. What gives?"

  It's a rather typical argumentative fallacy.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Patrick Elliott <sel### [at] npgcablecom> wrote:
> On 12/27/2011 4:55 PM, Cousin Ricky wrote:
> > Some questions earned the pinnacle status of double-drink question.  Examples:
> > "Why do atheists come to the Religion section?"  "Why do Catholics worship
> > Mary?"  "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"  That last
> > question really belongs in the Biology room, but young-Earth creationists aren't
> > known for keeping their domains straight.  Bottoms up twice!
> >
> Yeah, its right up there in the logic level with, "If motorcycles where 
> based on bicycles, why are their still bicycles?", and similar 
> stupidities. Not just wrong category, but just.. like why they hell not? 
> Just because some of them got smarter meant that somehow the original 
> niche they filled disappeared? Brainless...

  It's actually it's wronger than that. According to cladistics(*) humans
did not "evolve from monkeys". Instead, humans and monkeys have a common
ancestor species. This ancestor species probably looked more like a monkey
than a human, but was still relatively different from either.

  (Also, apes are more closely related to humans than monkeys. It seems that
creationists and other people who want to mock the theory of evolution
deliberately use the more distantly related monkeys more as a mockery than
anything else. According to cladistics humans and apes have a common ancestor
species, which in turn has a common ancestor species with monkeys.)

(*) Unlike most creationists and many other people think, the theory of
evolution does not say what species humans evolved from. The theory of
evolution describes the mechanism, not the history of evolution. For the
history you need to turn to paleontology and cladistics.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 23/12/2011 03:24 PM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.

They say every cloud has a silver lining. And in a sense, I guess that's 
true.

Darwin's Black Box is a book written by an ignorant man trying to bully 
you into believing his fantasies, using the flimsiest of logic. (I gave 
up approximately when he started arguing that the definition of 
"science" is too limiting... Anyone who doesn't understand what science 
is has no business calling themselves a scientist, in my view.)

On the other hand, reading Molecular Biology of the Gene [Watson et al] 
left me uninterested, yet reading Darwin's Black Box showed me just how 
interesting molecular biology is, and gave me decent intuitive 
metaphores for how this stuff actually works - something which the dense 
scientific reference text did not.

So I guess even something evil can harbour something good...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> On the other hand, reading Molecular Biology of the Gene [Watson et al] 
> left me uninterested, yet reading Darwin's Black Box showed me just how 
> interesting molecular biology is, and gave me decent intuitive 
> metaphores for how this stuff actually works - something which the dense 
> scientific reference text did not.

  If you want to read two interesting books about biology and science,
try "The Greatest Show on Earth" by Richard Dawkins and "The Demon Haunted
World" by Carl Sagan.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 28/12/2011 10:23 AM, Warp wrote:

>    If you want to read two interesting books about biology and science,
> try "The Greatest Show on Earth" by Richard Dawkins and "The Demon Haunted
> World" by Carl Sagan.

I got the former for Christmas last year. I haven't read the latter...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On 28-12-2011 9:18, Warp wrote:
> Patrick Elliott<sel### [at] npgcablecom>  wrote:
>> On 12/27/2011 4:55 PM, Cousin Ricky wrote:
>>> Some questions earned the pinnacle status of double-drink question.  Examples:
>>> "Why do atheists come to the Religion section?"  "Why do Catholics worship
>>> Mary?"  "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"  That last
>>> question really belongs in the Biology room, but young-Earth creationists aren't
>>> known for keeping their domains straight.  Bottoms up twice!
>>>
>> Yeah, its right up there in the logic level with, "If motorcycles where
>> based on bicycles, why are their still bicycles?", and similar
>> stupidities. Not just wrong category, but just.. like why they hell not?
>> Just because some of them got smarter meant that somehow the original
>> niche they filled disappeared? Brainless...
>
>    It's actually it's wronger than that. According to cladistics(*) humans
> did not "evolve from monkeys". Instead, humans and monkeys have a common
> ancestor species. This ancestor species probably looked more like a monkey
> than a human, but was still relatively different from either.

it is a bit more complicated than that. the set of all monkeys *and* 
homo is a clade. monkeys as a group are not. though the new world 
monkeys are. monkeys are all simians except humans. so what was the last 
common ancestor of man and chimps? that was not a member of the genus 
homo, so i think that by the definition of monkey it was a monkey (and 
an ape and a great ape). i am not sure if apes are considered monkeys. 
(in the netherlands we don't have a distinct name for ape, a monkey is 
an 'aap' and an ape is a 'mensaap' (mens==human). so here monkeys 
include apes.) if apes are not monkeys we have another cladistic 
problem. doesn't matter for the argument, just apply twice (or trice if 
great apes are not apes).

i prefer a more cladistic definition of monkey, which implies that i did 
not evolve from a monkey, but that i am a monkey and an ape and a great 
ape. ook.

>    (Also, apes are more closely related to humans than monkeys. It seems that
> creationists and other people who want to mock the theory of evolution
> deliberately use the more distantly related monkeys more as a mockery than
> anything else. According to cladistics humans and apes have a common ancestor
> species, which in turn has a common ancestor species with monkeys.)

funny that if they take it a bit further and try to mock the idea that 
we descend from mammals many more people would get the absurdity. otoh 
it might give a clue why creationists are in general allergic to breasts 
in public. perhaps they don't want to be confronted with things that 
point to their fallacy*.

> (*) Unlike most creationists and many other people think, the theory of
> evolution does not say what species humans evolved from. The theory of
> evolution describes the mechanism, not the history of evolution. For the
> history you need to turn to paleontology and cladistics.
>

*) insert your own pun here
-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the floor.

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On Tue, 27 Dec 2011 18:55:09 -0500, Cousin Ricky wrote:

>  "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still
> monkeys?"

Answer:  "Because you don't understand how evolution works."

Jim

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On 12/28/2011 1:18 AM, Warp wrote:
> Patrick Elliott<sel### [at] npgcablecom>  wrote:
>> On 12/27/2011 4:55 PM, Cousin Ricky wrote:
>>> Some questions earned the pinnacle status of double-drink question.  Examples:
>>> "Why do atheists come to the Religion section?"  "Why do Catholics worship
>>> Mary?"  "If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"  That last
>>> question really belongs in the Biology room, but young-Earth creationists aren't
>>> known for keeping their domains straight.  Bottoms up twice!
>>>
>> Yeah, its right up there in the logic level with, "If motorcycles where
>> based on bicycles, why are their still bicycles?", and similar
>> stupidities. Not just wrong category, but just.. like why they hell not?
>> Just because some of them got smarter meant that somehow the original
>> niche they filled disappeared? Brainless...
>
>    It's actually it's wronger than that. According to cladistics(*) humans
> did not "evolve from monkeys". Instead, humans and monkeys have a common
> ancestor species. This ancestor species probably looked more like a monkey
> than a human, but was still relatively different from either.
>
Yeah, more like, "If Motorcycles where derived from wagons, why are 
there still horse carts?", or something...

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On 12/28/2011 3:12 AM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> On 23/12/2011 03:24 PM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>> Yesterday, I burned my copy of Darwin's Black Box. Just so you know.
>
> They say every cloud has a silver lining. And in a sense, I guess that's
> true.
>
> Darwin's Black Box is a book written by an ignorant man trying to bully
> you into believing his fantasies, using the flimsiest of logic. (I gave
> up approximately when he started arguing that the definition of
> "science" is too limiting... Anyone who doesn't understand what science
> is has no business calling themselves a scientist, in my view.)
>
> On the other hand, reading Molecular Biology of the Gene [Watson et al]
> left me uninterested, yet reading Darwin's Black Box showed me just how
> interesting molecular biology is, and gave me decent intuitive
> metaphores for how this stuff actually works - something which the dense
> scientific reference text did not.
>
Not that I would bet on the intuitive metaphors of some clown trying to 
argue against its corner stone, as useful. Its far more likely that 
their metaphors are just as useless as their arguments (due to being 
based on entirely flawed assumptions). Way too much of science ends up 
in a category of, "counter intuitive", like the absurd idea that you 
would need to chop up 50 feet of rope, with DNA written on it, to get 3 
inches of code. Intuitively, this is completely idiotic, since no sane 
*person* would make something like that. And, the "intuitive" 
assumption, made by people that write these sorts of books, tends to be 
that you have something that looks more like a book chapter, rather than 
an fragmented hard drive, which someone dumped gigs of empty file 
fragments into, before asking the system to seek all the bits and pieces 
scattered between them, over 50% of the entire drive surface. lol

That sort of thing, and other such stuff, is "unnatural" to these sorts 
of people, so can't possibly be, you know, how nature actually does 
stuff. Sadly, if they where looking at certain viruses, or single cell 
organisms, which lack mitochondria, they would be correct. Its just, 
species with lots of bloody extra energy available to process DNA and 
RNA turn into the genetic equivalent of hoarders.

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On 12/28/2011 3:23 AM, Warp wrote:
> Orchid XP v8<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>> On the other hand, reading Molecular Biology of the Gene [Watson et al]
>> left me uninterested, yet reading Darwin's Black Box showed me just how
>> interesting molecular biology is, and gave me decent intuitive
>> metaphores for how this stuff actually works - something which the dense
>> scientific reference text did not.
>
>    If you want to read two interesting books about biology and science,
> try "The Greatest Show on Earth" by Richard Dawkins and "The Demon Haunted
> World" by Carl Sagan.
>
Another one, like "The Demon Haunted World", which is interesting, is 
Paranormality, but Richard Wiseman. He also has a couple others out, "59 
Seconds: Think a Little, Change a Lot", which goes into why self help is 
usually useless, and what sort of things, based on how people do think, 
would be more effective, and "Quirkology", which covers some seriously 
goofy studies that have been done over the years, which do a fair job of 
dispelling the suggestion that the average person is *at all* rational, 
outside of where they have to be to get something accomplished (and not 
even always then).

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Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
>   It's actually it's wronger than that. According to cladistics(*) humans
> did not "evolve from monkeys". Instead, humans and monkeys have a common
> ancestor species. This ancestor species probably looked more like a monkey
> than a human, but was still relatively different from either.
>
>   (Also, apes are more closely related to humans than monkeys. It seems that
> creationists and other people who want to mock the theory of evolution
> deliberately use the more distantly related monkeys more as a mockery than
> anything else. According to cladistics humans and apes have a common ancestor
> species, which in turn has a common ancestor species with monkeys.)

Please find attached a simplified cladogram.

Now, if C was the most recent common ancestor of all the apes, then how could C
not be an ape?

If C was an ape, then how can humans not be apes?

We were just getting comfortable with that conclusion, and then some
troublemakers pointed out...

If A was the most recent common ancestor of Old World monkeys and New World
monkeys, then how could A not be a monkey?

If A was a monkey, then how could B not be a monkey?

If B was a monkey, then how could C not be a monkey?

If C was a monkey, then how can apes not be a monkeys (which they *are*,
according to dictionaries)?

If apes are monkeys, then how can humans not be monkeys?

Just accept it.  Screw the creationists' fragile egos.

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Attachments:
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Preview of image 'monkeys.png'

On 29-12-2011 0:16, Cousin Ricky wrote:
> Warp<war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:
>>    It's actually it's wronger than that. According to cladistics(*) humans
>> did not "evolve from monkeys". Instead, humans and monkeys have a common
>> ancestor species. This ancestor species probably looked more like a monkey
>> than a human, but was still relatively different from either.
>>
>>    (Also, apes are more closely related to humans than monkeys. It seems that
>> creationists and other people who want to mock the theory of evolution
>> deliberately use the more distantly related monkeys more as a mockery than
>> anything else. According to cladistics humans and apes have a common ancestor
>> species, which in turn has a common ancestor species with monkeys.)
>
> Please find attached a simplified cladogram.

reading a bit more on wikipedia (possibly not the most reliable source, 
but it will have to do for this year) that cladogram is not correct 
[anymore]. there could have been an oval around the lesser apes, great 
apes and humans. 'ape' is nowadays used for that entire clade. even 
better, humans are great apes nowadays. monkeys still are not a clade as 
the humans have to be left out. in short your ovals should intersect. i 
added a correction for the great apes only.

this sort of things happen more often when names are used that date back 
to when we did not know yet how the genetic relationships were. we have 
it e.g. where birds are dinosaurs, dinosaurs (apart from birds) are 
reptiles but birds are not reptiles.

-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the 
floor, unless you prefer to not use uppercase.

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Attachments:
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Preview of image 'monkeys.png'

andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
>  monkeys still are not a clade as
> the humans have to be left out.

Why should humans be left out?  Because someone's religion says so?  Because we
don't like being monkeys?

In everyday speech, it's fine to set humans apart from monkeys.  We do the same
thing when we talk about "humans and animals."  However, in scientific contexts,
there is no point to it.

> this sort of things happen more often when names are used that date back
> to when we did not know yet how the genetic relationships were. we have
> it e.g. where birds are dinosaurs, dinosaurs (apart from birds) are
> reptiles but birds are not reptiles.

Mammals are also descended from ancient reptiles.  The biological community is
going to have to decide what they want to do with the term "reptile."  And
"fish."  And perhaps "amphibian," although I haven't studied that term.

P.S. The bubbles in my Venn diagram show lay usage, not scientific.  That's why
humans aren't in any of the bubbles.  The image as a whole was intended to lay
bare how silly it is to set our species apart from other primates in light of
today's knowledge.

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Cousin Ricky <rickysttATyahooDOTcom> wrote:
> If A was the most recent common ancestor of Old World monkeys and New World
> monkeys, then how could A not be a monkey?

  It of course depends on how the ancestral species are named, but I don't
see your point.

  Just because archosaurs are the most recent common ancestors of both
birds and crocodiles doesn't mean that a bird is a crocodile (or the
other way around). They are (according to cladistics) both archosaurs,
but not each other.

  Likewise if humans and monkeys had a common ancestor, that doesn't mean
that humans are monkeys (or the other way around). Unless you specifically
name this common ancestor "monkey".

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Patrick Elliott <sel### [at] npgcablecom> wrote:
> and "Quirkology", which covers some seriously 
> goofy studies that have been done over the years, which do a fair job of 
> dispelling the suggestion that the average person is *at all* rational, 
> outside of where they have to be to get something accomplished (and not 
> even always then).

  It indeed is so that the innate way of thinking for the human brain is
*not* rational skepticism. Rational skepticism is something that has to
be learned via years of study and the willingness to understand how the
world really works.

  The innate instinct of the human brain is to be naive, to believe what
you are told. This actually makes sense from an evolutionary perspective:
If a child is told "don't eat that plant, it's dangerous", this child had
a significantly higher chance of survival if he took that claim at face
value instead of being skeptical and testing it. Hence humans have been
naturally selected to be naive, especially in matter concerning dangers.
(It's no wonder that so many conspiracy theories are related to things
that are ostensibly dangerous. For example "vaccines are dangerous",
"fluoridated water is dangerous", "chemotherapy is poison", "the government
is out to get you", etc.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 29-12-2011 3:21, Cousin Ricky wrote:
> andrel<byt### [at] gmailcom>  wrote:
>>   monkeys still are not a clade as
>> the humans have to be left out.
>
> Why should humans be left out?  Because someone's religion says so?

in fact there is no religion that says explicitly so. simply because 
there was no reason to say anything about it at the time.
what e.g. the bible says is (KJV) 'So God created man in his own image, 
in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.' 
from this you can deduce that man was created and did not evolve from 
anything else. it does not say that man is not a monkey however. in 
genesis several groups of animals are named e.g. cattle, fish, and 
whales. if everything is created independently you can not group several 
species together. otoh if you are allowed to do that there is no reason 
not to group man with e.g. the mammals. tertium non datur.

> Because we don't like being monkeys?

some people don't.

> In everyday speech, it's fine to set humans apart from monkeys.  We do the same
> thing when we talk about "humans and animals."  However, in scientific contexts,
> there is no point to it.

there is a very good reason. it is called 'tradition'.

>> this sort of things happen more often when names are used that date back
>> to when we did not know yet how the genetic relationships were. we have
>> it e.g. where birds are dinosaurs, dinosaurs (apart from birds) are
>> reptiles but birds are not reptiles.
>
> Mammals are also descended from ancient reptiles.

no

> The biological community is
> going to have to decide what they want to do with the term "reptile."

they did, although their definitions change over time.

> And
> "fish."  And perhaps "amphibian," although I haven't studied that term.
>
> P.S. The bubbles in my Venn diagram show lay usage, not scientific.  That's why
> humans aren't in any of the bubbles.  The image as a whole was intended to lay
> bare how silly it is to set our species apart from other primates in light of
> today's knowledge.
>


-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the 
floor, unless you prefer to not use uppercase.

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On 29-12-2011 9:09, Warp wrote:
> Cousin Ricky<rickysttATyahooDOTcom>  wrote:
>> If A was the most recent common ancestor of Old World monkeys and New World
>> monkeys, then how could A not be a monkey?
>
>    It of course depends on how the ancestral species are named, but I don't
> see your point.
>
>    Just because archosaurs are the most recent common ancestors of both
> birds and crocodiles doesn't mean that a bird is a crocodile (or the
> other way around). They are (according to cladistics) both archosaurs,
> but not each other.
>
>    Likewise if humans and monkeys had a common ancestor, that doesn't mean
> that humans are monkeys (or the other way around). Unless you specifically
> name this common ancestor "monkey".

I answered that in a previous post. the last common ancestor of humans 
and monkeys was by definition a monkey.
still, humans are not monkeys. they are, however, apes.


-- 
tip: do not run in an unknown place when it is too dark to see the 
floor, unless you prefer to not use uppercase.

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andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> I answered that in a previous post. the last common ancestor of humans 
> and monkeys was by definition a monkey.

  What do you mean "by definition"?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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>> On the other hand, reading Molecular Biology of the Gene [Watson et al]
>> left me uninterested, yet reading Darwin's Black Box showed me just how
>> interesting molecular biology is, and gave me decent intuitive
>> metaphores for how this stuff actually works - something which the dense
>> scientific reference text did not.
>>
> Not that I would bet on the intuitive metaphors of some clown trying to
> argue against its corner stone, as useful.

Well, yeah, some of the stuff in the book is /obviously/ insane.

I remember being particularly shocked at the bit where he waives his 
hands around a bit, and then writes "now that we have conclusively 
/proven/ that ID is the correct theory..." At which point, I have two 
major objections:

1. You just spent two chapters utterly failing to convince me that 
evolution is false. You haven't /proven/ it false, you've just whinged 
that "X cannot evolve" (i.e., "I cannot imagine how X could evolve", 
which follows directly from "I don't want it to be possible for X to 
evolve").

2. Even if I accept that evolution is false, this does not prove that ID 
is therefore true. DOES. NOT. FOLLOW.

It defies belief that the author was genuinely unaware of objection #2. 
So what we are looking at here is willful deception of the less 
attentive reader. Such a thing disgusts me.



When Behe stops talking nonesense about how evolution is "impossible" 
and sticks to objective facts (like how rhodopsin works), things get 
much better.

The weighty tome tells us that propeins are amino acid polymers, each 
molecule weighting a few thousand Daltons, and that under physiological 
conditions molecular degradation is thermodynamically unfavourable, 
and... Behe, on the other hand, tells us that proteins are the cogs, 
gears, wheels, pullies, scaffolding and building materials of the 
cellular world.

A protein is a chemical. Usually you don't think much about individual 
chemical molecules. You think of a whole glass of the chemical as one 
essentially continuous entity. Much like a note from a piano is made of 
many individual waves, but you think of it as a continuous thing. But 
when you start thinking of molecules not as abstract things but as 
physical objects that can bend, stretch, pull, push and so forth, and 
you realise that enzymes work by grabbing molecules and slotting them 
together the right way around... suddenly molecular biology makes far 
more sense.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> 2. Even if I accept that evolution is false, this does not prove that ID 
> is therefore true. DOES. NOT. FOLLOW.

  This is a very typical false dichotomy. It naturally goes like: "Either
evolution is true, or ID is true. Hence if we prove evolution to the false,
the only possible conclusion is that ID is true."

  This argumentative fallacy is really, really common. If someone wants to
"prove" that ID is true, what is by far the most common tactic? Try to prove
evolution as false.

  Creationists use several other false dichotomies as well, such as for
example "either the Universe was created by nothing, or it was created by
an intelligent being", and "either life was formed by chance, or it was
created by an intelligent being".

  Of course the argument is inherently more fallacious than that. Let's
assume for a second that the universe was indeed created by an intelligent
being. This raises many obvious questions: What kind of being? Where is this
being now? Does this being still exist? Where did it come from? Are there
more than one? Was this being also created by another intelligent being?
How did this being create the universe? What kind of powers does it have?
Is this the only universe that it has created?

  The whole premise of ID doesn't actually answer anything at all, much
less anything useful. (Exactly what is the use in knowing that some kind
of "intelligent being" created the universe? How does this knowledge help
us in any way or form? We can't know anything at all about this hypothetical
"being", other than speculate that perhaps it created the universe. How does
this help us?)

  Of course the creationist will then turn to try to explain how the Bible
allegedly contains things that the people of the time could not have possibly
known. Even if that were true (and that's a big if), that's another fallacy.
(Writing some information that the people of the time "could not have
possibly known" doesn't tell anything about where that information came
from. Claiming that "it must have been given by God" is another false
dichotomy. There are many other possible explanations.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 29/12/2011 12:32 PM, Warp wrote:
> Orchid XP v8<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>> 2. Even if I accept that evolution is false, this does not prove that ID
>> is therefore true. DOES. NOT. FOLLOW.
>
>    This is a very typical false dichotomy. It naturally goes like: "Either
> evolution is true, or ID is true. Hence if we prove evolution to the false,
> the only possible conclusion is that ID is true."

This is, of course, utter nonsense. It really annoys me.

>    This argumentative fallacy is really, really common. If someone wants to
> "prove" that ID is true, what is by far the most common tactic? Try to prove
> evolution as false.

Einstein didn't otherthrow Newton by proving that Newton's laws of 
motion are flawed; he did it by offering an alternative, superior 
explanation.

And yet, read any text proving how ID is correct, and you'll hear 
"evolution this" and "evolution that" and "evolution the other"... I'm 
sorry, I thought you were telling me about ID? What does ID claim the 
answer is?

>    Of course the argument is inherently more fallacious than that. Let's
> assume for a second that the universe was indeed created by an intelligent
> being. This raises many obvious questions: What kind of being? Where is this
> being now? Does this being still exist? Where did it come from? Are there
> more than one? Was this being also created by another intelligent being?
> How did this being create the universe? What kind of powers does it have?
> Is this the only universe that it has created?
>
>    The whole premise of ID doesn't actually answer anything at all, much
> less anything useful.

How did we end up with such a vivid range of lifeforms on this planet? 
It's baffling, and it demands explanation. Evolution says "there's this 
specific mechanism by which it can happen". ID says "God did it". That's 
not even an answer, that's an /excuse/.

Evolution makes several testable predictions - for example, that various 
organisms should possess useless organs (because they once did something 
useful, and are no longer needed, and yet their "cost" is not sufficient 
to eliminate them). And all these predictions match the real world, as 
far as we know.

ID predicts that evolution is false. It makes no further predictions. On 
that metric alone, evolution is a superior theory. Even an incorrect 
theory can be superior if it describes the world better. Hell, we still 
teach people Newton's laws of motion, even though they have been 
conclusively proven false.

As you point out, ID says "the Designer did it", and then tells us 
nothing about the Designer. That's only half a theory. If you're saying 
that the Designer designed everything that exists today in one instant 
and then left, that's one theory. If you claim the Designer is invisibly 
at work all around as, constantly, to this day, that's a completely 
different theory, which yields utterly different predictions. So really, 
ID is an incomplete theory. Make up your mind who or what this 
"Designer" is, and then we might be able to have a sane discussion.

For example, WHY DID HE DO THIS? If we knew the design goal for life, we 
might be able to measure various lifeforms and see whether they meet 
this design goal. But noooo, ID does not specify.

Alternatively, HOW DID HE DO THIS? If we knew the design methods, the 
cognative limitations of the Designer, the tools available to Him, we 
might be able to look at life and see if its design is consistent with 
these constraints or not. But again, noooo. ID does not specify.

If you claim that the genome of all modern organisms was encoded into 
the original singular life form on Earth, we can do some math to compute 
whether that's feasible. But nooo, ID doesn't actually say when or where 
the design took place.

In short, if ID were to actually BE SPECIFIC, there's some danger that 
it might become testable. As it is, ID is not a scientific theory. Not 
because it is untrue [it is, but that isn't the reason], but because IT 
DOESN'T PREDICT ANYTHING. Similarly, string theory is not a science, 
because it makes no predictions. In the case of string theory, we can at 
least append "yet". :-P

>    Of course the creationist will then turn to try to explain how the Bible
> allegedly contains things that the people of the time could not have possibly
> known.

Irrelevant. Does it contain the information that ID does not? No? Well 
then you guys still have a problem, don't you? :-P

Of course, all of this is transparently a question of certain people NOT 
LIKING a theory, and wanting to make people stop saying it's true. They 
don't actually care about the truth, only what makes them happy. As if 
truth can be influenced by what you believe.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On 12/29/2011 1:17 AM, Warp wrote:
> Patrick Elliott<sel### [at] npgcablecom>  wrote:
>> and "Quirkology", which covers some seriously
>> goofy studies that have been done over the years, which do a fair job of
>> dispelling the suggestion that the average person is *at all* rational,
>> outside of where they have to be to get something accomplished (and not
>> even always then).
>
>    It indeed is so that the innate way of thinking for the human brain is
> *not* rational skepticism. Rational skepticism is something that has to
> be learned via years of study and the willingness to understand how the
> world really works.
>
>    The innate instinct of the human brain is to be naive, to believe what
> you are told. This actually makes sense from an evolutionary perspective:
> If a child is told "don't eat that plant, it's dangerous", this child had
> a significantly higher chance of survival if he took that claim at face
> value instead of being skeptical and testing it. Hence humans have been
> naturally selected to be naive, especially in matter concerning dangers.
> (It's no wonder that so many conspiracy theories are related to things
> that are ostensibly dangerous. For example "vaccines are dangerous",
> "fluoridated water is dangerous", "chemotherapy is poison", "the government
> is out to get you", etc.)
>
A better analogy, perhaps (given the tendency of children to test damn 
near anything once) is that, "Its better to a assume that the rustling 
in the bush is a pouncing tiger, than to have to look, to find out for 
certain."

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On 12/29/2011 5:00 AM, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> The weighty tome tells us that propeins are amino acid polymers, each
> molecule weighting a few thousand Daltons, and that under physiological
> conditions molecular degradation is thermodynamically unfavourable,
> and... Behe, on the other hand, tells us that proteins are the cogs,
> gears, wheels, pullies, scaffolding and building materials of the
> cellular world.
>
Which makes one sort of wonder why he fails to grasp/explain why the 
scaffolding, gears, wheels, pullies, etc. are all arranged in a DNA 
strand such that one, to use an architecture analogy, one is required to 
rearrange all the parts of the house, to open the door, since neither 
the door, the entry, the hallway, the living room, nor the roof, are 
arranged in such a manner as to be actually connected, or part of the 
same structure at all, until you remove all the "scaffolding" from 
between them, and crank the wheels, gears, and things, to cram it all 
back into something that actually functions. lol

So, yeah. Its either disingenuous that he doesn't "notice" these sorts 
of things, or he is like some guy that plots a long, complex, and 
absolutely effective, escape from the mental hospital, while imagining 
that he has invisible friends, who are watching the guards for him, is 
casting magic spells on the locks, and needs to get out, before the 
space aliens implant his brain in yet another body that doesn't belong 
to him.

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On 12/29/2011 5:32 AM, Warp wrote:
> Orchid XP v8<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>> 2. Even if I accept that evolution is false, this does not prove that ID
>> is therefore true. DOES. NOT. FOLLOW.
>
>    This is a very typical false dichotomy. It naturally goes like: "Either
> evolution is true, or ID is true. Hence if we prove evolution to the false,
> the only possible conclusion is that ID is true."
>
>    This argumentative fallacy is really, really common. If someone wants to
> "prove" that ID is true, what is by far the most common tactic? Try to prove
> evolution as false.
>
>    Creationists use several other false dichotomies as well, such as for
> example "either the Universe was created by nothing, or it was created by
> an intelligent being", and "either life was formed by chance, or it was
> created by an intelligent being".
>
>    Of course the argument is inherently more fallacious than that. Let's
> assume for a second that the universe was indeed created by an intelligent
> being. This raises many obvious questions: What kind of being? Where is this
> being now? Does this being still exist? Where did it come from? Are there
> more than one? Was this being also created by another intelligent being?
> How did this being create the universe? What kind of powers does it have?
> Is this the only universe that it has created?
>
Because, to every creationist, the "what does this do for us", is, 
"proves that our cherry picked list of crazy laws, moral codes, and 
personal prejudices, many of which we have to treat the Bible like its 
the amazing Elastagirl, to fit it to, is true as well, or something way 
closer than what you liberal, atheist, communist, scientists think." 
Assuming of course that they don't simply assume that those 4 things are 
all redundant, and mean the same thing anyway. You need to, apparently, 
be all three to be a) rich, and b) have a trophy wife, which explains 
why I haven't found a rich scientist/professor, and most of them would 
rather kick a vacuous air head super model, than marry one.

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