To Creationists

[Biochemist]

...And c'mon! I'm not that hard to convince.

I am not sure about that yet. For the moment, I am just trying to get you to listen (or, actually, read).

[Biochemist]

So, what DID you mean by that comment?

Did you read the first paragraph in post 39, the post that started this?

[Pyrotex]

...You essentially responded that the issue raised by Crimsonwolf is not a problem because a "precondition" (that you did not describe or substantiate) established conditions for the unlikely event. If you do not have data to support the existence of this sort of precondition, it is a faith position. This is merely a different faith position than CrimsonWolf's, not a refutation. And there would be nothing "obvious" about the presumption of the precondition unless you had a bias based on your faith position.

Hmmm. Hmmmmmmm. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm. ;)

Well, let's see what I can do here. It appears that I do not have data to support the existence of any precondition process for amino acids. So, the point goes to you. However, I disagree with your choice of language. I would say that my previous "mini-theory" was technically a speculation or conjecture. And you get another point, in that my speculation may not be entirely "obvious".

 

Let's start over from a different direction. The source of this contention was calculating huge improbabilities or questioning the huge improbability ("inexplicable") of reality turning out as it (certainly) did.

Sometimes huge improbabilities don't have to be explained and vindicated.

The other night I was playing bridge. I was dealt a moderately good hand with 2 aces, 2 kings, and a J-10-9-7-5 run in spades. I had a singleton in hearts, the 7. So, I thought to myself, "Good Lord!!!! What are the chances that I would get THIS combination of cards dealt to me in THIS hand!!!!! ;) It's Astronomical!!!! One-in-a-trillion!!! What a freakin miracle!!!"

 

Then I chuckled, for I knew that no matter how special or unspecial a hand looks, every bridge hand has exactly the same Astronomical odds against it being dealt! All bridge hands are equally likely. (Assuming a proper shuffle)

 

So, I can't get bent out of shape that all DNA we know of requires the same 20 Amino Acids. But I suspect that I know how it might have happened, and it doesn't require any bias or long-shot assumptions. In any case, you might not see the meaning of my little card analogy, but it is simply this: Sometimes huge improbabilities don't have to be explained and vindicated. Sometimes, out of all the gazillions of possibilities, reality just freezes in one of them, and that's the way it is from then on.

 

You can call that faith if you like. I don't. I would call it a tentative hypothesis, subject to further research and consideration.

[Pyrotex]

...Sometimes, out of all the gazillions of possibilities, reality just freezes in one of them, and that's the way it is from then on.

After I posted, I thought of an "obvious" example. An icetray full of tap water, placed in the freezer. When it comes out the next day, it is an icetray full of ice cubes. Take one cube out and examine closely. It is full of bubbles. You might ask, "What is the probability that this cube should have exactly 144 bubbles? And in THIS particular pattern? The odds must be ten-to-the-zillion!"

 

And you would be right. But so what?

 

This is my 2-to-the-9th-power post!

[Biochemist]

...You can call that faith if you like. I don't. I would call it a tentative hypothesis, subject to further research and consideration.

Hey we are back in synch again. My point was that all unsupported hypotheses should be weighted roughly equally. I was picking on you because you (apparently) weighted your tentative hypothesis more favorably than CW's. I suspect that neither of you (nor I ,for that matter) actually have a handle on the biogenetic mechanism...

 

There were a couple of people on this site (I think they call themselves interventionists) who contend that these improbabilities (and the uneven distribution of fossils reflected in the Punctuated Equilibrium model) point to the "obvious" conclusion that aliens occasionally deposited life forms.

 

I personally don't think that model is likely, but the data does not rule it out. It is normative in science to use intuition to weight alternative theories based on their superficial credibility. That intuition is the issue. Even Einstein famously intuited that quantum physics can't reflect the real state of nature ("God doesn't play dice...").

 

On this site there are a lot a smart, well founded individuals that really do have different intuitions. There are also a bunch of folks that really aren't science sorts.

 

I tend to be MUCH tougher on the biased scientists than on biased non-scientists.

[Biochemist]

..

So, I can't get bent out of shape that all DNA we know of requires the same 20 Amino Acids. But I suspect that I know how it might have happened, and it doesn't require any bias or long-shot assumptions....

On this point we have a disagreement. I think there was nothing in your mini hypothesis that decreased the probability. All you did was move the organization problem further back in time.

[Pyrotex]

On this point we have a disagreement. I think there was nothing in your mini hypothesis that decreased the probability. All you did was move the organization problem further back in time.

Okay, I guess we'll have to disagree.

I'm trying to do more than just sweep the probabilities under a rug.

Are you familiar with Dawkins' "Climbing Mount Improbable"?

His thesis (actually one of several) is that the probabilities are manageable because the initial statement of the problem typically given by those who find evolution uncomfortable is not quite correct.

The problem isn't to go from step 1 to step 2 with a probability of 10^100, in a billion years. (impossible!!)

The problem is to go from step 1 to step 2 at 10^10 in 100 million years; step 2 to step 3 at 10^10 in 100 million years;...;step 9 to step 10 at 10^10 in 100 million years. This is actually doable (!) and the probabilities multiply, so you get the same end result.

Communication theory has a similar problem. Building a single exchange so that any one of 500 million phones can call any other is really impossible. So they build exchanges that handle only a few 100,000 inputs and chain them together sequentially and in parallel. Voila! The problem is solvable!!!!

Never underestimate the power of massive parallel computation, where the initial state of each set of sequencial computations is based on the output of the preceding set. It really does work in telephony, making an intractable problem cheap and doable.

[Biochemist]

Okay, I guess we'll have to disagree.

I'm trying to do more than just sweep the probabilities under a rug.

Are you familiar with Dawkins' "Climbing Mount Improbable"?...

I do understand the Dawkins model, and the idea is certianly applicable. Nevertheless, every time I do a reasonable calculation (examples: 1) abiogenesis or 2) speciation by mutation for the 250 million year window from invertebrates to mammals in the Cambrian explosion) and allow for incremental services to "help" the calculations, it is very problematic to get the probabilities down below 1 in 10^20, even under highly favorable conditions. So, the Dawkins approach may suggest that the probabilities are not 1 in 10^50,000 as some have claimed. But it does not get them down to under 1 in 10^10. I don't think that one in ten billion is a particulalry good bassis for reasonability when you have factored in artificially favorable assumptions.

 

These count as things that make me go "Hmmmmmm". But then, so does string theory.

[Biochemist]

... Communication theory has a similar problem. Building a single exchange so that any one of 500 million phones can call any other is really impossible. So they build exchanges that handle only a few 100,000 inputs and chain them together sequentially and in parallel. Voila! The problem is solvable!!!!

Never underestimate the power of massive parallel computation, where the initial state of each set of sequencial computations is based on the output of the preceding set. It really does work in telephony, making an intractable problem cheap and doable.

Sure, but this is really a blissfully simple problem. A more appropriate comparison might be the complexity of managing a environment with 20,000 networked servers. If you have every tried to do application mapping in one of these environments, you find that it is very difficult to manage change and predict the effects of change, even with the best tools. Things tend to fail for reasons that are highly unpredictable.

 

Similarly, a cell with 300,000 proteins has far more interdependencies than 300,00 servers would have. And yet these things not only don't fail, they self repair.

 

This is something else that makes me go "Hmmmmmmm."

[Pyrotex]

I do understand the Dawkins model, and the idea is certianly applicable. Nevertheless, every time I do a reasonable calculation...does not get them down to under 1 in 10^10.

Good. That is a start. ;)

One thing I wish to add, and it concerns the expression of probability we have all been using.

You say the "odds" against throwing snake-eyes is 1 out of 36. Right? But for how many rolls of the dice? ONE. If I give you a dozen roles of the dice, the odds are much better.

 

You say the "odds" against some chemical forming, say an Amino Acid, is 10^10. Okay, but what is the analog for "one roll of the dice"?

 

A formal and proper response might be, "The odds of an Amino Acid forming in any given liter of primordial shallow water within one lunar month is 10^10".

 

Just throwing out an "odds" without stating the boundary conditions is meaningless. And boundary conditions include Time and Volume of the "experiment", as well as the starting chemical conditions.

 

Do the probabilities you are computing include these boundary conditions?? ;)

[Biochemist]

...You say the "odds" against throwing snake-eyes is 1 out of 36. Right? But for how many rolls of the dice? ONE. If I give you a dozen roles of the dice, the odds are much better....

I do understand probability, although I do not regard myself as a statistician.

 

I think we ought to start a new thread on the probabilistic issues of biochemical systems, and stay away from theological implications. You game?

[Biochemist]

I started a new thread in the biology forum on statistics and probability of speciation.

 

Link here:

 

http://hypography.com/forums/biology/5505-statistical-probability-issues-speciation.html#post84796

[CrimsonWolf]

Amusing discussion. Ever read Darwin's Black Box?

 

My choice of references to my earlier post was to make a point. Life does not simply happen and can not be replicated by any known scientific process. No life has ever come into existence under testable or observable conditions. We have only observed life coming from previous life of the same species (parents sex cells carrying genes). You can speculate all you want, but unless someone can make life from scratch using scientific processes then evolution argument will never win out. You can also go the other extreme and try to say the world was made in 6 literal days. Which is nonsense when the Hebrew world for day used in Genesis can also mean period of time of unspecific length. The average English reader never figures that out due to lack of research. Blind faith in any idea leads you no where unless you back that faith with reasonable and accurate knowledge.

[TheBigDog]

We have only observed life coming from previous life of the same species (parents sex cells carrying genes). You can speculate all you want, but unless someone can make life from scratch using scientific processes then evolution argument will never win out.

CW, assume this experiment is done successfully. What does that prove? What does that disprove? Because we can do it in a lab, does that mean we will find in nature if we wait long enough? Or that it is possible to happen naturally?

 

Bill