[_ Old Earth _] Is ID science?

[Barbarian]

Looked at the link. But it doesn't say who the designer of the circuit is. In fact, the link says:

He can't ask the designer because there wasn't one.

Of course, Bob, being a creationist insists that such things can't evolve and must have designer. So it shouldn't be hard for him to tell us. Why is it so hard for you to just tell us, Bob?

Who designed that circuit? And why won't you answer that question? Everyone here knows why, but I want to hear it from you.

 

[BobRyan]

......Patterson argues that by focusing on THIS part of his quote -- the correct direction of his point is obtained. And THIS IS THE PART where he EMPHASIZED that the story telling antics of atheist darwinist devotees "is NOT science" at all.

How "instructive" that THIS is the part of his quote that HE SAYS needs to be emphasized to get the "correct point".

I wonder how many times the darwinist horses can be lead to this water and still refuse to drink?....

Sadly, Dr Patterson is no longer alive to discuss his intention and arguments further and so remains a passive source for whatever conclusions anyone wants to try and draw from his remarks.

Indeed - we will simply have to trust our understanding of the english language as we "read the text"

However, I am a little concerned that you can be so certain that your interpretation of his meaning is correct;

I post "his words" and even he admits that the quotes of him ARE accurate AND he also points to ADDED text for those quotes that does nothing to 'undo them' as we can see "in the text".

Note: My argument is that he is an example of a devoted atheist darwinist who must settle for the darwinian dogma "no matter what' the pile of problems and hoaxes. As an atheist he has no other option.

it is certainly the case that, in one of the last things he wrote in the revised edition of Evolution he said:
[quote:dcca1][The] "misprints" shared between species ... are (to me) incontrovertible evidence of common descent. Evolution 2nd Edition (1998) p.122

Interestingly, in his review of this book Peter J. Mayhew of the Department of Biology at the University of York had this to say:

My guess is that if you are looking for an evolutionary text for 17–18-year-olds, Colin's book is hard to beat, and if you are looking, like me, to get back to evolutionary basics, this is something worth owning.

For the full review see:

http://www.nature.com/hdy/journal/v82/n4/full/6885362a.html
[/quote:dcca1]

As I keep saying - the VALUE in these Patterson quotes is that THIS IS a committed atheist darwinist - not simply a FORMER athiest or FORMER darwinist.

This does not seem to support the view that Patterson had significant doubts about the basic soundness of evolutionary theory.

you have stated your position well - you are trying to argue that the WORDS we actually see Patterson using DO NOT convey "significant doubt" -- certainly we all agree that he was loyal to Darwinism "to the very end" -- but the question as to whether we can spin his statements around to "No significant doubt" -- well let's "look at the text" -

Colin Patterson (Senior paleontologist at the British Natural History Museum and author of the Museum’s general text on evolution)

A 1981 lecture presented at New York City's American Museum of Natural History

Colin PATTERSON:

"...I'm speaking on two subjects, evolutionism and creationism, and I believe it's true to say that I know nothing whatever about either...One of the reasons I started taking this anti-evolutionary view,well, let's call it non-evolutionary , was last year I had a sudden realization.

"For over twenty years I had thought that I was working on evolution in some way. One morning I woke up, and something had happened in the night, and it struck me that I had been working on this stuff for twenty years, and there was not one thing I knew about it. "That was quite a shock that one could be misled for so long...

It does seem that the level of knowledge about evolution is remarkably shallow. We know it ought not to be taught in high school, and perhaps that's all we know about it...

about eighteen months ago...I woke up and I realized that all my life I had been duped into taking evolutionism as revealed truth in some way."

Patterson - again quoting Gillespie accusing that those "'...holding creationist ideas could plead ignorance of the means and affirm only the fact,'" Patterson countered, "That seems to summarize the feeling I get in talking to evolutionists today. They plead ignorance of the means of transformation, but affirm only the fact: 'Yes it has...we know it has taken place.'"

"...Now I think that many people in this room would acknowledge that during the last few years, if you had thought about it at all, you've experienced a shift from evolution as knowledge to evolution as faith. I know that's true of me, and I think it's true of a good many of you in here...

"...Evolution not only conveys no knowledge, but seems somehow to convey anti-knowledge [/u], apparent knowledge which is actually harmful to systematics..."

Some will observe evidence for "significant doubt" is easily seen "in the text" -- others will simply argue that they "don't see it".

Here is "some indication" that another well known atheist darwinist "got the point of the text" --

Dr. Frair provides his own testimony as a front-row attendee of this talk by Patterson
[quote:dcca1] Dr Frair:
I was sitting in the front row next to an AMNH curator of mammals, Karl Koopman, who, obviously very agitated kept slamming his pencil down in front of him.

Niles Eldredge in the Department of Invertebrates at AMNH was standing by the left wall (as one looks toward the speaker). Beside Eldredge stood a high school biology teacher, Roy Slingo, from the prestigious Scarsdale NY district.

Slingo later informed me that at one stage of the talk Niles Eldredge (well known for his anti-creationist perspective) grabbed his forehead and slid down the wall proclaiming, "My God, how can he be doing this to us."

[/quote:dcca1]

Yet I have no doubt that at least some here will respond "I don't see it --- I just don't see it" :wink:

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

Looked at the link. But it doesn't say who the designer of the circuit is. In fact, the link says:

He can't ask the designer because there wasn't one.

Indeed the programmer created the program modeled after the working schema of the human brain "according to the text" of your link. Then the massively complex massively designed computer RAN the programs over a period of time until finally it spit out " a diode".

As you already learned here -
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389449#p389428

Creationists CONTINUALLY argue that MORE COMPLEX systems can produce LESS comples ones -- if you had been paying attention I am sure this subtle point would have been noticed even by you.

Of course, Bob, being a creationist insists that such things can't evolve and must have designer.

Indeed must have a massively complex computer to host the programs, must have an even more massively complex human brain coding them and then must be allowed to run long enough to "produce the simple diode".

I know of NO creationist anywhere arguing against such a chain of complexity as the one you have identified for us.

Barbarian
Why is it so hard for you to just tell us, Bob?

Does this "look hard" Barbarian??

Seems to me that I am simply "reading" your text for you and telling you about the abvious points IN the text itself.

BTW - I can also do that with segments of random code AND then claim "I did not design that code" about the code aggregates that result -- maybe even highlight the example if a few of those random snippents just so happen to be generated in a sequence that says "Hello Barbarian" each time the speach-to-text software gets to the input "someone here can't read".

Who designed that circuit? And why won't you answer that question? Everyone here knows why, but I want to hear it from you.

Er um -- already answered it -- (now we are up to twice).
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389449#p389428
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389449#p389449

Reading, Barbarian -- what a concept.

Bob

 

[Barbarian]

Sorry, Bob, as you know, you didn't identify the designer in those links. Why are you having such a problem telling us who the designer of that circuit was?

Seems like an easy thing. Read the source, and tell us who the designer was. Unless there wasn't a designer.

Rock and a hard place um, Bob?

 

[lordkalvan]

My argument is simply that if "correctness of PREDICTION" is to be used as an "indicator" of viability of theory then the guys that "guessed the temperature" at 2.5 Kelvin for the Universe Sans-Big-Bang won the prize.

Ummm, in this case, no, "correctness of PREDICTION" alone is not an "indicator" of a theory's viability. The "correctness of prediction" may be coincidental or it may be that the estimates are based on measurements of observed phenomena. The viability of a theory depends on its predictive usefulness across a range of observed consilient features and its subsequent testability against those observations; it will survive and be modified as observations refine understanding.. If, for example, Eddington's figure approaches the Big Bang figure, but if his explanation for cause is different and shown to be incorrect or insufficient to explain measurements and observations made by later research, then your argument is demonstrably invalidated.

[quote:00831]I have no idea what you mean when you ask '"whose number" did they "find"'

Well - that's "one solution" to that problem in "history" about predictions.[/quote:00831]
Sorry, I still don't get it.

The point is that the principle is the same. The objective is to detect IN NATURE an element of ID such that for something like a "scanning function" you can discriminate in favor of ID and against background radiation. (for example). The "scan" does not know ahead of time what it will find - but it can be designed to discriminate for specific attributes/characteristics of ID rather than simply amplifying every string of static that comes along.....

Again, I accept the usefulness of the analogy for illustrative purposes, I just do not see its usefulness as evidence to establish your point in respect of biological "artefacts". In your illustration of the detection of intelligent design in parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, anyone looking for that design already knows that it exists even before they start looking because they know that parts of the EM spectrum are generated artificially from human sources. Intelligent design is a known and recognized part of the process. This clearly does not apply in the biological "spectrum" and so the principle is not the same.

 

[lordkalvan]

Indeed - we will simply have to trust our understanding of the english language as we "read the text"
......
I post "his words" and even he admits that the quotes of him ARE accurate AND he also points to ADDED text for those quotes that does nothing to 'undo them' as we can see "in the text".

Note: My argument is that he is an example of a devoted atheist darwinist who must settle for the darwinian dogma "no matter what' the pile of problems and hoaxes. As an atheist he has no other option.

But we also know that Dr Patterson took issue with the specific interpretation placed on his comments by creationists in his letter to Lionel Theunissen:

I think the continuation of the passage shows clearly that your interpretation (at the end of your letter) is correct, and the creationists' is false.

That brush with Sunderland (I had never heard of him before) was my first experience of creationists. The famous "keynote address" at the American Museum of Natural History in 1981 was nothing of the sort. It was a talk to the "Systematics Discussion Group" in the Museum, an (extremely) informal group. I had been asked to talk to them on "Evolutionism and creationism"; fired up by a paper by Ernst Mayr published in Science just the week before. I gave a fairly rumbustious talk, arguing that the theory of evolution had done more harm than good to biological systematics (classification). Unknown to me, there was a creationist in the audience with a hidden tape recorder. So much the worse for me. But my talk was addressed to professional systematists, and concerned systematics, nothing else.

As I keep saying - the VALUE in these Patterson quotes is that THIS IS a committed atheist darwinist - not simply a FORMER athiest or FORMER darwinist.

No, the value of Dr Patterson's quotes to creationists is that they can be misused as you are misusing them. Dr Patterson has made clear his words do not cast doubt on evolutionary theory and his later writings make his fundamental belief in the soundness of evolutionary theory obvious. It is also the case that, in respect of the fossil record in general and Archaeopteryx in particular, Dr Patterson was making the point that, in his opinion, there was insufficient evidence for any specific fossil to be identified as directly ancestral to later species. He did not deny that such evidence could be found nor that the fossil record was entirely consistent with the idea of evolution:

In several animal and plant groups, enough fossils are known to bridge the wide gaps between existing types. In mammals, for example, the gap between horses, asses and zebras (genus Equus) and their closest living relatives, the rhinoceroses and tapirs, is filled by an extensive series of fossils extending back sixty-million years to a small animal, Hyracotherium, which can only be distinguished from the rhinoceros-tapir group by one or two horse-like details of the skull. There are many other examples of fossil 'missing links', such as Archaeopteryx, the Jurassic bird which links birds with dinosaurs (Fig. 45), and Ichthyostega, the late Devonian amphibian which links land vertebrates and the extinct choanate (having internal nostrils) fishes. . .Evolution (1978 edition) pp.131-133

I am sure this must have been pointed out to you before, but you seem to prefer to believe that what you think Dr Patterson meant and understood about evolutionary trumps whatever Dr Patterson might subsequently have said that he meant, not to mention overriding anything he may have written in textbooks, letters and scholarly papers. Perhaps you believe that Dr Patterson unintentionally revealed the truth behind Evil Atheist Conspiracy and its determination to use evolutionary theory to 'disprove' the Bible by whatever means necessary?

 

[BobRyan]

My argument is simply that if "correctness of PREDICTION" is to be used as an "indicator" of viability of theory then the guys that "guessed the temperature" at 2.5 Kelvin for the Universe Sans-Big-Bang won the prize.

Ummm, in this case, no, "correctness of PREDICTION" alone is not an "indicator" of a theory's viability.

Fine -- but then you have taken a lot of the air out of the sails in the ship of Big Bang cosmology.

The "correctness of prediction" may be coincidental or it may be that the estimates are based on measurements of observed phenomena. The viability of a theory depends on its predictive usefulness across a range of observed consilient features and its subsequent testability against those observations; it will survive and be modified as observations refine understanding.. If, for example, Eddington's figure approaches the Big Bang figure

The latest CMB "actual" measurement is approximately 2.75K.

Are you suggesting it is about to jump to 5k?

, but if his explanation for cause is different and shown to be incorrect or insufficient to explain measurements and observations made by later research, then your argument is demonstrably invalidated.

With that "IF" you leave the entire Big Bang cosmology argument left "suspended" waiting for evidence.

The entire reason for bringing UP a "theory" that requires "all new laws of physics" and that requires "the 4 forces of nature - be combined into one" (things we can not repeat or test in the lab) -- a theory whose predictive quality has resulted in the masking of our 2.5k CMB predictions sans-big-bang as IF that was the Big Bang temperature prediction....

IF THAT is a "well accepted theory" thend ID SCIENCE that argues for the "Academic freedom to follow the data where it leads" and that IS demonstrated "commercially viable" in it's "predictive quality" when it comes to things like scanning-functions for intelligently designed electromagnetic wave forms is FAR better "science" -- far more "proven" -- by comparison.

Bob said -

The point is that the principle is the same. The objective is to detect IN NATURE an element of ID such that for something like a "scanning function" you can discriminate in favor of ID and against background radiation. (for example). The "scan" does not know ahead of time what it will find - but it can be designed to discriminate for specific attributes/characteristics of ID rather than simply amplifying every string of static that comes along.....

Again, I accept the usefulness of the analogy for illustrative purposes, I just do not see its usefulness as evidence to establish your point in respect of biological "artefacts".

Step 1. The general principle that we CAN find ID in NATURE itself is fully established in the example of one of the four forces in nature. So the argument "not possible" in general - is dead.

It clearly contrasts ID vs "What ROCKS can do given enought time mass and access to an energy source" in terms of background noise.

Step 2. Was to note that the DEGREE of DESIGN exhibited in the systems-design for DNA to Protein synthesis exhibits DESIGN FAR BEYOND that of a simple Intelligently designed WAVE form because BOTH systems require encoding, transmitting, error-correction, decoding and then translating to yeild a useful product. But in the case of the EM wave form all that is DONE BY US whereas in DNA it is all DONE FOR US!

Again -- just stating the obvious in step 2.

In your illustration of the detection of intelligent design in parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, anyone looking for that design already knows that it exists even before they start looking because they know that parts of the EM spectrum are generated artificially from human sources.

Indeed - but the electronic circuits that discriminate for the ID wave form "do not know that" to discriminate between "what rocks can do" and what is "intelligently designed" EVEN when the function is "scan".

Intelligent design is a known and recognized part of the process.

Not by the circuit doing the scanning.

It is down to science when it comes to seeing the attributes of what "rocks can do by themselves" vs attributes of a EM wave form characteristic of ID EM.

This also applies to all areas of science not just biology not just EM -- finding attributes that identify the difference between "what rocks and do on their own given enough mass time and exposure to an energy source" is the same exercise though it may not be the same "mechanics".

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

Sorry, Bob, as you know, you didn't identify the designer in those links.

Er um -- already answered it -- twice now.
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389449#p389428
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389449#p389449

Reading, Barbarian -- what a concept.

Why are you having such a problem with it?

Though I did not WANT to point the "glaringly obvious out to you a third time" -- I am willing to do it at some point -- starting with this.

When the DESIGNER creates a PROGRAM with function - A and the ability to randomize to A' all you have is a hat-trick when the designer then claims "I did not specify the exact A' - I am not the designer".

When designing a cartisian coordinate system with random objects arranged (take a star trek game with Klingon ships and bases) the randomizer arranges each of the cartisian maps -- and the programmer can easily argue "I did not specifiy that design" because the randomizer did it -- but the designer had to CREATE a software system capable of generating maps and arranging objects with attributes that fit into some limited set of parameters.

Get it? Yet?

The SAME is true if the programmer is creating software modules that are DESGINED to -- create circuit schemas and then inserts randomizing functions that use parameters modeled after the human brain and neural networks.

Get it? yet?

IT IS THE SAME hat trick to then claim "I did not design" the resulting schema or cartisian map. makes no difference!

Why are these simple concepts in reading so challenging for you Barbarian. You respond like a villager seeing their first flashlight in your efforts to pretend that you are not following the point.

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

Indeed - we will simply have to trust our understanding of the english language as we "read the text"
......
I post "his words" and even he admits that the quotes of him ARE accurate AND he also points to ADDED text for those quotes that does nothing to 'undo them' as we can see "in the text".

Note: My argument is that he is an example of a devoted atheist darwinist who must settle for the darwinian dogma "no matter what' the pile of problems and hoaxes. As an atheist he has no other option.

But we also know that Dr Patterson took issue with the specific interpretation placed on his comments by creationists in his letter to Lionel Theunissen:

Indeed so instead of "imagining" what the "issue is" let's "Read the text and SEE the points he highlights IN his response".

The bait-and-switch in this case that darwinists KEEP falling for is that Patterson SAID that SOMETHING Theunissen argued was more correct than what the creationist argued -- then they FAIL to "keep reading" and SEE what Theunnisen SAID he argued -- preferring to simply "ignore inconvenient facts that get in the way of good story". "AFter all didn't Patterson SAY that SOMETHING there was different" and so "why do we need to LOOK at what they said it was" is the form of argument that the darwinists take.

It is because LOOKING is not helpful to their argument. It is much better to STOP at Patterson's statement that "somethint was different" while IGNORING what HE said was the key to solving that DIFFERENCe and alos IGNORING what Theunnissen said was the key -- simply because "the details GET IN THE WAY" of the "good story" that darwinists NEEDED.

Notice that Eldredge appears to "GET the point" and it is not because he turned into a YEC.

I think the continuation of the passage shows clearly that your interpretation (at the end of your letter) is correct, and the creationists' is false.

Indeed - might be a good Idea ot SEE what is IN the continuation.

Might be a good idea to SEE what Theunissen SAID was "HIS interptretation".

You know "the details".

LK
That brush with Sunderland (I had never heard of him before) was my first experience of creationists. The famous "keynote address" at the American Museum of Natural History in 1981 was nothing of the sort. It was a talk to the "Systematics Discussion Group" in the Museum, an (extremely) informal group. I had been asked to talk to them on "Evolutionism and creationism"; fired up by a paper by Ernst Mayr published in Science just the week before. I gave a fairly rumbustious talk, arguing that the theory of evolution had done more harm than good to biological systematics (classification). Unknown to me, there was a creationist in the audience with a hidden tape recorder. So much the worse for me. But my talk was addressed to professional systematists, and concerned systematics, nothing else.

Ok the first DETAIL you were willing to post -- where Patterson claims there is a "difference" is that the AMNH talk was NOT a "Keynote address" -- however NOTHING IN MY quote of Patterson (or my quote of ANYONE) shows me to claim that it WAS a "keynote address".

so your first "detail" is NO DIFFERENCE AT ALL in what I have posted.

Yet you appeal to this "non-difference" as the thing that illustrates your point? OR are you falling back to "Patterson said - SOMETHING - was different ... so ignore what it was and just observe there WAS a difference" as if that solves the problem for Darwinism (and Eldredge for example) when it comes to Patterson's statements.

Whereas you argue that his comments give NO evidence of significant doubt as we see them here
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389498#p389498

The well known atheist darwinist Eldredge appears to "See the point" as we see in that link -- that you claim to miss.

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

As I keep saying - the VALUE in these Patterson quotes is that THIS IS a committed atheist darwinist - not simply a FORMER athiest or FORMER darwinist.

This does not seem to support the view that Patterson had significant doubts about the basic soundness of evolutionary theory.

you have stated your position well - you are trying to argue that the WORDS we actually see Patterson using DO NOT convey "significant doubt" -- certainly we all agree that he was loyal to Darwinism "to the very end" -- but the question as to whether we can spin his statements around to "No significant doubt" -- well let's "look at the text" -

Colin Patterson (Senior paleontologist at the British Natural History Museum and author of the Museum’s general text on evolution)

A 1981 lecture presented at New York City's American Museum of Natural History

Colin PATTERSON:

"...I'm speaking on two subjects, evolutionism and creationism, and I believe it's true to say that I know nothing whatever about either...One of the reasons I started taking this anti-evolutionary view,well, let's call it non-evolutionary , was last year I had a sudden realization.

"For over twenty years I had thought that I was working on evolution in some way. One morning I woke up, and something had happened in the night, and it struck me that I had been working on this stuff for twenty years, and there was not one thing I knew about it. "That was quite a shock that one could be misled for so long...

It does seem that the level of knowledge about evolution is remarkably shallow. We know it ought not to be taught in high school, and perhaps that's all we know about it...

about eighteen months ago...I woke up and I realized that all my life I had been duped into taking evolutionism as revealed truth in some way."

Patterson - again quoting Gillespie accusing that those "'...holding creationist ideas could plead ignorance of the means and affirm only the fact,'" Patterson countered, "That seems to summarize the feeling I get in talking to evolutionists today. They plead ignorance of the means of transformation, but affirm only the fact: 'Yes it has...we know it has taken place.'"

"...Now I think that many people in this room would acknowledge that during the last few years, if you had thought about it at all, you've experienced a shift from evolution as knowledge to evolution as faith. I know that's true of me, and I think it's true of a good many of you in here...

"...Evolution not only conveys no knowledge, but seems somehow to convey anti-knowledge [/u], apparent knowledge which is actually harmful to systematics..."

Some will observe evidence for "significant doubt" is easily seen "in the text" -- others will simply argue that they "don't see it".

Here is "some indication" that another well known atheist darwinist "got the point of the text" --

Dr. Frair provides his own testimony as a front-row attendee of this talk by Patterson
[quote:c40cf] Dr Frair:
I was sitting in the front row next to an AMNH curator of mammals, Karl Koopman, who, obviously very agitated kept slamming his pencil down in front of him.

Niles Eldredge in the Department of Invertebrates at AMNH was standing by the left wall (as one looks toward the speaker). Beside Eldredge stood a high school biology teacher, Roy Slingo, from the prestigious Scarsdale NY district.

Slingo later informed me that at one stage of the talk Niles Eldredge (well known for his anti-creationist perspective) grabbed his forehead and slid down the wall proclaiming, "My God, how can he be doing this to us."

[/quote:c40cf]

Yet I have no doubt that at least some here will respond "I don't see it --- I just don't see it" :wink:

 

[BobRyan]

As I keep saying - the VALUE in these Patterson quotes is that THIS IS a committed atheist darwinist - not simply a FORMER athiest or FORMER darwinist.

No, the value of Dr Patterson's quotes to creationists is that they can be misused as you are misusing them. Dr Patterson has made clear his words do not cast doubt on evolutionary theory

You are making a religious argument of the form "whenever we see the disparaging language of Patterson as in the quotes that Eldredge laments about -- we should not BELIEVE them to cast doubt for we BELIEVE that IF we had a quote from Patterson ABOUT Those remarks he would say that those remarks DO NOT cast DOUBT"

It is PATTERSON who claims "HE WAS DUPED"
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389498#p389498

and you argue that such language "does not cast doubt" no matter what we actually read IN the text --

Yours is a by-faith argument for darwinist orthodoxy in spite of the content of the text we read from Patterson!

It is left as an exercise for the reader to contrast your "faith" argument as it clings to orthodoxy in darwinism -- not admitting to the facts of the text, vs the response we SEE in Eldredge's lament (found at the end of my post above -- this link).

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=225#p389498

LK
and his later writings make his fundamental belief in the soundness of evolutionary theory obvious.

There is no argument at all on the table that Patterson was ever anything other than a devoted follower of atheist darwinism -- who was honest and objective enough to ADMIT to the flaws.

HE himself points to the "religious orthodoxy" in the arguments of fellow darwinists as we SEE the quote he provides.

LK
It is also the case that, in respect of the fossil record in general and Archaeopteryx in particular, Dr Patterson was making the point that, in his opinion, there was insufficient evidence for any specific fossil to be identified as directly ancestral to later species.

Ahhh now we get to the "inconvenient details" of WHY Patterson wrote to Sunderland (the creationist in question in all of this) and said

"I FULLY AGREE with YOUR COMMENTS on the LACK of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions"

On April 10, 1979, Patterson replied to the author (Sunderland) in a most candid letter as follows:

Patterson TO Sunderland -

“ I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them.
You suggest that an artist should be used to visualise such transformations, but where would he get the information from? I could not, honestly, provide it, and if I were to leave it to artistic license, would that not mislead the reader?

I wrote the text of my book four years ago. If I were to write it now, I think the book would be rather different. Gradualism is a concept I believe in, not just because of Darwin’s authority, but because my understanding of genetics seems to demand it. Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils. As a palaeontologist myself, I am much occupied with the philosophical problems of identifying ancestral forms in the fossil record.

You say that I should at least show a photo of the fossil from which each type of organism was derived. I will lay it on the line- there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument. The reason is that statements about ancestry and descent are not applicable in the fossil record. Is Archaeopteryx the ancestor of all birds? Perhaps yes, perhaps no there is no way of answering the question. It is easy enough to make up stories of how one form gave rise to another, and to find reasons why the stages should be favoured by natural selection. But such stories are not part of science, for there is no way of putting them to the test. So, much as I should like to oblige you by jumping to the defence of gradualism, and fleshing out the transitions between the major types of animals and plants, I find myself a bit short of the intellectual justification necessary for the job “

[Ref: Patterson, personal communication. Documented in Darwin’s Enigma, Luther Sunderland, Master Books, El Cajon, CA, 1988, pp. 88-90.]

[/quote]

LK
He did not deny that such evidence could be found

It is left as an exercisse for the reader to contrast that claim of yours above with Patterson's words to Sunderland on that very point!

Patterson To Sunderland

“ I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them.
You suggest that an artist should be used to visualise such transformations, but where would he get the information from? I could not, honestly, provide it, and if I were to leave it to artistic license, would that not mislead the reader?
[/size]

GIVEN that Patterson and Theunissen both AGREE that artifacts are CLAIMED as "transitional" "MISSIG LINKS" between A and C EVEN though there is NO SCIENCE saying that they are a descendant of A or ancestor to C -- given that level of gross gloss-over equivocation as the "foundational CONTEXT of the claims" is it any wonder that Patterson can THEN argue

PATTERSON -
There are many other examples of fossil 'missing links', such as Archaeopteryx, the Jurassic bird which links birds with dinosaurs (Fig. 45), and Ichthyostega, the late Devonian amphibian which links land vertebrates and the extinct choanate (having internal nostrils) fishes. . .Evolution (1978 edition) pp.131-133

It is "instructive" that Patterson shows us that these PRIME examples of missing links includ Archaeopteryx SINCE he already stated clearly that we HAVE NO SCIENCE telling us that Arhaeopteryx is either ANCESTOR to birds or DESCENDANT of Dinosaur they simply CLAIM "missing link" ANYWAY!!

A claim made in spite of what Patterson admits science does not tell us about fossils, not BECAUSE of it (as is evidenced in the Patterson quote below)

PATTERSON to Sunderland -
You say that I should at least show a photo of the fossil from which each type of organism was derived. I will lay it on the line- there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument. The reason is that statements about ancestry and descent are not applicable in the fossil record. Is Archaeopteryx the ancestor of all birds? Perhaps yes, perhaps no there is no way of answering the question. It is easy enough to make up stories of how one form gave rise to another, and to find reasons why the stages should be favoured by natural selection. But such stories are not part of science, for there is no way of putting them to the test. So, much as I should like to oblige you by jumping to the defence of gradualism, and fleshing out the transitions between the major types of animals and plants, I find myself a bit short of the intellectual justification necessary for the job “

[Ref: Patterson, personal communication. Documented in Darwin’s Enigma, Luther Sunderland, Master Books, El Cajon, CA, 1988, pp. 88-90.]

On this thread this has been pointed out to you, but you seem to prefer to believe that what you think Dr Patterson meant and understood about evolutionary gaps trumps whatever Dr Patterson might be seen to actually say about them "in the text" of his own words.

Bob

 

[Barbarian]

Sorry Bob, that won't cut it. The man who set up the experiment doesn't even understand the principle by which the circuit works. To say that someone designed a system when he doesn't know how it works or even the principle by which it works is absurd.

No, he wasn't the designer, since he manifestly did not design the circuit. If he did, he would understand it. And he doesn't. Try again.

Oh, and there's no point in trotting out your doctored stories about Patterson; he's already said that they were dishonestly edited. And everyone's seen that.

 

[BobRyan]

Sorry Bob, that won't cut it.

Pretending not to understand the point is not helping your argument.

The Cartisian map and the DESING of programs such that THEY randomize circuit design as output is the SAME exercise in principle BOTH programmers can do the hat-trick "claim" of the form "I never specified that map,,, I never designed that map layout ... I never specified that circuit layout".

You simply appeal to the reader's gullibility such that they might really think you don't understand the point just as you claim.

I rather suspect you are just pretending to fail to understand it.

As you also pretend not to understand what Patterson meant by "DUPED".

Bob

 

[lordkalvan]

Ummm, in this case, no, "correctness of PREDICTION" alone is not an "indicator" of a theory's viability.

Fine -- but then you have taken a lot of the air out of the sails in the ship of Big Bang cosmology.

Did you miss the 'alone' in my comment above? Or do you think Big Bang cosmology depends solely on the predicted value of the CMB? Because I'm pretty sure that I haven't done what you suggest I have done.

The latest CMB "actual" measurement is approximately 2.75K.

Are you suggesting it is about to jump to 5k?

I don't know where you think I am suggesting anything of the kind or, for that matter, why I would be suggesting it.

[quote:eea46]..but if his [Eddington's] explanation for cause is different and shown to be incorrect or insufficient to explain measurements and observations made by later research, then your argument is demonstrably invalidated.

With that "IF" you leave the entire Big Bang cosmology argument left "suspended" waiting for evidence.[/quote:eea46]
I have no idea what you mean by this comment.

The entire reason for bringing UP a "theory" that requires "all new laws of physics" and that requires "the 4 forces of nature - be combined into one" (things we can not repeat or test in the lab) -- a theory whose predictive quality has resulted in the masking of our 2.5k CMB predictions sans-big-bang as IF that was the Big Bang temperature prediction....

This seems to be a incomplete sentence. I cannot deduce what you are trying to say. The entire reason is ..... what? What I can point out again is that the correctness or otherwise of the predicted CMB temperature alone is not the sole evidential support for Big Bang cosmology.

IF THAT is a "well accepted theory" thend ID SCIENCE that argues for the "Academic freedom to follow the data where it leads" and that IS demonstrated "commercially viable" in it's "predictive quality" when it comes to things like scanning-functions for intelligently designed electromagnetic wave forms is FAR better "science" -- far more "proven" -- by comparison.

How is the ability to detect human activity in the EM spectrum an exclusive outcome of ID science? As far as I was aware, the ability to detect human activity in the EM spectrum long predates ID science by decades.

[quote:eea46]Again, I accept the usefulness of the analogy for illustrative purposes, I just do not see its usefulness as evidence to establish your point in respect of biological "artefacts".

Step 1. The general principle that we CAN find ID in NATURE itself is fully established in the example of one of the four forces in nature. So the argument "not possible" in general - is dead.

It clearly contrasts ID vs "What ROCKS can do given enought time mass and access to an energy source" in terms of background noise.[/quote:eea46]
Step 1 fails immediately because what you are pointing to as ID in NATURE is both human-created and, most importantly, KNOWN to be human created.

Step 2. Was to note that the DEGREE of DESIGN exhibited in the systems-design for DNA to Protein synthesis exhibits DESIGN FAR BEYOND that of a simple Intelligently designed WAVE form because BOTH systems require encoding, transmitting, error-correction, decoding and then translating to yeild a useful product. But in the case of the EM wave form all that is DONE BY US whereas in DNA it is all DONE FOR US!

In Step 2 you seem to be assuming your conclusion based on little more than personal incredulity. Please point to evidence beyond argument by analogy that supports your claim. Please explain how natural selection of favourable heritable traits over time is not an equally valid explanation of biological features that you prefer to see as the product of supernatural design.

[quote:eea46]In your illustration of the detection of intelligent design in parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, anyone looking for that design already knows that it exists even before they start looking because they know that parts of the EM spectrum are generated artificially from human sources.

Indeed - but the electronic circuits that discriminate for the ID wave form "do not know that" to discriminate between "what rocks can do" and what is "intelligently designed" EVEN when the function is "scan".[/quote:eea46]
I don't understand your point. It seems wholly irrelevant to any argument about design in biology.

[quote:eea46]Intelligent design is a known and recognized part of the process.

Not by the circuit doing the scanning.

It is down to science when it comes to seeing the attributes of what "rocks can do by themselves" vs attributes of a EM wave form characteristic of ID EM.

This also applies to all areas of science not just biology not just EM -- finding attributes that identify the difference between "what rocks and do on their own given enough mass time and exposure to an energy source" is the same exercise though it may not be the same "mechanics".[/quote:eea46]
And again, your point is?

 

[Barbarian]

(Bob asserts a man designed a circuit that he doesn't even understand.)

That's pretty weird, Bob. How can anyone design something that they don't even understand the principle by which it works? C'mon, try again. Tell us who designed it.

Hint: you could do what the Discovery Institute does; claim God did it.

The Cartisian map and the DESING of programs such that THEY randomize circuit design as output is the SAME exercise in principle BOTH programmers can do the hat-trick "claim" of the form "I never specified that map,,, I never designed that map layout ... I never specified that circuit layout".

It's a little tougher than that for you, Bob. In this case, he doesn't even know what happened, or how it works. Declaring that he "designed" something, the working of which he doesn't even understand, is more than a little silly.

As you also pretend not to understand what Patterson meant by "DUPED".

We all understand. Patterson said that his statements were misrepresented by the guys who fed you those edited "quotes." SOP for creationists.

 

[lordkalvan]

On this thread this has been pointed out to you, but you seem to prefer to believe that what you think Dr Patterson meant and understood about evolutionary gaps trumps whatever Dr Patterson might be seen to actually say about them "in the text" of his own words.

I have simply quoted to you what Dr Patterson wrote about the use creationists put his words to, his disagreement with that use, the intent behind his words and subsequent writings by Dr Patterson that indicate his confidence in the principles of evolutionary theory. This is not what I 'think Dr Patterson meant and understood about evolutionary gaps', it is what he says he meant and understood. You can continue posting and reposting your multi-colour, multi-size quotes from Dr Patterson's address; this will not alter the fact that he criticized the use to which creationists put his words, claimed they were used out of the specific context in which they were spoken and emphasized that creationists impart to his words a particular 'spin' suited to their own purposes.

 

[BobRyan]

On this thread this has been pointed out to you, but you seem to prefer to believe that what you think Dr Patterson meant and understood about evolutionary gaps trumps whatever Dr Patterson might be seen to actually say about them "in the text" of his own words.

I have simply quoted to you what Dr Patterson wrote

Indeeed - just As I have provided to you detailed reviews of the "inconvenient facts" in what he said and wrote.

My points is that we need to actually LOOK at what he said -- walking away with a half-snip "something about what the creationist said was not to Patterson's liking" is not sufficient grasp "of the details" - to cary the point forward.

That is why I took so much care to actually HIGHLIGHT the DETAIL points that Patterson himself identifies as being "the details that are in error" in what Sunderland said.

Click here to see part 1 of that detailed review of what PATTERSON said in his letter to THEUNISSEN -
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=195#p389329

This is very critical SINCE Patterson AFFIRMS to Theunissen that Sunderlands quote OF HIM was "Accurate" and since in his letter TO Sunderlan he states "I AGREE with you".

A more detailed review of Patterson's letter to Theunissen is found here showing Patterson's entire letter to Theunissen -
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389616#p389616

Given that we have those words from Patterson -- I find it uselful NOT to simply gloss over his statements -- but to LOOK for the details.

Although Others may find a gloss-over approach to be more "inconvenient".

I have also done a review of Theunissen's own summary of Pattersons letter and his own emphasis regarding the issue of "LACK of transitional forms" which is the THING that came up in Sunderlands letter and published statements about Patterson -

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389602#p389608

To see just HOW Theunnisen and Patterson AGREED that the statement about the LACK of transitionals should be viewed (as opposed to Sunderlands view of it) -- see the link above.

You can continue posting and reposting your multi-colour, multi-size quotes from Dr Patterson's address;

Thanks. I will continue to do that for the benefit of the unbiased objective readers.

Perhaps you were referring to the Patterson quotes we find at this link -
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=31996&p=389602#p389501

this will not alter the fact that he criticized the use to which creationists put his words,

Indeed -- he specifically objected to the term "KEY NOTE ADDRESS" -- the term MISSING from my quote of Patterson and my quote of Sunderland.

But thanks for repeatedly referencing the fact that what HE identified as the problem -- is not a problem IN any of the quotes I provide.

Notice that Patterson does NOT say "I said I was DUPED but I meant that in a GOOD way for Evolutoinism -- those dirty rotten creationists who think that such terms cast DOUBT on whatever was DUPING me are simply wrong".

We can not "imagine" or "Story tell" our way out of the problems Patterson highlighted for us.

HENCE Niles Eldredge's cogent response.

One that seems to have completely slipped past the distinctively darwinist-orthodox reviewers on this thread.

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

Mr Theunissen writes to Dr Patterson perfectly illustrating the weakness in thinking among evolutionism’s true believership that Patterson had commented on above “They plead ignorance as to the means of transformation but affirm only the factâ€Â

Theunissen writes:
Anyone who has actually read the book can hardly say that Patterson believed in the absence of transitional forms. For example (p131-133):
Patterson:
"In several animal and plant groups, enough fossils are known to bridge the wide gaps between existing types. In mammals, for example, the gap between horses, asses and zebras (genus Equus) and their closest living relatives, the rhinoceroses and tapirs, is filled by an extensive series of fossils extending back sixty-million years to a small animal, Hyracotherium, which can only be distinguished from the rhinoceros-tapir group by one or two horse-like details of the skull. There are many other examples of fossil 'missing links', such as Archaeopteryx, the Jurassic bird which links birds with dinosaurs (Fig. 45), and Ichthyostega, the late Devonian amphibian which links land vertebrates and the extinct choanate (having internal nostrils) fishes. . ."
Patterson goes on to acknowledge that there are gaps in the fossil record, but points out that this is possibly due to the limitations of what fossils can tell us. He finishes the paragraph with:
". . .Fossils may tell us many things, but one thing they can never disclose is whether they were ancestors of anything else."
It is actually this statement which is the key to interpreting the Sunderland quote correctly; it is not possible to say for certain whether a fossil is in the direct ancestral line of a species group. Archaeopteryx, for example, is not necessarily directly ancestral to birds. It may have been a species on a side-branch. However, that in no way disqualifies it as a transitional form,[b/] or as evidence for evolution.


Evolution predicts that such fossils will exist (hence: a true tautaulogy ) , and if there was no link between reptiles and birds then Archaeopteryx would not exist, whether it is directly ancestral or not. What Patterson was saying to Sunderland was that, of the transitional forms that are known, he could not make a watertight argument for any being directly ancestral to living species groups.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/patterson.html

NOTE (In Patterson’s letter of response to Theunnisen he agrees saying
Patterson to Theunnisen:
“I think the continuation of the passage shows clearly that your interpretation (at the end of your letter) is correct, and the creationists' is false. “


We have the perfect example of the fallacy Patterson complains about – for in the above example both HE and Theunissen argue that the story telling about “how one thing came from another†is NOT science (saying that fossils can NOT tell us if they are descendant or ancestor to a given species) AND YET they both agree that they need to CLAIM fossils as “transitional†or “missing links†EVEN though they have NO science that will confirm that they actually ARE descendant OR ancestor to either of the species they supposedly BRIDGE. This is literally “affirming the fact while claiming ignorance as to the MEANS†– as we see below –

Patterson:

about eighteen months ago...I woke up and I realized that all my life I had been duped into taking evolutionism as revealed truth in some way."

Patterson - again quoting Gillespie accusing that those "'...holding creationist ideas could plead ignorance of the means and affirm only the fact,'" Patterson countered, "That seems to summarize the feeling I get in talking to evolutionists today. They plead ignorance of the means of transformation, but affirm only the fact: 'Yes it has...we know it has taken place.'"

"...Now I think that many people in this room would acknowledge that during the last few years, if you had thought about it at all, you've experienced a shift from evolution as knowledge to evolution as faith. I know that's true of me, and I think it's true of a good many of you in here...

"...Evolution not only conveys no knowledge, but seems somehow to convey anti-knowledge [/u], apparent knowledge which is actually harmful to systematics..."

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

Patterson LETTER to Theunissen to Explain his former Letter to Sunderland –

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/patterson.html


(Hint: Here is where many have supposed that Patterson would “undo†or “papally annul†his previous frank statements regarding the glaring defects and shortcomings of atheist evolutionism. One way many hoped Patterson would do it is to claim that the quote of him was not accurrate – but instead Patterson AFFIRMS the accuracy of the quote AND ADDs to the weight of evidence against atheist Darwinism when he says the quotes the Creationists gave “were ACCURATE†as far as what they printed – AND then repeats the point that atheist darwinist "claims" about transitionals are claims made WITHOUT scientific support for arguing that the transitional is either a DESCENDANT of "A" nor an ANCESTOR of "C". Those supposed transitionals play a central role in Darwinist “stories easy enough to make up†about how one thing came from another but those "stories are NOT scienceâ€Â! according to Patterson.

Colin Patterson (Senior paleontologist at the British Natural History Museum and author of the Museum’s general text on evolution) – to fellow atheist Darwinist Theunnissen on Patterson’s letter to Sunderland.

Dear Mr Theunissen,
Sorry to have taken so long to answer your letter of July 9th. I was away for a while, and then infernally busy. I seem fated continually to make a fool of myself with creationists. The specific quote you mention, from a letter to Sunderland dated 10th April 1979, is accurate as far as it goes .
The passage quoted continues
[quote:d9b74] From a Letter by Patterson Written TO Sunderland –

"... a watertight argument. The reason is that statements about ancestry and descent are not applicable in the fossil record. Is Archaeopteryx the ancestor of all birds? Perhaps yes, perhaps no: there is no way of answering the question. It is easy enough to make up stories of how one form gave rise to another, and to find reasons why the stages should be favoured by natural selection. But such stories are not part of science, for there is no way to put them to the test."

I think the continuation of the passage shows clearly that your interpretation (at the end of your letter) is correct, and the creationists' is false.
That brush with Sunderland (I had never heard of him before) was my first experience of creationists. The famous "keynote address" at the American Museum of Natural History in 1981 was nothing of the sort. It was a talk to the "Systematics Discussion Group" in the Museum, an (extremely) informal group. I had been asked to talk to them on "Evolutionism and creationism"; fired up by a paper by Ernst Mayr published in Science just the week before. I gave a fairly rumbustious talk, arguing that the theory of evolution had done more harm than good to biological systematics (classification). Unknown to me, there was a creationist in the audience with a hidden tape recorder. So much the worse for me. But my talk was addressed to professional systematists, and concerned systematics, nothing else.
I hope that by now I have learned to be more circumspect in dealing with creationists, cryptic or overt. But I still maintain that scepticism is the scientist's duty, however much the stance may expose us to ridicule.
Yours Sincerely,
[signed]
Colin Patterson
[/quote:d9b74]

1. Patterson affirms that Sunderlands QUOTE of him IS accurate.
2. Patterson points to the “detail†of “key not speech†as being incorrect in the incident that Sunderland reported about Patterson.
3. Patterson affirms “again†the point that STORY TELLING about “how one thing came from another is NOT science†it is merely “stories easy enough to make upâ€Â.
4. Patterson argues “again†that supposed “transitional†like Archaeopteryx are in fact NOT known to be descendants of reptiles OR ancestors to birds – they are simply “CLAIMED†as transitional “anyway†since SCIENCE was not going to get that “ancestorâ€Â-“Descendant†information out of the fossil anyway!.
5. BOTH Theunissen and Patterson work on SOLVING the problem of salvaging darwinism GIVEN Pattersons statements about the LACK of transitional forms -- statements that Sunderland was highlighting. It is to THAT solution that Patterson refers when he argues that Theunissen's solution is also Patterson's.
6. The "solution" they BOTH agree to is that science CAN NOT tell us if a fossils is a descendant of some other species OR if it is in fact ancestor to some species -- but they will make the CLAIM for "transitional" ANYWAY -- since the art of "making up stories about how one thing came from another" was not SCIENCE in the first place!!

Bob

 

[BobRyan]

(Bob asserts a man designed a circuit that he doesn't even understand.)

That's pretty weird, Bob.

Less wild-claims, smoke and mirrors Barbarian - more substance and facts and fire please.

Barbarian
How can anyone design something that they don't even understand

Indeed you simply pretend not to understand the point "again".

Bob said -

The Cartisian map project AND the "DESIGN of programs such that THEY output randomized circuit design" is the SAME exercise in principle.

BOTH programmers "could" do the "hat-trick claim" of the form "I never specified that map,,, I never designed that map layout ... I never specified that circuit layout".

Barbarian
It's a little tougher than that for you, Bob. In this case, he doesn't even know what happened, or how it works.

That fact that the randomized circuit design is not his and has not be studied is like saying the cartisian map layout has not been studied but it appears to be a BETTER defensive deployment model than we use today. Neither of those arguments is impressive given the innefficiency with which a result is reached via randomized solutions.

It is like randomly screwing up a million house blueprints and then discovering that ONE of them has "a better bathroom". GREAT results if the guys working on that problem are all hamsters. HORRIBLE result if the guys are architects using super computers.

hint - you need to go back to programming and architecture 101 you are simply displaying your ignorance of the topic.

As you also pretend not to understand what Patterson meant by "DUPED".

Barbarian
We all understand. Patterson said that his statements were misrepresented by the guys who fed you those edited "quotes." SOP for creationists.

Note to the reader -- Barbarian provides NO QUOTE of PAtterson CLAIMING that anyone take that "I was DUPED" comment and "misrepresented it". He simply argues out of the void to invent that response.

Fact: Patterson never said his comment about "being duped" was ever misquoted or ever misrepresented by anyone.

Barbarian it is clear that you simply make stuff up with factless post after factless post when you run out of argument and THEN you simply "hope" some unsuspecting careless reader of this thread will "fall for it" -- who is it you are appealing to??

Bob