So we're on conspiracy theories now. Which I even called in my post.

I've had enough of this, cheerio AAT.

(January 8, 2016 at 3:09 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Yes, Pool..is does answer the why, completely and with nothing left to explain.  You can only get water with h20 because that's what we've defined -as- water.  If you use some other chemical structure, you get other substances which we have defined as other things, as "not water".

Next, please.

There was hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms and water before we defined them as hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms and water.

Quote: You can only get water with h20 because that's what we've defined -as- water.

Is wrong because even if we didn't define what we got from h20 as water we'd still get water. We don't get water because we defined what we get as water, we get water because it was how it was designed.
Just like in the case of 1 + 2 = 3 , we get that result not because we defined the result as 3 but because of the design we enforced in the number system and addition operation.

If water was designed then it would taste better. It taste like medicine!

(January 8, 2016 at 3:17 pm)pool Wrote: There was hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms and water before we defined them as hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms and water.

-and........?  Please finish your thoughts.

Quote:Is wrong because even if we didn't define what we got from h20 as water we'd still get water. We don't get water because we defined what we get as water, we get water because it was how it was designed.

No, if we defined h20 as fleeflerp we'd get fleeflerp.  The world would be covered in it.  You've already been told what fallacy you're committing here.  The only thing that's designed in your example is the word, not the object - and it still isn't an example of ID.....as the contention of ID is -not- that people make words.

This is inexcusably lazy baiting. I demand, at the very least, some entertainment value.

(January 8, 2016 at 3:21 pm)Rhythm Wrote:

(January 8, 2016 at 3:17 pm)pool Wrote: There was hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms and water before we defined them as hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms and water.

-and........?  Please finish your thoughts.

Quote:Is wrong because even if we didn't define what we got from h20 as water we'd still get water. We don't get water because we defined what we get as water, we get water because it was how it was designed.

No, if we defined h20 as fleeflerp we'd get fleeflerp.  The world would be covered in it.  You've already been told what fallacy you're committing here.  The only thing that's designed in your example is the word, not the object - and it still isn't an example of ID.....as the contention of ID is -not- that people make words.

This is inexcusably lazy baiting.  I demand, at the very least, some entertainment value.

Quote:Just like in the case of 1 + 2 = 3 , we get that result not because we defined the result as 3 but because of the design we enforced in the number system and addition operation.

We get water if h20 even if we did or did not define what we get from h20 as water. We don't get water because of h20 because we defined what we get from h20 as water..

(January 8, 2016 at 2:47 pm)AAA Wrote: I wasn't trying to oversimplify it to make it seem unrealistic. I'll call it neo-Darwinian evolution if that's better.

We just get this stuff a lot, these sorts of rhetorical tricks designed to make evolution look silly before the conversation has even begun. Happily, you seem like you're actually taking this seriously, which is a nice change from the usual creationist dreck.

Quote:Information: what is conveyed or represented by a particular arrangement or sequence of things. This is exactly what the genetic code is. It is relevant to evolution. Evolution must account for the particular arrangement of the nucleotides that leads to functional proteins. 1000 nucleotide long sequence that leads to a protein has more information than a 100 nucleotide long sequence. Evolution would have to have a mechanism to increase the number of nucleotides while maintaining functional proteins.

Proteins are hardly magic, we're already learning how to manipulate their expression via gene therapy, specifically through the introduction of specific nucleotide sequences that have been linked to protein expression. In fact it was early last year that, via some RNA injections, scientists were able to produce up to a threefold increase in protein expression in Zebrafish embryos. This mechanism is not only evidently extant- given that the scientists were able to locate and manipulate the nucleotide sequences that could increase protein expression- but we're also able to toy with it and ramp it up.

Quote:Frameshift mutations are a subclass of point mutations. I already talked about these (maybe not to you), but they destroy the function of the protein. The protein is made of amino acids. Amino acids are coded by a specific set of 3 nucleotides. When you insert a nucleotide, you shift each following nucleotide over a space. This disrupts each following codon, which changes each amino acid in the protein.

Granted, I should have done more to familiarize myself with that phenomena. However, not all frameshift mutations do this, as I'll explain further down.

Quote:As for duplication events, if the duplicated genes are expressed, you get too much protein product which disrupts the cell's functions. This organism would get selected against. If it isn't expressed it can't be selected for.

If it isn't expressed it's still present in the organism and passed on when it breeds, whereupon further mutations could alter it such that it is expressed or used for a different function. Evolution most commonly deals with successive mutations, not singular events.

Quote:The nylonase enzyme is about 1500 nucleotides long, which shows that it is a derivative of a preexisting protein. I haven't looked into it that much, but my guess would be that nylon's chemical structure closely resembles the chemical structure of the original substrate. It wouldn't take much change in the existing protein to break down the similar molecule.

What's interesting about nylonase is that originally, it was pegged as a gene duplication followed by a frameshift mutation, which just goes to show, successive mutations are a real thing in evolution. Eventually this hypothesis was dismissed, but the point remains that a frameshift mutation isn't an automatic negative.

Moreover though, the nylonase enzyme isn't a single thing, but three different enzymes that are completely different from the normal enzymes that strain of flavobacteria uses. Nylonase enzymes- of a completely different sort- have also been evolved into different strains of bacteria by means of adjusting selection pressures; you're not just looking at an alteration to a single protein to deal with a chemically similar substance, but at a cross-species tendency to develop new, differing enzymes to deal with an imposed selection pressure, which is the textbook definition of an evolved trait.

But I'm curious, too: why do you think that evolution isn't a change in existing proteins and structures?

Quote:I read a quick article on the lizards. It says that they still don't understand the genetic basis for the change, and that they will look into it. I will predict right now that the genes that led to the valves were present (but not expressed) in the original lizards. These sequences were then selected for in the new environment. Something like this would require very high mutation rates with extremely fortunate nucleotide sequences to happen that quickly.

Apparently the isolated population is genetically identical to its parent population, in the sense that they're the same species still. But natural selection working to select and intensify new traits based on environmental pressures is still evolution. Seriously, could you define what you think evolution is? Every contention you've made fits neatly within evolution, though you're using them to argue that evolution didn't happen. It's weird.

Quote:You say evolution doesn't need to make new information because it can modify existing information. This just asks the question of where the old information came from.

Earlier species. And that information came from earlier generations still. We can keep going like this, right up until the point where you'll have to falsely conflate evolution and abiogenesis to continue having a problem with this, at which time I'll just point out that you're falsely conflating two separate theories and at that point you'll have a problem with abiogenesis and not evolution... which kinda means I was right.

Will repeating your thoroughly discredited articles of assertion somehow improve them, Pool?  I doubt it very much.

(January 8, 2016 at 5:11 am)robvalue Wrote: When the consensus is backed by evidence which bears out the theory time and again, and the naysayers have produced no proper evidence at all to substantiate their objections, then we have a win.

That's not to say the theory is definitely true, of course things can change with new information. But it's the best that can be done with what is available. The models work, or at least they seem to beyond reasonable doubt.

Saying that there is some doubt is reasonable, but saying therefor anyone can just ignore theories and make up their own rubbish is absurd. If the rubbish had evidence, then it too would be science instead of rubbish.

So what's next? Conspiracy theories? All this amazing new evidence is being silenced?

Also, what does it matter? What difference does it make if life is designed? Why should I care?

I think you should go back and look at the evidence for evolution. There are some evidences presented for things like microevolution. When you think about what the evolutionary theory claims vs. what the direct evidence actually is, you realize that it is mostly them building ideas off their evolutionary presuppositions. They completely project their ideas on the fossil record, which in reality displays more of a stasis rather than change. This fits the creation model better (I wouldn't say I'm a creationist necessarily, but they have a compelling argument worth considering). The complexity in the cell was completely unexpected back last century according to the evolution model. Yet this is what we find.

Is there evidence being silenced? The intelligent design people seem to be discriminated against when it comes to peer reviewed ideas. The creationists claim that archeological evidence is being suppressed by the Smithsonian, such as the bones of much larger humans, burial stones with dinosaur like creatures depicted on them, destroying fossilized skulls and footprints in places where they shouldn't be. I don't like the words conspiracy theory, but you can't say all conspiracy theories are wrong, because there have been some pretty serious ones that have turned out to be true. You should look that up on like youtube or something.

What does it matter if life was designed? Well the first thing you should do is try to see if we can figure out who the designer/designers is/are. If it actually turns out to be the Biblical God, then it might change how you live your life.

Imagine a world, wherein there lives a person...for whom the truth or accuracy of the bible would -not- change the way they live their life.  Now consider for a moment, that you may live in that world.

(January 8, 2016 at 3:25 pm)pool Wrote: We get water if h20 even if we did or did not define what we get from h20 as water. We don't get water because of h20 because we defined what we get from h20 as water..

Let's cut through all the faux verbiage and get to the chase. Atoms have very specific ways they can bond together and the molecules they form by doing so have different properties in aggregate. Ok. Now get from there to "therefore design by an intelligent agency".