Ok so here is the basis of the irreducible complexity of life issue.

You have a turning thing in bacteria for example. It has various parts that work together to make it spin. Now I understand evolution once you get a certain something, how it proves to something else. I even understand systems improving and getting more complex as possible. However, it seems to be that it's impossible for a system to get there by direction of random mutations and natural selection.

Take example a car. Once you have a car, we can improve upon that model. Keep making it better. And better. But without essential components of the car, it's not like those essential components are going to be useful without coming together.

Even if they were useful separately, them coming to form a system, a complex system of various parts, still has no direction by natural selection and mutations.

If fact we can talk hypothetically or we can look at nature, and nature suggests a lot of things, the various components, work together with purpose of a being a part of a machinery (system).

There is more to it. If you have to completely type of machines, for example, wheels aren't going to be turning into computer screens evolution wise...(analogy)....engineers improve upon wheels, makes wheels better, and improve on computers and laptops but they are two different functions....

The same is true of many things in nature. Evolution will make it improve in that function primarily. At the very least, it's very unlikely to be heading towards another function completely.

For example, eyes to be moving towards becoming arms. This is not logical. Or eyes heading towards becoming a heart or digestive system.

Or a tree heading towards having legs and arms, and one day moving.

All this doesn't seem plausible to me.

Yes an animal can become a different animal. Gliding can turn into flight. Stuff like that can happen. But it's through improving in something...not a system that was headed towards a direction becoming something completely different or unrelated to what it was.

Tongues won't turn into brains for example. It's just not logical. They will become better tongues. They will not become something entirely different then a tongue as far natural selection and mutations go.

This is the argument from irreducible complexity.

So you have machinery that has various parts, that have a function, and would not function without various essential components. Those essential components have no direction of coming together through the process of evolution naturalism wise.

(April 6, 2013 at 10:58 am)MysticKnight Wrote: Ok so here is the basis of the irreducible complexity of life issue.

You have a turning thing in bacteria for example. It has various parts that work together to make it spin. Now I understand evolution once you get a certain something, how it proves to something else. I even understand systems improving and getting more complex as possible. However, it seems to be that it's impossible for a system to get there by direction of random mutations and natural selection.

Well my young padawan you are wrong.
Evolution can and has re-purposed elements, it can even remove bits.
Yes that's right evolution may have built up something and then removed un-needed parts. all that is required is the process of natural selection and time.

Quote:Take example a car. Once you have a car, we can improve upon that model. Keep making it better. And better. But without essential components of the car, it's not like those essential components are going to be useful without coming together.

They could have other uses and be refined, feathers started out in dinosaurs as a way of insulating themselves and later gained their role in flight.

Quote:Feather structures are thought to have proceeded from simple hollow filaments through several stages of increasing complexity, ending with the large, deeply rooted, feathers with strong pens (rachis), barbs and barbules that birds display today.[52]
Some evidence suggests that the original function of simple feathers was insulation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feathered_dinosaur

Quote:Even if they were useful separately, them coming to form a system, a complex system of various parts, still has no direction by natural selection and mutations.

If fact we can talk hypothetically or we can look at nature, and nature suggests a lot of things, the various components, work together with purpose of a being a part of a machinery (system).

There is more to it. If you have to completely type of machines, for example, wheels aren't going to be turning into computer screens evolution wise...(analogy)....engineers improve upon wheels, makes wheels better, and improve on computers and laptops but they are two different functions....

The same is true of many things in nature. Evolution will make it improve in that function primarily. At the very least, it's very unlikely to be heading towards another function completely.

I have elsewhere given the examples of jaw bones being re-purposed as the small bones of the ear. This would seem to be something that has an entirely different purpose than the one it originally had. where once they opened jaws wider now they amplify hearing. There are probably innumerable other examples but I have given one and that is enough to destroy this particular line of argument.

Quote:For example, eyes to be moving towards becoming arms. This is not logical. Or eyes heading towards becoming a heart or digestive system.

There are three different ways insects could have re-purpsed parts of themselves to form wings.

http://somethingscrawlinginmyhair.com/20...ect-wings/

Quote:Or a tree heading towards having legs and arms, and one day moving.

All this doesn't seem plausible to me.

Just because you dont think it happened does not mean it didn't.

Quote:Yes an animal can become a different animal. Gliding can turn into flight. Stuff like that can happen. But it's through improving in something...not a system that was headed towards a direction becoming something completely different or unrelated to what it was.

It can do exactly that evolution uses what is at hand and if it conveys an advantage it uses it. Evolution does not have a direction.

Quote:Tongues won't turn into brains for example. It's just not logical. They will become better tongues. They will not become something entirely different then a tongue as far natural selection and mutations go.

This is the argument from irreducible complexity.

It seems you need to look closer at evolutionary theory and research.
The theory says that it can do exactly what you say it can't.

Quote:So you have machinery that has various parts, that have a function, and would not function without various essential components. Those essential components have no direction of coming together through the process of evolution naturalism wise.

There are many ways evolution can fulfill all you ask. You don't find it logical I know, but the evidence says otherwise.

you may like to hear the ruling of a court case in america.

Quote:In his ruling, Jones said that while intelligent design, or ID, arguments “may be true, a proposition on which the court takes no position, ID is not science.” Among other things, he said intelligent design “violates the centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting supernatural causation”; it relies on “flawed and illogical” arguments; and its attacks on evolution “have been refuted by the scientific community.”

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/10545387/ns/te...WA-NJOsiSo

http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/evol/d...ticle.html

Quote:The great irony of the flagellum's increasing acceptance as an icon of anti-evolution is that fact that research had demolished its status as an example of irreducible complexity almost at the very moment it was first proclaimed. The purpose of this article is to explore the arguments by which the flagellum's notoriety has been achieved, and to review the research developments that have now undermined they very foundations of those arguments.

"Intelligent design is religion - not science." So ruled the court in Kitzmiller v Dover School Board.

downbeatplumb ' Wrote: They could have other uses and be refined, feathers started out in dinosaurs as a way of insulating themselves and later gained their role in flight.

That is true. But feathers are a feature, not a complex system. Arms aren't completely different from wings. They have similarity. But I see your point. I guess I have to clarify the problem I am having with systems as opposed to features.

Quote:I have elsewhere given the examples of jaw bones being re-purposed as the small bones of the ear. This would seem to be something that has an entirely different purpose than the one it originally had. where once they opened jaws wider now they amplify hearing. There are probably innumerable other examples but I have given one and that is enough to destroy this particular line of argument.

Ok, I guess it's far fetch to say nothing can do this (like a feature of a system changing). But it seems like systems are different. For example, the turning thing in bacteria. How would it function without it's various parts. And what direction to it's various parts acting separately ever have to come together via evolution?

Also it's circular reasoning to just state "well this changed to this" without providing explanation how it possibly happened naturalism wise, but not explaining how the reasoning of Michael Behe (and I tried to show in this thread) is wrong?

Quote:Just because you dont think it happened does not mean it didn't.

True enough. I just have to get around my head and see how a complex system is possible through that direction.

Quote:It can do exactly that evolution uses what is at hand and if it conveys an advantage it uses it. Evolution does not have a direction.

If has no direction, how are that various parts ever going to develop and come together to a form a complex system?

You will have to define what you mean by a "complex system".
There are many systems in the body and even in bacteria.
After all bacteria have had far more generations to evolve than we have.
In their own way they are just as evolved as us.

(April 6, 2013 at 10:58 am)MysticKnight Wrote: Ok so here is the basis of the irreducible complexity of life issue.

What issue?

Quote:You have a turning thing in bacteria for example. It has various parts that work together to make it spin. Now I understand evolution once you get a certain something, how it proves to something else. I even understand systems improving and getting more complex as possible. However, it seems to be that it's impossible for a system to get there by direction of random mutations and natural selection.

A "turning thing"? I think that when we get to the next part I'm going to bring this one back up - because I might be able to take that notion and show it to you in a different light, but for now, I think I understand what you mean to convey by it. As far as whether or not systems improve or become more complex, I would stress against considering the effects of evolution as some process of improvement. Similar with complexity, is a box full of gears more complex than a single gear? What makes it so, just the number of gears? Whether or not it would be impossible for a system to "get there" would depend upon "where" that was (and "getting there" is already starting to stretch it. Mutations that have the ability to factor into the process of evolution aren't, strictly speaking, random - and natural selection is an incredible powerful means of effecting change in populations.

Quote:Take example a car. Once you have a car, we can improve upon that model. Keep making it better. And better. But without essential components of the car, it's not like those essential components are going to be useful without coming together.

Yes, lets take a car - and the "turning thing" example above. Why didn't any biological cars evolve? Why don't we see large mammals locomoting with wheels instead of legs? Again, "improving upon" is a very bad way to approach this, but- I think that seats are useful, and so are lights, engines are useful, glass is useful, metals are useful, wheels are useful - in fact, a car isn't anything -but- a collection of independently useful things. I think what you mean to convey here is that the parts of a car are not useful -as a car- until you get to a bare minimum of those parts. But so what?

Quote:Even if they were useful separately, them coming to form a system, a complex system of various parts, still has no direction by natural selection and mutations.

Because cars don't have any means to effect this (except through ourselves). They're inanimate objects. Again I'd like to point out that we don't see any living toyotas in the animal kingdom either.

Quote:If fact we can talk hypothetically or we can look at nature, and nature suggests a lot of things, the various components, work together with purpose of a being a part of a machinery (system).

There is more to it. If you have to completely type of machines, for example, wheels aren't going to be turning into computer screens evolution wise...(analogy)....engineers improve upon wheels, makes wheels better, and improve on computers and laptops but they are two different functions....

Not, strictly speaking, true. Both in human engineering and evolutionary biology we see things that get re-tasked. Now, generally speaking, when something gets re-tasked to something else it;s because it at least has the ability to perform that function, so why a tire would turn into a computer screen (either biologically or in the engineering sense of the word) or why you would expect this is a mystery.

Quote:The same is true of many things in nature. Evolution will make it improve in that function primarily. At the very least, it's very unlikely to be heading towards another function completely.

For example, eyes to be moving towards becoming arms. This is not logical. Or eyes heading towards becoming a heart or digestive system.

Or a tree heading towards having legs and arms, and one day moving.

All this doesn't seem plausible to me.

Doesn't seem plausible to me either. Probably because evolution doesn't "makes things improve in one function primarily" or prevent anything from heading toward a different function. Nor would we expect to see an eye become an arm (or a heart, or a digestive system) anymore than we would expect to see a tire become a computer screen. If trees were going to get up and go on two legs I would expect that they would have done so by now...lol. Truth be told there's just too wide a gulf between "trees" and "arms and legs".

Quote:Yes an animal can become a different animal. Gliding can turn into flight. Stuff like that can happen. But it's through improving in something...not a system that was headed towards a direction becoming something completely different or unrelated to what it was.

Good, you understand the concept, it's un-directed and need not be directed.

Quote:Tongues won't turn into brains for example. It's just not logical. They will become better tongues. They will not become something entirely different then a tongue as far natural selection and mutations go.

"Better tongues"? Some "tongues" have become "noses". I'm not sure what you're trying to express with any of this, or why you're pointing to one specific adaptation as though anyone expects it to "turn into" some entirely separate and equally as specific an adaptation. In fact, if we saw that happening I might be likely to conclude that "someone" made it happen! In one of my children was born with fully functional wings in the place of their arms and then proceeded to fly around the room like bat that would be difficult to reconcile with evolutionary synthesis.......

Quote:This is the argument from irreducible complexity.

So you have machinery that has various parts, that have a function, and would not function without various essential components. Those essential components have no direction of coming together through the process of evolution naturalism wise.

Well, laying aside that the statement you opened with is in no way true........those "parts" don't "come together" - this is not how we understand evolution to work. Biology is not a service manager staring at his parts catalog ordering the right gear for the job and then bolting it onto a chassis......

(April 6, 2013 at 11:44 am)downbeatplumb Wrote: You will have to define what you mean by a "complex system".
There are many systems in the body and even in bacteria.
After all bacteria have had far more generations to evolve than we have.
In their own way they are just as evolved as us.

I mean where various parts come to form one function. Like the turner thing in bacteria.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13...mplex.html

Quote:It has been proposed that the flagellum originated from a protein export system. Over time, this system might have been adapted to attach a bacterium to a surface by extruding an adhesive filament. An ion-powered pump for expelling substances from the cell might then have mutated to form the basis of a rotary motor. Rotating any asymmetrical filament would propel a cell and give it a huge advantage over non-motile bacteria even before more spiral filaments evolved.

Finally, in some bacteria flagella became linked to an existing system for directing movement in response to the environment. In E. coli, it works by changing flagella rotation from anticlockwise to clockwise and back again, causing a cell to tumble and then head off in a new direction.

Without a time machine it may never be possible to prove that this is how the flagellum evolved. However, what has been discovered so far - that flagella vary greatly and that at least some of the components and proteins of which they are made can carry out other useful functions in the cells - show that they are not "irreducibly complex".

You were saying.

Is that what you meant by turning thing, lol, hell, that would have been the last thing that came to my mind..lol. I thought you were referring to how bacteria changed, overall..lol.

Does that address the logic of Michael Behe though? Yes it does. Thanks.

I see where I was mislead by the dark side.

I guess the whole it's improving in one function goes out the window with this.

However we are not out of the woods yet. I mainly want to know how "An ion-powered pump for expelling substances from the cell might then have mutated to form the basis of a rotary motor" is possible without direction towards that? Or does it get improved in expelling substances until it forms a rotary motor?