RE: Intelligent design type evolution vs naturalism type evolution.
April 6, 2013 at 11:46 am
(This post was last modified: April 6, 2013 at 11:58 am by The Grand Nudger.)
(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).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.
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....
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.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".
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.
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.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......
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.
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