Here, it is helpful to headline an update to L&FP, 62, as we need to return to a rich vein of thought that allows us to approach science in light of systems engineering perspectives: [[We may add a chart on a key subset of SE, reverse engineering, RE: One of the most significant Reverse Engineering-Forward Engineering exercises was the clean room duplication of the IBM PC’s operating framework that allowed lawsuit-proof clones to be built that then led to the explosion of PC-compatible machines. By the time this was over, IBM sold out to Lenovo and went back to its core competency, Mainframes. Where, now, a mainframe today is in effect a high end packaged server farm; the microprocessor now Read More ›

Our frame going forward, is knowledge reformation driven by application of the adapted JoHari Window, given obvious, fallacy-riddled ideological captivity of the intellectual high ground of our civilisation: Ideological captivity of the high ground also calls forth the perspective that we need to map the high ground: If you want some context on validity: So, we are now looking at ideologically driven captivity of the intellectual high ground and related institutions of our civilisation, leading to compromising the integrity of the knowledge commons through fallacy riddled evolutionary materialistic scientism and related ideologies. Not a happy thought but that is what we have to deal with and find a better way forward. We already know, knowledge (weak, everyday sense) is warranted, Read More ›

  Several years ago, we held a conference on the interaction between engineering, science, philosophy, and theology. The result of this was a book titled “Engineering and the Ultimate: An Interdisciplinary Investigation of Order and Design in Nature and Craft”. It is now available for half price at Amazon if anyone wants to pick up a copy! You can find the book here. It contains chapters from a number of authors on topics such as: Reverse engineering, its role in scientific methodology, and its relation to design The role of theology and philosophy in public architecture Modeling non-naturalistic causation mathematically Using non-naturalistic causation principles in software complexity analysis and management A reformulation of specified complexity using algorithmic information theory Meeting Read More ›

In the University of Houston alumni mag Parameters (Spring 2011) , vision researcher Haluk Ogmen says: Computers beat the brain in many tasks, like large number multiplication and database searches,” he said. “But there are other tasks that no computer even comes close to what we can do. In the area of navigation, the most powerful supercomputers cannot even match insects. So what’s missing are the engineering design principles that capture the fundamentals of biological information processing. That’s my goal as an engineer, to reverse–engineer vision, memory, and cognition and see how our brains and minds work. Design principles in vision? See “Biologist goes to war against language” for the correct Darwinspeak protocols currently in force.

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to attend a lecture by microbiologist Phillip Aldridge, of the University of Newcastle. The topic of his lecture was “The Regulation of Flagellar Assembly”. Being an ID proponent, I had a natural interest in what Aldridge was going to say, and I had been looking forward to the event for some time. I was already familiar to a degree with several of the key mechanisms and regulation of flagellar biosynthesis. Nonetheless, the lecture succeeded in re-kindling my passion for biology, and inspired me to do some in-depth research on my own with regards the workings of this engineering marvel.

I must confess that I was blown away. If one thought that the functional-specificity of arrangement with respect to the flagellum’s key components may well provide adequate grounds for a design inference, the mechanisms of flagellar construction take this intuition to a whole new level. So mesmerized I was by the motor’s intrinsic beauty and elegance, that I decided to provide a sketch overview of this amazing process for the benefit of readers of this blog. Of course, there are variations in the flagellum’s overall construct from species to species. The archetypical flagellum, however, is probably that of the closely related species, Escherichia coli, Salmonella enterica, and Salmonella typhimurium. It is this that I want to primarily focus on.

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One of the grand engineering challenges issued by The National Academy of Engineering is to Reverse-engineer the brain.
If the NAE considers it possible to Reverse-engineer the brain, does not that imply that the brain may have been engineered in the first place? i.e., as in designed by an intelligent agent? As you read through these materials, compare the close parallels with engineering design methods and what researchers are discovering about the brain, (compared to chance processes.) (Hmm. Is that why brain neurons were used for The Design of Life cover!) Perhaps we can see productive reverse engineering research supported by grants from the National Academy of Engineering. with true scientific freedom to pursue where the data leads.

Reverse-engineer the brain
Why should you reverse-engineer the brain?

The intersection of engineering and neuroscience promises great advances in health care, manufacturing, and communication.
. . . the secrets about how living brains work may offer the best guide to engineering the artificial variety. Discovering those secrets by reverse-engineering the brain promises enormous opportunities for reproducing intelligence the way assembly lines spit out cars or computers. . . .

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Scientist says: Science is the discovery of how things in the natural world work. Engineering is the practical application of scientific discovery. Engineer says: Engineering is the practical application of scientific discovery. Scientific discovery is simply reverse engineering. So you see, it’s really all engineering. You either take something that already exists and reverse engineer it (that’s science) or you take the knowledge gained from reverse engineering and create something that doesn’t already exist with it.

[From a colleague:] A few years ago, my brain research took some interesting turns. I was developing a theory of blood flow to the brain, specifically a theory of how the delicate blood vessels in the brain are protected from the strong pulsatility of the heartbeat. I realized that the system in the cranium that affords this protection seems to be designed. That is, it is a tuned mechanism quite analogous to vibration dampers widely used in engineering. I was haunted by the realization that the research that I was doing was essentially reverse engineering. Most of what I needed to know about pulsatile blood flow to the brain was in engineering textbooks! I was surprised as to how little Read More ›

It seems, despite UD’s resources tab, some still struggle to understand ID in the three distinct senses: inference, theory/research programme, movement. Accordingly, let us headline a clarifying note from the current thread on people who doubt, for the record: [KF, 269:] >>. . . first we must mark out a matter of inductive reasoning and epistemology. Observed tested, reliable signs such as FSCO/I [= functionally specific, complex organisation and/or associated information, “fun-skee”] beyond 500 – 1,000 bits point to design as cause for cases we have not observed. This is the design INFERENCE. Note, inference, not movement, not theory. Following the UD Weak Argument Correctives under the Resources tab, we can identify ID Theory as a [small] research programme that Read More ›

It takes a smart robot to mimic a reptile When researchers built a robot to sprawl like a prehistoric reptile, they were in for a surprise Early Permian era Orobates’ skeleton was “exquisitely preserved,” which created an excellent opportunity for researchers in paleontology to try to figure out how the lizard-like animal moved. And reverse engineering its movements can tell us a lot about how it lived. “It takes a smart robot to mimic a reptile” at Mind Matters It turns out walking, as opposed to sprawling, did not come about by the Darwinian method: It may be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad, Read More ›

Denyse recently linked to a presentation by Scott Minnich regarding the bacterial flagellum.  Minnich is probably among the dozen or so leading experts in the world on the bacterial flagellum.  Much of the information in his presentation will be familiar to followers of the issues, but a few points bear further examination. First a couple of bench-science items that jumped out at me: Minnich and his team discovered that DNA has a regulatory function in the form of a temperature switch.  Let me be clear, it is not that DNA codes for some molecular machine that is a temperature switch.  The DNA itself is the switch.  In simple terms, the coding portion that codes for a particular protein is bounded Read More ›

Professor James Tour’s recent video, The Origin of Life – An Inside Story, managed to accomplish three things at once: it shattered the credibility of abiogenesis as a theory; it provided American high school science teachers with an excellent classroom resource for countering evolutionary propaganda; and (perhaps unintentionally), it set a new research agenda for the Intelligent Design movement, which will transform it into a bona fide scientific discipline: the task of reverse-engineering life itself. Readers who wish to view the talk may do so here: Why Tour’s talk is the perfect resource for American high school science teachers who want to counteract evolutionary propaganda At the beginning of his talk, Tour explicitly declared that he would make no reference Read More ›

UDEditors:  “Berra’s Blunder”is a well known and documented error that Darwinist can’t seem to stop themselves from making.  See our glossary for a definition.  In the thread to a previous post Brian Douglas gave us an example of such a blunder and Eric Anderson provided a corrective.  All that follows (except, obviously, the text provided by Brian) is Eric’s:   brian douglas @36: Joe/Jack/virgil/Frankie/whoever, evolution just proposes the mechanism, not a step by step account of how it occurred. Much in the same way that I can propose the mechanisms involved in the production of a car without knowing the step by step process that is actually used. You are partially right, so let me see if we can bridge Read More ›

I think we need to watch a video by Friend of UD, Kirk Durston. But first, a loop-back note: I have been rather busy elsewhere with issues like AS-AD, Kondratiev waves, Hayek’s investment triangle, SD and Schumpeterian creative destruction.(Pardon the resulting absence.) BTW, this line of thought leads me to hold that the oh- so- dominant . . . and too often, domineering . . . evolutionary materialism of the past few generations has run its course and is about to be overtaken by ideational creative destruction in an information age.  A patently superior idea — we live in an obviously designed world, and we and other living creatures show further compelling signs of design — is going to prevail, Read More ›