Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

On Gritting Your Teeth and Sticking to a Narrative

Share
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Flipboard
Print
Email

An anti-ID commenter who goes by MatSpirit has been active in these pages for well over a year, during which time he has posted scores of comments in the comboxes of dozens of OPs.  This particular statement in one of his comments caught my eye:

If I understand correctly, the ID story is that some unidentified, undetectable supernatural agent acting at a time and place unknown arranged matter into patterns that are living creatures.

*palm forehead*

It is just staggering to me that someone can spend so much time and effort debating ID and still not have the first idea about the fundamentals of the theory.

I understand what is going on here, of course.  Like many of our opponents MatSpirit had a pre-conceived idea of what ID is about before he came to these pages, and nothing — not facts, not logic, not reason –will ever shake that idea.  You can explain the fundamentals of ID to a brick wall 1,000 times, and you can explain the fundamentals of ID to someone like MatSpirit 1,000 times, and it will have an identical effect – that is to say, none at all.

You see, MatSpirit has a narrative.  And the narrative must be maintained at all costs.

UPDATE

I invite readers to skip down to comment 30.  You will see that MatSpirit continues to grit his teeth and stick to his narrative even after it has been pointed out that is what he is doing.  It is really quite amazing.

 

 

 

 

Comments
...it makes OOL look impossibly difficult. What we're looking for is a theory that makes OOL possibly undifficult. Do you have one? Does DK? No? Sad, truly sad.Mung
July 15, 2016
July
07
Jul
15
15
2016
05:47 PM
5
05
47
PM
PDT
Barry has hijacked the thread again. Now we're on the "That's Gotta Hurt" thread.MatSpirit
July 14, 2016
July
07
Jul
14
14
2016
07:48 PM
7
07
48
PM
PDT
Upright Biped @ 180: "Daniel, you seem to have a problem conceptualizing what is at hand." I don't think the problem is on his end. You seem to have gone off the rails very early on. This is the second paragraph on biosemiosis.org:
Whichever theory one follows, there is one thing that all people can be certain of. Prior to the organization of the first heterogeneous living cell, unique physical conditions had to arise to make that organization possible. These conditions enable the translation of recorded information into physical effects. They are brought about by the presence of two sets of objects operating in a very special system. To organize the first living cell, one set of objects must encode the information in a series of representations, and the other set of objects must specify what is being represented. This is how a "recipe" for the cell can exist in a universe where no object inherently means (represents or specifies) any other object. It requires both a representation and the means to interpret it.
See my message 178. "Representation" and "translation" are not required for life and current OOL theory doesn't suppose they existed in the First Living Thing. Representation and translation are much faster and more flexible than direct copying and once direct copy organisms began to evolve it they dominated and replaced the old system. But representation and translation systems weren't possible until direct copying life evolved them. None of this should be a surprise to anybody, it's not exactly a secret. But the "no life without representation and translation" theory does have one big thing going for it from an ID/creationist viewpoint: it makes OOL look impossibly difficult.MatSpirit
July 14, 2016
July
07
Jul
14
14
2016
03:58 AM
3
03
58
AM
PDT
DK at #173 and #174,
Above, I posed two questions to UB: Have you devised any tests of your biosemiotic hypothesis? Are any such tests conceivable? What I got in reply was bluster.
Daniel, you seem to have a problem conceptualizing what is at hand. I encourage you to try harder, so that you don’t follow irrelevant questions with mere insults. You’ve already deflected any conversation or clarification of evidence (saying that you are up-to-date on the info). Likewise, you say you’ve been watching me make this argument “for years”. Given these things, it’s a wonder why your questions are so far removed from the actual issues? It is almost as if you have no familiarity at all. Let me ask you a question that might help you focus. What exactly do you think is the subject of the test you’re fixated on? Are you suggesting we dig up Alan Turing and test the need for a symbol system expressive enough to describe an interpreter for itself? Are you wanting to test von Neumann’s mathematical structure of self-replication, or the validity of Crick’s adapter hypothesis? Are you uncertain whether or not the anticodon-to-amino acid association is isolated from the codon-to-anticodon association? Are you wanting to test Pattee’s epistemic cut between rate-independent control and rate-based dynamics? Are you wondering if amino acids can be derived from the spatial orientation of nucleobases? Are you wanting to know if Nirenberg had to demonstrate the code in order to discover it? Shall I go on, or have you got the point yet? There is no observation that I am making that is even controversial; the observations that are important to my argument are generally considered settled science. The outstanding question is if genetic language and natural language require the same physical conditions in order to function. Not only is a test for that question provided on my website, but the answer to the question is already part of the scientific record – put there (repeatedly) by eminently well-trained researchers working within their specialties. So let us cut to the chase. You cannot find fault with the physical observations made in the argument, nor with the rationale. This leaves you with nothing to do but dig around for some rhetorical spin, move the goalposts, and wrap things up by slinging insults. This is the result when you have no intention whatsoever of acknowledging the physical evidence -- which is exactly what I talked about at the very start of this conversation. At least you’re consistent.Upright BiPed
July 13, 2016
July
07
Jul
13
13
2016
11:44 PM
11
11
44
PM
PDT
MatSpirit: " you ... recognize the sentence as being similar to those produced by humans." Can you be more precise about this quality you refer to: "similar to those produced by humans"? How similar is similar? Is "similar" somehow quantifiable. The cotton cloth wasn't made by humans, but it's similar "enough" to be considered something I would have the ability to recognize was designed. But, somewhere along this continuum, I'm unable to recognize that any aspect of the cell has this same quality, because...? why? Also, as to your suggestion that we already have a theory that explains it, well, that's an interesting assertion, which simply remains to be demonstrated. Once it is, you'd be correct.es58
July 13, 2016
July
07
Jul
13
13
2016
09:41 AM
9
09
41
AM
PDT
Upright Biped @ 171
Perhaps in his mere five decades of research on the subject he noticed that high-capacity information processing systems (the kind required to start the cell cycle) are not determined by the surface properties of the molecules that make up the system.
If you don't think that the actions of proteins are determined by their shapes (in other words, the 3-D positions of the atoms that make them) and the surface properties of those atoms (the chemical bonds they can make, the electrostatic attractions and repulsions they make, etc) then please tell us what does.
Has it occurred to you yet that you still have it backwards? Darwinian evolution requires specification and heredity to accomplish RV+NS.
But it doesnt need DNA to get them. Imagine a polymer made of ten small molecules strung together like beads on a string. Let each of those ten small molecules attract an identical molecule to its side. Let those ten new molecules join together into a second polymer chain. Let the chain break off. The original polymer has made an exact copy of itself. It has reproduced itself. That's all we ask for the first living thing. And it's done it without DNA. The pattern of the original ten small molecules is a specification. It specifies a polymer that can reproduce itself. The new polymer is identical to its parent. That's heredity. You can have specification and heredity directly without intermediate signs and symbols.</strong, DNA, RNA and their supporting hardware can speed reproduction up immensely, make it more accurate and more flexible, but simple life copies it's own structure directly without using those intermediates.
— on a separate note: Have you noticed your staunch belief in an unidentified event, that occurred at an unknown point in time, using undetectable physical processes? It seems like I saw you saying something negative about such things at the top of this page. 
The event is identified: the appearance of the first living thing. The time is hard to tell, but we know it was after the surface of the earth solidified and long before the first unambjguous fossil cells are found. The physical processes that made first life work are eminently detectable. We're talking ordinary molecular processes here. The problem is that we have no samples to examine. That's what science knows. Anything ID knows, it cribbed from science because ID does basically no research.MatSpirit
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
09:48 PM
9
09
48
PM
PDT
MatSpirit:
...no unintelligent process has ever been found that interweaves threads that regularly in such a simple pattern.
Why is cotton (and other materials) the only exception?Mung
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
09:31 PM
9
09
31
PM
PDT
Es58 @ 167
If I, as the first human to step on a planet outside our solar system, found a woven piece of cotton cloth, would I be justified in inferring it was a product of intent?
Sure, humans have been weaving cotton and other materials for thousands of years. Intentionally, for the most part. On the other hand, no unintelligent process has ever been found that interweaves threads that regularly in such a simple pattern. This includes not finding such woven cotton in any living thing. So you would be justified in thinking your woven cotton was an artifact.MatSpirit
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
08:38 PM
8
08
38
PM
PDT
It's almost as if you are incapable of stating the biosemiotic hypothesis.Mung
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
07:23 PM
7
07
23
PM
PDT
It's almost as if you have no scientific training at all. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bU6m5UqLx9MDaniel King
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
05:36 PM
5
05
36
PM
PDT
Above, I posed two questions to UB: Have you devised any tests of your biosemiotic hypothesis? Are any such tests conceivable? What I got in reply was bluster. I take that as "no" to both questions.
...yet the facts remain.
...to be investigated and explained further.Daniel King
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
05:31 PM
5
05
31
PM
PDT
Are you even capable of stating the “biosemiotic hypothesis”?
I have my doubts as well.Upright BiPed
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
10:01 AM
10
10
01
AM
PDT
Biosemiotics is the study of all forms of signification and communication. It recognizes that life is distinguished from the nonliving world by its dependence on signs and symbols. – H.H. Pattee Correction: MODERN EVOLVED life is distinguished from the nonliving world by its dependence on signs and symbols. The first living things are believed to have reproduced directly without benefit of DNA or any kind of genetic code.
I’m sure Howard Pattee will be crushed to find out that there are people who assume their conclusions about the origin of life. Perhaps in his mere five decades of research on the subject he noticed that high-capacity information processing systems (the kind required to start the cell cycle) are not determined by the surface properties of the molecules that make up the system. And what about you? You say “MODERN EVOLVED life is distinguished from the nonliving world by its dependence on signs and symbols”. Has it occurred to you yet that you still have it backwards? Darwinian evolution requires specification and heredity to accomplish RV+NS. (If A requires B for A to exist, then A cannot be the source of B). Obviously, you'll need to completely ignore how nature specifies objects in the natural world. It is your only hope of defending your position. How does that feel Mr. Empiricism? --- on a separate note: Have you noticed your staunch belief in an unidentified event, that occurred at an unknown point in time, using undetectable physical processes? It seems like I saw you saying something negative about such things at the top of this page. :)Upright BiPed
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
09:57 AM
9
09
57
AM
PDT
DK,
I may be physically or psychologically blind, because I don’t see any “entailments” in your post.
An entailment is a necessary consequence of something; it is useful in a scientific sense if it is a measurable consequence of something. Intelligent beings are capable of arranging matter in a very unique and specific organization, whereby a rate-independent representational medium is organized to provide control over rate-based dynamics. Such an organization can be uniquely identified through physical measurement, and can only be identified in recorded language, mathematics, and in the genetic code. This fact is documented in the scientific literature, but the knowledge represented by this is irrelevant to you because you refuse to engage it. Your only goal is to avoid the implications. Thus, you continue (over and over again) to seek a rhetorical position while steadfastly refusing to engage the evidence itself:
who, besides yourself, promotes the idea … activities of human beings … can somehow can be analogized to the organic chemistry … one can analogize until the cows come home … How can we determine the nature of that intelligence … Animal, vegetable, or mineral? … You’ve been marketing this stuff for years … is that your only product … nobody in the real world has been buying it … You’ve made your claim and you’re satisfied ... Maybe you don’t know what entailments are.
…yet the facts remain.Upright BiPed
July 12, 2016
July
07
Jul
12
12
2016
09:18 AM
9
09
18
AM
PDT
Daniel King:
Have you devised any tests of your biosemiotic hypothesis? Are any such tests conceivable?
Are you even capable of stating the "biosemiotic hypothesis"? My money is on no, you can't. Troll.Mung
July 11, 2016
July
07
Jul
11
11
2016
07:01 PM
7
07
01
PM
PDT
Daniel King:
This kind of ad hominem attack on the honesty of your interlocutor is pointless. It’s no substitute for clear argument.
Hi Troll!Mung
July 11, 2016
July
07
Jul
11
11
2016
06:57 PM
6
06
57
PM
PDT
Matspirit:
You know the sentence was designed because you are familiar with humans and their work and recognize the sentence as being similar to those produced by humans.
If I, as the first human to step on a planet outside our solar system, found a woven piece of cotton cloth, would I be justified in inferring it was a product of intent?es58
July 11, 2016
July
07
Jul
11
11
2016
06:26 PM
6
06
26
PM
PDT
es58 @ 152
I directed this to MatSpirit, but, open it to anyone who can help: thanks: : “how the Designer did his designing” Why does it matter? I see a page with a sentence on it. Do I need to know if it was made with a dot matrix printer, type writer, laser printer, a talented scribe, etc to know that the sentence was designed?
You know the sentence was designed because you are familiar with humans and their work and recognize the sentence as being similar to those produced by humans. When you look at an organism you know that it wasn't designed by a human, so your inference is invalid. Worse, you ignore an old and very well attested theory of evolution, which DOES account for your observations, and instead pursue a will-of-the-wisp theory that says an unknown Intelligent Designer did it at a time and place unknown to us via an unknown process.MatSpirit
July 10, 2016
July
07
Jul
10
10
2016
07:05 PM
7
07
05
PM
PDT
Upright Biped @ 163 Pattee
Biosemiotics is the study of all forms of signification and communication. It recognizes that life is distinguished from the nonliving world by its dependence on signs and symbols.
Correction: MODERN EVOLVED life is distinguished from the nonliving world by its dependence on signs and symbols. The first living things are believed to have reproduced directly without benefit of DNA or any kind of genetic code.MatSpirit
July 10, 2016
July
07
Jul
10
10
2016
06:48 PM
6
06
48
PM
PDT
Hi UB, Thank you for your kind response, but I may be physically or psychologically blind, because I don't see any "entailments" in your post. Maybe you don't know what entailments are. I'll repeat: “An entailment is a deduction or implication, that is, something that follows logically from or is implied by something else.” The scientific significance of entailments is that they pose questions that can be investigated in order to test an hypothesis. Have you devised any tests of your biosemiotic hypothesis? Are any such tests conceivable?
Your response was to sidestep the evidence (saying you were already familiar with it) and sought a rhetorical position instead.
This kind of ad hominem attack on the honesty of your interlocutor is pointless. It's no substitute for clear argument.Daniel King
July 10, 2016
July
07
Jul
10
10
2016
05:27 PM
5
05
27
PM
PDT
DK.
My apologies, UB, but I’ve reviewed this thread and I can’t find any entailments of the design inference. Would you assist me?
Sure. Here is my post (up-thread) from last Saturday: ========================= DK, A semiotic system is identifiable by the properties of its organization, where a representational medium controls a dynamic process. For an object to function as a representational medium it has to be established as one within a local system. A physicist would talk about this in terms of a ”cut” that “separates energy-degenerate, rate-independent genetic symbols from the rate-dependent dynamics of construction that they control.” The cell accomplishes this cut by separating the establishment of the code from the reading of the codons — i.e. the anticodon-to-amino acid association is spatially and temporally isolated from the codon-to-anticodon association. This is general knowledge. The organization of the system thereby establishes a discontinuity in the process, allowing an alphabet of rate-independent permutations to control rate-based dynamics. In turn, this enables an open-ended potential of referents (outcomes), making life and evolution possible. Since I cannot do any better a job of explaining it than the original authors, I can only point you to the Bibliography on Biosemiosis.org, and suggest you read Howard Pattee, a highly-esteemed physicist who studied symbol systems for five decades, and has been publishing these findings since at least 1967.
Biosemiotics is the study of all forms of signification and communication. It recognizes that life is distinguished from the nonliving world by its dependence on signs and symbols. However, of the innumerable examples of pattern recognition, recording, signaling, and communication throughout all levels of living organizations only two clear examples of open-ended, creative language systems exist, the genetic language and natural languages. (…) The fact remains that there is little evidence for the existence of any general-purpose languages other than the genes and natural languages; and there is no persuasive model of how a continuous dynamics could evolve into a general-purpose discrete coded symbol system. In fact, that is the reason the origin of life and the origin of language remain great mysteries. – H.H. Pattee
============================== Your response was to sidestep the evidence (saying you were already familiar with it) and sought a rhetorical position instead.Upright BiPed
July 9, 2016
July
07
Jul
9
09
2016
10:33 PM
10
10
33
PM
PDT
Hi Troll! Your idea of "getting a life" is probably different from my idea of getting a life. I have life, you don't. But you can change.Mung
July 9, 2016
July
07
Jul
9
09
2016
05:55 PM
5
05
55
PM
PDT
Hi Mung. Have you thought about getting a life? And while you're at it, what were those entailments?Daniel King
July 9, 2016
July
07
Jul
9
09
2016
05:37 PM
5
05
37
PM
PDT
Hi Troll! If you really want to apologize stop misrepresenting others.Mung
July 9, 2016
July
07
Jul
9
09
2016
05:31 PM
5
05
31
PM
PDT
Upright BiPed:
You originally suggested that ID should test any entailments associated with the design inference. In turn, I brought a specific set of entailments to your attention. Yet, in neither of your responses have you shown the slightest interest in questioning those entailments.
My apologies, UB, but I've reviewed this thread and I can't find any entailments of the design inference that you've cited. Would you assist me? And while you're at it, does your semiotic argument have any entailments?Daniel King
July 9, 2016
July
07
Jul
9
09
2016
05:26 PM
5
05
26
PM
PDT
Your claim is that the “organization of the living cell” is a “universal correlate of intelligence.”
Here again is what I said:
the encoding of polymers inside the living cell is a semiotic system that demonstrates an exclusive set of physical conditions not found anywhere else in the cosmos but in the use of recorded language and mathematics – two universal correlates of intelligence.
That’s the second time you’ve attempted to make “adjustments” to what I’ve said, and it’s the second time I’ve had to repeat my words. It’s a bad sign because it represents only rhetoric. You originally suggested that ID should test any entailments associated with the design inference. In turn, I brought a specific set of entailments to your attention. Yet, in neither of your responses have you shown the slightest interest in questioning those entailments. Instead, you want to dismiss them outright, without the need to engage any pesky details -- a fine scientific tradition, right?Upright BiPed
July 8, 2016
July
07
Jul
8
08
2016
11:33 PM
11
11
33
PM
PDT
Upright BiPed:
DK, you couldn’t be any more obvious. It’s the position you’re in here. You must dismiss physical evidence (and universal experience) because it doesn’t comport to your ideological preferences.
So you say. Your claim is that the "organization of the living cell" is a "universal correlate of intelligence." (your post 136) Let's assume that what I've quoted means something. What then? Where do you go from there? How can we determine the nature of that intelligence? Animal, vegetable, or mineral? You've been marketing this stuff for years. Is that your only product, or do you have a research program? How's that been going? So far, nobody in the real world has been buying it. Or is that it? You've made your claim and you're satisfied? Have you noticed that closed issues don't exist in science?Daniel King
July 8, 2016
July
07
Jul
8
08
2016
05:07 PM
5
05
07
PM
PDT
DK,
Yes, Upright, those are well known and experienced activities of human beings.
Yes they are. Humans are intelligent, and their activities in this domain can be exclusively identified by the physical organization required for those activities to occur.
I understand that you promote the idea that such human activities somehow can be analogized to the organic chemistry of the genetic code. That’s all well and good, one can analogize until the cows come home.
DK, you couldn’t be any more obvious. It’s the position you’re in here. You must dismiss physical evidence (and universal experience) because it doesn’t comport to your ideological preferences.
But what follows?
If you ignore physical evidence, it doesn’t matter. I suppose you can put the goalpost down. :)Upright BiPed
July 6, 2016
July
07
Jul
6
06
2016
08:51 PM
8
08
51
PM
PDT
Daniel King: If I’ve misunderstood, please correct me. You've been corrected at least twice now. Daniel King: Upright doesn’t need you to impersonate him. I see you are not incapable of speaking the truth. But his post confirms that I was right and you were wrong. Troll.Mung
July 6, 2016
July
07
Jul
6
06
2016
08:21 PM
8
08
21
PM
PDT
Is the use of recorded language and mathematics two universal correlates of intelligence, or not? I don’t think the question warrants much of a response. The capacity to scribble out the mathematical equations of our physical world, and fill up our libraries with books, are universally known to be a demonstration of intelligence.
Yes, Upright, those are well known and experienced activities of human beings. I understand that you promote the idea that such human activities somehow can be analogized to the organic chemistry of the genetic code. That's all well and good, one can analogize until the cows come home. But what follows? If I've misunderstood, please correct me.Daniel King
July 6, 2016
July
07
Jul
6
06
2016
04:58 PM
4
04
58
PM
PDT
1 2 3 7

Leave a Reply