Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

Still No Bomb

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I posted my No Bomb After 10 Years post on October 23 and left for vacation the next day, and I’ve had very limited access to the internet since then. I am back and I am amazed at the energy that has gone into responding to that post (1,608 comments!). I have had a chance to go over the comment thread and can report that there is still no bomb.

Amusingly, keiths insisted that he had posted a bomb over at The Skeptical Zone that proved that Darwinism is “trillions” of times better at explaining the data than ID. His argument failed at many levels. Yet, even more amusingly, he kept on insisting he had debunked ID after his so-called bomb had been defused by numerous commenters. See, e.g., here and here for just two examples.

Keiths’ unwarranted triumphalism is just the latest example of a phenomenon I have seen countless times over the last 10 years. Many Darwinists seem to be literally unable to see past their ideological blinders, and this makes them blind to errors in their arguments that are obvious to those who don’t share their metaphysical commitments. I expect keiths to continue to go on ranting about how his bomb is waiting to be defused. Let him. At the end of the day, neither he nor I get to decide. We write for the lurkers.

Let me end with this. As I’ve said before, I will abandon ID, shut down this site, and become a dyed-in-the-wool Darwinist just as soon as chance/law forces are demonstrated to have created complex specified information. [As always, question begging not allowed] keiths purported takedown did not even address this question, far less resolve it.

Comments
LoL! @ Astroman- We sneer because you don't have an argument- we are sneering at your constant insipidity. You are so unaware it is pathetic.Joe
November 5, 2014
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keiths:
UDers have been trying, and failing, to rebut my argument ever since.
What argument?Mung
November 4, 2014
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I got two rubber chickens hanging upside down on my front door. I used a marker pen to write 'Darwinist' on it. The other says 'Physicist'. I'm not sure which one I like the most. I'm thinking of adding a third one that says 'Materialist' on it. It's developing into a hobby. :-DMapou
November 4, 2014
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No No No No, learned hand. UDers' sneering is purely supplementary to the reasoned arguments they vainly proffer. Only yours are substitutes for arguments.Axel
November 4, 2014
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Astroman @101(which is not Barry's IQ): "Yet according to Barry, “sneers are poor substitute for an argument”." You have sensed the hypocrisy? But at least Barry changed it from "scoffing" to "sneering". That should allow him a little more mileage. But if you really want to see hypocrisy, check out Gordon's posts and comments. Barry is an amateur by comparison.william spearshake
November 4, 2014
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Yet according to Barry, “sneers are poor substitute for an argument”.
Sneers are great when talking to chickens, especially the fiendishly stupid kind. :-DMapou
November 4, 2014
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'Fox, go eat your own feces, jackass. I ain’t your bitch. LOL.' Mapou, you missed the last bit out. Hunter S Thompson said it better .... investing it with a certain aesthetic balance: 'It's a strange world. Some people get rich and others eat shit and die. However, I concede that your imprecation, 'jackass', is a more than worthy coda to that most memorable philosophical musing. Hope you read this 'bon mot' of Hunters, Silver Fox.Axel
November 4, 2014
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Yet according to Barry, “sneers are poor substitute for an argument”. He's right, although he is illustrating the biased punctuation of conflict.Learned Hand
November 4, 2014
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Barry Arrington said: "Alan, do you have anything of substance to say? As I have often said before, sneers are poor substitute for an argument." Denyse O'leary sneered: "So the trolls do not yet have the Bomb?" Andre sneered: "Perhaps you don’t really understand the issue, or you are willfully ignorant." Andre sneered: "TSZ is a vile place, on principle I won’t comment there." bornagain77 sneered: "Indeed I would hold you thinking you are as smart as God to be not only illogical but to be a completley insane position." (Keith S never made any such claim) Barry Arrington sneered: "Prediction confirmed @ comment 41. Who says ID proponents can’t make successful predictions!!" Andre sneered: "If it is conserved, which really is a problem for your unguided fairy tale!" Andre sneered: "Meng jou met die semels dan vreet die varke jou op" Andre sneered: "What bomb? You did not have anything…… it is a dud……." Joe sneered: "keith s- Your argument has been shown to be garbage and your ignorance has been exposed. Now the only question is why are you so proud of that?" Mapou sneered: "LOL. Where have seen this lame canard before?" Mapou sneered: " It’s embarrassing, to say the least. The only thing that is keeping Darwinism alive is politics and a bunch of brain-dead dirt worshipers." Joe sneered: "That comes AFTER, Alan. What, are you 5?" Mapou shattered irony meters everywhere: "Amazing how Darwinists love to accuse others of what they themselves are blatantly guilty of." Mapou sneered: "Why do you want to act like a jackass? Darwinists, by contrast, have managed to convince themselves and some others that theirs is not a religion just so they should get free money from the government. They don’t need to convince the government since they ARE the government. Just Big Brother pretending to be your friend. It’s the state religion whether you like it or not. Never mind, of course, that this is against the law of the land. The day will soon come when the impostors will be kicked out and discredited. I’ll be watching the whole thing unfold with a grin on my face, a bag of cheetos in one hand and a beer in the other." Mapou sneered: "Fox, go eat your own feces, jackass. I ain’t your bitch. LOL." Joe sneered: "Look at astroman’s comments- nothing but lie, cowardice and ignorance." Joe sneered: "I see that bothers you. We have told you how to calculate it. You choked. We provided a peer-reviewed paper that does so wrt biology, you choked. Your position has nothing to offer and that bothers you. Sweet" Upright Biped sneered: "…and frankly, what a stupid thing to say." Joe sneered: "FSC = CSI- and only a complete moron couldn’t see that, Alan. [...] Grow up, Alan" Joe sneered: "Alan will never do that, though. He would rather just spew stuff without having to support it." Mapou sneered: "Fox is not just a moron. He is fiendishly stupid, kinda like a chicken." Mapou sneered: "Why argue with a chicken?" Mapou sneered: "Rich @94, all I was trying to tell you is to kiss my asteroid orifice. You’re just like Fox, a stupid chicken. Fiendishly stupid." Joe sneered: "No rich, he is saying that you are not worth responding to." Joe sneered: "Astroman, Just read the literature. It is spelled out in black and white. They tried not to use too many big words so you may be able to understand it." Yet according to Barry, "sneers are poor substitute for an argument".Astroman
November 4, 2014
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Astroman, Just read the literature. It is spelled out in black and white. They tried not to use too many big words so you may be able to understand it.Joe
November 4, 2014
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Are you guys referring to this Durston? http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/01/31/durstons-devious-distortions/ http://thestochasticman.wordpress.com/2009/02/19/kirk-durston-the-world%E2%80%99s-most-boring-creationist/ And Joe, why don't you dig up Crick's remains and ask them if they agree with you (that Crick's definition of biological information equals your definition CSI)? By the way, what is your definition of CSI?Astroman
November 4, 2014
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Anthony Flew …and frankly, what a stupid thing to say. You don’t think people change their minds? Perhaps that says something about you. That's very uncharitable, Upright Biped. Did you read my comment and honestly walk away with the impression that I "don't think people change their minds"? Of course they do, and of course I know that they do. I tried to be specific: I'm skeptical that people change their minds on cherished beliefs because one killer argument (a "bomb") convinces them that they have been wrong all along. Thanks for the pointer to Flew. I haven't read his first-hand accounts, but he seems to fit the bill more or less. Although his conversion seems to be slow, as opposed to Arrington's offer of an instant sea change, he did identify one or two very specific arguments he found persuasive. I think this is tangential to my point, which is that such conversions are painful and scary. People tend to refuse them, and accordingly we'd expect a challenge like Arrington's to be hollow. I think that's what we see here. He's asking for people to essentially use CSI, which IDists haven't been able to do, in an objective way, which he admits in a later post is impossible. I'll respond further in that later post.Learned Hand
November 4, 2014
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No rich, he is saying that you are not worth responding to.Joe
November 4, 2014
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So, you don't know if FSC=CSI. I like your little dance, though.Rich
November 4, 2014
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Rich @94, all I was trying to tell you is to kiss my asteroid orifice. You're just like Fox, a stupid chicken. Fiendishly stupid.Mapou
November 4, 2014
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And opinions are fine, but not science. So I'll put you down as a "I don't know if CSI=FSC"?Rich
November 4, 2014
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Rich, I rarely get into discussions of complexity, not because I think IDists don't know what they are talking about, but because I don't think it's the kind of subject that will capture the public's imagination. Personally, I think any kind of pattern, be it the orbit of the planets or the curvature of the earth, and even something as ubiquitous and taken for granted as motion, is an unmistakable sign of intelligent design. The design was there long before the arrival of living organisms and human beings.Mapou
November 4, 2014
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I'm just asking a very simple question. You can say "I don't know" - which you don't, but you like to pretend that you look like you do ;)Rich
November 4, 2014
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Why argue with a chicken?Mapou
November 4, 2014
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Mapou, do you think FSC=CSI?Rich
November 4, 2014
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Joe:
FSC = CSI- and only a complete moron couldn’t see that, Alan.
Fox is not just a moron. He is fiendishly stupid, kinda like a chicken.Mapou
November 4, 2014
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R0bb at 80 you state:
"Once you fill in the blanks, we can see what method the assessor used to calculate CSI. We can then apply that same method to various objects that are known to be produced by nature, and if the result is always less than 500 bits, then your challenge stands."
R0bb there is one huge blank that needs to be filled by atheists/materialists. There are no known examples, 'in nature', nor in laboratory experiments going back 40 years, of unguided Darwinian processes producing a single protein (Behe: The First Rule). In fact, if you remove 'directed mutations' that are implemented via sophisticated molecular machinery on the genome (J. Shapiro), such as in immunity responses and epigenetic adaptations, and only include purely random mutations, there are no known examples of random mutations and natural selection doing much of anything useful at all. What random mutations do excel at is breaking things and reducing genetic information. Yet we do have evidence of intelligence, albeit through extreme effort, creating novel proteins. As you can see, that is a fairly big blank that needs to be filled in before the materialist's can claim that 'nature' has produced information. Of related interest, at bottom 'nature' already is information (Wheeler Zeilinger, Dembski), not matter-energy as materialists presuppose. i.e. as quantum telepotation has now shown energy-matter both ulitmately reduce to a information basis. So in reality R0bb is asking for evidence that information can produce information on top of its already producing energy and matter. Conversations with William Dembski–The Thesis of Being as Communion – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYAsaU9IvnIbornagain77
November 4, 2014
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I would love to see try to make his case that CSI and FSC are different. Then I will make my case, as has already happened, and we can compare. Alan will never do that, though. He would rather just spew stuff without having to support it.Joe
November 4, 2014
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FSC = CSI- and only a complete moron couldn't see that, Alan. CSI is based on Crick's definition of biological information and so is Durston's FSC. Grow up, AlanJoe
November 4, 2014
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When does this ever happen? I cannot think of a real-world example of a person abandoning (much less completely reversing course on) a dearly-held belief because they suddenly decide a particular argument proved them wrong.
Anthony Flew ...and frankly, what a stupid thing to say. You don't think people change their minds? Perhaps that says something about you.Upright BiPed
November 4, 2014
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It's Durston and CSI is not mentioned there. Functional sequence complexity =/= CSI.Alan Fox
November 4, 2014
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Astroman:
Joe, if calculating CSI is such a rigorously defined and useful tool as you claim it is then you should be able to demonstrate it by accurately calculating the CSI in a variety of things in nature and be able to define the CSI within those things in a coherent and relevant way.
CSI is better defined and utilized than anything your position has to offer. I see that bothers you. We have told you how to calculate it. You choked. We provided a peer-reviewed paper that does so wrt biology, you choked. Your position has nothing to offer and that bothers you. SweetJoe
November 4, 2014
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R0bb, The point of CSI is to see if it is present or not. We do not expect an exact number. However Thurston, et al. gave it a go in a peer-reviewed paper that has been linked to many times.Joe
November 4, 2014
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Look at astroman's comments- nothing but lie, cowardice and ignorance.Joe
November 4, 2014
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Barry:
As I’ve said before, I will abandon ID, shut down this site, and become a dyed-in-the-wool Darwinist just as soon as chance/law forces are demonstrated to have created complex specified information.
And as I responded when you said it before, you can look to ID's own Winston Ewert for such a demonstration. You never addressed this directly, but you did say, "There is no need to form any hypothesis whatsoever to meet the challenge." Since Dembski defined CSI in terms of a chance hypothesis, you must be speaking of a concept other than the one that Dembski developed. So what is your definition of CSI? To disambiguate the term, you need only refer us to an example of CSI assessment. That is, simply fill in the blanks in the following sentence: According to ______________'s calculations, ______________ has _____________ bits of CSI. Once you fill in the blanks, we can see what method the assessor used to calculate CSI. We can then apply that same method to various objects that are known to be produced by nature, and if the result is always less than 500 bits, then your challenge stands. Are you willing to allow us to put your challenge to the test? If so, simply fill in the blanks in the sentence above.R0bb
November 3, 2014
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