A splendid video about evolution

@sbu

I am still hoping you will reply to my post #118.

David

Yes I will resume the debate soon, I’m busy at work at the moment. Just wanted to acknowledge Laird’s comment first.

@sbu

I want very much to debate this with you, but as you know, science is best done in a careful analytic sort of way, so lets try to sort out one or two points.

1)      Are you conceding that random mutations on their own would be limited in power in the way Behe claims, or do you have a counter argument? This is important, as I will explain later in the discussion.
….
If indeed simple mutations on their own cannot power evolution, isn't that something worth knowing? I mean people talk as if RM+NS can produce absolutely anything (even starting from pre-biotic soup chemistry) - imposing some limits on this process would an interesting start.

I don't want to debate with you in a mud-slinging sort of way, I hope that you don't want that either.

David

David, while none of us claims to be professional biologists, and that becoming a true subject matter expert requires academic-level study, I'll give my best attempt at explaining why I remain unconvinced by (at least some of) Michael Behe's arguments.

We can certainly agree that the origin of life remains a mystery for now. However, regarding evidence that random mutations can produce beneficial changes, we have substantial molecular evidence. We can observe beneficial mutations arising in real-time through laboratory evolution experiments with bacteria and other organisms, giving us empirical data on both rates and effects.
Consider how cancer evolves to become treatment-resistant - this is a perfect example of random mutations producing 'solutions' to environmental challenges (drug treatments) that we can observe happening over months to years. Most mutations in cancer cells are neutral or harmful, but occasionally one provides resistance. These resistant cells are then selected for and multiply rapidly.
We see similar patterns in antibiotic resistance in bacteria, HIV developing drug resistance, and even beneficial mutations in human populations like lactose tolerance or high-altitude adaptations.
So I'm not following the argument in your point 1) - could you elaborate on what you mean?

With the birth of a more accurate understanding called Quantum mechanics, classical physics was shown only to be only an approximation by the 1920's . This must also apply to classical biology... a useful approximation at some scale... but also superseded by QM

QM itself, is now being extended, and generalized together with General Relativity...

And we also have Penington's mini revolution in theoretical physics... where he just comes right out and says it in his 2019 lecture. Matching patterns/replicas/copies can connect different spacetimes... with the right sort of isolation.

...what we're going to find is that just like for the page curve, there's going to be a really crucial role played by Euclidean wormholes connecting different space times. This time however it's gonna be a slightly different. Okay. Before, the euclidean wormholes were connecting different replicas that were used in this replica trick entropy calculation. Now, at least at some level what's going to be happening, is that to do this measurement on the hawking radiation, we're going to have to do some very complicated quantum computation. It's a very complicated measurement, if we want to turn it into a simple measurement, we need to use an amazingly powerful quantum computer, and that quantum computer is effectively going to be doing calculations that are equivalent to simulating the entire blackhole system, and somehow, there are going to be Euclidean wormholes connecting the real black hole to the simulated black hole in the quantum computer. At least that's one way of describing the picture, and that, is totally crazy, but the maths works. So yeah, you guys can see what you think of it at the end of this talk

At some fundamental mathematical level, organisms can connect to different spacetimes, allowing both the past AND the future to mathematically influence the organism (in a dumb way) towards future patterns where there are more of one pattern, compared with other patterns.

David, while none of us claims to be professional biologists, and that becoming a true subject matter expert requires academic-level study, I'll give my best attempt at explaining why I remain unconvinced by (at least some of) Michael Behe's arguments.

We can certainly agree that the origin of life remains a mystery for now. However, regarding evidence that random mutations can produce beneficial changes, we have substantial molecular evidence. We can observe beneficial mutations arising in real-time through laboratory evolution experiments with bacteria and other organisms, giving us empirical data on both rates and effects.
Consider how cancer evolves to become treatment-resistant - this is a perfect example of random mutations producing 'solutions' to environmental challenges (drug treatments) that we can observe happening over months to years. Most mutations in cancer cells are neutral or harmful, but occasionally one provides resistance. These resistant cells are then selected for and multiply rapidly.
We see similar patterns in antibiotic resistance in bacteria, HIV developing drug resistance, and even beneficial mutations in human populations like lactose tolerance or high-altitude adaptations.
So I'm not following the argument in your point 1) - could you elaborate on what you mean?

Thanks for starting to debate this issue iin a scientific way.

OK, my point is that following Behe's logic none of those observations should happen. Every one of them implies that living matter does not follow materialist laws. Somehow those biological systems must be able to sense which mutations are beneficial and which are not! I mean at rock bottom we have a stream of symbols (nucleotide bases) that must obey simple combinatorial rules.

Let's just take the case of bacterial resistance. This is an interesting case where a mutation can improve a bacterium provided a certain antibiotic is in use. In most (maybe all?) cases this weakens the bacterium in the wild. I think that is why bacteria have never absolutely overwhelmed the existing antibiotics.

A substantial number of biologists follow The Third Way (TTW):

https://www.thethirdwayofevolution.com/

This is a grouping that claims that evolution can somehow escape the limitations of RM+NS. @stephenw can give you more details of this approach. However, having read a bit of this concept, I couldn't find any clear example of how this way of thinking transcends the logic of Darwinism - even though it claims to. Maybe you will discover how this is done, and we will come into agreement!

I would say that the value of TTW is that it enables biologists to publish observations that aren't consistent with Darwinism - such as the ones you cite - but which do occur.

David

Thanks for starting to debate this issue iin a scientific way.
OK, my point is that following Behe's logic none of those observations should happen. Every one of them implies that living matter does not follow materialist laws. Somehow those biological systems must be able to sense which mutations are beneficial and which are not! I mean at rock bottom we have a stream of symbols (nucleotide bases) that must obey simple combinatorial rules.
Let's just take the case of bacterial resistance. This is an interesting case where a mutation can improve a bacterium provided a certain antibiotic is in use. In most (maybe all?) cases this weakens the bacterium in the wild. I think that is why bacteria have never absolutely overwhelmed the existing antibiotics.
A substantial number of biologists follow The Third Way (TTW):
https://www.thethirdwayofevolution.com/
This is a grouping that claims that evolution can somehow escape the limitations of RM+NS. @stephenw can give you more details of this approach. However, having read a bit of this concept, I couldn't find any clear example of how this way of thinking transcends the logic of Darwinism - even though it claims to. Maybe you will discover how this is done, and we will come into agreement!
I would say that the value of TTW is that it enables biologists to publish observations that aren't consistent with Darwinism - such as the ones you cite - but which do occur.
David

I'm a bit surprised by this response, as I was expecting you to challenge me again with Behe's classic bacterial flagellum argument or something similar. I'm in no way a proponent or defender of classical/neo-Darwinism. My only point throughout this entire thread is that it's difficult to disprove RM+NS and impossible to prove the existence of a designer through science. I personally think Max's point about classical evolution theory being an approximation is sound, and I fully support Third Way thinking as a way of opening up the entire field.

You make a valid philosophical point about the self-referential challenge of logical positivism - it's indeed one reason why strict logical positivism isn't considered the final word in philosophy of science.

However, in the specific context of intelligent design, I think the demand for empirical verification is entirely justified. ID proponents are making specific claims about the natural world - that certain biological structures require a designer, that complexity cannot arise through natural processes, etc. These are empirical claims about how the world actually works, not abstract philosophical principles.
If ID wants to be taken seriously as science rather than philosophy or theology, it needs to meet the same evidential standards as any other scientific theory: testable predictions, empirical evidence, falsifiability. The fact that the philosophical foundations of empiricism have their own complexities doesn't excuse ID from providing actual scientific evidence for its claims about biological systems.

Oh I agree about ID, that is a specific claim that needs hard evidence showing clear interventions in the evolutionary chain across time.

You make a valid philosophical point about the self-referential challenge of logical positivism - it's indeed one reason why strict logical positivism isn't considered the final word in philosophy of science.

However, in the specific context of intelligent design, I think the demand for empirical verification is entirely justified. ID proponents are making specific claims about the natural world - that certain biological structures require a designer, that complexity cannot arise through natural processes, etc. These are empirical claims about how the world actually works, not abstract philosophical principles.
If ID wants to be taken seriously as science rather than philosophy or theology, it needs to meet the same evidential standards as any other scientific theory: testable predictions, empirical evidence, falsifiability. The fact that the philosophical foundations of empiricism have their own complexities doesn't excuse ID from providing actual scientific evidence for its claims about biological systems.

We need to hold Darwinism to the same standards ~ because at the moment, it's a complete joke with no scientific or hard evidence to show for any of its claims. Just-so stories and mythological narratives are not good enough.

ID has presented a lot of evidence for intent and design being apparent in many biological systems ~ they've even corrected the errors made by many Darwinians. "Junk DNA" for example, and the "1% similar with chimps" claims made, which are shown to not be scientific at all.

ID is admitted philosophical ~ but so is Darwinism. Neither are hard science, as it were. But only Darwinism claims to be hard science.

We need to hold Darwinism to the same standards ~ because at the moment, it's a complete joke with no scientific or hard evidence to show for any of its claims. Just-so stories and mythological narratives are not good enough.

ID has presented a lot of evidence for intent and design being apparent in many biological systems ~ they've even corrected the errors made by many Darwinians. "Junk DNA" for example, and the "1% similar with chimps" claims made, which are shown to not be scientific at all.

ID is admitted philosophical ~ but so is Darwinism. Neither are hard science, as it were. But only Darwinism claims to be hard science.

Doesn't ID itself depend on the science surrounding evolution?

I'm happy to accept that Darwinists are papering over flaws, especially where they might indicated top down intervention by an immaterial entity...but I can't help but feel it's going too far to say it's a "complete joke"?

Doesn't ID itself depend on the science surrounding evolution?

I'm happy to accept that Darwinists are papering over flaws, especially where they might indicated top down intervention by an immaterial entity...but I can't help but feel it's going too far to say it's a "complete joke"?

If you mean biology, then certainly, but ID acts more of a interpretative philosophical framework, I would have thought?

Darwinism is a complete joke in the sense that there's no actual science to be found ~ it itself is just an interpretation of biology. The joke is that Darwinists frame their views as hard science, when they don't act anything like the rest of the other fields of biology. It's not even biology, really.

If you mean biology, then certainly, but ID acts more of a interpretative philosophical framework, I would have thought?

Darwinism is a complete joke in the sense that there's no actual science to be found ~ it itself is just an interpretation of biology. The joke is that Darwinists frame their views as hard science, when they don't act anything like the rest of the other fields of biology. It's not even biology, really.

If you could elaborate on this I'd be thankful.

I'm far more willing to accept Cosmic Fine Tuning, but ID at the evolutionary level always leaves me less convinced.