I’m so glad you referenced this paper as it perfectly …

Comment on The Adventist Accrediting Association is Still Reviewing LSU by Sean Pitman.

I’m so glad you referenced this paper as it perfectly illustrates my point. Here is the key passage in your cited paper:

A more appropriate model is the following: After guessing each of the letters, we are told which (if any) of the guessed letters are correct, and then those letters are retained. The second round of guessing is applied only for the incorrect letters that remain after this first round, and so forth. This procedure mimics the “in parallel” evolutionary process. (Wilf and Ewens, PNAS, 2010 – Link)

If you read this key passage, and the rest of the paper you cited, very carefully, you will notice something very interesting. Surprisingly, your authors make a very similar argument to that Richard Dawkins made with his fairly well known “Methinks it is like a weasel” evolutionary algorithm in his 1986 book, The Blind Watchmaker. The only real difference is that Wilf and Ewens merge “beneficial” mutations regardless of where they might occur within the population. That’s not the problem, of course. The problem is in getting the beneficial mutations to begin with anywhere within the population.

Richard Dawkins tried to illustrate the power of natural selection in this regard. What he did was very interesting. He first set up a target phrase, taken from Shakespeare, “Methinks it is like a weasel” as the goal of his evolutionary algorithm. Then, starting with a random sequence of the same length programmed into his computer as the “parent” sequence, he had the computer make 100 copies of the parent sequence (a rather high reproductive rate), each copy with exactly one additional random mutation compared to the parent sequence. Then, Dawkins had the computer analyze the “offspring” to see which ones were a closer match to the target phrase, “Methinks it is like a weasel”. Very quickly, in just 40-50 or so “generations”, the target phrase was evolved.

http://www.detectingdesign.com/methinksitislikeaweasel.html#Dawkins
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/12/me_thinks_hes_like_a_dawkins053651.html

Aha! Evolution of meaningful functional complexity in action – neatly and conclusively proved!

Not so fast. If it were this easy, computers could randomly generate all the works of Shakespeare without the need for human authors or intelligence – which would certainly prove the reality of the neo-Darwinian claims (and would put a lot of authors out of business at the same time). So, you see, there must be a small little problem with this scenario. And, of course, there is. There is a basic fundamental problem that is so obvious that I’m very surprised that such nonsense scenarios keep being published in literature as being remotely comparable to what takes place in biological evolution.

The problem is that the authors of your article (Wilf and Ewens) and Richard Dawkins assume, wrongly, that every single match to their target sequence will be functionally selectable all along the way. Their algorithm is set up to tell them if any additional mutation produces another “match” to the target sequence – or not. If this were the case in real life, then evolution at all levels of complexity would happen easily and very very quickly. The problem is that this does not reflect reality, and for good reason. The reality of the situation is that there is an exponentially stalling effect, with each step up the ladder of functional complexity, that is realized by all valid evolutionary algorithms that are based on functionality rather than sequence matching – to include computer generated algorithms or in real live biological systems (i.e., living things). The reason for this exponentially stalling effect is that not every character match to a target sequence is selectably beneficial by an algorithm that can only select based on the functionality or the meaning of the sequence – not on how many of its characters match a pre-determined target sequence (i.e., a reduced Hamming distance).

As an illustration, consider the random meaningless sequences “quiziligook”. What is the selectable difference between this meaningless sequence and “quiziliguck”? Nothing. They are both equally meaningless (in the English language system or “environment”) and therefore equally non-selectable by any function-based selection algorithm (which is what natural selection is).

This is where my concept of minimum structural threshold levels for functional systems comes into play. A sequence will not be beneficially selectable until a certain minimum structural threshold level of sequence size and specificity is realized which effectively produces a beneficial function/meaning. For lower-level systems, like meaningful 3-letter words for example, the minimum requirements for a novel meaningful 3-letter word are easily and commonly met by single or multi-character mutations (the odds of success are about 1 in 18 at this level). However, the odds of successfully finding a novel selectably meaningful 7-character sequence in sequence space are not nearly so good. The odds change exponentially to around 1 in 250,000.

You see, the basic problem is the changing ratio of potentially beneficial vs. non-beneficial sequences in sequence space. As the minimum size and/or specificity requirement of a system increases linearly, the ratio beneficial vs. non-beneficial sequences decreases exponentially. Very quickly, this creates a non-beneficial gap between what currently exists and what might exist to some benefit within the “gene pool”. And, as this gap increases linearly, the average time required to cross this gap, via any kind of random mutations, increases exponentially. By the time one considers sequences of a required length of more than 1000 characters, the average time required to cross the gap distances between beneficial islands within this level of sequence space is trillions upon trillions of years.

You really do need to read through the arguments I’ve given you before on this concept. You said you did read through them, but I don’t think you have. I’ve read your article, why not try reading my mathematical response?

http://www.detectingdesign.com/flagellum.html#Calculation

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com

P.S. Consider also that your article did not deal with the inevitable build up of detrimental mutations, which far outpaces the beneficial mutation rate, in each generation – a detrimental build up that far outpaces the maximum possible reproductive rate (and required death rate needed for natural selection to remove these detrimental mutations) for slowly reproducing species.

Sean Pitman Also Commented

The Adventist Accrediting Association is Still Reviewing LSU
I’m just saying, if a topic is important to how you view the world and your own eternal future, I dare say putting a little of your own effort into validating the opinions of the experts is well worth it. Experts are not always right you know.

Beyond this, if the best you have is the opinion of some experts, if you have no personal understanding of a topic or your own reasons why you believe like you do, you really are no better off than someone who who also has placed his/her unquestioning faith in some form of ultimate authority – like the Bible or the Qur’an or the Book of Mormon. You believe, like they do, based on the unquestioned authority of someone or something else outside of your own personal understanding of the topic or your own ability to explain it, in a rational way, to others. In other words, you don’t believe based on a form of “science” or empirical evidence from your own perspective. Your position is simply not testable or falsifiable outside of the opinions of others. It is possible that there are good scientific reasons to support your position, reasons which someone else may know and understand. But, for you, your position is not scientific since nothing can be presented to you that could even theoretically falsify or change your mind outside of the opinions of your experts. If they aren’t convinced, neither are you – regardless of the evidence presented. Your position, then, is nothing more than a faith position in the credibility of the experts.

Now, faith in experts isn’t an entirely bad thing. We all rely on experts to give us advice regarding things we haven’t had the time to investigate in sufficient detail for ourselves. It’s the best we can do in may cases. And, there is good evidence that experts are usually right. However, yet again, such faith is not based on real “science” from one’s own perspective beyond the fact that experience tells us that experts are usually right. That’s about as good as one can do if one’s understanding is derived from expert opinion alone.

So, in a discussion or debate over a controversial topic, if the very best that you can say is, “Well, the vast majority of experts disagree with you,” that’s just not helpful for someone who already knows this. How is this a substantive or scientific counter to the questions being presented which appear to fundamentally challenge expert opinion? If you don’t know how to answer the questions yourself, you just aren’t helpful. And, if you are unwilling to believe anything beyond what the experts tell you on anything, then you simply aren’t willing to think for yourself independent of the opinions of others. You are, again, subscribing to a form of blind faith and arguments from authority without any thought of questioning that authority – the same as any religious fundamentalist.

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com


The Adventist Accrediting Association is Still Reviewing LSU
Actually, billions of years is not a lot of time, not by a long shot, when you’re talking about trying to evolve anything beyond very very low levels of functional complexity. Any functional system that requires a minimum of more than 1000 specifically arranged characters (in any language system – English, Russian, Chinese, or computer code; or any biological system – DNA or protein sequences) is extremely unlikely to evolve via random mutations and function-based selection this side of trillions upon trillions of years of time. A few billion years is a tiny drop in the bucket compared to the amount of time that would be needed to get something as simple as a subcellular biomachine to evolve (like a rotary flagellum or ATPsynthase, etc).

As far as “conventional biologists” who are on board with me, by definition anyone on board with me is not “conventional”. There are a number of scientists who have their Ph.D.s in biology, biochemistry, mathematics, etc., who do agree with me. Of course, these scientists are not considered “conventional” in their thinking.

My question to you is, how much does being in agreement with popular or otherwise conventional scientists matter to you? Is your belief system with regard to evolutionary biology based on ideas that you personally understand? Or, is your position primarily based on the fact that the neo-Darwinian position happens to be popular?

Now, it’s fine if a scientific idea happens to be popular. But, popularity alone doesn’t make an idea scientific. To be truly scientific in your own thinking you have to be able to personally present a testable, potentially falsifiable hypothesis. If you cannot do this, if the best you can do is point to others and say, “Who am I to disagree with the experts?”, they be scientific in their thinking and understanding, but you are not being scientific. You are simply believing based on faith in the credibility and authority of others – very similar to religious fundamentalists who don’t care what empirical evidence may or may not come and go for or against their faith in the trustworthiness and credibility of the Bible or the Qur’an or the Book of Mormon.

In short, why do you believe what you believe aside from arguments from the authority of “experts”? Do you know? If not, why are you here? To tell me that I’m in the minority? I already know that…

My advice to you, for what it’s worth: Just sit down and start doing the math for yourself. Start calculating the ratios at different levels of functional complexity (different minimum sequence size and/or specificity requirements) and see what you discover all on your own. Then, see if it makes sense compared to what the “experts” are saying. See if you can figure out why it does or doesn’t make sense – and then let me know what you’ve discovered. I’m betting that if you take this task seriously, you’re in for a huge surprise.

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com


The Adventist Accrediting Association is Still Reviewing LSU
I’ve read a lot about it, and the basic ideas remain simple. If there is no functional difference between sequences, natural selection is simply powerless to preferentially select between them. This is a basic fact that is quite clear and simple and non-controversial. The other fact that should be obvious, but that isn’t generally recognized, is that each linear increase in the minimum size requirement for sequence space results in an exponential decrease in the ratio of beneficial vs. non-beneficial sequences within that space. This concept has been published in literature, but, for some reason, few seem to either know about it or understand its implications.

For example, take the English alphabet of 26 letters plus a space to make 27 total characters to deal with. If you move from 3-character sequence space (i.e., 27^3 = 19,683 possible 3-character sequences) to 6-character sequence space (27^6 = 387,420,489 possible 6-character sequences) it is quite clear that the size of sequence space comprised of all possible sequences of a particular size increases exponentially with each linear increase in sequence size. The question is, then, what happens to the ratio of beneficial vs. non-beneficial sequences? Does the ratio stay the same? Does it increase? Does it decrease? Is it possible to know?

The answer is quite clear, mathematically. It isn’t difficult or complex to understand – even for a layman. While the number of potentially beneficial sequences increases at higher levels, this increase is a linear increase while the increase in non-beneficial sequences is exponential. Of course, this disparity produces an exponential change in the ratio of beneficial vs. non-beneficial with each linear increase in the minimum size and/or specificity requirement of a sequence of characters.

What are the implications of this? Well, as potentially beneficial islands of sequences become exponentially more and more rare in sequence space, the minimum likely gap distance between any particular steppingstone and the next closest beneficial steppingstone increases in an linear manner. And, for each linear increase in the minimum likely non-beneficial gap distance, the average time required for random mutations to cross this gap increases exponentially.

None of these concepts are all that complex. None require a professional degree in math to understand. And, these simple concepts are devastating to the neo-Darwinian mechanism of random mutations and function-based natural selection. It just isn’t the creative mechanism that evolutionists have long claimed it to be. It just can’t do the job beyond very very low levels of functional complexity in what anyone would consider to be a reasonable amount of time (i.e., this side of trillions of years).

And, your authors, Wilf and Ewen, do not discuss this problem. Their paper doesn’t even address it. In fact, like Richard Dawkins, they present natural selection as being able to do something that it cannot do – select based on sequence comparison to some pre-formed ideal sequence without reference to functionality along each step of the way. This has the effect of removing non-beneficial gaps between steppingstones in sequence space. And, this would be great if it actually reflected real life. The problem, of course, is that this simply is not how natural selection can work in real life. It’s nothing more than a shady trick to appeal to the gullible or to those who really don’t understand the reality of how natural selection functions.

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com


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I fail to see where you have convincingly supported your claim that the GC leadership contributed to the harm of anyone’s personal religious liberties? – given that the GC leadership does not and could not override personal religious liberties in this country, nor substantively change the outcome of those who lost their jobs over various vaccine mandates. That’s just not how it works here in this country. Religious liberties are personally derived. Again, they simply are not based on a corporate or church position, but rely solely upon individual convictions – regardless of what the church may or may not say or do.

Yet, you say, “Who cares if it is written into law”? You should care. Everyone should care. It’s a very important law in this country. The idea that the organized church could have changed vaccine mandates simply isn’t true – particularly given the nature of certain types of jobs dealing with the most vulnerable in society (such as health care workers for example).

Beyond this, the GC Leadership did, in fact, write in support of personal religious convictions on this topic – and there are GC lawyers who have and continue to write personal letters in support of personal religious convictions (even if these personal convictions are at odds with the position of the church on a given topic). Just because the GC leadership also supports the advances of modern medicine doesn’t mean that the GC leadership cannot support individual convictions at the same time. Both are possible. This is not an inconsistency.