From: me22over7@gmail.com   
      
   On 9/12/2025 3:35 am, RonO wrote:   
   > On 12/7/2025 10:35 PM, MarkE wrote:   
   >> On 8/12/2025 3:40 am, RonO wrote:   
   >>> On 12/7/2025 2:11 AM, MarkE wrote:   
   >>>> On 7/12/2025 4:45 am, RonO wrote:   
   >>>>> On 12/6/2025 1:19 AM, MarkE wrote:   
   >>>>>> On 20/11/2025 11:07 pm, Ernest Major wrote:   
   >>>>>>> On 19/11/2025 11:00, MarkE wrote:   
   >>>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>>> However, if I understand Meyer's claim, he's saying that the   
   >>>>>>>> base- pair sequences in DNA are not physio-chemically   
   >>>>>>>> determined, but rather DNA is a neutral substrate for storing an   
   >>>>>>>> arbitrary, immaterial code. (In the same way, different   
   >>>>>>>> sequences of 0s and 1s on your hard drive have essentially the   
   >>>>>>>> same mass and energy, and are therefore not "physical" in that   
   >>>>>>>> sense.)   
   >>>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>>> However, evolution is claimed to be a non-mind process that   
   >>>>>>>> accumulates particular code sequences, i.e. information. Even if   
   >>>>>>>> Meyer's assertion that "Information is a massless, immaterial   
   >>>>>>>> entity" is accepted, he still needs to show why evolution (even   
   >>>>>>>> in- principal) cannot be a source of such information.   
   >>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>> There are different views as to what the information in DNA is.   
   >>>>>>> On the one hand one can take an infomatics viewpoint and use the   
   >>>>>>> Kolmogorov complexity as a measure of the amount of information   
   >>>>>>> present. On the other hand one could follow Dawkins and argue   
   >>>>>>> that natural selection impresses an incomplete record of the   
   >>>>>>> historical environment of ancestral populations on the genome of   
   >>>>>>> a species, and this is the information in the genome. Similarly   
   >>>>>>> phylogenetic bracketing can be used to infer with various degrees   
   >>>>>>> of confidence ancestral phenotypes, habitats and distributions -   
   >>>>>>> that's information extractable from clade pan-genomes.   
   >>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>> Meyer would seem to need a definition of information which can't   
   >>>>>>> be added by evolutionary processes, but yet still differs between   
   >>>>>>> taxa.   
   >>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>> If you stipulate that evolutionary processes don't change the   
   >>>>>>> information content of genomes, then as it is clear that   
   >>>>>>> evolutionary processes do change the DNA sequence of genomes,   
   >>>>>>> then one concludes, from the voluminous evidence for common   
   >>>>>>> descent with modification through the agency of natural selection   
   >>>>>>> and other processes, that all genomes have the same information   
   >>>>>>> content, and the claim that an intelligent designer is required   
   >>>>>>> to account for the information evaporates. (There might be a   
   >>>>>>> circular argument as a residue.)   
   >>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>> If one the other hand you accept that evolutionary processes do   
   >>>>>>> change the information content of genomes then you difficulty in   
   >>>>>>> justifying the need for a mind to act as the source of   
   >>>>>>> information. On the one hand you could resort to occasionalism   
   >>>>>>> (Islamo-Calvinist determinism) and deny the existence of natural   
   >>>>>>> processes, a la Ray Martinez (suspected of being an occasionalist   
   >>>>>>> evolutionist). On the other hand you could argue that the   
   >>>>>>> information is imported from the environment and a mind was   
   >>>>>>> needed to create the initial pool of information, in which case   
   >>>>>>> you're basically back at the Cosmological Argument. If, on the   
   >>>>>>> gripping hand, you assert this much and no more, you need to   
   >>>>>>> identify limits to how much can be achieved by evolutionary   
   >>>>>>> processes. If you don't, all you have is an appeal to incredulity.   
   >>>>>>>   
   >>>>>>   
   >>>>>> Apologies for the delay in this response.   
   >>>>>>   
   >>>>>> Within the ranks of ID, Behe (at least) accepts some degree of   
   >>>>>> common descent and therefore genome/information change. Although   
   >>>>>> his recent book Darwin Devolves has this blurb on Amazon:   
   >>>>>>   
   >>>>>> 'A system of natural selection acting on random mutation,   
   >>>>>> evolution can help make something look and act differently. But   
   >>>>>> evolution never creates something organically. Behe contends that   
   >>>>>> Darwinism actually works by a process of devolution―damaging cells   
   >>>>>> in DNA in order to create something new at the lowest biological   
   >>>>>> levels. This is important, he makes clear, because it shows the   
   >>>>>> Darwinian process cannot explain the creation of life itself. “A   
   >>>>>> process that so easily tears down sophisticated machinery is not   
   >>>>>> one which will build complex, functional systems,” he writes.'   
   >>>>>>   
   >>>>>> Would Progressive Creation (RTB) fit under occasionalism?   
   >>>>>   
   >>>>> Probably not.  The Reason to Believe creationists want to exclude   
   >>>>> descent with modification.  In it's place they claim that their   
   >>>>> designer is recreating new species (some of them can still   
   >>>>> interbreed, so they could be sub species) just a little different   
   >>>>> from the existing species.   They want to claim de novo creation is   
   >>>>> involved and not descent with modification.   
   >>>>>   
   >>>>> You should have seen Behe's claims about whale "devolution".  He   
   >>>>> claimed that a lot of the evolution back to an aquatic lifestyle   
      
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