From: rokimoto557@gmail.com   
      
   On 12/13/2025 8:07 AM, MarkE wrote:   
   > On 11/12/2025 3:23 am, RonO wrote:   
   >> On 12/10/2025 3:40 AM, MarkE wrote:   
   >>> 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?   
   >>>>>>>>   
      
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