[continued from previous message]   
      
   >>>>> Would Progressive Creation (RTB) fit under occasionalism?   
   >>>>   
   >>>> No. Creationists sometimes try to argue that science excludes the   
   >>>> supernatural as a matter of principle. Passing over the slippery   
   >>>> nature of what counts as supernatural, I disagree. The actual   
   >>>> restriction is to phenomena which behave, at least statistically, in   
   >>>> a regular way, or to put it simply science assumes that "evidence   
   >>>> means something", i.e. empirical observation is an epistemologically   
   >>>> valid source of knowledge.   
   >>>> Occasionalism is the position that there are no natural processes;   
   >>>> instead God does everything. Progressive creationism can grade into   
   >>>> occasionalist evolutionism, but God, episodically or steadily,   
   >>>> magicking new species into existence is not occasionalist.   
   >>>>   
   >>>> Philosophical naturalism is the position that nothing is   
   >>>> supernatural; occasionalism is the position that everything is   
   >>>> supernatural. Most religious views lie somewhere between those two   
   >>>> extremes.   
   >>>   
   >>> Most Christian views require at times irregularity (occasional   
   >>> occasionalism?), however they not antithetical to the pursuit of   
   >>> science. As I've said here before, identifying and demonstrating that   
   >>> boundary would be where science itself points to a creator. bmmmm   
   >>   
   >> I believe that the usual phrasing would be "an interventionist god".   
   >>   
   >> Did you intend to claim that the stochastic nature of radioactive   
   >> decay is points to a creator?   
   >   
   > No. But the minimal necessary complexity of a sustainable, self-   
   > replicating entity, yes.   
   >   
   >>   
   >> Your first problem is distinguishing unrecognised regularity from   
   >> irregularity. Your second problem is in leaping from irregularity to   
   >> creator. An unknown is not necessarily supernatural, and the   
   >> supernatural is not necessarily a creator god. Your third problem is   
   >> that this looks like an appeal to "the God of the gaps".   
   >   
   > Agreed, these are all problems/challenges, and should be acknowledged   
   > and considered.   
   >   
   >>>   
   >>>>>   
   >>>>> The nature and measurement of information seems slippery. As you   
   >>>>> mention, is it Kolmogorov complexity or Darwkin's "incomplete   
   >>>>> record of the historical environment", or something else?   
   >>>>>   
   >>>>> ID posits a lawlike conservation of information, which I find   
   >>>>> intuitively appealing, but Dembski's efforts to formally define   
   >>>>> this have yet to land it seems.   
   >>>>>   
   >>>>   
   >>>> My intuition goes the other way. Hardware random number generators   
   >>>> create information out of "nothing".   
   >>>   
   >>> But not information that is specified (as in CSI), which is the   
   >>> critical distinction, and why Dembski and others give this so much   
   >>> attention.   
   >>   
   >> That's a substantial retreat from conservation of information.   
   >   
   > I'm not unreasonably unwilling to give a few yards.   
      
   That concession only lasted a few paragraphs.   
   >   
   >>   
   >> It seems to me that by claiming the genomes contain complex   
   >> *specified* information you're assuming what you're trying to prove.   
   >   
   > Genes are typically hundreds units long (i.e. complex) and code for   
   > functional proteins among a vast majority of nonfunctional combinations   
   > (i.e. specified). So no question-begging there.   
      
   That's not what specified means. Specified means that it confirms to a   
   pre-existing specification. That's what makes it the argument circular.   
   But if you want to concede that CSI is nothing more than an appeal to   
   incredulity, be my guest.   
   >   
   > As for the non-coding regions of the genome, that raises questions of   
   > the functional proportion and degree of specificity.   
   >   
   >>   
   >>>   
   >>>>   
   >>>> If the laws of physics are invariant with respect to time-reversal   
   >>>> then information (in some senses) is conserved. But while T-   
   >>>> violation has not been observed, physicists believe that the laws of   
   >>>> physics are CPT- invariant, and as CP-violation has been observed   
   >>>> this implies that T- violation also occurs. There is also the black-   
   >>>> hole information paradox, wherein black holes appear not to conserve   
   >>>> information.   
   >>>>   
   >>>> Creationists have been known to argue that evolution is impossible   
   >>>> because of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, ignoring that the law does   
   >>>> not preclude local decreases in entropy. (If the creationist 2LOT   
   >>>> was true, life would also be impossible.) Similarly, even if an   
   >>>> analogous law of information existed it would not preclude evolution   
   >>>> (and life); just as life (and evolution) exports entropy into the   
   >>>> environment, they could import information from the environment.   
   >>>> Dembski et al could retreat to the question of the ultimate source   
   >>>> of the information, but that is just the cosmological argument   
   >>>> redux, and not an argument against the factuality of evolution.   
   >>>>   
   >>>> For an analogy, consider the connectome - the set of connections   
   >>>> between neurons. In the same was as DNA this can been seen as   
   >>>> containing information. In most animals (C. elegans is an exception)   
   >>>> this is not fully defined by the genome. So a proportion of the   
   >>>> information in the connectome must be imported from the environment   
   >>>> (whether sensory inputs or biochemical noise).   
   >>>>   
   >>>> Turning again to the question of conservation of information.   
   >>>> AlphaZero, starting with nothing more than the rules, bootstrapped   
   >>>> itself to superhuman levels of play in, inter alia, Go and chess.   
   >>>> Did that process increase information? In that case where did the   
   >>>> information come from?   
   >>>   
   >>> As I’ve mentioned on t.o before, in the past I worked as an engineer   
   >>> programming Field programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). At the time, I   
   >>> read an article which utilised a genetic algorithm to develop an FPGA   
   >>> circuit for a clocked counter of some sort. It turned out to be a   
   >>> very efficient solution, but humanly incomprehensible because it   
   >>> appeared to utilise parasitic capacitances or some other secondary   
   >>> analogue effect. The device used was programmed with a 2kbit   
   >>> configuration file, and so it appeared that 2,000 bits of information   
   >>> (presumably qualifying as complex specific information) had been   
   >>> created de novo by an evolutionary process. I wrote to William   
   >>> Dembski at the time, who responded with an interest in investigating   
   >>> the example further, but offered an initial assessment that   
   >>> information had been “smuggled in” to the system by an intelligent   
   >>> designer (i.e. the creators of the experimental set up).   
   >>>   
   >>> My point being (without claiming anything definitive) the information   
   >>> may be from sources such as the intelligent system/algorithm   
   >>> designers, or from a brute force search of the entire soluition space   
   >>> (or enough of it to outperform humans).   
   >>   
   >> The whole point of using genetic algorithms is that, in suitable   
   >> domains, they greatly outperform brute force searches. They are   
   >> vulnerable to hanging up on local maxima, but this can be in part   
   >> addressed by annealing.   
   >>   
   >> I find the "smuggled information" response underwhelming. If a genetic   
   >> algorithm can import information from an "artificial" environment set   
   >> up by human experimenters then why can't it import information from a   
   >> "natural" environment? At which point you're back at the cosmological   
   >> argument again.   
   >   
   > In this case the device was programmed with (as I recall) 2 kilobits of   
   > data, starting with a random sequence and ending with the refined   
      
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