Alan, shall we run some numbers? I need your knowledge...

[Steady Eddie]

Hey Alan,

Just for fun, I want to see if you and I could re-run some numbers from scratch, with at least vague ballpark accuracy.

My way of approaching the mathematical viability, let alone the "mathematical inevitability", of Darwinism is to focus in on one 'simple' molecular machine, structure, or function. After all, these phenomena, along with the proteins that comprise them, are the building blocks of life, and are necessary to originate ANY type of terrestrial life, including first life.

So, basically, find the probability of originating one 'simple' machine, or even component.
Then come up with an estimate of all of the necessary protein machines, structures, and functions necessary to operate the simplest known cell.

Then, I need to know how many replications per year could be expected if the whole world were filled with the simplest single-celled organism known.

That way, we can calculate some kind of time factor - how long would it take for the hypothetical population to produce the machines, structures, and functions necessary for the population to exist in the first place.

Then also we could calculate the number of replications, equal to the inverse of the probability of all these proteins occurring naturalistically.

But, for me, a non-scientist, simplicity is the key. I need a scientist I can trust, and who 'gets' what Darwinism is all about, to give me the numbers that I need to make my calculations relevant.

For example, let's take the, shall we say, 'well-studied' e. coli flagellum, and see what we end up with.

Sound like a plan?

[Steady Eddie]

BTW, can anyone post this article?
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdfplus/10.1086/392766

[Alan Kleinman MD PhD]

There is a problem with this plan. And that problem is the selection conditions. Consider the EV computer algorithm that Thomas Schneider at the National Cancer Institute wrote. He claims that his "creatures" which start out as random sequences of bases evolve binding sites. The genome is broken into three areas, the binding site region, the gene region and a non-gene/non-binding site region. What he uses for his selection conditions are numerical values for the correct bases he defines as a binding site. He assigns error values if the incorrect base is in the binding site regions and if binding sites are found in the gene region or non-binding site/non-gene region, he counts that as errors. He then kills off the half of the population with the most errors, duplicates the remaining population while putting in random errors as they are duplicated. He repeats the selection condition, counts the errors and again removes the half of the population with the most errors and so the cycle goes.
.
Now, what are the selection conditions for the genes which produce the proteins which constitute the flagella? What are the selection conditions which would form any gene de novo (of new)? There are no selection conditions that do this. Evolutionist can't tell you what the selection conditions are that would transform a reptile scale into a feather. There are no selection conditions that would create flagella from scratch. Behe is correct, this is an irreducibly complex structure.

[RonO]

This is likely the saddest part of this thread. You put up a Behe Paper
and what do you think that Behe has failed to do for over 20 years with
his IC claims? If Kleinman or Behe could calculate the probability that
you want them to calculate they would have done it by now. Behe would
just claim that he needs to know things that he hasn't got a clue about
before he calculates the probability. Why do you think that he has
never put up a quantitative explanation for his "well matched" parts.
Until Behe does that Kleinman can't calculate anything like you want to
calculate. How many unselected steps has Behe ever verified exist in
his IC systems? He made the claim that his IC depended on the order and
arrangement of unselected steps, but until he figures out what they are
Kleinman can't calculate anything. It has been that way since Behe
answered his critics back at the turn of the century (17 years ago).
You have been give those references and you know what Behe claimed, so
how can Kleinman calculate the probabilities?

Remember a simple machine like the lever and fulcrum (a tree branch
falling between two rocks) is irreducibly complex, but it isn't the type
of IC that Behe is talking about. Take one part away and the system
stops doing its normal function, but the parts are not well matched
enough and there aren't enough unselected steps or their order isn't
right for the simple machine to be Behe's IC.

Really, if Behe or Kleinman could caluculate the probabilities that you
want to calculate don't you think that it would have been done in the
last 20 years of the ID scam?

Ron Okimoto

[Steady Eddie]

I'm assuming 100% selection efficiency for the purposes of this calculation. I'm actually assuming an impossible situation; that the earth was filled with simple life forms that are capable of replicating but have not yet evolved any specific necessary machinery to operate a cell.

So this is just quick-and-dirty, and I know that I am giving away everything but the kitchen sink, because the assumptions I make are weighted in the favour of Darwinism.

[Alan Kleinman MD PhD]

That's my point, there are no selection conditions that would transform scales into feathers let alone all the complex genes and corresponding proteins even in the simplest replicator such as Mycoplasma.

[RonO]

It doesn't matter Eddie. He needs to know things that he has no idea
about. Why didn't Dembski (a math PhD) ever do it for Behe's IC or his
own specified complexity or complex specified information? These would
have just been bits of what you want calculated and they couldn't do it.
That is why the bait and switch is run on rubes like you. The ID
science just does not exist and you aren't going to get it from the ID
perps or Kleinman.

Ron Okimoto

[RonO]

This is not true and if you knew anything about feathers you would know
that it isn't true.

It looks like the initial feathers were downy like feathers that lacked
the full structure of contour feathers, or just spiky feathers. We know
that downy feathers are good for conserving body heat. Birds are warm
blooded, it turns out that some dinos were likely warm blooded too.
Mammals are warm blooded and have fur. What do you not get?

Ornamentation for camouflage or sexual selection. Flightless birds use
their feathers for these things even though they can't fly. They also
use their feathers for improving their maneuverability on the ground,
just look at ostriches.

There was one study where they demonstrated that feathers not good
enough for flight (they cut them shorter) could still be used to
maneuver and the birds were able to go up surfaces (something like
climbing trees) with the assist.

So you should claim that you don't know all the selective pressures
because you simply do not.

Why didn't Dembski ever confirm specified complexity or complex
specified information ever existed in nature? That is also an issue
with you because even if you know the selection pressures what actually
happened in what order etc.

There are other factors that you can't deal with.

Why not work with what you can deal with? Use the math to determine why
Behe and Denton (two of the initial ID perps at the Discovery Institute)
admit that biological evolution is fact. We can and we do, do those
calculations and they all work out. Behe and Denton do not deny that,
so why not repeat what they have come to understand and check that out.
Working on junk that you can't answer is just a good way to waste your
time, and you have already determined for yourself that you can't answer
those eddie type questions questions. Why not answer the questions that
you can answer?

Ron Okimoto

[Ernest Major]

There's a folk tale that scientists proved that bumblebees can't fly.
What really happened is that simplistic models of flight, applicable to
fixed wing aircraft, can't account for the flight abilities of bumble
bees. When something like this happens, when a model predicts that an
observation is impossible, scientists conclude that they're using the
wrong model.

There is evidence that all known organisms share a common ancestor;
there is evidence that the processes of population genetics and
environmental changes are sufficient to account for their diversity and
disparity. To refute this evidence you need more than a model; you need
a model that you can convince people applies.

I don't understand why you think that Dr. Kleinman could assist you with
this, since he doesn't even attempt to demonstrate that his model
supports his conclusions.

--
alias Ernest Major

[Bob Casanova]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 13:50:03 +0100, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by Ernest Major
<{$to$}@meden.demon.co.uk>:

What, his assertion that it does isn't enough? Tsk,
tsk...he's a "double doctor", after all.
--

Bob C.

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science,
the one that heralds new discoveries, is not
'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...'"

- Isaac Asimov

[Steady Eddie]

On Sunday, 17 September 2017 19:15:02 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:

Okay, so the median protein length in e. coli is 277. Let's take 200 as a rough length of a protein for this calculation, shall we?

http://book.bionumbers.org/how-big-is-the-average-protein/

[jillery]

Apparently the good DrDr has left the building.

--
I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.

Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Attributed to Voltaire

[Bill Rogers]

Not sure why you need to do a calculation. There are thousands of proteins in even the simplest cell. Even if you say there are only 100 amino acids per protein and only 1000 different proteins in a simple cell, then the chance of a random sequence of 100 x 1000 amino acids being just exactly the sequence to be found in this simple cell would be 1 in 4^100000. It's obvious that if random stringing together of full length protein sequences were the mechanism of evolution, then life would be impossible.

[Steady Eddie]

And the e. coli flagellum is comprised of about 30 proteins, correct?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK6250/

Now, how many possible different amino acid chains can be made randomly from 200 positions?

Well, proteins are made from 20 amino acids.

So, how does the math go? 20 exp 200 possible different amino acid chains?

My calculator tells me 1.6e60. Does this mean 1.6 X 10^60? Help!

[Bill Rogers]

The number is huge. If the bacterial flagellum were required to evolve by the random condensation of amino acids into those specific 20 200 amino acid chains, there's not enough time since the Big Bang for it to happen. Not even close.

[John Stockwell]

It means you are making the mistake of thinking that this is a random assembly
problem. The relevant issue is not the amino acids that a flagellum is made
of, it is the issue is the genetic sequence that causes the organism to
build a flagellum.

Is there only one kind of flagellum? No. Are there other structures whose DNA could be modified to arrive at one of the flagella
patterns? Yes. These are the secretory structures that bacteria use for a variety of functions.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13663-evolution-myths-the-bacterial-flagellum-is-irreducibly-complex/

-John

[Steady Eddie]

Wait, but the number of replications is also huge, in MILLIONS! or BILLIONS! of years, right?
That's what the Darwinists are counting on.
So, how huge a number of e. coli replications could have occurred in 3.5 BILLION! years, if they absolutely covered the earth for the entire 3.5 BILLION! years?

How many e. coli could comfortably, sustainably, populate the earth, under some kind of hypothetical "ideal" conditions? Just a rough guess... anybody?
anybody?
Bueller?

[aug....@gmail.com]

I calculate an upper bound on the number of generations as 7 trillion, shortening the time frame from 3.5 billion to 270 million years as E. coli is associated with warm blooded organisms. As for the number of individuals, each of which is associated with a replication event. that would have a back-of-the-envelope upper bound of 2 to the 7,000,000,000,000th power. I have the sense that that's a Very Big Number.

[Öö Tiib]

E. coli is parasite that lives in guts of warm-blooded animals. You got
about billion of those in your body.

[Ernest Major]

Escherichia coli's primary habitat is the intestines of endothermic
organisms, so it's not the ideal bacterium to cover the earth. (We would
infer that Escherichia coli evolved from other bacteria a few hundred
million years ago.)

Estimates of the standing population of bacteria are in excess of 10^30
organisms. On the one hand the standing population of some bacteria is
reduced by eukaryotic predation (and viral parasitism), on then other
hand eukaryotes provide additional habitats for bacteria; so it's not
clear whether that figure should be increased or decreased. Add in the
billions of year, and your talking 10^40 to 10^45 replications,
depending on what assumptions you make.

The Escherichia coli pangenome is of the order of 10^10 base pairs, but
individual cells have considerably smaller genomes.

But if you take the ratio of the number of replications to the number of
base pairs in the genome you get a number in the order of 10^30 to
10^35. That makes producing a genome seem like a trivial task.

> anybody?
> Bueller?
>


--
alias Ernest Major

[Bill Rogers]

No, you need this to happen before the E. coli are there. If you depend on the random condensation of thousands of 200 amino acid long chains even to get a foot in the door, it just cannot happen. In fact, I slipped earlier, thinking of 4 nucleotides rather than 20 amino acids. So it's really 20^(100000). Far more than the total number of elementary particles in the observable universe, so even if each elementary particle were an E. coli cell, it wouldn't be enough. No detailed calculation is necessary; it's blindingly obvious that the random condensation of amino acids cannot possibly yield the proteins required een for the simplest cell. Simply impossible.

[Steady Eddie]

Come on, don’t hold back! Let’s assume the ENTIRE 3.5 billion years have been spent with the earth full of e. coli. That would make about 90 TRILLION generations!

So, with the earth full of e. coli, how many TOTAL REPLICATIONS have taken place in these 90 trillion generations?

[RonO]

Something like what you are trying to calculate was done decades ago and
the results were misused by creationists for decades. Behe and Dembski
would tell you that these types of calculations aren't as biologically
relevant as you think.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0022519377900443

Yockey was not a creationist as far as I know. He did do some work on
abiogenesis models.

The scientific creationists that tried to use calculations like this
failed and the ID scam was needed. The ID perps tried to avoid making
these calculations. Instead the fooled the rubes with IC and SC and the
new law of thermodynamics. You can figure out why for yourself. If you
need some help ask Kleinman why the ID perps don't do junk like this.

Remember the Abzyme work. They could evolve the enzymatic function that
they were screening for in antibodies in less than 2 trillion tries.
Each antibody producing cell could produce a different antibody sequence
and the mice only have a total of two trillion cells so in less tries
than the cell number in a mouse they could detect the evolution of
enzymatic function. The original antibody sequence did not have the
activity. The antibody system has a way to recombine sequences and
insert substitutions pretty much as randomly as you would want. Since
the antibodies don't know what enzymatic function they should be
evolving that doesn't seem to matter. It happens. Such a small
fraction of protein space has to be searched to find the enzymatic
function that your giant numbers are meaningless.

So calculate as large a number as you want, but it never did any
creationists any good.

Ron Okimoto

[jillery]

And yet we know E.coli exists. There are only a few inferences which
resolve this apparent paradox:

1) Goddit.

2) E.coli aren't real, they're just a subjective construct.

3) The assumptions on which the math is based are incorrect and/or
inappropriate to the question.

I leave it as an exercise which inference is the more likely, but the
recent and many replies from and to the good DrDr should give a heavy
hint.

[jillery]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 14:31:15 -0700 (PDT), 嘱 Tiib <oot...@hot.ee>

Umm... not a parasite, but a true symbiote. You would be hard-pressed
to live without them.

[August Rode]

It's your fantasy, Ed. If that's where you want to go, have fun.

[Steady Eddie]

On Monday, 18 September 2017 17:40:04 UTC-6, Ron O wrote:
> On 9/18/2017 2:04 PM, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > On Sunday, 17 September 2017 19:15:02 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
> >> Hey Alan,
> >>
> >> Just for fun, I want to see if you and I could re-run some numbers from scratch, with at least vague ballpark accuracy.
> >>
> >> My way of approaching the mathematical viability, let alone the "mathematical inevitability", of Darwinism is to focus in on one 'simple' molecular machine, structure, or function. After all, these phenomena, along with the proteins that comprise them, are the building blocks of life, and are necessary to originate ANY type of terrestrial life, including first life.
> >>
> >> So, basically, find the probability of originating one 'simple' machine, or even component.
> >> Then come up with an estimate of all of the necessary protein machines, structures, and functions necessary to operate the simplest known cell.
> >>
> >> Then, I need to know how many replications per year could be expected if the whole world were filled with the simplest single-celled organism known.
> >>
> >> That way, we can calculate some kind of time factor - how long would it take for the hypothetical population to produce the machines, structures, and functions necessary for the population to exist in the first place.
> >>
> >> Then also we could calculate the number of replications, equal to the inverse of the probability of all these proteins occurring naturalistically.
> >>
> >> But, for me, a non-scientist, simplicity is the key. I need a scientist I can trust, and who 'gets' what Darwinism is all about, to give me the numbers that I need to make my calculations relevant.
> >>
> >> For example, let's take the, shall we say, 'well-studied' e. coli flagellum, and see what we end up with.
> >>
> >> Sound like a plan?
> >
> > Okay, so the median protein length in e. coli is 277. Let's take 200 as a rough length of a protein for this calculation, shall we?
> >
> > http://book.bionumbers.org/how-big-is-the-average-protein/
> >
>
> Something like what you are trying to calculate was done decades ago and
> the results were misused by creationists for decades. Behe and Dembski
> would tell you that these types of calculations aren't as biologically
> relevant as you think.
>
> http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0022519377900443
>
> Yockey was not a creationist as far as I know. He did do some work on
> abiogenesis models.

Thanks for that info, Ron.
But, Yockey seems to be saying that abiogenesis is mathematically impossible.
Surely, he has been engaged and debunked on this topic since 1974?
Would you please cite (and quote if possible) the most convincing refutation of Yockey, in your opinion?

> The scientific creationists that tried to use calculations like this
> failed and the ID scam was needed.

First, I'm looking forward to that refutation of Yockey.

> The ID perps tried to avoid making
> these calculations. Instead the fooled the rubes with IC and SC and the
> new law of thermodynamics. You can figure out why for yourself. If you
> need some help ask Kleinman why the ID perps don't do junk like this.

Hmm, I don't know where you get the idea that ID researchers don't do this math...

> Remember the Abzyme work. They could evolve the enzymatic function that
> they were screening for in antibodies in less than 2 trillion tries.
> Each antibody producing cell could produce a different antibody sequence
> and the mice only have a total of two trillion cells so in less tries
> than the cell number in a mouse they could detect the evolution of
> enzymatic function. The original antibody sequence did not have the
> activity. The antibody system has a way to recombine sequences and
> insert substitutions pretty much as randomly as you would want. Since
> the antibodies don't know what enzymatic function they should be
> evolving that doesn't seem to matter. It happens. Such a small
> fraction of protein space has to be searched to find the enzymatic
> function that your giant numbers are meaningless.

Would you cite that please?

[Steady Eddie]

You forgot the option:
An intelligent agent caused it.
It's YOU that seems to want to involve some God in the evaluation process.
That's where you demonstrate the real, religious reasons for your faith in the power of Chance.

You see the threat that admitting the truth could pose to your faith, so you refuse to even see the option.

[jillery]

>You forgot the option:
>An intelligent agent caused it.

Specify the functional differences between your intelligent agent and
God. Otherwise go throw mud in your pigsty, porky.

>It's YOU that seems to want to involve some God in the evaluation process.
>That's where you demonstrate the real, religious reasons for your faith in the power of Chance.
>
>You see the threat that admitting the truth could pose to your faith, so you refuse to even see the option.

You might have a point if you knew what you were talking about.

[Steady Eddie]

I don't know - the science doesn't say. The physical sciences, indispensable in themselves, cannot pass the threshold of physical matter and energy. That's why anyone interested in the science does not hop over the threshold and start railing at the God that threatens their own God.

Yes, we're talking about Gods here - at least by definition of powerful, superhuman forces.

But let the science first speak about the necessity of intelligent agency for the production of life as we know it.

> >It's YOU that seems to want to involve some God in the evaluation process.
> >That's where you demonstrate the real, religious reasons for your faith in the power of Chance.
> >
> >You see the threat that admitting the truth could pose to your faith, so you refuse to even see the option.
>
>
> You might have a point if you knew what you were talking about.

Well, let's just suppose that I know what I'm talking about in this instance.

[jillery]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 20:05:43 -0700 (PDT), Steady Eddie

Since you finally admit we're talking about Gods here, then I accept
your tacit admission that your previous objection is a meaningless
digression.

>But let the science first speak about the necessity of intelligent agency for the production of life as we know it.

Unless and until you're willing and able to define your presumptive
characteristics of your presumptive intelligent agent, the only thing
anybody, including you, can reasonably say about them is they could do
anything. That's what makes ID a useless hypothesis, it doesn't
explain anything. Not sure why even you have so much trouble
understanding this.

>> >It's YOU that seems to want to involve some God in the evaluation process.
>> >That's where you demonstrate the real, religious reasons for your faith in the power of Chance.
>> >
>> >You see the threat that admitting the truth could pose to your faith, so you refuse to even see the option.
>>
>>
>> You might have a point if you knew what you were talking about.
>
>Well, let's just suppose that I know what I'm talking about in this instance.

You would first have to show some evidence that you know what you're
talking about. Don't be insulted that I don't wait for you to do so.

--

[Steady Eddie]

I could show you, but then I'd have to kill you.
;)

[jillery]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 21:04:15 -0700 (PDT), Steady Eddie

>I could show you, but then I'd have to kill you.
>;)

That only shows you don't know what you're talking about.

[r3p...@gmail.com]

Selection cannot occur unless a DNA replication machine and its biological housing already exists, but biological housing and a DNA replication machine cannot exist unless selection has occurred. The facts dictate that evolutionary theory resides in a painted corner, a mutually exclusive quandary that they, for the most part, attempt to cover up.

And it should be emphasized that we are talking about not just any machine but a complicated machine. And complicated DNA replication machinery just doesn't materialize into existence, not to mention its biological housing. All in all we are talking about something that required much mutation and much selection. Yet evolutionary theory is clear: macromutation and single step selection do not occur, do not exist. Abiogenesis is manifestly impossible. This is precisely why so called rational scientists like Francis Crick advocated directed panspermia to accomplish biological First Cause.

So when probably theory is called in to provide the likelihood of the problem just described the numerical answer supports genuine impossibility. Life is a miracle as per Genesis 1.

Ray

[Steady Eddie]

Yeah?
So what's a zillion kajillion times a BILLION! ?

Big number?

[r3p...@gmail.com]

On Monday, September 18, 2017 at 11:05:03 PM UTC-7, r3p...@gmail.com wrote:
> Selection cannot occur unless a DNA replication machine and its biological housing already exists, but biological housing and a DNA replication machine cannot exist unless selection has occurred. The facts dictate that evolutionary theory resides in a painted corner, a mutually exclusive quandary that they, for the most part, attempt to cover up.
>
> And it should be emphasized that we are talking about not just any machine but a complicated machine. And complicated DNA replication machinery just doesn't materialize into existence, not to mention its biological housing. All in all we are talking about something that required much mutation and much selection. Yet evolutionary theory is clear: macromutation and single step selection do not occur, do not exist. Abiogenesis is manifestly impossible. This is precisely why so called rational scientists like Francis Crick advocated directed panspermia to accomplish biological First Cause.
>

> So when probability theory is called in to provide the likelihood of the problem just described the numerical answer supports genuine impossibility. Life is a miracle as per Genesis 1.
>
> Ray

Life is not merely improbable; rather, it's impossible without a Creator. Eddie, Alan, and others can theorize all they want about the improbability of cumulative selection occurring but the real and only impossibility one needs to focus on is the impossibility of abiogenesis as described above. Not just any impossibility but a mutually exclusive impossibility. Yet Darwinists believe inanimate matter, absent a miracle worker, conquered a mutually exclusive impossibility. Great is their faith indeed.

Ray

[Burkhard]

r3p...@gmail.com wrote:
> Selection cannot occur unless a DNA replication machine and its biological housing already exists, but biological housing and a DNA replication machine cannot exist unless selection has occurred.

erm, no. Nothing says that the process that led to abiogenesis was
driven by natural selection. Maybe you should try to read up on the
current literature on abiogenesis first?

[Steady Eddie]

Well, I guess this is where the last response not expressing outright insanity left off, so... ahh...
Yes, I am having fun, so can anybody calculate from the above information, how many TOTAL REPLICATIONS would have taken place in a hypothetical world full of e. coli-like cells for 3.5 BILLION! years?

[jillery]

You are correct that DNA and its housing are too complicated for first
life. Of course, there are other ways besides DNA to duplicate
biologically, ex. self-replicating RNA. There are likely other
mechanisms we don't know about.

[jillery]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 23:20:01 -0700 (PDT), Steady Eddie

>Yeah?
>So what's a zillion kajillion times a BILLION! ?
>
>Big number?

You must enjoy proving me right, you do it so often.

[jillery]

So explain how your Creator did it. Don't forget the step-by-step
detail, the math, et al, etc, inter alia, and so on...

And while you're straining out the gnat of abiogenesis, explain how
you swallow the existence of your Creator.

[RonO]

He is saying that the way that he is thinking of it does not work, and
that others have the same idea, but what does that mean. Yockey
understood that he just wasn't doing something relevant.

It obviously isn't just the first example that worked. Yockey was
working on a short protein, but could it have been shorter or longer.
It may have been in another paper, but he does the calculation and
estimates the number of protein sequences limited to the size of cyt C
that would work just going by the variation known at that time in
nature. It was around 10^45 possible sequences with those limitations
that would work. From the abstract you know that there are 10^61
possible sequences total with 20 amino acids. What about sequences that
were larger or smaller doing the same thing? I only know about these
papers because the scientific creationist posters used to put up the
junk. Gish used to be a Yockey fan. The papers never amounted to
anything in the field.

I don't follow Abiogenesis research so I do not know about any formal
refutations or if they were needed. You might consider the fact that
the ID perps do not use Yockey. What does that tell you?

The calculations are pretty much refuted (as not meaning much) by the
abzyme work because only 10^12 sequences have to be searched to find the
enzymatic activity that the researchers were looking for. So something
has to be wrong with Yockey's conclusions from his calculations. He
obviously isn't considering some relevant notions. Protein space is
huge, but a very small portion of it has to be searched to find what you
want. It should make sense to you because how does evolution work?
Take the example of gene duplication. You have a protein sequence that
is doing something, but you make another copy of it and a few changes
can make it do something else. How does that work? Remember the
Thorton work on steroid receptors. Behe had believed that Thorton
really had done what he claimed to have done, but Behe was only saying
that, that was the limit of natural evolution. Thorton didn't find
anything to support Behe's designer did it notions, he only found things
that would be expected to be possible. Thorton had determined that the
two major classes of steroid receptors shared a common ancestor and he
could look at extant lifeforms and work backwards and tell Behe how they
had evolved. This all happened pre Cambrian, and the steroid receptors
were major players in the evolution of the multicellular phyla that we
have today.

If you look at lifeforms, they have explored very little of the
available protein sequence space, and have been able to do everything
that they need to do.

If the creationists had been able to effectively use Yockey why was the
ID scam needed? Why don't the ID perps use Yockey?

Think for just a moment and you might get it.

>
>> The scientific creationists that tried to use calculations like this
>> failed and the ID scam was needed.
>
> First, I'm looking forward to that refutation of Yockey.

Why don't the ID perps use Yockey if it had amounted to anything?

>
>> The ID perps tried to avoid making
>> these calculations. Instead the fooled the rubes with IC and SC and the
>> new law of thermodynamics. You can figure out why for yourself. If you
>> need some help ask Kleinman why the ID perps don't do junk like this.
>
> Hmm, I don't know where you get the idea that ID researchers don't do this math...

Put up an example where they have done the math? Was it done for IC?
Was it done for specified complexity or complex specified information?
Why don't the ID perps use Yockey if he has already done what they need
to do? The scientific creationists tried to use Yockey, but what
happened to them?

>
>> Remember the Abzyme work. They could evolve the enzymatic function that
>> they were screening for in antibodies in less than 2 trillion tries.
>> Each antibody producing cell could produce a different antibody sequence
>> and the mice only have a total of two trillion cells so in less tries
>> than the cell number in a mouse they could detect the evolution of
>> enzymatic function. The original antibody sequence did not have the
>> activity. The antibody system has a way to recombine sequences and
>> insert substitutions pretty much as randomly as you would want. Since
>> the antibodies don't know what enzymatic function they should be
>> evolving that doesn't seem to matter. It happens. Such a small
>> fraction of protein space has to be searched to find the enzymatic
>> function that your giant numbers are meaningless.
>
> Would you cite that please?

I have given you the citations multiple times before, what did you ever
do with them but run? What will you do this time?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abzyme

The first reference is a review if you can get through the pdf.

>
>> So calculate as large a number as you want, but it never did any
>> creationists any good.

What good have the creationist calculations ever done?

Why don't the ID perps use Yockey? Aren't you trying to do what Yockey
did? What good did it ever do creationists?

Ron Okimoto


>>
>> Ron Okimoto
>
>

[Steady Eddie]

Okay, let's just assume one replication per hour per cell.
that's:
3.5 billion X 365 X 24 = about 3 X 10^12.

And the number of possible amino acid chains of 200 length are: 20 ^ 200 =
1.6e+260 (I tried the calculation on an online calculator)

Now, here is where I need a mathematician's help - making sure we're talking about the same power:

Does 1.6e+260 equal 1.6 X 10 ^ 260?

or does it mean 1.6 ^ 260?

I'll go with the former until I'm corrected.

So, how many planets earth full of a bacterium-like cell for the whole history of life on earth would be needed to have even odds of producing ONE of the specific proteins needed for a flagellum?

that's 1.6 X 10^260 / 3 X 10^12

=about .5 X 10^248

Looks like Lady Luck would need about 10^248 earths, FULL of e.coli, ALL replicating for 3.5 BILLION! years, to break even on producing ONE of the particular proteins needed for the e. coli flagellum.

So, how many earths would be required for Chancey-Chance Chance to break even on, gradually, producing ALL 30 of the specific proteins needed to build a flagellum?

That's easy, just raise that to the power of 30.

So, the odds of ONE e. coli flagellum arising by chance is about 1 in 10^278, according to my calculations.

So, how many earth-like planets packed with e. coli for 3.5 BILLION! years would be required for an even chance of a flagellum developing?

10^278 / 10^12 =
(drum roll please...)
10^266.

You would need in the order of 10^266 earth-like planets, each full of celsl with the replication power of e. coli, replicating for 3.5 BILLION! years to get an even chance of producing ONE e. coli flagellum naturalistically.

No wonder the multiverse is so appealing to Atheists.
LOL!

Or let's look at it another way:

HOW LONG would it take an e. coli-like cell to have an even chance of pumping out ONE e. coli flagellum?
We need only divide the chance of the flagellum arising by chance by the number of replications available:

10^278 / 10^12 =
(drum roll please...)

It seems it would take an earth FULL of e. coli-like cells 10^266 YEARS to have a reasonable chance of hitting on the 30 specific proteins needed for one flagellum. That, of course, doesn't account for the actual BUILDING PROCESS, which requires HOW MANY particular proteins? WHO KNOWS?

But, somebody please check my math! I don't know if I got my exponents right.

[Bill Rogers]

You don't need a mathematicians help. It's blindingly obvious that if what is required for evolution is the random assembly of amino acids into the 30 chains that make up the flagellum, never mind all the other essential proteins, that a number of trials far greater than the number of elementary particles in the universe times the number of seconds since the Big Bang. If evolution works by random assembly of multiple, specific amino acid chains, ti can never happen. Period. You don't need help with the arithmetic - the numbers are vastly bigger than you need them to be to rule out evolution by the random assembly of specific sequences.

[Sean Dillon]

Eddie: I think what Bill R is quietly telling you here is that the math is meaningless because that isn't how evolution works.

[Steady Eddie]

Thank you Bill

[Bob Casanova]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:27:06 -0700 (PDT), the following
appeared in talk.origins, posted by Steady Eddie
<1914o...@gmail.com>:

>On Monday, 18 September 2017 13:05:05 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
>> On Sunday, 17 September 2017 19:15:02 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
>> > Hey Alan,
>> >
>> > Just for fun, I want to see if you and I could re-run some numbers from scratch, with at least vague ballpark accuracy.
>> >
>> > My way of approaching the mathematical viability, let alone the "mathematical inevitability", of Darwinism is to focus in on one 'simple' molecular machine, structure, or function. After all, these phenomena, along with the proteins that comprise them, are the building blocks of life, and are necessary to originate ANY type of terrestrial life, including first life.
>> >
>> > So, basically, find the probability of originating one 'simple' machine, or even component.
>> > Then come up with an estimate of all of the necessary protein machines, structures, and functions necessary to operate the simplest known cell.
>> >
>> > Then, I need to know how many replications per year could be expected if the whole world were filled with the simplest single-celled organism known.
>> >
>> > That way, we can calculate some kind of time factor - how long would it take for the hypothetical population to produce the machines, structures, and functions necessary for the population to exist in the first place.
>> >
>> > Then also we could calculate the number of replications, equal to the inverse of the probability of all these proteins occurring naturalistically.
>> >
>> > But, for me, a non-scientist, simplicity is the key. I need a scientist I can trust, and who 'gets' what Darwinism is all about, to give me the numbers that I need to make my calculations relevant.
>> >
>> > For example, let's take the, shall we say, 'well-studied' e. coli flagellum, and see what we end up with.
>> >
>> > Sound like a plan?
>>
>> Okay, so the median protein length in e. coli is 277. Let's take 200 as a rough length of a protein for this calculation, shall we?
>>
>> http://book.bionumbers.org/how-big-is-the-average-protein/
>
>And the e. coli flagellum is comprised of about 30 proteins, correct?
>
>https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK6250/
>
>Now, how many possible different amino acid chains can be made randomly from 200 positions?
>
>Well, proteins are made from 20 amino acids.
>
>So, how does the math go? 20 exp 200 possible different amino acid chains?
>
>My calculator tells me 1.6e60. Does this mean 1.6 X 10^60? Help!

Yes, it does; it's standard notation.

But back to whatever your intended point might be...what
*is* your intended point, given that "randomly" is
irrelevant, since evolution is anything but random?
--

Bob C.

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science,
the one that heralds new discoveries, is not
'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...'"

- Isaac Asimov

[Bob Casanova]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 13:40:59 -0700 (PDT), the following

appeared in talk.origins, posted by Steady Eddie
<1914o...@gmail.com>:

>On Monday, 18 September 2017 14:05:05 UTC-6, Bill Rogers wrote:
>> On Monday, September 18, 2017 at 3:30:04 PM UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:

>> > On Monday, 18 September 2017 13:05:05 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
>> > > On Sunday, 17 September 2017 19:15:02 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
>> > > > Hey Alan,
>> > > >
>> > > > Just for fun, I want to see if you and I could re-run some numbers from scratch, with at least vague ballpark accuracy.
>> > > >
>> > > > My way of approaching the mathematical viability, let alone the "mathematical inevitability", of Darwinism is to focus in on one 'simple' molecular machine, structure, or function. After all, these phenomena, along with the proteins that comprise them, are the building blocks of life, and are necessary to originate ANY type of terrestrial life, including first life.
>> > > >
>> > > > So, basically, find the probability of originating one 'simple' machine, or even component.
>> > > > Then come up with an estimate of all of the necessary protein machines, structures, and functions necessary to operate the simplest known cell.
>> > > >
>> > > > Then, I need to know how many replications per year could be expected if the whole world were filled with the simplest single-celled organism known.
>> > > >
>> > > > That way, we can calculate some kind of time factor - how long would it take for the hypothetical population to produce the machines, structures, and functions necessary for the population to exist in the first place.
>> > > >
>> > > > Then also we could calculate the number of replications, equal to the inverse of the probability of all these proteins occurring naturalistically.
>> > > >
>> > > > But, for me, a non-scientist, simplicity is the key. I need a scientist I can trust, and who 'gets' what Darwinism is all about, to give me the numbers that I need to make my calculations relevant.
>> > > >
>> > > > For example, let's take the, shall we say, 'well-studied' e. coli flagellum, and see what we end up with.
>> > > >
>> > > > Sound like a plan?
>> > >
>> > > Okay, so the median protein length in e. coli is 277. Let's take 200 as a rough length of a protein for this calculation, shall we?
>> > >
>> > > http://book.bionumbers.org/how-big-is-the-average-protein/
>> >
>> > And the e. coli flagellum is comprised of about 30 proteins, correct?
>> >
>> > https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK6250/
>> >
>> > Now, how many possible different amino acid chains can be made randomly from 200 positions?
>> >
>> > Well, proteins are made from 20 amino acids.
>> >
>> > So, how does the math go? 20 exp 200 possible different amino acid chains?
>> >
>> > My calculator tells me 1.6e60. Does this mean 1.6 X 10^60? Help!
>>

>> The number is huge. If the bacterial flagellum were required to evolve by the random condensation of amino acids into those specific 20 200 amino acid chains, there's not enough time since the Big Bang for it to happen. Not even close.
>
>Wait, but the number of replications is also huge, in MILLIONS! or BILLIONS! of years, right?
>That's what the Darwinists are counting on.
>So, how huge a number of e. coli replications could have occurred in 3.5 BILLION! years, if they absolutely covered the earth for the entire 3.5 BILLION! years?
>
>How many e. coli could comfortably, sustainably, populate the earth, under some kind of hypothetical "ideal" conditions? Just a rough guess... anybody?
>anybody?
>Bueller?

Once again, your initial assumption, that amino acid chains
build randomly, is incorrect, so your questions and implied
assertions, derived from that assumption, are also
incorrect. And irrelevant.

[Mark Isaak]

On 9/18/17 8:05 PM, Steady Eddie wrote:
> [...]

> Yes, we're talking about Gods here - at least by definition of
> powerful, superhuman forces.

Gods are not necessarily particularly powerful. In many, probably most,
creation accounts, it takes the god or gods multiple tries before they
create humans in their present form.

--
Mark Isaak eciton (at) curioustaxonomy (dot) net
"Ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can
have." - James Baldwin

[jillery]

That you thank Bill shows that you don't understand his reply. Here's
a clue for you: Focus on his conditional "if", and then think about
how that could be false.

[Bill Rogers]

He did seem to miss that, didn't he.

[jillery]

On Tue, 19 Sep 2017 16:12:50 -0700, Bob Casanova <nos...@buzz.off>
wrote:

Based on his posts elsethread, he's trying to carry the good DrDr's
claim that extremely low improbabilities are evidence for ID, which
is, of course, just another variation of an IDiot PRATT. Your point
elsethread, that the probabilities don't apply biological Evolution,
is an apt response.

[Steady Eddie]

Okay, this seems to be your topic sentence:

"If evolution works by random assembly of multiple, specific amino acid chains, it can never happen. Period."

So how do you think evolution works to create machines like a flagellum?

[jillery]

Why is it that you never explain how your presumptive God created
machines like a flagellum?

[Ernest Major]

On 20/09/2017 04:50, Steady Eddie wrote:
> Okay, this seems to be your topic sentence:
>
> "If evolution works by random assembly of multiple, specific amino acid chains, it can never happen. Period."
>
> So how do you think evolution works to create machines like a flagellum?

People will tell you that if you want to refute a theory you have to
understand it first. (Perhaps not quite true; if you trust the proponent
about the predictions of a theory you can refute it by showing that a
prediction is contradicted by observation.)

So, if you don't know how people think organelles like flagellae
originated, you can't investigate mathematically whether the origin is
plausible. That you went ahead and investigated a silly model makes it
look like you're mocking religion, not seriously attempting a refutation
of whatever you thought you were attempting a refutation of.

You should have asked how people think that evolution works to create
organelles like flagellae before attempting a calculation, not after.

--
alias Ernest Major

[Bill Rogers]

If you really wanted to know that, you wouldn't need to ask me. But for anyone who might be interested, here is a relatively recent (2007) review of the evolution of flagella

http://www.pnas.org/content/104/17/7116.full.pdf+html,

[aug....@gmail.com]

Congratulations on calculating the number of hours in 3.5 billion years! Well done. Of course, you think you've calculated something to do with the replication rate of cells but you've done no such thing. Here's a free hint for you, Ed: if you include the units in your calculations, you stand a better chance of figuring out exactly what you've calculated.

The remainder of your calculations are sheer nonsense so let's just stop here.

[jillery]

Of course, Steadly did ask for your opinion, and he was unlikely to
get that without asking you for it.

Given the article's age, I suspect that cdesign proponentists have
already responded to it. I suspect at least one of them credited ID
for inspiring scientists to do the work, while at least one other
claimed the article makes a bunch of unproved just-so assumptions and
inferences, ex. that the core proteins are from a series of
duplications, aka exaptation of the gaps.

[Bob Casanova]

On Tue, 19 Sep 2017 21:16:58 -0400, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by jillery <69jp...@gmail.com>:

That was also my take. It's not like that particular bogus
claim has never been made here, but maybe he thinks it's
fresh and new.

> Your point
>elsethread, that the probabilities don't apply biological Evolution,
>is an apt response.

Thanks. I wanted him to respond, but it seems unlikely he
will since he can't refute what I wrote, it's unlikely he
had some other "point" in mind, and he never acknowledges
error.

[Bob Casanova]

On Tue, 19 Sep 2017 20:50:49 -0700 (PDT), the following

appeared in talk.origins, posted by Steady Eddie
<1914o...@gmail.com>:

>On Tuesday, 19 September 2017 12:20:05 UTC-6, Bill Rogers wrote:

<snip>

>> You don't need a mathematicians help. It's blindingly obvious that if what is required for evolution is the random assembly of amino acids into the 30 chains that make up the flagellum, never mind all the other essential proteins, that a number of trials far greater than the number of elementary particles in the universe times the number of seconds since the Big Bang. If evolution works by random assembly of multiple, specific amino acid chains, ti can never happen. Period. You don't need help with the arithmetic - the numbers are vastly bigger than you need them to be to rule out evolution by the random assembly of specific sequences.

>Okay, this seems to be your topic sentence:
>
>"If evolution works by random assembly of multiple, specific amino acid chains, it can never happen. Period."
>
>So how do you think evolution works to create machines like a flagellum?

Basically, it reduces to:

1) If a random change is deleterious it will generally be
eliminated by selection.

2) If a random change is beneficial it will generally be
preserved by selection.

3) If a random change is neutral it will not be acted on by
selection and will either be preserved or eliminated by
chance, *unless* environmental change makes it either
deleterious or beneficial, in which case 1) or 2) applies

As both you and the Good DrDr seem to have forgotten,
selection is the opposite of random.

[Steady Eddie]

Thanks. Note his disclaimer:
"Although several scenarios have been posited to explain how this organelle might have been originated (13), the actual series of evolutionary events that have given rise to the flagellum, as might be inferred from the relationships of all genes that contribute to the formation and expression of this organelle across taxa, has never been accomplished."

Any cites to people that DO know how the flagellum originated?

[jillery]

Thank you Steadly for proving me right again, that you parrot your
fellow IDiots.

[erik simpson]

You know about Google, don't you? Ever heard of Wikipedia? I though not.
Anyway you could always start here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_flagella

It actually turns out this has been a subject of great interest and there are
LOTS of studies. You probably won't read any of them, and you'll probably
assert that nobody knows.

[Bill Rogers]

No. Well, unless you count creationist sites that say that God just created it that way.

I'll go with an incomplete but progressively improving account backed by evidence over an unfalsifiable claim that God just made it that way any day.

[Steady Eddie]

And it's your privilege to follow whatever faith you choose.

[jillery]

On Thu, 21 Sep 2017 04:11:49 -0700 (PDT), Steady Eddie
<1914o...@gmail.com> wrote:

>And it's your privilege to follow whatever faith you choose.

To claim science is a religion is just another IDiot PRATT. You can
baldly assert it's true as often as you want, but that doesn't make it
so.

[Steady Eddie]

And how is your 'inference' from the relationship of genes falsifiable?
Oh, that's right - by working through the necessary steps and doing the math.
That's the same way that you could falsify the need for an intelligent designer, also.

If you claim that any particular molecular machine arose by natural causes, you have to show HOW these natural causes did it. That "has never been accomplished", even for the most-studied organelle in biology.

Let's take a closer look at Liu and Ochman's paper that you cited above. The abstract says:

"Based on the phylogenetic occurrence and histories of each of these proteins, we could distinguish an ancient core set of 24 structural genes that WERE PRESENT in the COMMON ANCESTOR to all Bacteria. Within a genome, many of these core genes show sequence similarity only to other flagellar core genes, indicating that they were DERIVED FROM ONE ANOTHER, and the relationships among these genes suggest THE PROBABLE ORDER in which the structural components of the bacterial flagellum arose. These results show that CORE COMPONENTS of the bacterial flagellum originated through the successive duplication and modification of a few, or perhaps even a SINGLE, PRECURSOR GENE."

This shows the foundational assumption that Darwinist biologists require to be true: SIMILARITY MEANS COMMON ANCESTRY. As you know, they even coined a word for it - HOMOLOGY. Darwinists think that, if they can just show enough SIMILARITIES between extant structures found in life, they can conclude that they all arose without an intelligent agent.
It's time for Darwinists to test this assumption.

One place to start would be with the 24 structural flagellar genes that were assumed to be present in the assumed common ancestor. The authors claim that the sequence similarity between these genes indicates that they were DERIVED FROM ONE ANOTHER.
Hmm, that's funny - so were they derived from ONE ANOTHER, or from a COMMON ANCESTOR?

I think the paper shows that they really meant they were derived from a COMMON ANCESTOR, which contained 24 structural genes that produced the components of a working flagellum.

Was this COMMON ANCESTOR an actual functional flagellum?

Perhaps molecular phylogeny can actually be put to good use here:
Can the genetic sequence of the ORIGINAL flagellum be deduced, or is this just another UNFALSIFIABLE statement?

[Bill Rogers]

The thing is, compatible nested hierarchies derived from multiple different genetic and morphological features *could* certainly be produced by an unspecified, omnipotent supernatural agent. As could absolutely anything else. If you won't accept such hierarchies as evidence of common descent because you find a supernatural agent who wanted to create nested hierarchies more plausible, then there's really nothing more to say. I certainly cannot refute you, anymore than I can refute a "Last Thursday"-ist. Common descent, on the other hand, could easily be refuted if different genetic and morphological characters produced wildly different taxonomic trees. They don't, though. There are inconsistencies at the margins, but massive agreement overall. If you cared to understand the theory you are trying to overturn, you'd already know that.

[Steady Eddie]

Why not act scientifically and try to confirm your theory?
So far, all you've got is your opinion that the differences between the taxonomic trees that were predicted (or, predictable under your theory) and the relationships that we find are not "wildly" different, and the inconsistencies can be safely called 'marginal'.
The facts that you implicitly admit are: the reality is DIFFERENT than predicted (though you protest "not wildly"), and there are INCONSISTENCIES in your taxonomic 'trees' (though you protest "marginal").

You don't want me to get into this any deeper - even exploring these problems can arguably put the lie to your assumption in itself - and I won't at this point because it is not the topic under discussion.

So let's set this 'SIMILARITY PROOF' of yours aside for the moment, and get back to the discussion at hand:

There are evidently 24 structural genes that appear in all extant flagella.
So what were the 24 proteins that went into the structure of the assumed common ancestor?
Surely molecular phylogenies can get a pretty accurate result?
Or, do you prefer to leave that unfalsifiable?

[Peter Nyikos]

Before I address what goes on below, Eddie, I have some timely
news for you: Bob Casanova, who accused you of "running away again" on
another thread you began,

Evolutionary Theorist Concedes: Evolution "Largely Avoids" Biggest Questions of Biological Origins

...and posted comments about you belittling you to the max,
has now beat an ignominious retreat out of that thread, after having
posted some amazingly incompetent statements about biology
and biologists.

He didn't dare wait around to see whether I could demolish his
pompous claims, and slammed the door behind him with a sarcastic
"HAND."

But just because someone buries his head in the sand, that
doesn't stop me from letting the general readership know what
he is burying his head about. I did that in the following post,
done less than 5 hours ago:


https://groups.google.com/d/msg/talk.origins/JgQMZh9T0l0/drawy8DFAwAJ
Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2017 11:56:57 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <2685ab3c-ed65-443f...@googlegroups.com>

It's a long one, but the following bit should give you some
idea of how badly Bob screwed up:

______________________excerpts_____________________

[Bob:]

> >> but the usual issues,
> >> flagella, length of time available, no "hopeful monsters"
> >> (aka one-generation new species) have all been answered.

[Peter:]
> >"answered" with completely inadequate arguments in each case,
> >except "hopeful monsters," but the difference between Prum's
> >Stage II and Stage IV for feathers is deep in the "hopeful
> >monster" category.

[Bob:]
> Again, I disagree. And since you and I have exactly the same
> qualifications as biologists (zero), my opinion is just as
> valid as yours.


[Peter:]
Do you realize what you are saying?


You are saying that biologists have ZERO qualifications for
telling whether the jump from tufts of hairlike fibers to
pennaceous feathers is in the "hopeful monster" category?

Do you even know what a pennaceous feather is? It is a Prum Stage IV
feather complete with calamus, rachis, barbs, barbules and hooks.

Do those last [six] words, minus "and", mean anything to you?


> Below, when this applies I will save time
> and just post (*).

I don't think you know what you are saying.

Do you also think the jump from a gliding mammal without elongated
digits to a fully winged bat might not be in the "hopeful monster"
category? That biologists have ZERO qualifications for judging
whether it is or not?

If so, then you have even LESS reason to praise scientists in
talk.origins than I do, because you think they are far more
incompetent that they really are.
======================== end of excerpt ===================

The irony is, Bob had been trying to make it seem like science
has already progressed to where it *might* be in the year 2500
if it keeps progressing at the rate it has been.

And now, on to what you've been up to here.

On Friday, September 22, 2017 at 5:00:06 PM UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:
> On Thursday, 21 September 2017 04:50:05 UTC-6, Bill Rogers wrote:
> > On Wednesday, September 20, 2017 at 10:50:02 PM UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > On Wednesday, 20 September 2017 05:00:05 UTC-6, Bill Rogers wrote:
> > > > On Tuesday, September 19, 2017 at 11:55:02 PM UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > On Tuesday, 19 September 2017 12:20:05 UTC-6, Bill Rogers wrote:
> > > > > > On Tuesday, September 19, 2017 at 1:40:05 PM UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > > > On Tuesday, 19 September 2017 01:25:03 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > > > > On Monday, 18 September 2017 18:10:02 UTC-6, August Rode wrote:
> > > > > > > > > On 2017-09-18 17:58, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > > > > > > On Monday, 18 September 2017 15:10:05 UTC-6, aug....@gmail.com wrote:
> > > > > > > > > >> On Monday, 18 September 2017 16:45:05 UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > > > > > >>> On Monday, 18 September 2017 14:05:05 UTC-6, Bill Rogers wrote:
> > > > > > > > > >>>> On Monday, September 18, 2017 at 3:30:04 PM UTC-4, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> On Monday, 18 September 2017 13:05:05 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>> On Sunday, 17 September 2017 19:15:02 UTC-6, Steady Eddie wrote:

> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>> But, for me, a non-scientist, simplicity is the key. I need a scientist I can trust, and who 'gets' what Darwinism is all about, to give me the numbers that I need to make my calculations relevant.

Bob Casanova does NOT get what Darwinism (what he calls the ToE)
is all about. He ignorantly thinks it refers to the overwhelmingly
supported hypothesis that all life has evolved from primitive
microorganisms. He doesn't know that it has to do with trying
to EXPLAIN how all this could have happened in a mere 600 million
years since the fossil record suggests they started.

In fact, I think you can divide all the non-creationists here
besides myself into three camps: those who think as Bob does,
those who think the ToE only needs to account for the change
in genetic information within individual populations, and those
who haven't made their views clear about the second group's
position.

> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>> For example, let's take the, shall we say, 'well-studied' e. coli flagellum, and see what we end up with.
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>> Sound like a plan?
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>> Okay, so the median protein length in e. coli is 277. Let's take 200 as a rough length of a protein for this calculation, shall we?
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>> http://book.bionumbers.org/how-big-is-the-average-protein/
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> And the e. coli flagellum is comprised of about 30 proteins, correct?
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK6250/
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> Now, how many possible different amino acid chains can be made randomly from 200 positions?
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> Well, proteins are made from 20 amino acids.
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> So, how does the math go? 20 exp 200 possible different amino acid chains?
> > > > > > > > > >>>>>
> > > > > > > > > >>>>> My calculator tells me 1.6e60. Does this mean 1.6 X 10^60? Help!
> > > > > > > > > >>>>

> > > > > > > > > >>>> The number is huge. If the bacterial flagellum were required to evolve by the random condensation of amino acids into those specific 20^200 amino acid chains, there's not enough time since the Big Bang for it to happen. Not even close.


Here is the Achilles' heel of your argument. We haven't the foggiest
idea which amino acid chains could substitute for the existing ones
and still give us a working flagellum.

But that ALSO underscores what I wrote about "might" and the year
2500 above. Most talk.origins participants are political animals
who would be nonplussed that I gave such a distant target date for a
truly mature biology.

I've snipped a lot, where you try to make hay of that astronomical
number.

> > > > > > > You would need in the order of 10^266 earth-like planets, each full of cells with the replication power of e. coli, replicating for 3.5 BILLION! years to get an even chance of producing ONE e. coli flagellum naturalistically.

You are talking about flagellae of the EXACT SAME composition
than the existing ones.

> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > No wonder the multiverse is so appealing to Atheists.
> > > > > > > LOL!

Unfortunately for the atheists, they have FAR more daunting
numbers to contend with than the one you gave, and they aren't
based on such shaky calculations. They have to do with the
fine tuning of the basic constants of physics.

But it's a stalemate between you and the atheists: you have no good
arguments against the existence of a multiverse, they don't
have any good ones against the existence of a creator of our
tiny, young [a mere 13-14 gigayears] universe.


<big skip of long sparring>

> > > > > So how do you think evolution works to create machines like a flagellum?
> > > >
> > > > If you really wanted to know that, you wouldn't need to ask me. But for anyone who might be interested, here is a relatively recent (2007) review of the evolution of flagella
> > > >
> > > > http://www.pnas.org/content/104/17/7116.full.pdf+html,

The abstract gives the usual chatter about homologs, which
Behe has skewered many times as having no relevance to the
plausibility of the "several scenarios" having taken place
in the mere 1 gigayears, tops, that it is supposed to have
occurred during.

> > > Thanks. Note his disclaimer:
> > > "Although several scenarios have been posited to explain how this organelle might have been originated (13),

Bill Rogers was wasting his and everyone else's time with
that PNAS article. He should have given us a link to (13)
so we could see whether those scenarios were crafted enough to
impress me, let alone Behe.

> the actual series of evolutionary events that have given rise to the flagellum, as might be inferred from the relationships of all genes that contribute to the formation and expression of this organelle across taxa, has never been accomplished."

How pretentious! had they said "AN actual series of evolutionary events
that COULD have given rise to the flagellum in the allotted time,"
they would be much closer to real candor.

> > >
> > > Any cites to people that DO know how the flagellum originated?
> >
> > No. Well, unless you count creationist sites that say that God just created it that way.
> >
> > I'll go with an incomplete but progressively improving account backed by evidence over an unfalsifiable claim that God just made it that way any day.

"incomplete" could be in the running for Understatement of the Month,
and "progressively improving" for the Overstatement of the Month,
had not Bob Casanova beaten both by a country mile three posts
prior to the one linked above.

> And how is your 'inference' from the relationship of genes falsifiable?
> Oh, that's right - by working through the necessary steps and doing the math.

As far as feathers are concerned (see excerpt above), Harshman
has confessed a complete inability to identify the genes OR the
evolutionary steps OR the selection pressures needed to move
from before Prum's hairlike stage to fully formed feathers.

And Harshman's specialty is ornithology!!!

> That's the same way that you could falsify the need for an intelligent designer, also.
>
> If you claim that any particular molecular machine arose by natural causes, you have to show HOW these natural causes did it. That "has never been accomplished", even for the most-studied organelle in biology.

Nor for feathers, nor for bat wings.

I've left the rest in. I have other self-important dragonflies
besides just Bob Casanova to slay, and it takes time to maneuver them
into the right corners. In fact, Bob helped the process along by
painting himself into one. Not everyone is so incompetent.

BE careful: if you paint yourself into a corner, you might become
one of them.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/

[Steady Eddie]

That's his Achilles' heel, not mine.
It only takes a moment of serious thought to realize that you can't just throw any "substitute" protein (i.e. structural component) into an existing machine.
Or, if you're supposing that there may have been a series of "substitute" working flagella, one of which somehow turned into the e. coli machine, you're back to figuring out how the "substitute" flagella changed into the extant one.

> But that ALSO underscores what I wrote about "might" and the year
> 2500 above. Most talk.origins participants are political animals
> who would be nonplussed that I gave such a distant target date for a
> truly mature biology.
>
> I've snipped a lot, where you try to make hay of that astronomical
> number.
>
> > > > > > > > You would need in the order of 10^266 earth-like planets, each full of cells with the replication power of e. coli, replicating for 3.5 BILLION! years to get an even chance of producing ONE e. coli flagellum naturalistically.
>
> You are talking about flagellae of the EXACT SAME composition
> than the existing ones.

Correct.
Biology's task is to account for the existence of EXISTING life forms, not imaginary past life forms.

> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > No wonder the multiverse is so appealing to Atheists.
> > > > > > > > LOL!
>
> Unfortunately for the atheists, they have FAR more daunting
> numbers to contend with than the one you gave, and they aren't
> based on such shaky calculations. They have to do with the
> fine tuning of the basic constants of physics.
>
> But it's a stalemate between you and the atheists: you have no good
> arguments against the existence of a multiverse, they don't
> have any good ones against the existence of a creator of our
> tiny, young [a mere 13-14 gigayears] universe.

Of course, I have good arguments against the existence of a multiverse.
For one, there is no evidence for them.

> <big skip of long sparring>
>
>
> > > > > > So how do you think evolution works to create machines like a flagellum?
> > > > >
> > > > > If you really wanted to know that, you wouldn't need to ask me. But for anyone who might be interested, here is a relatively recent (2007) review of the evolution of flagella
> > > > >
> > > > > http://www.pnas.org/content/104/17/7116.full.pdf+html,
>
> The abstract gives the usual chatter about homologs, which
> Behe has skewered many times as having no relevance to the
> plausibility of the "several scenarios" having taken place
> in the mere 1 gigayears, tops, that it is supposed to have
> occurred during.
>
> > > > Thanks. Note his disclaimer:
> > > > "Although several scenarios have been posited to explain how this organelle might have been originated (13),
>
> Bill Rogers was wasting his and everyone else's time with
> that PNAS article. He should have given us a link to (13)
> so we could see whether those scenarios were crafted enough to
> impress me, let alone Behe.

What, the Matzke paper?
LOL!
It is just as factually impoverished as this one.

> > the actual series of evolutionary events that have given rise to the flagellum, as might be inferred from the relationships of all genes that contribute to the formation and expression of this organelle across taxa, has never been accomplished."
>
> How pretentious! had they said "AN actual series of evolutionary events
> that COULD have given rise to the flagellum in the allotted time,"
> they would be much closer to real candor.

Either-or.

> > > >
> > > > Any cites to people that DO know how the flagellum originated?
> > >
> > > No. Well, unless you count creationist sites that say that God just created it that way.
> > >
> > > I'll go with an incomplete but progressively improving account backed by evidence over an unfalsifiable claim that God just made it that way any day.
>
> "incomplete" could be in the running for Understatement of the Month,
> and "progressively improving" for the Overstatement of the Month,
> had not Bob Casanova beaten both by a country mile three posts
> prior to the one linked above.
>
>
> > And how is your 'inference' from the relationship of genes falsifiable?
> > Oh, that's right - by working through the necessary steps and doing the math.
>
> As far as feathers are concerned (see excerpt above), Harshman
> has confessed a complete inability to identify the genes OR the
> evolutionary steps OR the selection pressures needed to move
> from before Prum's hairlike stage to fully formed feathers.
>
> And Harshman's specialty is ornithology!!!
>
> > That's the same way that you could falsify the need for an intelligent designer, also.
> >
> > If you claim that any particular molecular machine arose by natural causes, you have to show HOW these natural causes did it. That "has never been accomplished", even for the most-studied organelle in biology.
>
> Nor for feathers, nor for bat wings.
>
> I've left the rest in. I have other self-important dragonflies
> besides just Bob Casanova to slay, and it takes time to maneuver them
> into the right corners. In fact, Bob helped the process along by
> painting himself into one. Not everyone is so incompetent.
>
> BE careful: if you paint yourself into a corner, you might become
> one of them.

Thanks, but I'm not afraid of painting myself into a corner.
The truth will show itself from ANY corner, with sufficiently close examination and consideration.

> Peter Nyikos
> Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
> University of South Carolina
> http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos/
>
> > Let's take a closer look at Liu and Ochman's paper that you cited above. The abstract says:
> >
> > "Based on the phylogenetic occurrence and histories of each of these proteins, we could distinguish an ancient core set of 24 structural genes that WERE PRESENT in the COMMON ANCESTOR to all Bacteria. Within a genome, many of these core genes show sequence similarity only to other flagellar core genes, indicating that they were DERIVED FROM ONE ANOTHER, and the relationships among these genes suggest THE PROBABLE ORDER in which the structural components of the bacterial flagellum arose. These results show that CORE COMPONENTS of the bacterial flagellum originated through the successive duplication and modification of a few, or perhaps even a SINGLE, PRECURSOR GENE."
> >
> > This shows the foundational assumption that Darwinist biologists require to be true: SIMILARITY MEANS COMMON ANCESTRY. As you know, they even coined a word for it - HOMOLOGY. Darwinists think that, if they can just show enough SIMILARITIES between extant structures found in life, they can conclude that they all arose without an intelligent agent.
> > It's time for Darwinists to test this assumption.
> >
> > One place to start would be with the 24 structural flagellar genes that were assumed to be present in the assumed common ancestor. The authors claim that the sequence similarity between these genes indicates that they were DERIVED FROM ONE ANOTHER.
> > Hmm, that's funny - so were they derived from ONE ANOTHER, or from a COMMON ANCESTOR?
> >
> > I think the paper shows that they really meant they were derived from a COMMON ANCESTOR, which contained 24 structural genes that produced the components of a working flagellum.
> >
> > Was this COMMON ANCESTOR an actual functional flagellum?
> >
> > Perhaps molecular phylogeny can actually be put to good use here:
> > Can the genetic sequence of the ORIGINAL flagellum be deduced, or is this just another UNFALSIFIABLE statement?

Peter, I admit I don't quite follow all of your arguments on T.O. and I'm not really interested in figuring you out.
You go ahead and work your angles and I'll work mine.
All the best to you.

[jillery]

On Fri, 22 Sep 2017 16:31:16 -0700 (PDT), Peter Nyikos
<nyi...@bellsouth.net> continued to ejaculate his repetitive
irrelevant spew from his puckered sphincter:

>Before I address what goes on below, Eddie, I have some timely
>news for you: Bob Casanova, who accused you of "running away again" on
>another thread you began,

Since you have decided to carry Steadly's water, try to keep him from
drowning himself. I have read domestic turkeys have that problem,
too.


<snip remaining repetitive irrelevant spew from your puckered
sphincter>

[Bob Casanova]

On Fri, 22 Sep 2017 16:31:16 -0700 (PDT), the following
appeared in talk.origins, posted by Peter Nyikos
<nyi...@bellsouth.net>:

>Before I address what goes on below, Eddie, I have some timely
>news for you: Bob Casanova, who accused you of "running away again" on
>another thread you began,

Why don't you just ask him for a date?

<snip the usual Peterisms>

[Bob Casanova]

On Wed, 20 Sep 2017 10:41:22 -0700, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by Bob Casanova <nos...@buzz.off>:

[Crickets...]

And now Peter can stick his oar in...

[Steady Eddie]

By all means, don't let me stop you.
Go ahead and demonstrate how a series of beneficial mutations created the e. coli flagellum.

[jillery]

By all means, demonstrate how your presumptive Designer created the
E.coli flagellum.

My impression is you spend a lot on repairing your glass house.

[Steady Eddie]

[crickets...]

[Bob Casanova]

On Sat, 23 Sep 2017 11:22:10 -0700 (PDT), the following

>By all means, don't let me stop you.
>Go ahead and demonstrate how a series of beneficial mutations created the e. coli flagellum.

I'm not a biologist, but how that happened has been
discussed here by those who are. But barring that, see steps
1-3 above, and try to understand what they mean and imply.

[Bob Casanova]

On Sun, 24 Sep 2017 07:28:27 -0700 (PDT), the following

>> By all means, don't let me stop you.
>> Go ahead and demonstrate how a series of beneficial mutations created the e. coli flagellum.
>
>[crickets...]

Not at all; some of us don't spend all our waking hours on
Usenet. You asked yesterday; I replied today. Get over
yourself.

[Steady Eddie]

Yes, how that "happened" has been discussed, and, if you've been paying attention, you would understand what has been uncovered.
Do you understand?
Can you state, simply and in your own words, what has been discovered regarding the origin of the e. coli flagellum?

Do YOU understand what steps 1-3 imply?
Let me help you:
If there is not an unbroken chain of numerous, successive, slight (i.e. probabilistically feasible) BENEFICIAL modifications that could result in the e. coli flagellum, then it couldn't have arisen by Darwinian mechanisms.
What part of that do you not understand? Darwin understood it perfectly well:

"If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ [or organelle] existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down."

[jillery]

You forgot to make explicit the implications of 1-3 and your statement
above. Let me help you:

1) you don't see "BENEFICIAL" in Darwin's statement. That's something
you added all by yourself. Each step doesn't have to be beneficial.
In fact, most are not, but neutral.

2) even detrimental changes are not usually eliminated immediately,
and sometimes not at all.

3) what is beneficial, neutral, or detrimental depends on the
environment at the time of selection. So what was neutral in the past
can become beneficial in the future.

4) not mentioned in this topic is your piggybacking on the good DrDr's
posts, where you assert the extreme improbability of specific proteins
coming together by random chance. This is a double strawman, that
biological evolution doesn't work by random change, and organs don't
have to start evolving with any specific protein.

None of your comments come even close to the level of showing that "it
couldn't have arisen by Darwinian mechanisms", your own explicit
standard. All you have done above is to show that you don't know what
you're talking about.

[Bob Casanova]

On Sun, 24 Sep 2017 23:51:05 -0400, the following appeared
in talk.origins, posted by jillery <69jp...@gmail.com>:

Thanks for covering this; I guess we can assume this answers
Eddie's complaints.

[Bob Casanova]

On Sun, 24 Sep 2017 13:51:17 -0700 (PDT), the following

Nope. See the part above which starts "I'm not a biologist"?
What do you suppose that might mean in this context" Why is
"in your own words" so important to you? Since it *has* been
covered by actual biologists, something you specifically
acknowledged, what do you think a layman could add which
would be of worth?

>Do YOU understand what steps 1-3 imply?

Yes.

>Let me help you:
>If there is not an unbroken chain of numerous, successive, slight (i.e. probabilistically feasible) BENEFICIAL modifications that could result in the e. coli flagellum, then it couldn't have arisen by Darwinian mechanisms.

So by this you think we must actually observe each of those
changes, and the fact that they are possible and even likely
is unimportant? IOW, you don't understand how science
works?

>What part of that do you not understand? Darwin understood it perfectly well:
>
>"If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ [or organelle] existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down."

Yep. And he was unable to find any, just as modern
biologists have been equally unable to find any. What part
of the combination of "possible under the known rules of
chemistry and biology" and "no observable alternative" do
*you* not understand?

[jillery]

On Mon, 25 Sep 2017 14:07:13 -0700, Bob Casanova <nos...@buzz.off>
wrote:

That makes sense to me only if you're being ironic.

I apologize if I jumped into a private conversation, but my impression
is, since Steadly doesn't listen to anybody, Steadly can't have too
many people correcting him.

[Bill Rogers]

Remember how this thread started. The aim was to show that by multiplying lots of numbers together, 20^N where N is several thousand, that you could show that evolution was impossible. I, and others, pointed out that such a calculation is completely unnecessary to show that the random condensation of amino acids into several hundred or thousand specific sequences is fantastically unlikely. Every biologist would agree with you that if evolution worked by the random condensation of amino acids and nucleic acids into specific sequences, then it wouldn't work at all. But such a model has nothing whatsoever to do with any model of evolution that any biologist takes seriously.

Then you asked, "well, OK, if not by the random condensation of amino acids, how do you think the flagellum evolved?" I gave you a link to a paper with evidence that the 24 core proteins of the flagellum are all derived by gene duplication and diversification from a single ancestral protein.

You said (in short) "Not good enough. What were the specific mutations and the specific selection pressures that made it all happen."

Do you see what's happened? You set out to show that evolution was mathematically impossible and now you're reduced to complaining that we don't know all the steps in complete detail for the origin of the flagellum. You don't come close to showing that evolution is impossible. You don't come close to showing that there is some physical law that prevents the gradual selection of gene duplications and mutations to produce a flagellum. Your claim is simply that we don't know enough of the details.

And that's true. We don't know the evolutionary history of the flagellum to the level of detail that you say you'd need to be convinced. And moreover, science can never compete with the claim that "God revealed to me that he created it just exactly that way because that's how He wanted it." You cannot put up some provisional theory of the evolution of the flagellum up against "God made it that way" to ask which one better explains the evidence, because "God made it that way" explains any possible evidence perfectly.

So I think we agree on two things. First, evolution by the random condensation of amino acids into a collection of specific sequences is so vastly unlikely as to be mathematically impossible; no biologist thinks that's how it works, anyway. Second, biologist are unlikely ever to have an individual mutation by mutation, selection by selection account of any complex structure. If that's what it would take to convince you of the theory of evolution, you'll never be convinced, and we can go on to talking about the weather.

[Bob Casanova]

On Mon, 25 Sep 2017 18:50:38 -0400, the following appeared

Which I was; no one with any sense could think Eddie would
stop complaining no matter what was posted.

>I apologize if I jumped into a private conversation, but my impression
>is, since Steadly doesn't listen to anybody, Steadly can't have too
>many people correcting him.

No problem; the "thanks" was *not* intended to be ironic,
and Usenet is not email, even though I have occasionally
seen complaints about someone "butting into a private
discussion".

[Bob Casanova]

On Tue, 26 Sep 2017 04:12:56 -0700 (PDT), the following
appeared in talk.origins, posted by Bill Rogers
<broger...@gmail.com>:

Thank you. If you have no objection, since that was so
succinct and complete regarding the usual complaints seen
here and their refutation, I'd like to preserve it and paste
it into the occasional discussion. Full credit, of course.

[jillery]

On Tue, 26 Sep 2017 09:58:20 -0700, Bob Casanova <nos...@buzz.off>

There are times when the opinion of a particular person is relevant,
and also times when others toss in peanut shells. The point being,
Usenet is a like CB radio or Petticoat Junction's telephone; don't
expect privacy.

[Bill Rogers]

Feel free....

[Bob Casanova]

On Tue, 26 Sep 2017 13:48:15 -0400, the following appeared

Good points, and both points are relevant in their
appropriate contexts.

[Bob Casanova]

On Tue, 26 Sep 2017 12:43:59 -0700 (PDT), the following

Thanks.

[Steady Eddie]

Well, OK, if not by the random condensation of amino acids, how do you think the flagellum evolved?

> Then you asked, "well, OK, if not by the random condensation of amino acids, how do you think the flagellum evolved?" I gave you a link to a paper with evidence that the 24 core proteins of the flagellum are all derived by gene duplication and diversification from a single ancestral protein.

Let’s take a closer look at what the paper claims:

“Based on the phylogenetic occurrence and histories of each of these proteins, we could distinguish an [imaginary] ancient core set of 24 structural GENES that were present in the [presumed] common ancestor to all Bacteria. Within A GENOME [assumably meaning ‘within the genome of any given extant version of flagella’], many of these core GENES show SEQUENCE SIMILARITY ONLY TO OTHER FLAGELLAR CORE GENES, indicating that they were [LOL!] DERIVED FROM ONE ANOTHER, and the relationships among these genes suggest the probable order in which the structural components of the bacterial flagellum arose. These results show that CORE COMPONENTS of the bacterial flagellum originated through the successive duplication and modification of a few, or perhaps even a single, precursor GENE.”
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/17/7116.full.pdf

First, it says that there are 24 GENES that are more or less SIMILAR across all known flagella, that are only found in flagella.
Then, it somehow MIND-WARPS into ONE PROTEIN being the originator of ALL 24 EXISTING COMPONENTS OF THE E. COLI FLAGELLUM.
But that’s blind faith for you…

Do you KNOW that, or do you have FAITH in that?
If you do know that, how do you know?
Have you checked whether it’s even remotely possible for the 24 necessary genes for a flagellum to descend from one common ancestral protein?
I do my math; please do yours.

> You said (in short) "Not good enough. What were the specific mutations and the specific selection pressures that made it all happen."

Yes, that’s exactly what I said.
Only if you have a specific scenario can you evaluate the probabilities involved.

> Do you see what's happened? You set out to show that evolution was mathematically impossible and now you're reduced to complaining that we don't know all the steps in complete detail for the origin of the flagellum.

That’s right. And if you don’t know all the hypothetical steps, how can you even come close to mitigating the odds against the multiplicative rule of probabilties?

> You don't come close to showing that evolution is impossible. You don't come close to showing that there is some physical law that prevents the gradual selection of gene duplications and mutations to produce a flagellum. Your claim is simply that we don't know enough of the details.

I know. And without any details, you don’t come close to showing that Darwinian evolution is possible.

> And that's true. We don't know the evolutionary history of the flagellum to the level of detail that you say you'd need to be convinced. And moreover, science can never compete with the claim that "God revealed to me that he created it just exactly that way because that's how He wanted it."

“God revealed to me”? What’s that about?
Don’t you think that’s a little hypocritical, when you only parrot what your professors ‘revealed’ to you?

> You cannot put up some provisional theory of the evolution of the flagellum up against "God made it that way" to ask which one better explains the evidence, because "God made it that way" explains any possible evidence perfectly.

That’s right.
That’s why you have to come up with a better or equally valid explanation.
It’s called science, by the way…

> So I think we agree on two things. First, evolution by the random condensation of amino acids into a collection of specific sequences is so vastly unlikely as to be mathematically impossible; no biologist thinks that's how it works, anyway. Second, biologist are unlikely ever to have an individual mutation by mutation, selection by selection account of any complex structure. If that's what it would take to convince you of the theory of evolution, you'll never be convinced, and we can go on to talking about the weather.

The point isn’t whether I’d be convinced. It’s whether a reasonable would be convinced with the thin inferences that you tout as convincing evidence.

Are you a biologist?

[r3p...@gmail.com]

Eddie: How do new species come to exist in the wild?

Ray

[Steady Eddie]

How do you define a species?

[r3p...@gmail.com]

Sexually reproducing animals, like, for example, coyotes.

Ray

[Steady Eddie]

They're created by solemn declaration of the most high Darwinists.

[jillery]

"Random condensation of amino acids" has nothing to do with how the
flagellum evolved. Evolution isn't random. Write that backwards on
your forehead, to remind you whenever you look in the mirror.

>> Then you asked, "well, OK, if not by the random condensation of amino acids, how do you think the flagellum evolved?" I gave you a link to a paper with evidence that the 24 core proteins of the flagellum are all derived by gene duplication and diversification from a single ancestral protein.
>
>Let’s take a closer look at what the paper claims:
>
>“Based on the phylogenetic occurrence and histories of each of these proteins, we could distinguish an [imaginary] ancient core set of 24 structural GENES that were present in the [presumed] common ancestor to all Bacteria. Within A GENOME [assumably meaning ‘within the genome of any given extant version of flagella’], many of these core GENES show SEQUENCE SIMILARITY ONLY TO OTHER FLAGELLAR CORE GENES, indicating that they were [LOL!] DERIVED FROM ONE ANOTHER, and the relationships among these genes suggest the probable order in which the structural components of the bacterial flagellum arose. These results show that CORE COMPONENTS of the bacterial flagellum originated through the successive duplication and modification of a few, or perhaps even a single, precursor GENE.”
>http://www.pnas.org/content/104/17/7116.full.pdf
>
>First, it says that there are 24 GENES that are more or less SIMILAR across all known flagella, that are only found in flagella.
>Then, it somehow MIND-WARPS into ONE PROTEIN being the originator of ALL 24 EXISTING COMPONENTS OF THE E. COLI FLAGELLUM.
>But that’s blind faith for you…
>
>Do you KNOW that, or do you have FAITH in that?
>If you do know that, how do you know?
>Have you checked whether it’s even remotely possible for the 24 necessary genes for a flagellum to descend from one common ancestral protein?
>I do my math; please do yours.

The problem is your "math" is for the wrong subject. You could have
posted "E=mc^2" for all the relevance your "math" has to the origin
of bacterial flagellum.

>> You said (in short) "Not good enough. What were the specific mutations and the specific selection pressures that made it all happen."
>
>Yes, that’s exactly what I said.
>Only if you have a specific scenario can you evaluate the probabilities involved.

BZZT! If you specify something that you know has already happened,
then you know the probability of it happening is one. The bacterial
flagellum exists, it's amino acid sequence is known, its existence is
a certainty. You still conflate events which you know happened and
events which are hypothetical.

>> Do you see what's happened? You set out to show that evolution was mathematically impossible and now you're reduced to complaining that we don't know all the steps in complete detail for the origin of the flagellum.
>
>That’s right. And if you don’t know all the hypothetical steps, how can you even come close to mitigating the odds against the multiplicative rule of probabilties?

Since you asked, because the multiplicative rule of probabilities
doesn't apply to biological evolution. Try to keep up.

>> You don't come close to showing that evolution is impossible. You don't come close to showing that there is some physical law that prevents the gradual selection of gene duplications and mutations to produce a flagellum. Your claim is simply that we don't know enough of the details.
>
>I know. And without any details, you don’t come close to showing that Darwinian evolution is possible.

BZZT! To prove X impossible (that's *your* word), one has to account
for all possible cases of X every where and every when; a virtually
impossible task. OTOH to prove X possible, all one need do is
describe just *one* possibility which violates no physical laws.
That's why to demand someone prove something impossible is the
hallmark of stupid argumentation.

>> And that's true. We don't know the evolutionary history of the flagellum to the level of detail that you say you'd need to be convinced. And moreover, science can never compete with the claim that "God revealed to me that he created it just exactly that way because that's how He wanted it."
>
>“God revealed to me”? What’s that about?
>Don’t you think that’s a little hypocritical, when you only parrot what your professors ‘revealed’ to you?

False equivalence. The difference is his professors almost certainly
cited material, objective evidence. You have nothing to back up your
revelations but your bald assertions and religious spam.

>> You cannot put up some provisional theory of the evolution of the flagellum up against "God made it that way" to ask which one better explains the evidence, because "God made it that way" explains any possible evidence perfectly.
>
>That’s right.
>That’s why you have to come up with a better or equally valid explanation.
>It’s called science, by the way…

Right here would have been a good place for you to have explained how
"God made it that way" explains anything at all, nevermind all things
perfectly. Don't be insulted that I don't wait for you to do so.

>> So I think we agree on two things. First, evolution by the random condensation of amino acids into a collection of specific sequences is so vastly unlikely as to be mathematically impossible; no biologist thinks that's how it works, anyway. Second, biologist are unlikely ever to have an individual mutation by mutation, selection by selection account of any complex structure. If that's what it would take to convince you of the theory of evolution, you'll never be convinced, and we can go on to talking about the weather.
>
>The point isn’t whether I’d be convinced.

You're right about that. It's assumed you will never admit you're

convinced.


>It’s whether a reasonable would be convinced with the thin inferences that you tout as convincing evidence.
>
>Are you a biologist?

One more time, what kind of evidence would convince you? Your failure
to answer this question shows that your POV is utterly baseless.

[jillery]

On Thu, 28 Sep 2017 19:27:43 -0700 (PDT), r3p...@gmail.com wrote:

>On Thursday, September 28, 2017 at 5:20:02 PM UTC-7, Steady Eddie wrote:

>> How do you define a species?
>>
>
>Sexually reproducing animals, like, for example, coyotes.
>
>Ray

Oh my.

[r3p...@gmail.com]

Suddenly your replies are not making sense, why is that? I'm asking YOU the most basic on-topic question only to get an evasive and snarky comment when the chips are down. Eddie: How do new species appear in the wild? Here, I'll make it easier to answer, choose one: A) direct creation; B) Darwinian evolution working within the boundaries of created-kinds; or C) you don't know?

Ray

[Bill Rogers]

It is impossible to come up with a better explanation than "God wanted it that way." Whatever other explanation there is, there will always be things unknown, discrepancies that might be technical errors or might be important clues. But God explains every last jot and tittle of evidence perfectly. You can put two non-supernatural explanations side by side and ask which one better explains the data, but throw an omnipotent, inscrutable God into the mix and He'll beat them all every time.

>
> > So I think we agree on two things. First, evolution by the random condensation of amino acids into a collection of specific sequences is so vastly unlikely as to be mathematically impossible; no biologist thinks that's how it works, anyway. Second, biologist are unlikely ever to have an individual mutation by mutation, selection by selection account of any complex structure. If that's what it would take to convince you of the theory of evolution, you'll never be convinced, and we can go on to talking about the weather.
>
> The point isn’t whether I’d be convinced. It’s whether a reasonable would be convinced with the thin inferences that you tout as convincing evidence.

I certainly would not be convinced of the correctness of evolution if the only evidence for it were 24 protein sequences from the bacterial flagellum which share some sequence similarities. Nor should you be.

>
> Are you a biologist?

Yes, I'm a retired parasitologist. You can find my papers (mostly on leishmaniasis, and malaria, with a couple on cellular immunology) by searching Medline for "Rogers WO". But who cares? You already disagree with the conclusions of the overwhelming majority of professional biologists, so why would it matter to you whether I'm one or not?