Posted on 05/08/2009 4:25:57 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
Using “Evolutionary Algorithms” by Intelligent Design
May 8, 2009 — Evolution can’t be all bad if scientists can use it to optimize your car. Science Daily said that scientists in Germany are “simulating evolution” to come up with ways to optimize difficult problems. Using “Evolutionary Algorithms”, they can discover solutions for engineering problems like water resource management and the design of brakes, airbags and air conditioning systems in automobiles. The simulated evolution program searches through a large number of random possibilities to make numerous successive slight improvements.
“The algorithms are called ‘evolutionary’ because the characteristics of evolution – mutation, recombination and selection – form the basis of their search for promising solutions,” the article claimed. Solutions that show promise are mutated and further selected.
Conferences on Evolutionary Algorithms are held each year and the interest in them is spreading into other disciplines. “The Evolutionary Algorithms are therefore a collective term for the various branches of research which have gradually developed: evolution strategies, evolutionary programming, genetic algorithms and genetic programming.”
Every once in awhile we need to give a refresher course about these reports, to show why the terminology is ludicrous. This has nothing to do with evolution and everything to do with intelligent design. Calling these“evolutionary algorithms” is like calling Eugenie Scott a creationist. Evolutionary Algorithm is an oxymoron – if it is evolutionary, it is not an algorithm, and if it is an algorithm, it is not evolutionary. Why? Because the essence of evolution, as Charles Darwin conceived it, has nothing to do with intelligent selection. Evolution is mindless, purposeless, and without a goal. These scientists, by contrast, have clear goals in mind. They are consciously and purposefully selecting the products of randomness to get better designs – intelligent designs. They may not know what the computer program will produce, but they sure well programmed the computer, and put in the criteria for success. Employing randomness in a program does nothing to make it evolutionary. The hallmark of intelligence is having a desired end and pulling it out of the soup of randomness. This is something evolution cannot do – unless one is a pantheist or animist, attributing the properties of a Universal Soul to nature. Undoubtedly, the NCSE would decry that. They can barely tolerate theistic evolutionists – the well-meaning but misguided Christians who try to put God in the role of the engineer who uses evolutionary algorithms for his purposes (e.g., man).
Remember – if it has purpose in it, it is not evolution. We must avoid equivocation. To discuss evolution with clarity it is essential to understand the terms and not mix metaphors. Charlie lept from artificial selection (intelligent design) to natural selection (materialism) only as a pedagogical aid. He did not intend for natural selection to have a mind like the goal-directed farmer or breeder uses. To think evolution, think mindless. Notice that itself is a one-way algorithm. You can think mindless, but the mindless cannot think.
For a definitive, in-depth treatment on why evolutionary algorithms cannot be mixed with evolution, see the book No Free Lunch in the Resource of the Week entry above.
[[This is listed under “Arguments we think creationist should not use”]]
There’s NO reason to avoid it- The second law PREVENTS evolution- if you care to find out how, lemme know- neither friction nor digestion nor any of those examples eve3n come close to representign hte problems evolution faces concernign hte law as you’;ll find out if you wish to continue this- I warned you that it makes the position that evolution could have escaped the law of entropy look silly, but if you wish to continue- lemme know
[[You seem to overlook the fact that the 2nd law of thermodynamics only applies to a closed system, which the earth is not.]]
LOL NO I didn’t overlook this, and as I mentioend in previous post, an open sysytem is even WORSE for evolution, and there is absolutely NO need for creationsits to avoid these arguments because the second law is devestating to Macroevolution when you KNOW what you’re talkign about- As I said Timothy Wallace sent that scientist whining and crying back to his own blog because he was made to look so foolish and obviously had NO answers to the questions which proved entropy was devestating to dynamic living systems DESPITE the silly examples of ‘positive’ ‘disorder’, which again- have absolutely nothign to do with the issue of Macroevolution.
Again- you’re hitchign your wagon to a distant star when the REAL WORLD evidence shows overwhelmingly that Evolution can NOT escape nor ‘turn entropy into a positive situation’ trillions of times- the odds are overhwelming AGAINST Macroevolution- bottom line= impossible
You should discuss this with your fellow creationist over at Creation Ministries International. They are the ones advising against using that argument.
If you noticed I copied and pasted the text directly from their site with a link.
BTW exactly how many peer-reviewed papers have you had published?
Oh no buddy. This requires proof. I want your evidence that I stated such. You badgered me for a while and I told you "I don't know and I don't care". I finally posted something because you made such a big issue about it with everyone else. I posted the reference at the time of Abel's death where Cain indicated more people in the world. I made no suggestion as to their genesis, I only posted the verse and asked if Cain was then referring to Adam and Eve as those who kill him their only remaining child(according to you--- to me, I don't know).
[[The second law of thermodynamics states for a closed system; in an open system entropy is not reduced.]]
Oh good golly- now you’re making up rules of science as you go? Do you really wish to push this issue? Because you wil lfind out open systems are WORSE for evolution- not better
You keep saying that without defending your position in any way.
I'm glad you agree that Scientific American doesn't know from peanuts.
The simple program, "reproduces", mutates the population, and selects(elitism) and uses this process to "step through" the solution space.(albeit in ways that make you unhappy)
I don’t need to discuss anything with htem- if they wish to avoid these discussions, that’s fine, but they need not do so
I suggest you and Puget give the following a good read before you decide you wish to discuss this further, and also note that many prominent scientists won’t even touch the issue, or try to make the case that evolution could have escaped the second law because they know AND admit how devestating hte law really is for Macroevolution— and do note the exchange between Wallace and Schneider (the links are on the right in the box- I’ll post an exerpt here- but you owe it to yourself to read the whoel article and hten the exchange between Wallace and Schneider before you decide you wish to tread where even scientists won’t go-
“The debate between proponents of evolutionism and creation scientists concerning thermodynamics seems likely to continue without end. This is not because the laws of thermodynamics (and their ramifications) are subject to debate or relativistic interpretation, but because a handful of dogmatic evolutionists continue to vocally and energetically deny the truth concerning a simple matter of scientific knowledge:
The second law presents an insurmountable problem to the concept of a natural, mechanistic process: (1) by which the physical universe could have formed spontaneously from nothing, and (2) by which biological life could have arisen and diversified (also spontaneously) from a non-living, inanimate world. (Both postulates form essential planks in the platform of evolutionary theory in general.)
While many highly qualified scientists who number themselves in the camp of evolutionism are candid enough to acknowledge this problem, the propagandists of evolution prefer to claim the only “problem” is that creationists “misunderstand” real thermodynamics.
Open vs. Closed Systems
The classic evolutionist argument used in defending the postulates of evolutionism against the second law goes along the lines that “the second law applies only to a closed system, and life as we know it exists and evolved in an open system.”
The basis of this claim is the fact that while the second law is inviolate in a closed system (i.e., a system in which neither energy nor matter enter nor leave the system), an apparent limited reversal in the direction required by the law can exist in an open system (i.e., a system to which new energy or matter may be added) because energy may be added to the system.
Now, the entire universe is generally considered by evolutionists to be a closed system, so the second law dictates that within the universe, entropy as a whole is increasing. In other words, things are tending to breaking down, becoming less organized, less complex, more random on a universal scale. This trend (as described by Asimov above) is a scientifically observed phenomenon—fact, not theory.
The evolutionist rationale is simply that life on earth is an “exception” because we live in an open system: “The sun provides more than enough energy to drive things.” This supply of available energy, we are assured, adequately satisfies any objection to evolution on the basis of the second law.
But simply adding energy to a system doesn’t automatically cause reduced entropy (i.e., increased organized complexity, or “build-up” rather than “break-down”). Raw solar energy alone does not decrease entropy—in fact, it increases entropy, speeding up the natural processes that cause break-down, disorder, and disorganization on earth (consider, for example, your car’s paint job, a wooden fence, or a decomposing animal carcass, both with and then without the addition of solar radiation).
Speaking of the general applicability of the second law to both closed and open systems in general, Harvard scientist Dr. John Ross (not a creationist) affirms:
“...there are no known violations of the second law of thermodynamics. Ordinarily the second law is stated for isolated [closed] systems, but the second law applies equally well to open systems ... there is somehow associated with the field of far-from equilibrium phenomena the notion that the second law of thermodynamics fails for such systems. It is important to make sure that this error does not perpetuate itself.”
[Dr. John Ross, Harvard scientist (evolutionist), Chemical and Engineering News, vol. 58, July 7, 1980, p. 40]
So, what is it that makes life possible within the earth’s biosphere, appearing to “violate” the second law of thermodynamics?
The apparent increase in organized complexity (i.e., decrease in entropy) found in biological systems requires two additional factors besides an open system and an available energy supply. These are:
a “program” (information) to direct the growth in organized complexity
a mechanism for storing and converting the incoming energy.
Each living organism’s DNA contains all the code (the “program” or “information”) needed to direct the process of building (or “organizing”) the organism up from seed or cell to a fully functional, mature specimen, complete with all the necessary instructions for maintaining and repairing each of its complex, organized, and integrated component systems. This process continues throughout the life of the organism, essentially building-up and maintaining the organism’s physical structure faster than natural processes (as governed by the second law) can break it down.
Living systems also have the second essential component—their own built-in mechanisms for effectively converting and storing the incoming energy. Plants use photosynthesis to convert the sun’s energy into usable, storable forms (e.g., proteins), while animals use metabolism to further convert and use the stored, usable, energy from the organisms which compose their diets.
So we see that living things seem to “violate” the second law because they have built-in programs (information) and energy conversion mechanisms that allow them to build up and maintain their physical structures “in spite of” the second law’s effects (which ultimately do prevail, as each organism eventually deteriorates and dies).
While this explains how living organisms may grow and thrive, thanks in part to the earth’s “open-system” biosphere, it does not offer any solution to the question of how life could spontaneously begin this process in the absence of the program directions and energy conversion mechanisms described above—nor how a simple living organism might produce the additional new program directions and alternative energy conversion mechanisms required in order for biological evolution to occur, producing the vast spectrum of biological variety and complexity observed by man.
In short, the “open system” argument fails to adequately justify evolutionist speculation in the face of the second law. Most highly respected evolutionist scientists (some of whom have been quoted above with care—and within context) acknowledge this fact, many even acknowledging the problem it causes the theory to which they subscribe.”
http://www.trueorigin.org/steiger.asp
After reading htrough those- lemme know if you want more- there’s plenty more- the case for Macroevolution defeating the second law is a doen deal- didn’t happen
==Even one of GGG’s favorite web sites “Creation Minstries International” is advising against using the Thermodynamics argument.
The argument CMI is advising creationists to avoid is the idea that the Second Law began at the Fall. If I understand CottShop correctly, he’s not making that argument. Rather, he’s pointing out that the Second Law makes Darwinian evolution impossible.
[[If I understand CottShop correctly, he’s not making that argument. Rather, he’s pointing out that the Second Law makes Darwinian evolution impossible.]]
That is correct- CMI was advising agaisnt arguing that the second law began after the fall, and yep- I’m aruing that the second law is our friend, and not somehtign Creationists need to avoid discussing as pointed out in the trueorigin’s links I provided, as it renders Macroevolution impossible despite htere being examples of negative entropy that don’t relate to to a hypothetical process of ever icnreasing complexity that literally woudl have taken trillions of isntances of violations to the law which governs every other living system known- (But apparently we’re to ignore the fact that the vast majority of everythign is subject to it? And that evolving life supposedly wasn’t trillions of times?)
No- Wallace exposes the myth very well that Macroevos like to parrot that supposedly Creationists ‘don’t understand the second law of thermodynamics’. As well I’ve links to several other sites showing quite a bit more concerning this issue
>>The argument CMI is advising creationists to avoid is the idea that the Second Law began at the Fall. If I understand CottShop correctly, he’s not making that argument. Rather, he’s pointing out that the Second Law makes Darwinian evolution impossible.<<
The 2nd law doesn’t apply to the earth because the earth is not an isolated system.
Not to mention the 2nd law only applies to total entropy, some areas can become more ordered while others become less ordered, even in a completely isolated system.
[[Not to mention the 2nd law only applies to total entropy, some areas can become more ordered while others become less ordered, even in a completely isolated system.]]
Lol- entropy isn’t about ‘order’ While a species can experience ‘order’, entropy still takes it’s toll while the ‘order’ is working it’s function.
As well your ‘isolated/non isolated’ system falls apart at hte seams (and the open systems is infact even worse than a closed/isolated system- contrary to popular Anti-Creation opinion, open systems do NOY nullify the effects of entropy, and infact increase the problem for Macroevolution. Pointing to moot irrelevent static examples of DECREASED Entropy, and asserting those examples thusly translate to living dynamic systems is a losing argument as seen in the links I provided- not sure why Anti-Creationists keep makign hte claim that open systems allowed trillions of violations in Dynamic living systems- but whatever- The evidence and real world facts do not match the claim
Open vs. Closed Systems
The classic evolutionist argument used in defending the postulates of evolutionism against the second law goes along the lines that “the second law applies only to a closed system, and life as we know it exists and evolved in an open system.”
The basis of this claim is the fact that while the second law is inviolate in a closed system (i.e., a system in which neither energy nor matter enter nor leave the system), an apparent limited reversal in the direction required by the law can exist in an open system (i.e., a system to which new energy or matter may be added) because energy may be added to the system.
Now, the entire universe is generally considered by evolutionists to be a closed system, so the second law dictates that within the universe, entropy as a whole is increasing. In other words, things are tending to breaking down, becoming less organized, less complex, more random on a universal scale. This trend (as described by Asimov above) is a scientifically observed phenomenon—fact, not theory.
The evolutionist rationale is simply that life on earth is an “exception” because we live in an open system: “The sun provides more than enough energy to drive things.” This supply of available energy, we are assured, adequately satisfies any objection to evolution on the basis of the second law.
But simply adding energy to a system doesn’t automatically cause reduced entropy (i.e., increased organized complexity, or “build-up” rather than “break-down”). Raw solar energy alone does not decrease entropy—in fact, it increases entropy, speeding up the natural processes that cause break-down, disorder, and disorganization on earth (consider, for example, your car’s paint job, a wooden fence, or a decomposing animal carcass, both with and then without the addition of solar radiation).
Speaking of the general applicability of the second law to both closed and open systems in general, Harvard scientist Dr. John Ross (not a creationist) affirms:
“...there are no known violations of the second law of thermodynamics. Ordinarily the second law is stated for isolated [closed] systems, but the second law applies equally well to open systems ... there is somehow associated with the field of far-from equilibrium phenomena the notion that the second law of thermodynamics fails for such systems. It is important to make sure that this error does not perpetuate itself.”
[Dr. John Ross, Harvard scientist (evolutionist), Chemical and Engineering News, vol. 58, July 7, 1980, p. 40]
So, what is it that makes life possible within the earth’s biosphere, appearing to “violate” the second law of thermodynamics?
The apparent increase in organized complexity (i.e., decrease in entropy) found in biological systems requires two additional factors besides an open system and an available energy supply. These are:
a “program” (information) to direct the growth in organized complexity
a mechanism for storing and converting the incoming energy.
Each living organism’s DNA contains all the code (the “program” or “information”) needed to direct the process of building (or “organizing”) the organism up from seed or cell to a fully functional, mature specimen, complete with all the necessary instructions for maintaining and repairing each of its complex, organized, and integrated component systems. This process continues throughout the life of the organism, essentially building-up and maintaining the organism’s physical structure faster than natural processes (as governed by the second law) can break it down.
Living systems also have the second essential component—their own built-in mechanisms for effectively converting and storing the incoming energy. Plants use photosynthesis to convert the sun’s energy into usable, storable forms (e.g., proteins), while animals use metabolism to further convert and use the stored, usable, energy from the organisms which compose their diets.
So we see that living things seem to “violate” the second law because they have built-in programs (information) and energy conversion mechanisms that allow them to build up and maintain their physical structures “in spite of” the second law’s effects (which ultimately do prevail, as each organism eventually deteriorates and dies).
While this explains how living organisms may grow and thrive, thanks in part to the earth’s “open-system” biosphere, it does not offer any solution to the question of how life could spontaneously begin this process in the absence of the program directions and energy conversion mechanisms described above—nor how a simple living organism might produce the additional new program directions and alternative energy conversion mechanisms required in order for biological evolution to occur, producing the vast spectrum of biological variety and complexity observed by man.
In short, the “open system” argument fails to adequately justify evolutionist speculation in the face of the second law. Most highly respected evolutionist scientists (some of whom have been quoted above with care—and within context) acknowledge this fact, many even acknowledging the problem it causes the theory to which they subscribe.”
http://www.trueorigin.org/steiger.asp
“The thermodynamicist immediately clarifies the latter question by pointing out that ... biological systems are open, and exchange both energy and matter. The explanation, however, is not completely satisfying, because it still leaves open the problem of how or why the ordering process has arisen (an apparent lowering of the entropy), and a number of scientists have wrestled with this issue. Bertalanffy (1968) called the relation between irreversible thermodynamics and information theory one of the most fundamental unsolved problems in biology.”
[C. J. Smith, Biosystems 1:259 (1975)]
“We have repeatedly emphasized the fundamental problems posed for the biologist by the fact of life’s complex organization. We have seen that organization requires work for its maintenance and that the universal quest for food is in part to provide the energy needed for this work. But the simple expenditure of energy is not sufficient to develop and maintain order. A bull in a china shop performs work but he neither creates nor maintains organization. The work needed is particular work; it must follow specifications; it requires information on how to proceed.”
[G.G. Simpson and W.S. Beck, Life: An Introduction to Biology, Harcourt, Brace, and World, New York, 1965, p. 465]
“Closely related to the apparent ‘paradox’ of ongoing uphill processes in nonliving systems is the apparent ‘paradox’ of spontaneous self-organization in nature. It is one thing for an internally organized, open system to foster uphill processes by tapping downhill ones, but how did the required internal organization come about in the first place? Indeed the so-called dissipative structures that produce uphill processes are highly organized (low entropy) molecular ensembles, especially when compared to the dispersed arrays fro which they assembled. Hence, the question of how they could originate by natural processes has proved a challenging one.”
[J.W. Patterson, Scientists Confront Creationism, L:R: Godfrey, Ed., W.W. Norton & Company, New York, 1983, p. 110]
Open vs. Closed Systems
The classic evolutionist argument used in defending the postulates of evolutionism against the second law goes along the lines that “the second law applies only to a closed system, and life as we know it exists and evolved in an open system.”
The basis of this claim is the fact that while the second law is inviolate in a closed system (i.e., a system in which neither energy nor matter enter nor leave the system), an apparent limited reversal in the direction required by the law can exist in an open system (i.e., a system to which new energy or matter may be added) because energy may be added to the system.
Now, the entire universe is generally considered by evolutionists to be a closed system, so the second law dictates that within the universe, entropy as a whole is increasing. In other words, things are tending to breaking down, becoming less organized, less complex, more random on a universal scale. This trend (as described by Asimov above) is a scientifically observed phenomenon—fact, not theory.
The Pythagorean Theorem has immense moral imperative! It describes the indisputable truth about the relationship in terms of ratio of the hypoteneuse of a right angled triangle to it's other sides. It would be a violation of our conscience to deny the truth of the Pythagorean Theorem. If you needed to calculate distance within a plane, given the length of two sides, you would never use anything else. It would be an absurd and meaningless sin!
Truth is the only moral imperative in the universe.
CottShop, GGG, your posts are Epic Science Fail. Lay readers will come away with less knowledge than if they didn’t read your posts. In summary, you simply don’t know what you are talking about.
*Substitutions---mine
[[CottShop, GGG, your posts are Epic Science Fail.]]
Per usual Doc- you offer NOTHING but ad hominem ‘content’ Per usual you offer nothign to refute ANYTHING. Those reading my posts will see how silly the arguments about living in an open system allows for macroevolution claims really are- I’d say that if you have evidnece refuting it, then present it, but really, I’m tired of your games and glaring generalizatiosn which do absolutely nothign but attack without substance- such ‘arguments’ are better suited to lesser sites that care nothign for science or evidence like TO or DC
*Substitutions-—mine
You do not address a specific claim.
You provide opinion and not a single shred of “evidence”.
Your first and only post is an arrogating statement representing a class to which you apparently do not belong(they vs we).
Therefore, I think your post is self-referential.
(Thanks Andrew- too tired to respond to his petty post)
Open vs. Closed Systems
The classic evolutionist argument used in defending the postulates of evolutionism against the second law goes along the lines that “the second law applies only to a closed system, and life as we know it exists and evolved in an open system.”
The basis of this claim is the fact that while the second law is inviolate in a closed system (i.e., a system in which neither energy nor matter enter nor leave the system), an apparent limited reversal in the direction required by the law can exist in an open system (i.e., a system to which new energy or matter may be added) because energy may be added to the system.
Now, the entire universe is generally considered by evolutionists to be a closed system, so the second law dictates that within the universe, entropy as a whole is increasing. In other words, things are tending to breaking down, becoming less organized, less complex, more random on a universal scale. This trend (as described by Asimov above) is a scientifically observed phenomenon—fact, not theory.
Let's repeat that last line- a line that Doc DENIES with a glib hand-wave and a smile- for everyone to see:
This trend (as described by Asimov above) is a scientifically observed phenomenon—fact, not theory.
It is a scientifically observed phenomenon- Not a theory- scientifically observed phenomenon- not simply a hypothesis based on nothing more substantive than an assumption- scientifically observed phenomenon, not some assumption based on dogmatic opinion formed to prop up a failing hypothesis.
Doc apparently doesn't want anyone to read up on established scientific phenomenon, and apparently doesn't want anyone learning the truth about the claims of Macroevolutionists, and the silly idea that an 'open system' allows for serious violations of the second law. It's just simply amazing the level of discourse that crops up everytime someone posts something a macroevolutionist doesn't like- Well done Doc- At least you're consistent, if nothign else
You are confusing abiogensis with evolution.
They are two different aspects of science. Evolution does not address the origin of life only how life has changed since its inception.
That is a common misperception
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