ID and the 2LoT

I keep hearing from cdesign proponentsists that ID is not creationism. That ID is totally a scientific theory with predictions and everything that they’d love to show except the dog ate their lab notes the mean old bourgeois scientific establishment is suppressing the truth.

And then Bill Dembski posts this:

The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics has never been a friend of materialistic evolution. Granville Sewell’s arguments concerning it at the following two links are worth pondering:

Link 1: from the book IN THE BEGINNING

Link 2: video presentation “A Mathematician’s View of Evolution”

You can read the preface (PDF) of the Disco Tute’s latest emesis, in which Granville Sewell writes:

The origin and development of life seem to violate the second law of thermodynamics in a clear and spectacular way; however, such arguments are routinely dismissed by saying that the second law does not apply to open systems, such as the Earth. The author counters this idea with the tautology that “if an increase in order is extremely improbable when a system is closed, it is still extremely improbable when the system is open, unless something is entering which makes it not extremely improbable.”

Sewell either doesn’t understand the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, or he’s deliberately lying.

Perhaps the most layman-friendly version of the 2LoT is

Heat generally cannot flow spontaneously from a material at lower temperature to a material at higher temperature.

Right now, I’m sipping a drink with ice cubes in it. How did those ice cubes form? I started out with water at room temperature (say, about 20°C). My freezer then “sucked” the heat out of the water, bringing it to 15°C, then 10°C, then finally 0°C when it froze. And where did that heat go? Into the room.

You can test this for yourself: go stand by the back of a fridge, or an air conditioner, and you’ll feel that the air coming out is slightly warmer than the ambient air.

In other words, what my freezer does is move heat from a material at lower temperature (the water) to a material at higher temperature (the air in the room).

But note that the 2LoT says “spontaneously”. That’s a key word. The only reason my freezer works is that it’s getting electrical energy from the wall socket. If you put water into a freezer that hasn’t been plugged in, it’s never going to spontaneously freeze, any more than water will spontaneously go uphill.

But it’s possible to pull heat out of a colder object and into a warmer one using a freezer, just as it’s possible to move water uphill using a pump. But both of these come at a cost: you have to keep adding energy into the system. If you pyt a small amount of energy into your pump, you can move a small amount of water uphill; if you want to move a lot of water uphill, you need to put more energy into the pump. Ditto with freezers. It’s possible to freeze Lake Michigan in a week, but not with a common household freezer.

Sewell’s rebuttal to people who actually know what the fuck they’re talking about is:

if an increase in order is extremely improbable when a system is closed, it is still extremely improbable when the system is open, unless something is entering which makes it not extremely improbable.

That “something [which] is entering” is sunlight. If I put my freezer inside a capsule (insulated against heat loss) at 20°C, then shoot the capsule into space, and put water in the ice tray in the freezer, it’ll never turn into ice.

But if I then hook the freezer up to a solar panel, and point the panel at the sun, then yes, the freezer will cool the water and heat up the rest of the capsule. But then the capsule is no longer a closed system, since energy from sunlight is entering it. And thus, something that’s very very improbable (read: impossible) in a closed system becomes possible in an open system.

In fact, that’s what photosynthesis is: plants take energy from sunlight, and use it to force CO2 and water molecules together against their wish, to make sugar molecules. The sugars can then be broken up to release energy where it’s needed. It’s like using a solar panel to charge batteries that can then be used wherever they’re needed.

I’ll leave you with Sewell’s conclusion, a dumb-bomb of such potent moronicity that it ought to be banned by international arms treaties:

The conclusion: “If we found evidence that DNA, auto parts, computer chips, and books entered through the Earth’s atmosphere at some time in the past, then perhaps the appearance of humans, cars, computers, and encyclopedias on a previously barren planet could be explained without postulating a violation of the second law here. But if all we see entering is radiation and meteorite fragments, it seems clear that what is entering through the boundary cannot explain the increase in order observed here.”

I Get Email

I don’t I Get Email as often as PZ does, but I figured I’d share this one, sent in by someone going by “Your Name”. I’m not entirely sure what he’s on about, but I think it’s this, which I wrote in a moment of being tired of being calm and reasonable all the time.

Ok, I stumbled your page basically tearing down creationists and their
lack of “facts” or “proof” and it seems that your logical scientific
mind cannot comprehend that:

A: The entire premise of religion, philosophically, is based upon faith.

Nice way to concede right out of the gate. Faith is not a reliable way of figuring out what’s true or false. Rather, it’s an excuse people use to believe something they already want to believe.

To believe in something that cannot be proven by human logic or with
fancy math problems. To ask a person to prove that god exists clearly
shows you have absolutely no clue what religion is, what it means, and
its connection to what makes us human. We’re soooooo smart. We know it
all, yet, the leading scientists in the world cannot explain even the
most basic aspects of human emotions and behavior. Can you prove that
electricity can charge carbon particles that, by some miracle,
“transform” into complex proteins to “magically” evolve into life?
Although Darwin titles his most popular work “the origin of species”,
Darwin’s evolution is NOT the origin of species. It is a theory and the
only parts of it that have any validity are that species (that are
already here) adapt to their environment through natural selection.

And that’s why he titled his book The Origin of Species and not The Origin of Life.

You
let me know when you, or anyone for that matter, electrically charges
carbon to create complex proteins necessary for life to evolve. Please.
Let me know.

Nice collection of strawmen you’ve built yourself there.

B: Creationism has a legitimate right to be taught in schools

In the same way as phlogiston and the ether have a legitimate place in physics class: examining failed hypotheses can be useful in learning how not to make the same mistakes in the future.

Okay, now it’s getting late, and I don’t have the energy for a point-by-point fisking. See the Index of Creationist Claims for more rebuttals.

and to
exist as a theory on the origin of species, seeing as how there is no
solid, universally accepted theory that has been proven as FACT. How can
we learn if never exposed to differing ideas? Isn’t that the point of
education, especially in terms of philosophical perspectives on the
origin of life? I thought all you smartie smarties were all about
exposing others minds to different ideas and perspectives to give them a
true broad sense of whatever it may be that is being discussed so they
come to an educated conclusion? Hmmm. Seems like that attitude has gone
out the window as of late. God forbid someone have a different opinion
(yes OPINION) than you.

I am by no means trying to contradict your opinions and do not wish to
impose any specific ideology on you, rather I suggest you scale back the
vitriol towards others who may not agree with you or have a different
perspective of life. Elitists are constantly insulting us “simple” folk
who accept the fact that we are merely tiny insignificant humans in a
great big universe (many of them depending on what kind of science you
choose to read about.) that we possibly cannot understand. Some would
have us believe humans are DEFINITELY the most advanced and most
knowledgeable creatures in existence. Surely, we know everything there
is to know. Please note the sarcasm.

I started out atheist. I do not go to church. Never have and never will,
but I will tell you what changed my mind in terms of believing in
something that greater than myself, or my species for that matter, that
cannot be proven with science. Its when I started reading about
theoretical physics and the quantum theory and the likes. The fish in a
fishbowl analogy, we’re fish in a fishbowl. We can see whats outside but
cant understand it as we only understand what is known to us in our
reality. Now, I’m no expert, nor am I a scientist, but I think those
theories alone should convince any hard headed atheist that there is
simply too much about our universe that is, and will always be, foreign
to us to the point where we will NEVER understand it. Which is why faith
is so necessary in relation to what makes us human. Einstein didn’t want
to disprove the existence of god, he wanted to know and understand the
way things were built by him. Honestly, I do not even really know what
“creationism” is other than teaching that there are theories life didn’t
“poof” out of the sky during a thunderstorm some odd billions of years
ago and I tend to agree with that because frankly, that’s bullshit. I
find the whack job “were all aliens from outer space” theories more
believable than that.

Do I read the bible? Yes. Do I take it literally? Hell no! People who do
need help. They are the ones that give halfway intelligent believers a
bad name, and are the cause for the “evils” in the world that are blamed
on religion and give your kind reason to speak so poorly of those who
believe. Tell a moron who truly believes in whatever god that god wants
him to kill said person and he will. No one can help that for thousands
of years religion has been misused to herd mindless idiots into groups
to do horrible things to our fellow men. Did Jesus come to earth and die
for our sins? Is he the “son” of god? Is there heaven, hell? Who knows
for sure, but I tend to gravitate towards Christianity as the purpose of
the messiah in Christianity is to move people away from ritualistic
nonsense of the old testament and come to an understanding that FAITH
and believing in something greaterthan ourselves is the true point to it
all. I always get a kick out of the fact that self proclaimed geniuses
who claim to have such a broad and open mind are, in fact, some of the
most narrow minded people on earth. Irony. Great, isn’t it?

I’m not the smartest guy on earth, but I’m far from stupid and have
always loved science and technology though unlike you, I have managed to
merge the faith of religion with the rigidity and logic of science.
Science cannot explain what makes us human, though I believe religion
can. I don’t think any specific religion is “right” or “wrong”. I don’t
say religion is “truth” like many of the mindless idiots out there as
that is contradictory to faith, but you are not insulting just those
types with your words. There are many like me, who can look at things
from the proper perspective, whom you insult as well. Which is why you
may want to tone it down. Not every person with faith is an idiot and
not every math whiz computer programmer guy, like yourself, is the all
knowing supreme master of all things life. Have a little humility. Just
please understand. Others may be wrong or illogical, but that doesn’t
make you right. You push a theory and claim it as truth. Sounds a little
like the religious folks you so despise.

Even if evolution were 100% fact. Where did space time come from? What
initiated the big bang? The origin of LIFE goes back much further than
Darwin’s theories predict or even earth itself and the funny thing is;
Well never know. So please stop insulting those who do not think like
you. No individual of faith will ever be able to win a fact based
logical argument because you cant argue the origins of life in that
manner. There are no supporting or contradictory facts on either side.
No one is “right” and no one is “wrong”. You cannot disprove the
existence of a god as I cannot prove it. It is an argument that cannot
be won by either side. Faith is not a competition or judgment of
intelligence. Maybe it is to you but then again, maybe your not as smart
as you think you are.

Ken Ham Is Not Ashamed, for Some Reason

Not too long ago, in a post entitled
I Am Not Ashamed,
Ken Ham, director of that epicenter of idiocy, Answers in Genesis,
criticizes Christians too wimpy to admit that they still believe in
fairy tales. He urges all True Christians™ to embrace their
inner crazy and proudly proclaim their gullibility to the world.

AIG will lead this charge by erecting billboards with the theme of
I Am Not Ashamed
Some examples include



If I might suggest a few others:

The Bible speaks for itself on pr0n:
There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.
Ezekiel 23:20

The Bible speaks for itself on revenge:
Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.
Psalm 137:9

The Bible speaks for itself on whether the Earth is round:
an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world
Matthew 4:8

The Bible speaks for itself on 401(k)s:
Take therefore no thought for the morrow
Matthew 6:34

You get the idea. I’m sure you can come up with your own suggestions.

There is one bright spot for Mr. Ham, though:

The Bible speaks for itself on intelligence:
 
 

A Scientific* Experiment

* Not scientific.


I normally don’t read Denyse O’Leary, because I like Canada too much to taint my mental image of it with her ignorant hackery. But for the past few days, she’s had a series of posts at Happy Dembski’s House of ID Circle-Jerk called about “Access Research Network’s top ten media-related intelligent design stories for 2009”.

But since it says “intelligent design stories” in the series title, I thought I’d conduct an experiment:

Hypothesis:

Half or more of the “intelligent design” stories are really just evolution-bashing.

Experimental procedure:

I will read the “Top Ten Media-Related Intelligent Design Stories for 2009”, as chosen by ARN and/or O’Leary. Or at least skim them until I get bored or distracted by shiny things. Or at least read the headline.

I will then evaluate whether they present evidence for ID, or merely constitute science-bashing, using the Behe-cross technique[1], and tally[2] my results.

Methodology:

This will be an open trial, unless the articles are so stupid that I poke my eye out, in which case the experiment will be blind. In case of extreme stupidity, it may even turn out to be double-blind.

Control:

If necessary, I will read Pharyngula, Hemant Mehta, Wonkette and the label of that bottle of Médoc I’ve been saving, until I regain my self-control.


[1] This experimental technique, which consists of dismissing evidence without reading it, has a long informal history, but it was formalized and made famous Michael Behe at the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial.

[2] Tally Tal”ly, adv. [See Tall, a.]
Stoutly; with spirit. [Obs.] –Beau. & Fl.
Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary (1913).

That is, I plan on having a glass of porter stout or other spirits while writing up the results.


Results:

Summary of ARN’s Top 10 Science News Stories:

Rank Title #Evo #ID
1 Texas Requires Critical Analysis of Evolution 5 0
2 Louisiana Implements Academic Freedom Act 4 0
3 Polls Show that Americans Overwhelmingly Support Academic Freedom in Evolution Education 7 0
4 The Darwin Bicentennial Bust 6 0
5 Discover Magazine Names Forrest Mims to Top 50 Brains in Science List 2 3
6 California Science Center Sued over Cancellation of Darwin’s Dilemma Film Showing 3 4
7 Michael Behe Expelled from Bloggingheads 1 1
8 Federal Court Dismisses Evolutionist Lawsuit in Texas 4 0
9 Ben Stein Expelled from the University of Vermont 2 1
10 Evolutionary Psychology Finally Comes Under Media Attack 2 0
Rank: the story’s rank in ARN’s list. Title: the story’s title. #Evo: the number of times the words “evolution” or “Darwin” are mentioned in ARN’s summary. #ID: the number of times the words “ID” or “intelligent design” are mentioned in ARN’s summary.

Several broad themes emerged, the most popular being “Teach the controversy!” (stories 1, 2, 3, and 6). It was followed closely by “Help! Help! We’re being repressed!” (stories 5, 7, and 9). Stories 4 and 10 represented the “Evolution is doomed! DOOOOOOMED!” category. Story 8 arguably falls into the “Fluff” category. Or perhaps the “It’s Okay When We Do It” category.

Conclusion:

Creationists are still a bunch of WATBs. Not a single piece of evidence for ID made their top 10 list. And since any such evidence, had it existed, would undoubtedly have made the top 10 list, it’s safe to conclude that there isn’t any.

Under hypothesis, above, I said I expected over half of the stories to fail to purport to provide any support for ID, but I’m surprised that they didn’t stick a single “Complexity complexity complexity” story in there.

ID ≠ YEC?

If you’ve been following the ID movement for any time, you know that the group they try to publicly distance themselves from the most, after Darwiniacs, are other creationists, especially young-earthers.

So you’ll understand my surprise when I saw this come in on the ID the Future podcast feed:

On this episode of ID the Future, Casey Luskin examines a new peer-reviewed paper that demolishes a very common and very fallacious objection to intelligent design. That objection? “Aren’t there vast eons of time for evolution?”

I haven’t listened to it, so it’s possible that the blurb is misleading (it wouldn’t be the first time a creationist wrote something misleading). But are they so starved for peer-reviewed papers that they’ll even take something that seems to support YECism?

Ray Comfort, Plagiarist?

Looks like Ray Comfort found it too hard to write a 50-page introduction to Origin on his own: Metropulse.com, a Knoxville, TN local paper, has a story about Stan Guffey, a University of Tennessee lecturer who wrote a brief bio of Charles Darwin. Turns out that bio bears a striking resemblance to the first few pages of Comfort’s introduction (you know, the part that isn’t batshit crazy).

(HT Unreasonable Faith and AIG Busted.)

I find it ironic that the approach investigators use to detect plagiarism are similar to that taken by biologists to find homologies, which are one of the bits of evidence pointing to common descent.

So maybe Ray can use creationist arguments in his defense: “You cherry-picked your examples to make your case. If you look at the other 47 pages of the introduction, you’ll see that it’s nothing like anything Dr. Guffey has written”, or “Similarities do not mean that I copied from Guffey. It’s more likely that both texts were written by God.” Or the ever-popular “Did anyone see copying take place? Then how do you know it happened?”

(Cross-posted at UMD Society of Inquiry.)

Kent Hovind’s Dissertation

I think I just came a little in my mouth. But then again, I’m a glutton for punishment.

Kent Hovind’s “doctoral dissertation” at Patriot “University” has been released on Wikileaks. Grab it while it’s hot!

Those who lack the patience to read the whole thing may wish to read Karen Bartelt’s analysis.

(HT PZ.)

ID at 25

ID the Future has a new episode entitled Intelligent Design Turns 25. I haven’t listened to it, but the title alone is cause for contemplation.

25 years of “Darwinism will be dead within 5 years”.

25 years since the phrase “scientific creationism” was deemed too obviously religious to pass legal muster, and therefore in need of a pair of Groucho glasses.

25 years without a single experiment, testable theory, or, indeed novel argument.

25 years of whining about how the mean old scientific establishment doesn’t take ID seriously.

22 years since the phrase “cdesign proponentsists” came into existence.

20 years of evolutionary theory somehow still lurching forward, zombie-like, propped up by academic tradition, Vested Interests(TM), and of course, its enormous predictive power and ever-plentiful practical applications.

How time flies.

Disco Tute Sues

Oh, lovely. The Disco ‘Tute is suing the California Science Center. Technically, the suit is about the California Science Center (I was going to say “CSC”, but that’d be confusing) not releasing certain documents that Disco asked for under FOIA. But what really chaps their hide is that scientists have a bias against bullshit pseudoscience:

“We believe the reason the California Science Center withheld these public documents is simple: the e-mails show evidence of discrimination against the pro-intelligent design viewpoint.”

Yeah, I bet those mean mainstream scientists also have a bias against dowsing, astrology, and Bigfoot sightings, too. Mean ol’ poopy heads! Why can’t they consider all opinions to be equally valid, regardless of evidence or lack thereof?

To quote David St. Hubbins of Spın̈al Tap,

I believe virtually everything I read, and I think that is what makes me more of a selective human than someone who doesn’t believe anything.

Is David Berlinski Redecorating His Home?

For those who don’t know, David Berlinski is one of the Disco Tute’s pet “scientists”. If you’ve seen the movie Expelled, he’s the one who spent his entire interview practically lying on his couch, spouting airy nonsense filled with sesquipedalian words.

The IDists love him because in addition to being an evolution denialist, he’s also a secular Jew (or so he claims), which means they can use him to prop up the idea that ID isn’t religious dogma.

He’s also appeared on the Intelligent Design the Future podcast six times in the past month, and there are thirteen posts about him at Evolution News and Views.

When an actor appears in a movie that’s far beneath them, say, if Morgan Freeman were to make a cameo in Zack and Miri Make A Straight-to-DVD Romantic Comedy, I tend to assume that said actor wants to pick up a few bucks on the side because they’re redecorating the living room.

Berlinski isn’t an actor (and I certainly don’t want to insult Morgan Freeman by comparing him to Berlinski), but he seems willing to say anything as long as the DI’s checks keep clearing. So it looks to me as though he’s trying to redecorate his living room either through speaking commissions, or through book sales. (His 2008 book is out in paperback, and he’s just published another one through Discovery Institute Press.

At any rate, I’ve listened to several of his interviews, and he doesn’t seem to have anything to say. So meh.