Using "Math" or Probability Against Evolution is BS
One of my favorite magazines is Skeptical Inquirer. The May/June issue (was not on line when I wrote this) reviews believers' attempts to use probability theory against evolution. This attempt is good for a few laughs.
The main source of "mathematical" arguments against evolution is Willaim Dembski. He uses lots of meaningless equations and math symbols to cover his lack of understanding about evolution.
Anti evolutionists continue to claim evolution theory works like this. There were only random events. After enough random events the complex human hand developed as well as the human brain. Anti evolutionist then conclude this could not have happened because the probability and time required are out of reach.
To illustrate the difference between what anti evolutionists claim is evolution theory and what it actually says we can start by tossing 100 pennies on a table. The average from a few tosses will show 50 heads and 50 tales. Development of a human requires the same odds as a toss come up with 100 tails. Of course, if the coins were tossed for billions of years odds are it would never yield 100 tails. That is the case anti evolutionists make.
Evolution itself, however, does not yield a human in one coin toss. Instead, it is as if one took the 50 heads and tossed them again. This time there would be 25 tales. Twenty-five plus to make 75 tales. Do that again with the 25 heads and so on.
I'm not an expert in this but I think of it in this way. There was one living cell. The thinking is magnetic or static electricity might have resulted in some transformation from plants. That cell swam around and eventually there were fish. Then by random development some fish developed an ability to get oxygen from the air instead of just from water.
Some of the new fish found food on the beach beside the water and wiggled to get it. Randomly feet or some other locomotion developed and those who had it grew faster and stronger than those who did not.
The point is, the land animal did not face the improbable odds at the time there were only one-cell creatures. It all came about in steps, the odds of each step were much higher than anti evolutionists assign to the 100 coin tails.
When you encounter an anti evolutionist using probability theory to debunk evolution I suggest a little critical thinking.
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ReplyDeleteA good post. Except, you quote me and the source completely wrong. Evolution did not happen due completely random events. That's the point of the blog and the Skeptic mag. source. It is Bible thumpers who INCORRECTLY claim evolution scholars attribute evolution entirely to random events. They do not. Please read my blog again.
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Deletetsm--"Lamarckianism" meaning: When I put labels on types of arguments I am smarter than anyone in the room.
DeleteI tried to explain it in my blog but obviously I failed. Let me try again: There is some randomness, but it is not merely random because the odds change as development takes place. Thus, the time for development is reduced from what it would be if it were completely random as some Christians claim it to be. It has been done in controlled conditions. Let's say it took a billion years for one celled creatures to become fish. There were thousands of kinds of fish, each developed a certain way because they could eat and reproduce better than some other way. Out of these thousands, one developed the ability to breath air instead of oxygen from water (whales). There is lots of food right beside the water and the fish takes a few bites. A few fish have stronger fins and can move up the bank--they reproduce faster and later have feet. This development of feet did not take the billion years it took to develop fish. It was much shorter because the fish with feet did not have to start from one cell, and randomly select genes with feet. They were already a billion years along so the next step was not completely random, the odds of developing feet had changed from the time of one cell. The Christian BS clings to the idea the odds of one cell coming up with a creature with feet are too long to have been without a creator who gave them feet.
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete"ever thought about that." Only building full of books has been written about the first living cell. Of course no one knows for certain. We know there are electrical charges in nature, lightening for example. It can alter many things--some thing that may have started the changes that brought on a living cell.
Delete"maybe what Skeptic (magazine) meant was when you get a more advanced point in the evolutionary trail you have a greater change of making the next jump,"
Correct. That's what I was trying to explain. Scientists have been plotting evolution in real time for decades. When weather, food, etc changes the versions of animals that can best deal with the new circumstances survive and others do not. My friend at NDSU, Jerry Faust, studies butterflies. As you travel around the whole butterflies are different but their dna comes from the same butterflies. As the climate is changing they change from one kind to another. It would take thousands or millions of years for butterflies if we started from fish or whatever. It doesn't take long with the millions of years already behind them.
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ReplyDeletetsm -- I'm glad you find those names interesting. I do not. More powerful are experiments and/or actual observations of evolution. These open the door to what might have or probably did happen to bring us into existence.
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Deletetsm--We're mostly in agreement then. I agree to go from a fin to a foot will require some generations of random mutations to develop. I don't agree, nor do scientists, that it would take as many years as going from one cell to a walking fish. There are different levels of probability. I explained that with the one hundred coin toss (which was used in Skeptics Magazine). To get all tails throw 100 coins on the floor. Pick up the tails only and throw them again, pick up only the tails again. Eventually you are down to say 5 coins. To get 5 tails requires some randomness. But the number of tosses required will be a million less than it was for 100 coins. Christians who use "probabilities" to bash evolution use only the 100 coins.
ReplyDeletethis is off topic. but no matter, it won't be published anyway. but I remember when Jon complained about the anti-abortion whackos who protested at his residence. said that that was a bad thing to do. and I agreed. now that we have numerous instances of leftist whackos who have done the same thing (especially in MN). and are now being encouraged to demonstrate at the homes of US Supreme Court justices. leaves me wondering if Jon will, in the interests of honesty/consistency, condemn the actions of his leftist buddies. if he has, I haven't seen anything to that effect written on this blog. so how about it, Jon?
ReplyDeleteI was not aware protesters were at their houses. They should not protest there.
DeleteI would guess they have security as they should. I did not.
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ReplyDeleteSo many things happening with the anti abortion court that parallel prohibition. I've been writing about this for years. In prohibition politics had to exempt Catholics--they needed to toss down wine for religion. Exempt them. Now Muslims are gearing up to make a religious argument in favor of abortion. Coming: Muslims are exempt from the abortion prohibition. Prohibition was to address a grave evil, alcohol. It killed people, broke up families made people miss work. Get ride of it entirely and the world will be a better place. Then there was marijuana--really an evil weed. The "evil" label lasts a few years they we move on to another.
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