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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  09:26:19   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote
One can't falsify ID.


Correct. Because there is no 'theory of ID' to falsify...can we move on now? <:0)

Some ID supporters seem to think so but they are wrong. Sober never said that it could be falsified, so why do you keep bringing it up? Did you understand the paper?

Sober states the "theory of ID" in very general terms and also concludes that it is not scientific - meaning, in essence, that it is NOT a theory.

His paper makes perfect sense - if one understands it.


It makes no sense at all, and neither, unfortunately, are you at this point. Once again......there is NO SUCH THING as a theory of ID. If you think there is, please state it for me.

Once you think you have found the theory of ID, only then will it make any sense to see if it can be falsified.
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  10:16:15   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote


The problem is that you're attributing value to one particular outcome (life as we know it) without basis. With the black squares on the wall, this makes sense, but what you're doing with life is more equivalent to letting the blindfolded man shoot a fully white wall and then seeing where he hit and drawing a tiny black box around it and saying how unlikely it was for this to happen.


Some think that if there is a weakness to the concept of specificity, here it is.

I disagree that this is a weakness because it is the origin of complex LIFE that we are discussing.

Didn't have to be homo sapiens or any particular organism that arose, i.e. elephants, fish or baboons, just complex life...and there is ONLY one way to construct complex life: by preprogrammed information in the form of DNA. There is your specificity.

Can you think of any other construction method that could reproduce, living, sentient entities such as we have on planet earth?
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  10:29:04   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

And I propose we are in the minds of some teenage mythical creatures like minotaurs and dragons while they play the RPG Students and Studies made by Wizards of the Coast. (No, real wizards and a different coast)

Now, prove me wrong, Jerry.


Wouldn't need to prove you wrong ........You would need to show me what logic led you to conclude this....I will keep an open mind while you do.

It's not like the entire origins discussion is some new fangled purple alligator ruling the universe from my underwear type of postulation. It has been around ever since cognizant man has. Many brilliant minds have thought it through...will you close yours?

As a side note....let me simplify converting exponents into bits...there is a formula for it that I have somewhere, but Claude Shannon made it easy for us in his original paper when he states that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits (and some some change if you are a math purest like Dave, but kill Shannon, not the messenger...lol)
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Dave W.
Info Junkie

USA
26020 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  10:29:41   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Dave W.'s Homepage Send Dave W. a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by JerryB

So, here's the deal....we were discussing scientific theory and relating said theories to Karl Popper's concept that a positive aspect of a theory is its potential of falsifiability or refutability. If you DON'T have a scientific theory to begin with, there is not one in existence to falsify.......That would seem to me to be obvious to anyone.
So you're saying that the only things that are falsifiable are scientific theories? My claim to be a plumber cannot be demonstrated to be false?!

Popper's concept is that falsifiability is a necessary (but not sufficient) quality for something to be scientific. You've got it backwards, thinking that all things that are falsifiable must be scientific theories.
Yet, you seem to be declaring that, under Popperian thought there is a way to falsify nonexistent theories.......You are now so side-tracked on the conversation that you are into plumbing....Care to start over? <:0)
What you seem to see is not what is.
No, in fact I can prove that it can't.
Well, why on earth don't you just do so......If you can prove that ID CANNOT detect design, wouldn't that be the end of the discussion? Wouldn't the whole concept just go away? Isn't that what you want?
Great. If the entire universe is designed, as you have suggested, then it should be impossible to fail to detect design if we had a method to do so. Unfortunately, any proposed method to detect design cannot be tested empirically, because it should never (inside this universe) result in "not design." So even if some method could distinguish between "design" and "not design," we'd never know if it were working, because "design" will always be the answer.

You might object with "chance!" But you cannot declare that the laws of probability in this universe are anything but the result of design themselves. You also cannot claim to be able to make a generator of true randomness. For example, which side a tossed coin lands on is the result of deterministic physical processes (all designed), and so isn't actually random.

In other words, the very premise of a designed universe precludes any potential ID method from being of any value whatsoever.
A no-true-unbiased-person argument. How predictable. Tell us, what qualities do unbiased people have that objectively distinguishes them from biased people? How can we tell that you are unbiased?
Am I unbiased at this point, no. I've studied the issues and even flirted with atheism at one point in my life--But I entered my studies unbiased, determined to let the chips fall where they may, utilizing an open mind coupled with a lot of thought. I was once unbiased, but not anymore. I made up my mind. So have you, apparently.
Why not answer the first question?
No, that's a number Dembski pulled out of his ass.
Actually, no he didn't. Borel's law has been a part of science at least since I studied chemistry in college.
Borel's Law of Large Numbers doesn't say anything about improbable things being impossible, so you must be talking about some other thing called "Borel's law," but the only other references to that phrase I can find via Google are creationist sites and refutations thereof.
Borel mused that for a chemical reaction to occur, certain conditions must be present and if the odds are more than 1:10^50 against a chemical reaction occurring, it CANNOT happen given ANY amount of time.
Please reference Borel's original work in which he "mused" what you claim, including page number(s).
Dembski is a mathematician who took Borel's law and mathematically expanded it accordingly: Dembski defines a universal probability bound of 10^-150, based on an estimate of the total number of processes that could have occurred in the universe since its beginning. Estimating the total number of particles in the universe at 10^80, the number of physical state transitions a particle can make at 10^45 per second (Planck time, the smallest physically meaningful unit of time) and the age of the universe at 10^25 seconds, thus the total number of processes involving at least one elementary particle is at most 1:10^150. Anything with a probability of less than 10^150 is unlikely to have occurred by chance.

That's hardly pulling numbers out of the air.
Yes, it is. Why include only the baryons in the observable universe? Why mention Planck time when a not-inconsequential number of scientists think that space/time isn't quantized but continuous? Why didn't Dembski include the price of tea in his calculations?
False dichotomy. Something is up, yes. But "chance" or "intelligence" are not the only two options for explanation.
Ahh...so we agree that "something is up." Now we only have to come to an understanding of what that 'something' is.
There's your problem: you think you already know.
So, let's discuss the other options other than chance or purposeful design........what are those other options?
Go read more Dembski. The biggest fault with he (and you) is that you're both willing to ignore the probability of unknown natural processes (Dembski called it "regularity" in his original filter, if I remember correctly) in order to conclude "intelligence."

In your case (Dembski's too, actually), you're willing to dismiss known natural processes in order to conclude "intelligence."

- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too.
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Dave W.
Info Junkie

USA
26020 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  10:33:47   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Dave W.'s Homepage Send Dave W. a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by JerryB

...and there is ONLY one way to construct complex life: by preprogrammed information in the form of DNA...
You're going to have to tell all the RNA that it couldn't possibly reproduce itself.
Can you think of any other construction method that could reproduce, living, sentient entities such as we have on planet earth?
Argument from failure of imagination. Ho-hum.

- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too.
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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard

3192 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  10:54:54   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send BigPapaSmurf a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by JerryB

Can you think of any other construction method that could reproduce, living, sentient entities such as we have on planet earth?


Only one comes to mind, evolution.

"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History

"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  12:32:38   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote
So you're saying that the only things that are falsifiable are scientific theories? My claim to be a plumber cannot be demonstrated to be false?!

Popper's concept is that falsifiability is a necessary (but not sufficient) quality for something to be scientific. You've got it backwards, thinking that all things that are falsifiable must be scientific theories.


No, I'm saying that scientific theories must be falsifiable in order to hold credibility.....You are trying to falsify chemistry and plumbing which don't have a dang thing to do with the discussion....Now, if you can tell me the theory of plumbing that applies to the scientific method, we'll talk further.....Otherwise, your musings are so far from Karl Popper's work that we are not even on the same subject.

Great. If the entire universe is designed, as you have suggested, then it should be impossible to fail to detect design if we had a method to do so.



Let's stop right here for a moment because even your paramount underlying precept is false.

As example, physicians miss the correct diagnosis quite often. That does NOT then extrapolate into: therefore medicine is not a science. So, your logic is faulty from the git-go. Now we can go on.

Unfortunately, any proposed method to detect design cannot be tested empirically, because it should never (inside this universe) result in "not design." So even if some method could distinguish between "design" and "not design," we'd never know if it were working, because "design" will always be the answer.


This could not be further from the truth. You are screwing up the system you are studying which is a no-no in science. This will just confuse you. Are we studying the universe as a whole, a planet within it, a goose on the planet or a bug on the goose on the planet in the universe? You have to define your system or you will just be confused.

And look at what you just wrote: any proposed method to detect design cannot be tested empirically, because it should never (inside this universe) result in "not design."

This means that dust can settle randomly in a house and I MUST attribute that dust to have settled in patterns caused by an intelligent designer just because I know that the architect who built the house was one. You can't see how silly this is?

Yes, it is. Why include only the baryons in the observable universe? Why mention Planck time when a not-inconsequential number of scientists think that space/time isn't quantized but continuous? Why didn't Dembski include the price of tea in his calculations?


This is all irrelevant.....You claimed that Dembski just pulled a number out of the air. He did not and you stand refuted on that accusation. The very fact that you are now trying to attack his reasoning shows that there IS reasoning to attack and therefore no numbers just 'made up' from nothing as you implied....You fail on this debate point as well, my friend.
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  12:35:58   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by BigPapaSmurf

Originally posted by JerryB

Can you think of any other construction method that could reproduce, living, sentient entities such as we have on planet earth?


Only one comes to mind, evolution.


I'm afraid that STILL requires genetic material to mutate...*wink*
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moakley
SFN Regular

USA
1888 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  12:42:29   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send moakley a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by BigPapaSmurf

Originally posted by JerryB

Can you think of any other construction method that could reproduce, living, sentient entities such as we have on planet earth?


Only one comes to mind, evolution.
Not as a target, but as an accumulation of traits that enhanced survivability in an environment. But now I'm being redundant since that is what evolution is. JerryB is asking us to believe that sentience was a destination, a target.

Life is good

Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned. -Anonymous
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie

USA
4826 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  12:55:40   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Valiant Dancer's Homepage Send Valiant Dancer a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by JerryB

Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

And I propose we are in the minds of some teenage mythical creatures like minotaurs and dragons while they play the RPG Students and Studies made by Wizards of the Coast. (No, real wizards and a different coast)

Now, prove me wrong, Jerry.


Wouldn't need to prove you wrong ........You would need to show me what logic led you to conclude this....I will keep an open mind while you do.

It's not like the entire origins discussion is some new fangled purple alligator ruling the universe from my underwear type of postulation. It has been around ever since cognizant man has. Many brilliant minds have thought it through...will you close yours?

As a side note....let me simplify converting exponents into bits...there is a formula for it that I have somewhere, but Claude Shannon made it easy for us in his original paper when he states that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits (and some some change if you are a math purest like Dave, but kill Shannon, not the messenger...lol)


But you ask me to prove your assumption that we are a computer simulation is wrong. Yet you have assumed that if someone has come up with something to test, that it merits testing.

In some cases, it doesn't.

Shannon's cliam that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits is absurd. You cannot have something that is less than one bit as one bit is a single 0/1 switch. It is the smallest unit of information we can consider. It cannot be subdivided into fractional units. Now, if you are talking about 3.2 bytes (a collection of 8 bits) then you'd have something. Or even 3.2 nibbles (4 bits).

Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils

Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  13:34:47   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

Originally posted by JerryB

Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

And I propose we are in the minds of some teenage mythical creatures like minotaurs and dragons while they play the RPG Students and Studies made by Wizards of the Coast. (No, real wizards and a different coast)

Now, prove me wrong, Jerry.


Wouldn't need to prove you wrong ........You would need to show me what logic led you to conclude this....I will keep an open mind while you do.

It's not like the entire origins discussion is some new fangled purple alligator ruling the universe from my underwear type of postulation. It has been around ever since cognizant man has. Many brilliant minds have thought it through...will you close yours?

As a side note....let me simplify converting exponents into bits...there is a formula for it that I have somewhere, but Claude Shannon made it easy for us in his original paper when he states that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits (and some some change if you are a math purest like Dave, but kill Shannon, not the messenger...lol)


But you ask me to prove your assumption that we are a computer simulation is wrong. Yet you have assumed that if someone has come up with something to test, that it merits testing.

In some cases, it doesn't.

Shannon's cliam that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits is absurd. You cannot have something that is less than one bit as one bit is a single 0/1 switch. It is the smallest unit of information we can consider. It cannot be subdivided into fractional units. Now, if you are talking about 3.2 bytes (a collection of 8 bits) then you'd have something. Or even 3.2 nibbles (4 bits).


No I didn't...I never stated that we ARE a computer simulation...I simply introduced an article on that subject that I found interesting and thought this forum would probably be good for that type of discussion.

How you assume that I'm arguing some point within that paper, I don't quite grasp (perhaps playing devil's advocate a bit, but I certainly don't hold a position either way).

And that side note wasn't to you, but others trying to calculate bits from an exponent ....Here...argue with the guy that invented the term 'bit' and told you how to calculate it...This is the original paper:

"The choice of a logarithmic base corresponds to the choice of a unit for measuring information. If the base 2 is used the resulting units may be called binary digits, or more briefly bits, a word suggested by J. W. Tukey. A device with two stable positions, such as a relay or a flip-flop circuit, can store one bit of information. N such devices can store N bits, since the total number of possible states is 2N and log2 2N =N.

If the base 10 is used the units may be called decimal digits. Since
log2M = log10M/log10 2 = 3:32log10M; a decimal digit is about 3 1/3 bits."

http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/ms/what/shannonday/shannon1948.pdf

Perhaps you'll go down in history as the first to show Shannon wrong and we can take all these computers to the dumpster...*wink*

Edited to say that I thought it was 3.2 bits......indeed it is 3 1/3....I was going by memory.......
Edited by - JerryB on 12/17/2012 13:38:26
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie

USA
4826 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  13:52:29   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Valiant Dancer's Homepage Send Valiant Dancer a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by JerryB

Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

Originally posted by JerryB

Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

And I propose we are in the minds of some teenage mythical creatures like minotaurs and dragons while they play the RPG Students and Studies made by Wizards of the Coast. (No, real wizards and a different coast)

Now, prove me wrong, Jerry.


Wouldn't need to prove you wrong ........You would need to show me what logic led you to conclude this....I will keep an open mind while you do.

It's not like the entire origins discussion is some new fangled purple alligator ruling the universe from my underwear type of postulation. It has been around ever since cognizant man has. Many brilliant minds have thought it through...will you close yours?

As a side note....let me simplify converting exponents into bits...there is a formula for it that I have somewhere, but Claude Shannon made it easy for us in his original paper when he states that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits (and some some change if you are a math purest like Dave, but kill Shannon, not the messenger...lol)


But you ask me to prove your assumption that we are a computer simulation is wrong. Yet you have assumed that if someone has come up with something to test, that it merits testing.

In some cases, it doesn't.

Shannon's cliam that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits is absurd. You cannot have something that is less than one bit as one bit is a single 0/1 switch. It is the smallest unit of information we can consider. It cannot be subdivided into fractional units. Now, if you are talking about 3.2 bytes (a collection of 8 bits) then you'd have something. Or even 3.2 nibbles (4 bits).


No I didn't...I never stated that we ARE a computer simulation...I simply introduced an article on that subject that I found interesting and thought this forum would probably be good for that type of discussion.

How you assume that I'm arguing some point within that paper, I don't quite grasp (perhaps playing devil's advocate a bit, but I certainly don't hold a position either way).

And that side note wasn't to you, but others trying to calculate bits from an exponent ....Here...argue with the guy that invented the term 'bit' and told you how to calculate it...This is the original paper:

"The choice of a logarithmic base corresponds to the choice of a unit for measuring information. If the base 2 is used the resulting units may be called binary digits, or more briefly bits, a word suggested by J. W. Tukey. A device with two stable positions, such as a relay or a flip-flop circuit, can store one bit of information. N such devices can store N bits, since the total number of possible states is 2N and log2 2N =N.

If the base 10 is used the units may be called decimal digits. Since
log2M = log10M/log10 2 = 3:32log10M; a decimal digit is about 3 1/3 bits."

http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/ms/what/shannonday/shannon1948.pdf

Perhaps you'll go down in history as the first to show Shannon wrong and we can take all these computers to the dumpster...*wink*

Edited to say that I thought it was 3.2 bits......indeed it is 3 1/3....I was going by memory.......


Thats unmitigated bullshit. He wants to call a bit (a known entity of computer science as a single base 2 digit) as a standard base 10 entity. You cannot subdivide an on/off condition. While strings of bits can express a maximum number (1,3,7,15), the individual bits may not be subdivided. You would still need to express 10 as a four bit number. The fact that there are combinations that express higher numbers is immaterial. It is still 4 bits. And the basis for hexidecimal expressions of bytes/nibbles.

The computers aren't the problem. Shannon's assumption is.

And why bring up an "interesting" topic if you don't believe it and don't have the capability of defending it? Why should we waste time examining a subject which is conceptual at best and a flight of fancy at worst?

Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils

Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion
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Hawks
SFN Regular

Canada
1383 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  14:08:43   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Hawks's Homepage Send Hawks a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Dave W.

Originally posted by JerryB

...and there is ONLY one way to construct complex life: by preprogrammed information in the form of DNA...
You're going to have to tell all the RNA that it couldn't possibly reproduce itself.

And since this whole thread started with the possibility that we live in a computer simulation, it follows that Jerry knows that one needs DNA to simulate "complex life". Clever guy.


Originally posted by JerryB
...there is NO SUCH THING as a theory of ID. If you think there is, please state it for me.

Some things are best explained as the result of intelligence. Or something similar to that. Don't blame me that it's a crap attempt at a theory. IDists claim that their theory is testable and it potentially could be - if it wasn't for the fact that ID says NOTHING about the designer. Anyhow, IDists make a claim (a theory) that they pretend is testable and that claim is not a methodolgy. IDists feeble attempts at testing the theory are methodologies. Feeble methodologies, feeble theory.

Once you think you have found the theory of ID, only then will it make any sense to see if it can be falsified.


Sober's whole point was that falsifiability was a bad way to test a theory. Theories are probabilistic and as such, one has no justifiaction to reject one simply because it is unlikely. Rather, one has to compare theories to see which one is more likely than the other.

But you'd know that if you'd understood the paper...

METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL
It's a small, off-duty czechoslovakian traffic warden!
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  14:09:00   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

Originally posted by JerryB

Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

Originally posted by JerryB

Originally posted by Valiant Dancer

And I propose we are in the minds of some teenage mythical creatures like minotaurs and dragons while they play the RPG Students and Studies made by Wizards of the Coast. (No, real wizards and a different coast)

Now, prove me wrong, Jerry.


Wouldn't need to prove you wrong ........You would need to show me what logic led you to conclude this....I will keep an open mind while you do.

It's not like the entire origins discussion is some new fangled purple alligator ruling the universe from my underwear type of postulation. It has been around ever since cognizant man has. Many brilliant minds have thought it through...will you close yours?

As a side note....let me simplify converting exponents into bits...there is a formula for it that I have somewhere, but Claude Shannon made it easy for us in his original paper when he states that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits (and some some change if you are a math purest like Dave, but kill Shannon, not the messenger...lol)


But you ask me to prove your assumption that we are a computer simulation is wrong. Yet you have assumed that if someone has come up with something to test, that it merits testing.

In some cases, it doesn't.

Shannon's cliam that a decimal converts to 3.2 bits is absurd. You cannot have something that is less than one bit as one bit is a single 0/1 switch. It is the smallest unit of information we can consider. It cannot be subdivided into fractional units. Now, if you are talking about 3.2 bytes (a collection of 8 bits) then you'd have something. Or even 3.2 nibbles (4 bits).


No I didn't...I never stated that we ARE a computer simulation...I simply introduced an article on that subject that I found interesting and thought this forum would probably be good for that type of discussion.

How you assume that I'm arguing some point within that paper, I don't quite grasp (perhaps playing devil's advocate a bit, but I certainly don't hold a position either way).

And that side note wasn't to you, but others trying to calculate bits from an exponent ....Here...argue with the guy that invented the term 'bit' and told you how to calculate it...This is the original paper:

"The choice of a logarithmic base corresponds to the choice of a unit for measuring information. If the base 2 is used the resulting units may be called binary digits, or more briefly bits, a word suggested by J. W. Tukey. A device with two stable positions, such as a relay or a flip-flop circuit, can store one bit of information. N such devices can store N bits, since the total number of possible states is 2N and log2 2N =N.

If the base 10 is used the units may be called decimal digits. Since
log2M = log10M/log10 2 = 3:32log10M; a decimal digit is about 3 1/3 bits."

http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/ms/what/shannonday/shannon1948.pdf

Perhaps you'll go down in history as the first to show Shannon wrong and we can take all these computers to the dumpster...*wink*

Edited to say that I thought it was 3.2 bits......indeed it is 3 1/3....I was going by memory.......


Thats unmitigated bullshit. He wants to call a bit (a known entity of computer science as a single base 2 digit) as a standard base 10 entity. You cannot subdivide an on/off condition. While strings of bits can express a maximum number (1,3,7,15), the individual bits may not be subdivided. You would still need to express 10 as a four bit number. The fact that there are combinations that express higher numbers is immaterial. It is still 4 bits. And the basis for hexidecimal expressions of bytes/nibbles.

The computers aren't the problem. Shannon's assumption is.

And why bring up an "interesting" topic if you don't believe it and don't have the capability of defending it? Why should we waste time examining a subject which is conceptual at best and a flight of fancy at worst?


LOL...You're funny.....references that Shannon was wrong, please??
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JerryB
Skeptic Friend

279 Posts

Posted - 12/17/2012 :  14:26:38   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send JerryB a Private Message  Reply with Quote

Some things are best explained as the result of intelligence. Or something similar to that. Don't blame me that it's a crap attempt at a theory. IDists claim that their theory is testable and it potentially could be - if it wasn't for the fact that ID says NOTHING about the designer. Anyhow, IDists make a claim (a theory) that they pretend is testable and that claim is not a methodolgy. IDists feeble attempts at testing the theory are methodologies. Feeble methodologies, feeble theory.


So: "Some things are best explained as the result of intelligence" is known as the theory of ID? Some reference to that, please.

NO need to go any further on this muse until you show that at least there are SOME out there brandishing around this statement as a theory of science. Seems hauntingly suspicious to me that you're just making it up.


Sober's whole point was that falsifiability was a bad way to test a theory. Theories are probabilistic and as such, one has no justifiaction to reject one simply because it is unlikely. Rather, one has to compare theories to see which one is more likely than the other.

But you'd know that if you'd understood the paper...


I see...so since the above theory of ID is pretty much exactly as you describe here, not falsifiable BUT it cannot be rejected no matter how unlikely or stupid it sounds (according to you) you are positing that this should STAND as the theory of ID? Would you class this with perhaps Newton's laws or Einstein's theories of relativity?

BTW, Sounds like you are arguing the creationist side now... <:0)
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