Universal Evolution

[QED]

Of all the facts known to science, one of the most startling has to be the apparently arbitrary but highly critical values possessed by the physical constants.

For example if the gravitational constant was too low stars would not shine. If higher then stars would burn up too fast using up all their fuel before life had a chance to evolve on planets in orbit around them. Likewise, if the electromagnetic coupling constant had been lower, electrons would not stay in orbit around atomic nuclei. If higher, electrons would not bond with other atoms. Also, if the strong force coupling constant holding particles together in the atomic nucleus were weaker, then multi-proton particles would not be viable and the only element in the Universe would be Hydrogen. If stronger the only element in the universe might be Iron. Complex molecules are thus only possible in a narrow range of conditions.

This gives rise to the notion of a high degree of "fine tuning" required in order to bring about a universe suitable for life. The properties of the universe that we currently enjoy emerge directly from these apparently "carefully chosen" values and even the tiniest changes would preclude life from ever appearing. Some people look upon all this as a clear indication of there having been some supreme designer who sensitively adjusted a set of cosmic dials at the inception of the universe in order that it would be long lived and bountiful. Sadly not much can be said or done to test this hypothesis, and as such it remains a non-scientific explanation.

However there are other theories as to why we might find ourselves in such an apparently carefully designed universe. And thankfully some of these ideas come with their own methods of verification which means that they do not have to remain purely speculative. This is a vital distinction because some people seem to be under the impression that there are limits to knowledge when it comes to matters relating to universal origins and this is not necessarily the case.

For example, in one idea developed by Professor Lee Smolin, natural selection becomes responsible for all the apparent Intelligent Design of our universe in the same way that natural selection explains the apparent design of living things. Essentially what he is saying is that there exist many universes, just as there exist many animals and that universes, like animals, have a system of reproduction with some universes being more efficient than others at creating progeny. At the heart of his theory are black holes which are produced by certain types of dying stars.

Along with Alan Guth, Smolin suggests that when viewed from the other side of their event horizons black holes look like new inflating universes. If the laws of nature in each new universe relate to those of the parent natural selection will step in to "fine tune" the physical constants over many generations such that universes large enough and complex enough to form stars of the right composition will dominate over those with less favourable tuning for black hole production.

As a consequence any universe that we happen to find ourselves in would tend towards being one in which the physical constants were tuned towards values resulting in something approaching a maximum for black hole production. This is where the potential for validation comes in: If the theory is to remain standing then changes in the physical constants ought to result in a reduction of black hole production. If changes were available which increased production then we would have to ask why natural selection had not gone down this route already. So far Smolin's theory has withstood this test to an impressive degree. Theoretical tweaking of the constants both above and below the known values do indeed reduce the number of black holes that would result.

Does this not demonstrate then that science can look beyond what might seem like brick-walls and, while not delivering us with certainties, can deliver us with likelihoods and probabilities that exceed all reasonable doubts?

(I've started this new debate topic in order to draw off-topic discussion along these lines away from the Hovind/Callahan Debate)

[Jose]

I find I must agree with QED. All that evolution requires is (1) a replication system that allows something to produce a new generation from time to time, (2) a bit of slop in that replication system, so that once in a while, errors (or "changes" if you'd prefer) happen, and (3) a mechanism by which some of the replicating things do better than others. It doesn't matter what the thing is that's replicating, or what the replication mechanism is. IF replication occurs, and IF occasional errors occur, then there WILL be a variety of forms of these things. If there is some constraint, like materials of which to build new things, or a "test" for which ones "work better," or anything that results in some of these things replicating more often than others, then evolution will occur.

Personally, I can understand this for living things (DNA is mutable). I can understand it for cultures and languages (the elders hand down their knowledge to the new generation, but occasionally things change--the new generation does something different, or the elders improved their knowledge over their lifetimes). I can understand it for computer-designed things (we "merely" program a bit of error into the replication mechansim). It's harder for me to see for black holes, inasmuch as I don't know how they replicate, or even if they replicate. But then, they eat, as near as we can tell, and my experience tells me that things that eat also reproduce. If they reproduce, and if they obey the laws of chemistry and physics (and why wouldn't they?), then there will be occasional errors.

Maybe that's why the universe has to restart itself from time to time. The black holes eventually eat everything, then scrounge around eating each other, until there's only one left. It's so full it does what I always fear when I'm at a restaurant--it explodes. The universe lumbers along from big bang to big bang, the whole thing driven by black holes.

[QED]

Thanks Jose. I don't think there can be any doubt that evolution is applicable to any system with the properties we've described. I can see how that this might come as a terrible shock to those convinced that evolution is not a practical function in the first place -- and to have it suggested that it might not just be responsible for life but also for the very structure of our universe would no doubt cause a serious degree of consternation.

But the facts remain facts. Our engineers can themselves employ the principle of evolution to deliver design without intelligent input so we know for sure that it is a practical and powerful function. And because of this, in my opinion, it is beyond all reasonable doubt that it ultimately serves as the causative agent for all the persistent structure seen in the natural world. After all, when an effective system like this has been discovered and demonstrated why should we posit a more elaborate and essentially indescribable alternative?

There is another reason for proposing evolution as a causative agent for everything we see around us and that is it's characteristic signature of change. Observations of our universe clearly show a dynamic system in which change is an persistent feature! Even the distribution of elements is one that shows a distinct difference between past and present. This signature is not one that we are encouraged to expect by creationists who do their best to flatten everything into a one-off event.

[Bro Dave]

But, can you simply dismiss that evolution is the primary tool with which the Creator brings his creation into being? It is, in my view, the clockwork mechanism that gudes universe unfoldment, like rails guide a train. And yes, it is GREAT that our engineers have figured out the best way to design, is to mimic what occurs so beautifully in nature. It is, however a bit arrogant for them to take all the credit, don't you think?

Bro Dave

[QED]

But, can you simply dismiss that evolution is the primary tool with which the Creator brings his creation into being? It is, in my view, the clockwork mechanism that gudes universe unfoldment, like rails guide a train. And yes, it is GREAT that our engineers have figured out the best way to design, is to mimic what occurs so beautifully in nature. It is, however a bit arrogant for them to take all the credit, don't you think?

Dave, I don't know where you've got this chip on your shoulder from. All the examples of evolutionary engineering I've ever seen have gone to great lengths to give credit to nature for the inspiration behind the techniques that have been borrowed.

However you certainly deserve praise for appreciating that the mechanism itself has been successfully codified. Too many others are unnecessarily prevented from doing so because they fail to see that there still remains a question as to how such principles can arise in the first place. The real question then is what if anything colors the natural products of the world -- for if we are to imagine that intelligence somewhere has designed the universe to evolve along particular lines, then we ought to be able to justify this idea.

After all, in AI land there is a computer based demonstration of evolution called [url=lhttp://ai-depot.com/ArtificialLife/Programmer-Perspective.html]Core Wars[/url]

Core Wars, in another way to define, is a resembling model of Darwin's famous "survival of the fittest" theory. It is a gaming arena where computer processes battle against each other for one sole objective - survival. The fact that Core Wars warriors shares this purpose with real life forms offers it as a perfect paradigm for studying phenomena in a virtual biological environment, generating artificial life forms in the process. Core Wars warriors resemble complete life forms in it. It's not too difficult to find analogies between these warriors and other biological life forms. Though the behavioral complexity of these computer-simulated processes are way behind that of real life processes, they do exhibit comparable phenomena when placed in a Core Wars simulator. A warrior can copy itself and then split to the copy, which is much like cell division, or jump to the copy, which is more like the biological equivalent of movement. A process can cause another process to stop, which is somewhat like biological predation. Furthermore, some of the more complex programs have displayed such abilities as setting a trap, self-repair, and mimicry, all of which have biological equivalents. This functionality lends credence to Core Wars to function as an experimental bed for artificial life experiments.

The evidence from this seems clear enough. The mechanism that prevails has survival as its single minded goal. This really seems very obvious to me, because survival is another word for persistence and no universe will ever be full of things that are unable to persist. I really don't see how there could be any choice in the matter and hence I don't see any need for a clever God to make it this way.

[Bro Dave]

But, can you simply dismiss that evolution is the primary tool with which the Creator brings his creation into being? It is, in my view, the clockwork mechanism that gudes universe unfoldment, like rails guide a train. And yes, it is GREAT that our engineers have figured out the best way to design, is to mimic what occurs so beautifully in nature. It is, however a bit arrogant for them to take all the credit, don't you think?

Dave, I don't know where you've got this chip on your shoulder from. All the examples of evolutionary engineering I've ever seen have gone to great lengths to give credit to nature for the inspiration behind the techniques that have been borrowed.

Sorry if I came across that way. I guess it’s a knee jerk reaction to so many who give the Creator zero credit.

However you certainly deserve praise for appreciating that the mechanism itself has been successfully codified. Too many others are unnecessarily prevented from doing so because they fail to see that there still remains a question as to how such principles can arise in the first place. The real question then is what if anything colors the natural products of the world -- for if we are to imagine that intelligence somewhere has designed the universe to evolve along particular lines, then we ought to be able to justify this idea.

After all, in AI land there is a computer based demonstration of evolution called [url=lhttp://ai-depot.com/ArtificialLife/Programmer-Perspective.html]Core Wars[/url]

Core Wars, in another way to define, is a resembling model of Darwin's famous "survival of the fittest" theory. It is a gaming arena where computer processes battle against each other for one sole objective - survival. The fact that Core Wars warriors shares this purpose with real life forms offers it as a perfect paradigm for studying phenomena in a virtual biological environment, generating artificial life forms in the process. Core Wars warriors resemble complete life forms in it. It's not too difficult to find analogies between these warriors and other biological life forms. Though the behavioral complexity of these computer-simulated processes are way behind that of real life processes, they do exhibit comparable phenomena when placed in a Core Wars simulator. A warrior can copy itself and then split to the copy, which is much like cell division, or jump to the copy, which is more like the biological equivalent of movement. A process can cause another process to stop, which is somewhat like biological predation. Furthermore, some of the more complex programs have displayed such abilities as setting a trap, self-repair, and mimicry, all of which have biological equivalents. This functionality lends credence to Core Wars to function as an experimental bed for artificial life experiments.

The evidence from this seems clear enough. The mechanism that prevails has survival as its single minded goal. This really seems very obvious to me, because survival is another word for persistence and no universe will ever be full of things that are unable to persist. I really don't see how there could be any choice in the matter and hence I don't see any need for a clever God to make it this way.

I don’t have a problem with modeling evolution. It seems to me, the Core War program’s rules are pretty high level, with definite sociological overtones. These are not simplistic rules that "predated everything". These are more in like with creative guidelines, which indeed follows the concept of guided evolution. I think the only “war” is over the “packaging” of the guiding intelligence we both observe.

Bro Dave

[QED]

I don’t have a problem with modeling evolution. It seems to me, the Core War program’s rules are pretty high level, with definite sociological overtones. These are not simplistic rules that "predated everything". These are more in like with creative guidelines, which indeed follows the concept of guided evolution.

But Dave, the guidance mechanism is oh-so-simple... from the very beginning it's just survival. Survival as I keep pointing out is another word for persistence. I think people get dazzled by the all the complexity issues and lose sight of the primitives.

To illustrate how primitive this sort of thing can be imagine having a huge skip full of 'S' shaped hooks. Start pulling one through the heap and it will pick up another, and another and so on until you get a long chain. It's difficult to put into words what's happening here: Essentially logic is at work at a mechanical level and the result is a persistent structure. While it in no way describes how evolution works I think it can serve to demonstrate the inevitable logic that evolution has at its foundation.

[Bro Dave]

I don’t have a problem with modeling evolution. It seems to me, the Core War program’s rules are pretty high level, with definite sociological overtones. These are not simplistic rules that "predated everything". These are more in like with creative guidelines, which indeed follows the concept of guided evolution.

But Dave, the guidance mechanism is oh-so-simple... from the very beginning it's just survival. Survival as I keep pointing out is another word for persistence. I think people get dazzled by the all the complexity issues and lose sight of the primitives.

Okay, please explain how to code the "simple" rule of survival...

To illustrate how primitive this sort of thing can be imagine having a huge skip full of 'S' shaped hooks. Start pulling one through the heap and it will pick up another, and another and so on until you get a long chain. It's difficult to put into words what's happening here: Essentially logic is at work at a mechanical level and the result is a persistent structure. While it in no way describes how evolution works I think it can serve to demonstrate the inevitable logic that evolution has at its foundation.

QED, your "S-hook example" reminded me of the examples in my math textbooks; Close to on connection with the real problems. Chemicals are supposedly "driven" by a desire to survive??? Interesting.

What I don't understand, is all the convolutions and gymnastics, just to avoid even the consideration that there is intelligence guideing the Universe. I know scientifically that does not satisfy you, but you are still free to understand the clever mechanism the Creator put into the wonderful "machine" of evolution. Is that such a painful possibility that it must never be considered?

Bro Dave

[Jose]

What I don't understand, is all the convolutions and gymnastics, just to avoid even the consideration that there is intelligence guideing the Universe. I know scientifically that does not satisfy you, but you are still free to understand the clever mechanism the Creator put into the wonderful "machine" of evolution. Is that such a painful possibility that it must never be considered?

It is not that it is painful, or that it must never be considered. It's that it isn't necessary. We look at the natural processes going on around us, and ask if they are sufficient to explain what we see. The answer is yes. There are some missing details--rather like the road atlas not showing where the trees are beside the road--but the big picture is there. Sure, we can imagine that there are gods of various types pushing and pulling, or ETs beaming waves of Purposeful Action at us, but we don't need to do this to arrive at a workable explanation. By contrast, what tells us to bring in such explanations are various books that contradict each other, while at the same time, each crying I Am Truth! With such a cacophany of self-proclaimed truths, it seems fair to look at the world itself and see what is actually required to explain things.

[Bro Dave]

[]It is not that it is painful, or that it must never be considered. It's that it isn't necessary. We look at the natural processes going on around us, and ask if they are sufficient to explain what we see. The answer is yes. There are some missing details--rather like the road atlas not showing where the trees are beside the road--but the big picture is there. Sure, we can imagine that there are gods of various types pushing and pulling, or ETs beaming waves of Purposeful Action at us, but we don't need to do this to arrive at a workable explanation. By contrast, what tells us to bring in such explanations are various books that contradict each other, while at the same time, each crying I Am Truth! With such a cacophany of self-proclaimed truths, it seems fair to look at the world itself and see what is actually required to explain things.

Lets deal with specifics. The claim has been made that what happens in evolution is very "simple". This is both true and false. It is simple to the degree that the mechanism for control, i.e. DNA, is based on 4 chemicals. But what is accomplished with those chemical is astounding! Now, if anyone will explain the EXACT "simple" coding used by those initial chemicals that made them "want" to survive I am all ears!

As for "crying I AM Truth", I've made no such claim. My claim is that science is no where near explaining our universe, even at the "simplist" levels. All our "facts" are relative. For anyone to dismiss even the possiblity that there is a Master Architech responsible for design and unfoldment of that Universe, seems to step beyond what is reasonable. And to dismiss it because we have sufficient explainations, is truly laughable.

Bro Dave

[Jose]

Lets deal with specifics. The claim has been made that what happens in evolution is very "simple". This is both true and false. It is simple to the degree that the mechanism for control, i.e. DNA, is based on 4 chemicals. But what is accomplished with those chemical is astounding! Now, if anyone will explain the EXACT "simple" coding used by those initial chemicals that made them "want" to survive I am all ears!

Does "want" exist for chemicals? Does a chemical know what survival is? It is fun to anthropomorphize, but it tends to lead one astray. Certainly, DNA contains lots of information, and there is a pretty darned complicated bunch of chemistry by which DNA is read and the resulting chemicals participate in various reactions. But, would it be a surprise if there were a bit of complicated stuff going on after several billion years? Remember, the stuff replicates. Any changes that result in better replication out-compete the fore-runners. Complexity happens.

As for "crying I AM Truth", I've made no such claim. My claim is that science is no where near explaining our universe, even at the "simplist" levels. All our "facts" are relative. For anyone to dismiss even the possiblity that there is a Master Architech responsible for design and unfoldment of that Universe, seems to step beyond what is reasonable. And to dismiss it because we have sufficient explainations, is truly laughable.

Indeed, you have not cried "I Am Truth." The books do. It seems to me, that to rely on some book that somebody wrote, and to conclude that because that book professes to be an accurate history of the universe in greater or lesser detail, is as laughable as your suggestion that one should reserve judgement about a Master Architect. ...by which I mean that we can sling opinions at one another forever without significant progress. To make progress, we need more than opinion.

Please, don't mistake what I said earlier. I didn't "dismiss even the possibility that there is a Master Architect." Rather, I said the data do not compel us to include one in the explanation. These are quite different things. I merely ask what the evidence is, then attempt to fit the bits of evidence together. If there is Master Architect, he has hidden his hand, and left no trace beyond the natural laws that he set in motion. If there is NO Master Architect, and the natural laws are merely natural laws, then we achieve the same result.

I also ask--quite seriously--how anyone is supposed to tell which Master Architect is the right one. As I said, there are many books and many oral traditions that promise that their particular Master Architect is the One And Only, and that all others are pretenders. I do not refer only to the Truthbook, as some call it, but to all of the others as well. Each claims to know the answer. How can anyone distinguish among them? Not having been raised in the tradition of any of them, and not having had any of them convince me that one is preferable to another, I give them equal weight, and equal opportunity for me to reserve judgement as to whether any may be valid. I look at what is, and ask only that those things that exist provide clues as to their workings, and clues as to their history. So far, those clues point only to natural events, and implicate no deities. This does not rule out deities; it merely does not rule them in. Nor does it shed light on the question I ask above--how to distinguish among different peoples' favorite deity.

It is possible to ask as well, whether the Master Designer was all that good at what he designed. This is not the thread for that discussion; there are others aimed at this topic. Suffice it to say that there's a lot of really sloppy design work in living things. So, while your basic philosophy is compelling--that the universe is pretty danged astounding and seems to cry out for a Master Plan--some of the details are so very weird that they call such a plan into question. Again, I'd prefer to reserve judgement about the designer, rather than use the evidence at hand to judge her.