A new generation of Microsoft Software- the new model for software development.

Microsoft have announced a new model of software design. Applying the results of evolutionary history we see that unintelligent random change combined with natural selection has produced feats of engineering and informational brilliance far in advance of our own feeble efforts.

Software Engineers at Microsoft have now started including their patented “evo-soft” package in all of their operating system software.

Andrew Randon (a software evangelist) said “We copied Nature… we introduced a software mutation package. It randomly changed the code in a way exactly analogous to the way DNA mutates in nature. The package includes point mutations (where one zero is substituted for one 1 in the code), chromosome recombination events, (where one section of code is swapped to a new location in the code) and even transposon events are mimicked.”

Bill Gates said “We have been testing this new evo-software in the public domain for several years now and the results are encouraging. No one has noticed any negative impact and we are certain that new functions will appear much more quickly with this system than simply relying on our own software engineers.”

George Steady from Sun Microsystems said “We are very jealous of this product and the thinking behind it. I wish we had thought of it first.”


Google refused to comment but there are rumours that they have a similar project of their own which they will soon be releasing as a search facility which will only work with Windows systems.

BMW shares plummet as a mutant model escapes.

After an industrial dispute with the quality control team
an extraordinary version of the new BMW saloon has caused a bigger press scramble than BMW marketing departments ever intended. No one is quite sure exactly what happened on the production line in the Berlin assembly plant but a new push button control appeared on the left of the CD/DVD system with the word “Geschlecht” on it.

This was embarrassing enough in itself as over 1000 cars had been produced and sold before the button and its extraordinary function was spotted by a team of service engineers in Hamburg. Hans Smut from Autoservice said “It was the most extraordinary experience in my life. There was no BMW documentation for this and nothing in my 40 years in th industry prepared me for what happened”


What happened is the most closely guarded secret in the history of the car industry. As Gerhard Dien put it:

“It blew my mind… A week after I pressed the button I found the little baby in the boot. It was about 15cm long and enclosed in a squashy plastic layer. "

One month later it was too big to fit in the boot and after 3 months it was a fully functional copy of the original…bright and shiny as new!

"No one told me about this function when I bought the car but I am not complaining!”

Comments

I have to admit....I had not looked at the comments bit of the blog. I did not realise that I had turned comments off! I have now turned them on.... so feel free to comment away... and I will delete all the comments I don't like!

Switches....

Something happens when you turn it on….something different happens when you turn it off.

Switches on their own are of no use.

Switches where the same thing happens when you switch them are no use.

The switch needs to do something useful in two different sets of circumstances for it to be useful.

The simplest living organism is full of switches and control systems.

The biochemical pathways shown here (you can click on the first image to see parts of the diagram more clearly) have elaborate control systems that operate at different levels.

The biochemical switch that controls the two possible lifestyles of the virus called Bacteriophage Lambda has been studied in great detail it was this little switch that convinced me (way back in 1986- see here) that there was a real case for an intelligent designer.

One of the snazzy molecules involved in a DNA/protein switch:

You need the whole lot!

Bill Dembski happened to blog on this subject today with some more interesting background to this subject and how it should make Emperor Darwin blush here.


The most striking example of irreducible complexity is life itself. A multitude of overlapping webs of intricate complexity yet showing an abundance of interdependent systems all of which are essential before even the simplest cell can be said to be truly alive. What a wonderful thing life is!

I used to possess a wall chart of the basic biochemical pathways in cells. In the good old days it used to be sent free by a pharmaceutical company... Boehringer Mannheim.
Now it has been put up on the web. It is not as good as having a copy of it on the wall however!
Here is a tiny piece of the poster:



The web version is
here.

You can click on any of the squares on the web version to see a larger version of that part of the whole picture.

The whole diagram represents the biochemical reactions that happen inside each living cell (some reactions only happen in plants [coloured green], some only in bacteria etc- but the majority is common to all living cells)
Each of the arrows represents a specific enzyme catalysed reaction. Each of the enzymes is a complex molecule made up of hundreds of amino acids put together according to a specific blueprint coded by DNA.

A model of a single enzyme:

In many of these pathways each of the enzymes is essential for the cell to remain alive.

The whole pathway cannot be replaced by a single big super-enzyme, the pathway is needed or you are dead and each of the enzymes in the pathway are complex structures all of which are needed in many cases to provide a useful function.

What further complicates the situation is that the whole complex web is full of elaborate control systems as well... but that is another story!

It literally shouts brilliant design all over. You have to be very deaf indeed not to hear it. A child can hear it.

ID - Unbiblical?

Dennis Alexander runs a molecular immunology group at Cambridge University and has also written two books on science from a Christian perspective. Recently a version of one of his lectures has been published on the web here. He has recently expanded his attack on Intelligent Design from a Christian perspective. His article is available here entitled "Is Intelligent Design Biblical?" and a shortened version of it is due to be published in the British Christian monthly "Evangelicals Now."


One of the obvious pieces of background material to the Apostle Paul's claim in Romans 1:20

(For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse)

is the oral examination that God gives to Job after his lengthy discussion of God's ways with his friends.

Job is to realise God’s power and wisdom when he surveys biology. E.g Job 39:26

Does the hawk fly by your wisdom?

Here we are pointed to God’s aeronautical brilliance. It is surely in the sense of design that God is using this word here. Just as he gave wisdom to Bezaleel to follow His design for the ark of the covenant God uses his own wisdom and engineering brilliance to make a wonder for us to see something of the splendour of his superior intelligence.

To suggest that God is somehow belittled by analogies with human engineering is entirely wrong. It was the Spirit of God who came upon Bezaleel to enable him to accomplish his works of wood and metal working brilliance. It is the outworking of the image of God in man that allows us to be designers and engineers and to discover God’s thoughts after Him.

ID - Back to Babel?

Dennis Alexander runs a molecular immunology group at Cambridge University and has also written two books on science from a Christian perspective. Recently a version of one of his lectures has been published on the web here. He has recently expanded his attack on Intelligent Design from a Christian perspective. His article is available here entitled "Is Intelligent Design Biblical?" and a shortened version of it is due to be published in the British Christian monthly "Evangelicals Now."

Dr. Alexander makes the accusation that ID people are guilty of "terminological inexactitude." Changing the meanings of words to suit your argument is one of the commonest and most effective ways of deception. Here is Dr. Alexander's accusation:

It should also be noted that in making its case the ID literature uses
the terms ‘naturalism’ and ‘naturalistic’ in a way that is quite different from
their commonly accepted meanings. The Oxford dictionary definition of
‘naturalism’ in its philosophical sense is “a view of the world that excludes
the supernatural or spiritual” and this is indeed how this term is generally
understood. Instead ID proponents commonly use ‘naturalistic’ as a
synonym for ‘scientific’

Sadly Dr. Alexander does not give a single specific example of this terminology confusion. This makes contradicting him difficult and this is a pity as it is a crucially important point. On the basis of the UK system of justice ID people are innocent until proven guilty and Dr. Alexander has notably failed to prove this particular charge.

More evidence please!

ID - another "god of the gaps" argument?

Dennis Alexander runs a molecular immunology group at Cambridge University and has also written two books on science from a Christian perspective. Recently a version of one of his lectures has been published on the web here. He has recently expanded his attack on Intelligent Design from a Christian perspective. His article is available here entitled "Is Intelligent Design Biblical?" and a shortened version of it is due to be published in the British Christian monthly "Evangelicals Now."

This is the second post in the series discussing Dr Alexander's short statement opposing ID from a Christian perspective. (The first post is here.)

Are ID people following a will-o-the-wisp “God of the gaps” argument?

Dr. Alexander asserts that ID people are enthusiastically embracing an apologetic mirage which will gradually fade away as scientific knowledge increases. He believes that given time natural forces under the normal government of God will be all that is required to explain all of biology. As the gaps in our knowledge decrease the God we needed to explain the gaps gradually contracts to the point where we see that this sort of God was not needed at all.

The God of the gaps argument against ID assumes for its validity that there are no gaps which require God’s direct intervention. This is precisely the point at issue! Just because some gaps have been crossed does not imply that all gaps can be crossed. To dismiss ID as another “God of the gaps” argument is just the same as asserting it is wrong without bothering to consider it.

For Dr. Alexander to imply that in the nine years since the publication of Darwins Black Box the problem of the evolution of the blood clotting system has been essentially solved is simply an abuse of his position as a respected scientist.

Dr. Alexander knows that despite huge efforts the whole field of abiogenesis is still just as empty of real explanations for the origin of life now as it was 30 years ago. Indeed the more work that is done the bigger the gap between living and not living becomes. It is sad to see a truth seeking scientist failing to acknowledge this.

ID - guilty of semi-deism?

Dennis Alexander runs a molecular immunology group at Cambridge University and has also written two books on science from a Christian perspective. Recently a version of one of his lectures has been published on the web here.
He has recently expanded his attack on Intelligent Design from a Christian perspective. His article is available here entitled "Is Intelligent Design Biblical?" and a shortened version of it is due to be published in the British Christian monthly "Evangelicals Now." I intend to produce a series of posts responding to his larger article.

In this post I want to examine Dr. Alexander's claim that ID is a revival of Deism and further that Michael Behe (and by implication those who embrace ID) is at least semi-Deistic in his teaching.

Here is his accusation:

It is in dissecting this argument that the semi-deism of Behe’s position may be perceived most clearly. The key give-away phrase is where Behe states that ‘Some features of the cell appear to be the result of simple natural processes, others probably so.’ Behe envisages a quasi-autonomous domain called ‘nature’ in which there are ‘naturalistic processes’ which science can explain, and a quite different domain in which the designer acts supernaturally to bring about designed processes which science is unable to explain.

Deism accepts a Real Creator and a real supernatural origin of matter, space, time and energy. At this point Deism is indistinguishable from classical Theism.

It is in its negative position that Deism is distinguished from Theism. Deism says (according to the OED) that having created the universe God does not intervene in it. God is the absentee landlord or the watch maker who wound up the watch and placed it carefully on the mantelpiece to carry on its unwinding. Thus deists reject the deity of Christ, the historicity of miracles and the whole concept of the special revelation of the scriptures. Thus Deism is actually serious and ugly heresy.

Alexander’s accusation of semi-deism is not focused on the traditional divergences of Deism from Christianity but on the understanding of divine providence or God's sovreignty over all creation and what we call natural laws and forces. Theism asserts that the laws of nature are laws and that they are regular because of the personal faithfulness and reliability of God and that the realm of natural law is under the sovereignty of the Word of God. The reign of natural law is the way God normally governs the universe but a Christian Theist claims that God has acted and will act above and beyond natural law.

Alexander’s accusation is therefore a claim that in stating that a class of natural phenomena exhibit ID we are also necessarily claiming that natural phenomena outside this class have escaped from the sovereignty of God’s Word. We have created a “semi-autonomous domain called ‘nature’ in which there are ‘naturalistic processes’ which science can explain.” However it seems to me that there is no evidence from the quote that Alexander uses of Behe that his understanding of natural law is any different from Alexander’s. Proposing a class of natural phenomena that exhibit ID is entirely independent of our convictions regarding God’s sovereignty over natural laws.

Alexander’s charge of heresy is founded upon wholly inadequate evidence. To distinguish three classes of features in a cell under the headings “natural, probably natural and designed” does not provide grounds for the accusation that the natural or even the probably natural have thereby escaped into an autonomous or semi-autonomous domain outside of the sovereignty of God. Saying we can reliably detect instances of ID in nature says nothing about our convictions about the sovereignty of God and natural laws.

To make a serious accusation such as the one Alexander makes here in print and in public is a solemn business and one which ought not to be made carelessly or lightly. If he is justified in his accusation then it is right to ask him to come forward with further evidence. If he has no further evidence then he has a duty to publically retract his accusation and admit that he was mistaken.

(William Dembski has a couple of posts on the background to this argument linked from here. Peter Williams has another background article here -"Paper on Theistic Evolution & ID published by Bethinking.org")

Let there be LIFE!

My sister and brother in law told us the story of their camping trip to Glencoe. They arrived at the campsite and began unpacking the car… At a certain stage in the unpacking process they realised that they had brought the tent but not the poles!

All the independent forms of life that have been investigated so far are found enclosed within a membrane. This defines the edges of something which is alive. Inside is the cytoplasm…the essential living mass of molecules and reaction. Outside is the great environment with all its blessings and curses.

The membrane seals.

When the membrane seals then you need everything necessary for life to be on the inside of the membrane to make the little creature living. This includes all the materials and structures for a functioning life cycle. This turns out to be rather a large amount of nanotechnology!

Don’t shut the lid until you are sure you have got everything!

A question about defining the borders of science.

Looking across the atlantic to the debate in the USA about intelligent design and particularly the court case in Dover…one question occurred to me this morning as I was trying to summon up the will power to start my sit ups….it was this…

If there are to be clear boundaries defining what is science and what is not science (which the Panda’s thumb-ites seem to want…. If we don’t exclude intelligent design from science then the whole world of science and technology will fall apart don’t you know!) then where does the debate about what science is take place? Does the debate about what science is take place within science or outside science? Is the debate about what science actually is a scientific debate or not?

If the new NCSE/AAAS rules of science are to be applied rigorously…do they apply to the debate about making the science rule book? Are the new rules of science to be scientific or not? Can the new rules of science be taught in science lessons or not?

Molecular Mousetrap?

For more of these lovely animations take a look at this page.

This is the hook of that famous little engine that is causing all this stir!

Does this look designed?

Do you fancy building it from lego?

How about building it from lego blindfolded?











What is it? It is a protein structure that provides a little tunnel through a membrane in a “simple” bacterium.

Elegance? Beauty? Majesty?
The ribbons that are shown represent chains of amino acids that are put together each in the correct location to produce this exquisite masterpiece of protein technology.

Here is another view from above: