HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Let's cut the crap, Ted
Date: 20 Nov 92 00:09:44 GMT

: From: news@fedfil.UUCP (news)
: Message-ID: <113@fedfil.UUCP>
:: 1. How did Earth stay in one piece inside the Roche limit?
:: 2. How did life survive Earth's journey to its present orbit?
: I haven't got the slightest idea.  [...] What we DO know 
                                                ^
Ah, I see Ted may have a tapeworm also.

Or, as Tonto said when the Lone Ranger wondered whether they
could perhaps negotiate with the hostile indians who were about
to put him to death...   "What you mean ``we'', kemosabe?"

: is that the felt effect of gravity was heavily attenuated
: in antediluvian times, as I have heavily documented on t.o, that this is 
: consistent with the notion of a former solar system of roughly the nature
: which I have described, that Velikovsky, Talbott, Cardona, and others have
: heavily documented the descriptions of this former system which exist in
: antique literature and on pyramid walls etc.  Aside from Talbott's Saturn
: Myth, there are numerous papers of Cardona's from Aeon and Kronos.

So, in order to answer the question "how did the dinosaurs stand",
Ted is willing to leave dangling questions such as "how did the
earth survive sresses sufficient to turn it into a ring of gravel"
and "how did the earth not freeze" and "why are dinosaur finds
made outside 30 degrees from the sub-saturn point" and "why wasn't 
the sub-saturn point covered with water" and "why do tree-ring
dates disagree with Ted's chronology" and "why do ice-core dates
disagree with Ted's chronology" and "where did the extra mass
Ted requires saturn to have had go" and several dozens more.

In other words, going along with Ted's models, we make *negative*
progress in terms of the model fitting the facts.

It is also interesting to speculate what Ted could possibly mean by
"[..attenuated felt effect is..] consistent with the notion of a
former solar system [..a-la Talbott]", when simple calculations
show that such a "former solar system" would not produce the 
felt effect properties that Ted uses it for in the first place.
--
Wayne Throop  ...!mcnc!dg-rtp!sheol!throopw
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: Information in a system.
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 23:19:57 GMT

In article <9LPDuB14w165w@kalki33>, kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
> kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub) writes:
>>   Kalki,
>> 
>>   Right now I am running a computer program at home.  It generated 100
>> creatures.  Each has two wheels and two sensors for detecting "food".  Using
>> tiny nural net as a brain, the information from the sensors is sent to the
>> wheels.
>
>[lot of stuff describing the "creatures"]
>
>>   Now here is the question:  Obviously the creatures have become more
>> sophisticated at locating food.  They have generated rules, information if
yo
>> will, on how to locate it.  Now, where did that information come from?
>> 
>>   Remember, my initial state was completely random, so it didn't come from
>> there.  I have no idea what the proper neural inputs are for locating food,
s
>> didn't put them there.  The program alters the creatures in a completely
rand
>> manner, so it didn't add any information to the system.  Where did it come
>> from?
> 
> You must have the first computer in history to generate "completely"
> random numbers!

  Not the first.  All I had to do was hook a diode to the serial port backwards
and read off the quantum trickle of electricity.  If you think that isn't random
you havent read much about QM.  (Okay, so it doesn't really work that way, but
it would only take a few hours to hook this up, and I would get the same
results).  Objection overruled.

> And the first program in history that wasn't created by
> a programmer!

  The program that simulates them was created by me, but the programs the
creatures run was written by my random number generator.

> And the first computer to ever assemble itself!

  What does that have to do with anything?  Do you mean to tell me that as soon
as a human being touches something it is no longer capable of producing random
behavior?

> And the
> first source of electric power to just hook itself up to your house and
> start generating 60hz, 117 VAC!

  the computer runs on AC, but the creatures do not.  They are virtual data
structures, and as such exist only in theory: they have no form and thus use no
energy.

>       |  Don't forget to chant:   Hare Krishna Hare Krishna   |
>       |                           Krishna Krishna Hare Hare   |
>       |                           Hare Rama Hare Rama         |
>       |                           Rama Rama Hare Hare         |

  Dont forget to chant: Awa Tana Siam
                        Yea Siam Anas

 |  __L__
-|-  ___  Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub
 |  | o | kv07@iastate.edu
 |/ `---' Iowa State University
/|   ___  Math Department
 |  |___| 400 Carver Hall
 |  |___| Ames, IA  50011
 J  _____
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: TMakinen
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Organization: <none>
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 17:00:46 GMT

In article <2m38TB5w165w@kalki33> kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
>> So what?  If I take a pack of cards (let's make it a Tarot deck, so the
>> numbers are larger!) and shuffle it, the chances of that sequence
>> occurring are 1 in 78!  Now thanks to the ever-wonderful CMU Common
>> Lisp, I can evaluate that:
>> 
>>
11324281178206297831457521158732046228731749579488251990048962825668835325234
>> 
>> Roughly 1 in 10 to the 115.  Now by most people's measurement, that's a
>> rather small possibility.  But I only had to do it once to achieve that
>> result!
>
>Yes. So you agree with us that it takes an intelligent being to create
>the conditions under which a particular configuration of matter
>--distinct from other configurations-- can arise. This must be true,
>since you shuffled the deck, and we are supposing that you are an
>intelligent being.

That is the most stupid comment I've ever heard.
If I understood right, you (pl.) are saying, that the main point is that some
conscious being shuffled the deck so that some combination appeared. That was
the most insignificant part of the demonstration. In fact, a random generator
using the radioactive decay could be used to shuffle the deck. And don't say
that the generator was made by a conscious being. Nobody put the random numbers
inside, and they are the only input to the shuffling device. Hey, there are a
lot of chaotic phenomena in the nature, they can easily be used to shuffle the
deck.

A better example is a cup of distilled water. If the exact microstate of the
system is measured (within the restrictions of Heisenberg uncertainty
principle) , the result is then something. The probability that this result was
obtained is absolutely vanishing. Still it was measured even on the first
attempt! I'm a wizard or what?

Although the philosophy behind the quantum mechanics speaks about the relation
between an observation and the conscious observer, you (still plural?) are
getting it bloody wrong way round.

Teemu
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Subject: The K continum contradicts itself.
Reply-To: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1992 22:37:27 GMT

In article <e0N3TB8w165w@kalki33>, kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
> If there isn't a model for abiogenesis "yet", then why do supposedly
> reputable scientists make the premature claim that life arose from
> non-life? Unless a model can be shown to be correct, then it is not
> scientific to claim that the phenomenon occurred, is it? No one has ever
> seen a living organism arise from an assemblage of lifeless matter, have
> they?

   Wrong, wrong, and right.  Abiogenisis is the most parsimonious 
explaination and hence the best.  You really haven't a clue what 
science is, have you?

> I agree with you that, since no one can agree on a model for the
> evolution of life from matter, it is unscientific to claim that it
> happened. It is, therefore, an article of faith to state that one knows
> such evolution occured.

   I see you are also ignorant of the basic facts.  The Theory of Evolution
does not treat abiogenisis.  Evolution has been directly observed.  Also:

                         HOW MANY POINTS DO I GET?

   The K just acknowledged my point that there is no good model of abiogenisis.
This means he just called his very own "Probability of Evolution" idea complete
crap.  I left my scorecard in my other computer :).

Dan
Danwell@IASTATE.EDU
PS: I must warn you, crusader, that I have a _very_ horny hide.
From: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: question about Bob's winter wardrobe
Date: 24 Nov 92 02:09:28 GMT
Organization: animal -- coelomate -- deuterostome

In article <7694@tekig7.PEN.TEK.COM> bobb@tekig1.PEN.TEK.COM (Robert W Bales) writes:

>Possesion of *half* of what is needed to lock feathers
>together would offer no advantage, so each structure *by itself* would not be
>selected for. 

Ever worn a down jacket, Bob? 

>Without the structures needed for interlocking, there would be
>no interlocking mechanism.

Nice sentence, Bob 8-)

>   Bob Bales

Chris Colby 	---	 email: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu	---
"'My boy,' he said, 'you are descended from a long line of determined,
resourceful, microscopic tadpoles--champions every one.'"
 	--Kurt Vonnegut from "Galapagos"
From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: Sat, 14 Nov 92 04:59:28 EST
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

johnsd2@vccnw01.its.rpi.edu.its1 (Daniel Norman Johnson) writes:

> >>   Please be real.  To model even the simplest organic reactions mathematic
> >> is intractable.  (I assume p107 of the book you referred to earlier)
> 
> >Well then the proposal of molecular evolution that life arose from
> >reactions between simple organic molecules cannot be demonstrated, can
> >it? And if it cannot be demonstrated, then all claims that it actually
> >occurred are premature, aren't they? And if one believes it occurred,
> >then one does so on faith alone, right?
> 
> This has nothing to do with evolution. That's abiogenesis. Evolution
> talks about live developing from other life, not "simple organic molecules"

Oh? Then what does the following statement by Watson mean?

"We see not only that the laws of chemistry are sufficient for
understanding protein structure, but also that they are consistent with
all known hereditary phenomena."

"Complete certainty now exists among essentially all biochemists that
the other characteristics of living organisms (for example,... the
hearing and memory processes) will all be completely understood in terms
of the coordinative interactions of small and large molecules."

From The Molecular Biology of the Gene (pg. 67)

> It does not bode will for you disproof of evolution that you do not know
> what evolution is, Kalki. Cris Colby (FAQmaster Extraordinare) recently
> posted some FAQs you should probably read, to prevent this sort of faux-pas.

Yeah, yeah, we all know you pseudo-scientists are terrified of losing
your grants.

Sincerely,
Kalki "and the rice must have given birth to the scorpions" Dasa


       -------------------------------------------------------
      |  Don't forget to chant:   Hare Krishna Hare Krishna   |
      |                           Krishna Krishna Hare Hare   |
      |                           Hare Rama Hare Rama         |
      |                           Rama Rama Hare Hare         |
      |                                                       |
      |   Kalki's Infoline BBS Aiken, South Carolina, USA     |
      |        (kalki33!kalki@lakes.trenton.sc.us)            |
       -------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: ds0007@medtronic.COM (Dale Skiba)
Subject: Re: design in living organisms
Organization: Medtronic, Inc.
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 02:19:16 GMT

Alan M Feuerbacher (alanf@tekig6.PEN.TEK.COM) wrote:
: In article <1992Nov18.123429.6757@city.cs> lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
: > [....]
: >This is a sad consequence of mankind's rebellion against God,
: >aka the Fall.
: >Genesis 3:16
: >16. Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy
: >    conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy
: >    desire hall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.
: >
: >Your description of difficult childbirth is correct, and is just one
: >example of many things in creation which were originally perfectly
: >designed, but have been corrupted because of the Fall.
: 
: So you're saying that God changed Eve's genetic makeup so that she
: became unable to bear children without extreme pain?  Is this
: consistent with a loving God?
: 
: Is it consistent with God's explicit statement that if Adam and Eve
: disobeyed him they would die, *not* be genetically damaged?

No, no, no!  You guys got it all wrong.  Everyone knows why Human
women experience far greater pain during childbirth than any other
mammal.  Humans brains are ALMOST too big to fit through the birth
canal...  Sometimes they are, and the women even dies during labor!

The human brain is a information storage organ.  Therefore it follows
that when Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge, their brains
had to expand from "ape size" to "modern human size" to absorb all
this information.

See, I have come up with a creationist theory that sucessfully
explains the missing link!  And you guys said it couldn't be done.
I'll write up a formal Scientific theory to post in the near future.

:-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) 

--
Dale Skiba
From: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: 18 Nov 92 17:06:38 GMT
Reply-To: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Organization: The Aurora Group

In article <Zcu9TB5w165w@kalki33> kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
>So no scientist who is worthy of the title would
>ever claim that abiogenesis occurred, or even that there is sufficient
>reason to suppose that it did, right?

If you grant that there was once a period when life did not exist, and
that it exists now, then abiogenesis, by definition, has occurred.
No scientist who is worthy of the title would ever claim to know
(beyond reasonable doubt) by what mechanism it occurred.  That shouldn't
stop anyone from speculating about what mechanisms are the most likely.
These speculations rarely include the mechanism of a full-fledged
miracle (which seems to be the mechanism you favor) because that isn't
even a mechanism, but an excuse to use in the lack of one.  Besides, it
is hard to imagine anything *less* likely than such a miracle.
-- 
Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every
isaak@aurora.com      generation is humbled by nature." - Philip Lubin
From: dmu5391@hertz.njit.edu (David M. Utidjian Esc stnt)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Kalki Suggestions
Date: 16 Nov 92 19:56:54 GMT
Organization: New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, N.J.


As a suggestion:

I propose we ignore Kalki until he has had the good grace to
read some of the popular and readily available literature
that is available on the net (see FAQs) and from libraries or
local bookstores.  By that time one of us may have had time
to get a hold of his(their) book and have read it.

It seems like a rapidly degenerating thread...  Kalki is already
entering baby-talk-taunt-mode.  Once that happens it will not
get very far.

Kalki et. al; has just posted umpteen articles which are 
repetitively boring.  These articles are filling up the newsfeed
and making it difficult to read this group.  Such people as the
Kalki(s) leave me wondering if people are born/created to have
such personalities or whether they figure out how to do it all
by themselves.  

David "Don't weat the technique!" Utidjian
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: jgacker@news.gsfc.nasa.gov (James G. Acker)
Subject: B&B: Thursday oopser
Organization: Goddard Space Flight Center
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 14:05:04 GMT


Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: mrjg8679@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Michael R James)
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1992 17:01:46 GMT

kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:


Since more than a few people have already included the Kalkii
in their kill files, I will take a stab..

>Supernovae have been observed, have they not? So it is known that they
>occur, whether or not the mechanism is known.

Well, strictly speaking we have observed _effects_ which are interpreted
to have been supernovae (i.e. bright light, etc.)
Directly observed, no.

>Has abiogenesis been observed? No it has not. So this fact plus the fact
>that no adequate model under which it can occur has been proposed
>indicate that there is no justification for believing that it occurred.

Again, directly observed, no.  But there is reason to believe that we
have 'seen' one case, the effects of which are all around you(pl).

>This is what passes for "thought" to us.

>Sincerely,
>Kalki "my, what a fertile brain you have" Dasa

--
  Michael James   james@falhrd.msd.anl.gov   
                Joel:  Could you state that in the form of adesperatecry
                       toGodtosaveyoufromanunholydeath,Please?
           Tom Servo:  DUCK and COVERRRR!!!!
                                     - MST3K Rocket Attack USA
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: plumpton@wampyr.cc.uow.edu.au (David Plumpton)
Subject: Re: Laying a trap
Keywords: Computer program, random, mutation, chess
Organization: University Of Wollongong
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 21:50:01 GMT

lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
>1
>Lets say there is a computer program which `knows' the
>legal moves of chess - lets call it ChessMover.
>ChessMover plays very poor chess because its moves are
>made at random. But it does play very fast. ChessMover
>is small, compact and extremely efficient. But it plays
>bad chess because it has not been designed with any
>chess playing algorithms at all.

>Would it be possible to subject ChessMover to random
>mutations, so that eventually you evolve ChessPlayer,
>a chess program which plays very well, say at master
>level?

This is a poor analogy for evolution or abiogenesis (which ever one you're
attempting to analyse here). A chess program does not reproduce.
No form of natural selection is applied to it.

>2
>For those of you who are not game fans, but more business
>oriented:
>Consider a spreadsheet program such as Lotus123 or
>QuattroPro. Lets say you have a small calculator program,
>like the toy ones which pop up in some windowing front
>ends. Would it be possible to apply random mutations to
>Calculator until it evolves into Spreadsheet?

This has all the flaws of the first example plus one: it is more unlikely
to satify a path of mutations when the target is specified in advance.
-- 
/------------------------------\ /-------------------------------\
I       David Plumpton          I     There is a holy trinity:    |
I plumpton@wampyr.cc.uow.edu.au I N Tesla, R Feynman and C Sagan  |
\------------------------------/ \-------------------------------/
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: akbloom@aplcenmp.apl.jhu.edu (Keith Bloom)
Subject: Re: design in living organisms
Organization: The Johns Hopkins University
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 00:47:25 GMT

lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:

>>....If you were a 
>>female you'd have to squeeze your offspring through the only
>>bone surrounded structure anywhere near the uterus. If I had designed
>>females, I'd have cut them a little slack and not force them to
>>send kids through (as Robin Williams put it) "the Play-Dough Fun
>>Factory of Life". 

>This is a sad consequence of mankind's rebellion against God,
>aka the Fall.
[ ...deleted... ]
>Your description of difficult childbirth is correct, and is just one
>example of many things in creation which were originally perfectly
>designed, but have been corrupted because of the Fall.

Yes, before Eve ate the apple, a woman came equipped with a zipper on
her abdomen.  When the baby was ready to be born, all she'd have to do
is unzip, and out it would come with no trouble at all.  After the
Fall, God was so mad at Eve that He took away the zipper, and that's
why childbirth became so dangerous and difficult.

Now I have a question.  It's something I've wondered about for a long
time.  Does religious fundamentalism cause brain damage, or is it just
that people who suffer from brain damage are more likely to become
fundamentalists?


Keith
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Lionel, Kalki, and Bales . . . take note
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 15:20:15 EST
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub) writes:

>   If you read my request for Kalki to explain where the information content
> comes from in my alife project, skip the next paragraph . . .

[lot of stuff about simulated life project]

>   My point is that the behavior of the bacteria was not only unpradicted by m
> but I didn't even expect it to approach what was happening: they exceeded the
> expectations their programming was made for, even beyond what I intended.  So
> there was no inteligent force driving behind them.

>   Despite this total lack of a guiding intelligence (they were doing the exac
> opposite of what I wanted them to do) when I examined the data structures the
> were very well designed.  The structure was a little funny, only a person on
> drugs would have thought of doing it that way, but it was well ordered and th
> structure was clear.
> 
>   So clearly structure does not require intelligence.  (I did not write any o
> the programs for the bacteria).

There still remains the undeniable fact that these simulations could not
have existed without your actions and the actions of those who
contributed, in whatever way, to the project's design and construction.
Now you have introduced an additional term into the discussion,
"intelligence". We should deal with this too. If by "intelligence" we
mean the ability to run an algorithm, then yes, structure does not
require intelligence, since a cube of solid hydrogen at absolute zero
has structure but is not running any algorithms. But if you are using
intelligence in the place of, say, consciousness, then this is
inadequate, since consciousness is the cause of algorithms, and is not
equivalent to them.

Sincerely,
Kalki "Git along, little enzymes!" Dasa


       -------------------------------------------------------
      |  Don't forget to chant:   Hare Krishna Hare Krishna   |
      |                           Krishna Krishna Hare Hare   |
      |                           Hare Rama Hare Rama         |
      |                           Rama Rama Hare Hare         |
      |                                                       |
      |   Kalki's Infoline BBS Aiken, South Carolina, USA     |
      |        (kalki33!kalki@lakes.trenton.sc.us)            |
       -------------------------------------------------------