HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: wolfone@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Patrick Chester)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: AWESOME computer program (Populus)
Keywords: AWESOME
Date: 12 Nov 92 07:09:39 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

In article <BxFnD8.Ir1@well.sf.ca.us> keithd@well.sf.ca.us (Keith Doyle) writes:
]
]
]>In article <100221@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
]>>The program is called Populus and is written by some folks at the
]>>Ecology, Evolution and Behavior department at the U. of Minnesota.
]
]lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) responds:
]>Aha! I thought there was something rather dodgy about this program.
]>So, its a vehicle for spreading the evilutionist progaganda!
]
]>Its funny how games where one gets to play God are very poplular.
]
]Isn't this a tacit admission that to tweak the parameters of
]evolutionary mechanisms is equivalent to "playing God"?
]

Forget playing God. Try Sid Meier's Civilization for some fun. Think of
yourself as a Highlander building your own civilization.

]Lionel Tun seems to be arguing theistic evolution!  Fancy
]that!
]
]Keith


-- 
Patrick Chester            |----------------------------------------------------
wolfone@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu |"The earth is too fragile a basket in which to keep
Politically Incorrect      |  all your eggs." Robert A. Heinlein
Future Lunar Colonist      |"The meek shall inherit the Earth. The rest of us
#^%$!! Militarist          |  are going to the stars." Anonymous
(Of the Sun Tzu mentality) |----------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: onar@hsr.no (Onar Aam)
Subject: Re: Would you believe anyway ???
Organization: Rogaland University Centre
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 17:11:29 GMT


>p.s. Science cannot explain some of the biggest things in life  --  LOVE,

Let me remind you that science DO in fact explain love - evolutionary. If you by
love mean sexual relationships then this is the mechanism which drives
reproduction (i.e. a conservative mechanism). If you by love mean to care for
your child then this is the mechanism with which you preserve YOUR genes (those
who kill their babies does NOT preserve their genes). Love is a necessary
conservative mechanism. Love is selfish. Yes, I bet you that your love to God is
based upon selfishness. Would you love God if you knew that you weren't going to
heaven? Or if you felt that you gained nothing spiritually from it? I doubt it.



Onar.
From: adpeters@sunflower.bio.indiana.edu (Andy Peters)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Lionel, Evolution and the Theory of Games
Keywords: Survival, environment, games
Date: 12 Nov 92 21:12:42 GMT
Organization: Program in Evolution, Ecology, and Behavior, Indiana University

In article <1992Nov11.220916.4256@athena.mit.edu> lking@athena.mit.edu (Loren King) writes:
>
>Lionel
>
>Well, the subject line sort of says it all.  Robert Axelrod, William
                                              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Hamilton and John Maynard Smith have done what you've suggested,
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>although with a different game (i.e. the prisoner's dilemma).

My Heroes!

>You see, your solitary chess program which randomly mutates isn't 
>contained in an environment where natural selection can work over time.
>
>Try this though:  Have a few thousand chess programs play each other.
>Insert a random mutation factor which changes the structure of some programs
>periodically.  Now, insert a kill-rule, and a reproduction rule as follows:
>At set points in time, more successful programs (i.e. more wins) are allowed 
>to reproduce themselves, while less-successful (i.e. less wins) ones are not.
>Further, programs die after a certain number of games, and losses hasten 
>death.

Actually, for even more realism, insert a probability function (as
opposed to a deterministic one):  if you lose 50% of the time, you
have a 50% probability of death after each game, etc.

>Now you've come close to simulating natural selection of mutations which 
>yield strategies more successful for survival in a given environment.

[Excellent reading list, for _anyone_ interested in evolution, deleted]

>Loren King

-- 
* Andy Peters                     * I borrowed Dad's jack.  I'll *
* Program in Evolution,           *   return it and his rivet    * (<-Don't
*      Ecology, and Behavior      *        gun tomorrow          *     ask)
* Indiana University, Bloomington *            -Bob              *
From: cust_ts@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Tero Sand)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: AWESOME computer program (Populus)
Date: 6 Nov 92 13:54:08 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki

In article <1992Nov6.111851.29067@city.cs> lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
>In article <ksand-051192183202@wintermute.apple.com> ksand@apple.com (Kent Sandvik ) writes:
>>Lionel, why don't we have any computer programs that show that
>>evolution is impossible? 
>
>Because as usual, you would choose not to believe.
>
>Example: would you like to take a ride in an Airbus
>whose computer program was modified randomly? Why
>not? After all, the theory of evolution states that
>this is how improvements are generated.

I give up. Up to now, I've tried to be at least minimally polite, but
there really is only one appropriate answer to this:

Lionel, you're an idiot.
-- 
-Tero Sand
  EMail: cust_ts@cc.helsinki.fi     Snail mail: Auroran Sairaala os. 6-1
  (if that doesn't work, try                    Nordenskioldinkatu 20
   custts@cc.helsinki.fi)                       00250 Helsinki 25, Finland
From: TMakinen
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Bales vs. Meritt on isochrons
Date: 5 Nov 92 08:54:06 GMT
Organization: <none>

In article <7478@tekig7.PEN.TEK.COM> bobb@tekig1.PEN.TEK.COM (Robert W Bales)
writes:
>    
>>  Isochron dates provide a method of testing that the "bucket" was
>>  empty at the start of "rainfall".
>
>This is the theory. If true, it is a consequence of the theory's being
>correct.  Therefore, it cannot logically be citied as a reason to believe
>that the theory is correct.
>
>>So again, with an isochron bucket available, why should we seriously
>>consider contradictory results from the leaky or overflown buckets?
>
>Because:
>
>     1. There is no evidence that the "isochron bucket" is more accurate than
>        the others.
>
>     2. The buckets said to be "leaky" and "overflown" are actually not known
>        to be so.
>
>In short, we seriously consider both theories because the sum total of the
>evidence indicates that one is as likely to be correct as the other.
>

You correctly missed the most important part. The isochron method can be
independently verified with other methods giving consistent results. That is
somewhat equivalent to measuring the ratio at which the wooden bucket soaks.
Then by splitting the bucket into two parts and measuring the thickness of the
soaked layer it can be determined how long there has been water in the bucket,
i.e. was it empty when it started to rain.

Besides, would you kindly give a throughout description about your buckets?

Teemu Makinen   ---   teemu.makinen@fmi.fi
From: smullins@cidmac.ecn.purdue.edu (Scott H Mullins)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: 9 Nov 92 17:20:25 GMT
Organization: Purdue University Engineering Computer Network

In article <cR6wTB13w165w@kalki33> kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
>keck@athena.cs.uga.edu (Paul Keck) writes:
[deletions]
>> totally random.  The process doesn't start from scratch at each step, i.e.
>> if the bacterium fails its "dice roll" to add this or that base pair to 
>> its DNA, it doesn't go back to its component chemicals.
>>
>But if the bacterium is being pressured by "natural selection" (i.e. a
>hostile environment) to mutate and reproduce or perish, then if it
>doesn't get just the right burst of cosmic rays at the right time, it
>will perish and decompose back into its component chemicals. Is it not
>so?

Oh, absolutely. What with the selection pressure of antibiotics the bacterium
that cause syphilis and gonorrhea are just disappearing, right? :-)
Is it purely by chance that these and other diseases treated with 
antibiotics are producing resistant strains?

>Since the doctrine of evolution does not state that a human being
>springs "full-formed from the primordial soup", no valid critique of
>evolution can proceed as if this is what evolution claims.

Very reasonable statement. Your approach is certainly smarter than the 
average creationist in this regard. (I mean that in all seriousness)

>> It should be interesting to see what kind of evidence KD will post.
>
>After all, you can read the book if you want to.

Only if we can find it. My local bookstore doesn't even have record of the
publisher.

>We will begin by posing (and eventually answering) the question: what is
>the information content of the known laws of physics?

Waiting.

>
>Sincerely,
>Kalki Dasa

Scott
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun)
Subject: Re: AWESOME computer program (Populus)
Organization: City University, London
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 92 12:57:43 GMT

In article <MAGUIRE.92Nov10155811@signal.clarkson.edu> maguire@sun.soe.clarkson.edu (Bill Maguire) writes:
>Lionel writes:
>>OK, I issue a challenge. Take your favourite chess program on
>>your favourite computer. Randomly change any number of bits or
>>bytes in the program's executable file. If you manage to find
>>a random change which makes the program better at chess, I will
>>accept it as evidence that significant AND beneficial random
>>mutations are possible. Oh, and I'll eat my flat cap.
>>
>>[...]
>[...]
>Here's something you could do with this game.  Take a set of these
>games, each with different random weights.  Have a little tournament
>then throw out the games that did the worst.  Duplicate the remaining
>games and modify the weights in the duplicates by a small random
>amount.  Repeat until you get bored.  Think that final set of games is
>any better than the first batch Lionel?

A number of people have pointed out this sort of use 
of `randomness' in the design of a program. But please note that  
the program has been specially designed in this way. The use of
randomness here is very specific and very tightly controlled. It
is being used as part of the _design_ process.

>
>Well even if you don't, the important thing to understand is that
>different weights produce different behavior.  Some values of
>weights will produce better games than others.
>
>I'm sure you can easily see that if the memory location holding the
>number of moves to look ahead is increased then, although the computer
>game will be slower, the program will be better at chess.
>
>If the program is using a polynomial heuristic, by modifying one of the
>coefficients you just might make the program play better.

This is more like it, the sort of random mutation I am talking
about. Lets say the chess program is 1M (approx 1 million bytes or
8 million bits). You randomly change a few bits. Your claim is
that you may by chance change a variable such as `number of
moves ahead' or `a coefficient of some sort'. Do you really
think that the program will play better chess? I am talking
about a _well designed_ chess program which has _already_
been finely tuned. In evospeak you might say an organism that
has become well adapted to its environment.

1. The chances of your random bit change causing the program to
   crash is proportional to the size of the change.
2. The chances of your random bit change having a significant
   effect of the performance of the program is proportional
   to the size of the change.

So, your program must continue working _and_ it must make a
significant change _and_ the change must be beneficial.

>I think its time for you to eat your flat cap.

Haha. Thou speakest too soon.

--
Lionel Tun   (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk)
Vision Group, City University, London, EC1V 0HB. 071-477 8000 x 3889
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
From: kmagnacca@eagle.wesleyan.edu
Date: 10 Nov 92 00:55:40 EDT
Organization: Wesleyan University

In article <96759@netnews.upenn.edu>, weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) writes:
> In article <1992Nov9.115616.11913@nic.funet.fi>, TMakinen writes:
>>	   (Yes, we are plugging this book. But that's ok, it is a good
>>and important book. Dr. Thompson is not a "crackpot", he is a professional
>>scientist with a long list of published papers, etc....)
> 
> He's a crackpot.  Long lists of published papers are no defense.

   Apparently with no long list of published papers in respected 
scientific journals.  The only reference the library here could 
come up with was a review of one of his biomechanistic books.

Karl
------
"Find a great ideal, a great purpose, marry it, and raise a family."
					 --Negativland, "U2"
From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Date: 11 Nov 92 21:53:08 GMT
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

libwca@emory.edu (Bill Anderson) writes:

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

> Who is "we", exactly?  Is this the royal form, or have you got a
> rat in your pocket?

I am Kalki Dasa
We are devitees of Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

Well excuuuuuuuuuse we!

Sincerely,
Kalki 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)            |
       -------------------------------------------------------
From: trygve.lode@f201.n914.z8.rbbs-net.ORG (trygve lode)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: noah's ark
Date: 7 Nov 92 04:48:56 GMT

Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix @ U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
<1992Nov6.112019.1@woods.ulowell.edu>

In article <1992Nov6.112019.1@woods.ulowell.edu> cotera@woods.ulowell.edu
writes:
>In article <Bx6Dnn.F9r@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>,
adpeters@sunflower.bio.indiana.edu (Andy Peters) writes:
>> In article <Hq9NTB1w164w@cellar.org> kml@cellar.org (Scott Tiger) writes:
>>>bkorb@starbase.Convergent.Com (Bruce Korb) writes:
>>>> |> 	The flood did not cover mountains.  It covered a giant fertile
>>>> |> 	valley where humans lived at the time.
>
>Then how did Noah's Ark get on top of a mountain? Or did it evolve there over 
>the past million years?

Well, there's always the theory proposed by Mark Twain in _Letters From
The Earth_ that, given the amount of rain that was said to have fallen
during the flood and the much greater height of the mountain the ark was
said to have landed atop, the ark must have been the first heavier-than-
air flying machine rather than merely a large boat.  This, he suggests,
is certainly no more absurd than any other aspect of this particular myth.

Trygve   (Who realized last night that it seems doubtful that anyone who
          has ever kept a saltwater tank could be a biblical creationist.) 

 * Origin: RBBS-NET <--> InterNet GateWay (8:914/201.0)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: watson@sce.carleton.ca (Stephen Watson)
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Organization: Home for Indigent Bit-Bashers
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1992 21:50:58 GMT

In article <1992Nov6.201635.14018@athena.cs.uga.edu> keck@athena.cs.uga.edu (Paul Keck) writes:
>is happening.  The probability may be 10e-150000 that life will form in
>one test tube (not that I believe that, or course), but when you have
>10e150000 test tubes spread over the Earth's surface in those shallow
 ^^^^^^^^^
>seas and deep sea vents, the probability becomes more like a sure thing. 

I think not.  The number of protons in the entire universe is only something
like 10^80. ("only" he says :-)


-- 
==Steve Watson: watson@sce.carleton.ca===Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario==
| The above is the output of a 7th-order Markovian analysis of all posts on   |
| this group for the past month.  Not only is it not Carleton's opinion, it's |
| not even *my* opinion: it's really just a mish-mash of all YOUR opinions!   |
From: TMakinen
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Science is inadequate--NOT!
Date: 5 Nov 92 09:05:25 GMT
Organization: <none>

In article <Bx7JAo.1LL@news.cso.uiuc.edu> mchaffee@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (Real
life?!  Bahahahahah!!) writes:
>What you fail to note is that EVERYTHING was a supernatural phenomenon before
>it was explained. [ examples... ] The PURPOSE of science
>is to examine "supernatural phenomena" and prove that they are not.  If we
>had accepted everything we didn't understand from the beginning of time as god
>at work, we as a race would not exist.  Science's purpose, to me, is to prove
>that THERE ARE NO SUPERNATURAL PHENOMENA.

That's about excactly what I tried to say.

Teemu Makinen
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode)
Subject: Re: noah's ark
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix @ U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 92 20:48:56 GMT

In article <1992Nov6.112019.1@woods.ulowell.edu> cotera@woods.ulowell.edu writes:
>In article <Bx6Dnn.F9r@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>, adpeters@sunflower.bio.indiana.edu (Andy Peters) writes:
>> In article <Hq9NTB1w164w@cellar.org> kml@cellar.org (Scott Tiger) writes:
>>>bkorb@starbase.Convergent.Com (Bruce Korb) writes:
>>>> |> 	The flood did not cover mountains.  It covered a giant fertile
>>>> |> 	valley where humans lived at the time.
>
>Then how did Noah's Ark get on top of a mountain? Or did it evolve there over 
>the past million years?

Well, there's always the theory proposed by Mark Twain in _Letters From
The Earth_ that, given the amount of rain that was said to have fallen
during the flood and the much greater height of the mountain the ark was
said to have landed atop, the ark must have been the first heavier-than-
air flying machine rather than merely a large boat.  This, he suggests,
is certainly no more absurd than any other aspect of this particular myth.

Trygve   (Who realized last night that it seems doubtful that anyone who
          has ever kept a saltwater tank could be a biblical creationist.)
From: rh@smds.com (Richard Harter)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: apology
Keywords: AWESOME
Date: 7 Nov 92 10:35:48 GMT
Reply-To: rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter)
Organization: Software Maintenance & Development Systems, Inc.

In article <100918@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
>In article <BxALIL.6Lr@access.digex.com> huston@access.digex.com (Herb Huston) writes:

>>Chris, as a Friend of Washoe (I just sent in my annual contribution to help
>>the research and received the newsletter), I must protest this repeated
>>slurring of chimpanzees. 

>I also got email to this effect. I'm not trying to say Lionel is
>chimp-like, only his mental powers are.

You're just getting in deeper.  The insult to chimps is to claim that
their mental powers are as limited as his.  I will grant, if you like,
that Lionel's powers of vocalization are greater than those of chimps,
and even that they are slightly greater than those of parrots.  But I
see no evidence that his intellectual capacity [to say nothing of his
moral integrity] is the equal of any self-respecting chimpanzee.  I
think it would be fair to say that he is brighter than the average
parrot, albeit less instructive in his discourse.
-- 
Richard Harter: SMDS Inc.  Net address: rh@smds.com Phone: 508-369-7398 
US Mail: SMDS Inc., PO Box 555, Concord MA 01742.    Fax: 508-369-8272
In the fields of Hell where the grass grows high
Are the graves of dreams allowed to die.
From: jviv@usmi01.midland.chevron.com (John Viveiros)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Well oiled doctrine
Date: 6 Nov 92 17:29:37 GMT
Organization: Chevron

Edward C. Goodwin (ecg@po.CWRU.Edu) wrote:
> 1).  Is oil definately known to be of biological origin?  Coal is
> obviously formed from plant material but are there any characteristics
> shared between oil and coal that might suggest a causal link?  Oil
> consists of hydrocarbon chains while coal (I think) has a fair amount
> of graphite and hydrocarbon rings.
>	
> Ed Goodwin (1 kyu)			"Facts do not cease to exist

There is a fairly new branch of study going (so I've been told) that is
looking at the organic molecules present in oil in order to determine
the specific source material.  Although I work for an oil company, this
is not my area of expertise, but I've had conversations with those who
are experts.  An example of the obvious connection between oil and plant
material is the existence of beta carotene in oils.  Generally, the
current state of knowledge appears to be that certain types of organic
materials (leaves vs. plankton vs. diatoms) define different
hydrocarbons (coal vs. gas vs. oil) [not a one to one, I've forgotten
which produces which].

Hope this is helpful.

John

-- 
John Viveiros     (jviv@chevron.com)
Chevron USA        Standard disclaimer applies
Midland TX
From: gascan@dcst16.dc (Bill Gascoyne)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: The purpose of science (was Science is ina
Date: 8 Nov 92 21:38:27 GMT
Reply-To: gascan@dcst16.dc
Organization: LSI Logic Corporation

In article 1@woods.ulowell.edu, cotera@woods.ulowell.edu () writes:
> 
> Huh? I think you're in science for the wrong reason.  The purpose of science is
> to quantify nature.
> --Ray Cote

No doubt anyone who attempts to go beyond quantifying and into qualifying (explaining
WHY, or trying to find reasons, rather than simple descriptive quantification) is
guilty of herresy.

---
1. Bill Gascoyne