HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Subject: Re: Yes, Virginia, Mutation is Enough (long!)
Keywords: artificial life, Tierra
Reply-To: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 19:45:37 GMT

   Unfortunately, mutation may not be enough, at least in the example
you cite.  The Tierra simulator has sex in it though not as a designed
feature.  When one of Tom Ray's parasites jumps to another creature's
copy routine it may jump to the copy routine of a dead creature which
has been partially overwritten.

   This allows big chunks of code to jump around; in other words SEX.

On the other hand, early life could blot up RNA/DNA fragments from the
environment and express them, so this is not a fatal flaw in Tierra as an early
life model.

   We are having seminars in artificial life here at ISU the year
and I gave the talk on Tierra.

Dan
Danwell@IASTATE.EDU
From: jgacker@news.gsfc.nasa.gov (Class Guest3)
Subject: Re: Methinks it's like a weasel (Blind Watchmaker)
Organization: Goddard Space Flight Center
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 14:25:12 GMT

Corey Carroll (corey@sdf.lonestar.org) wrote:

: Aaaaah.  That's a good point.  There wasn't *biological*
: evolution before life, but there was *chemical* and *molecular*
: evolution.  Apparently you don't know much about the theories on
: abiogenesis either?  For a non-technical introduction, read the
: first two chapters (especially chapter 2) of _The Selfish Gene_
: by Richard Dawkins.  (another book which _Life_ likes to quote
: from).


	Just wanting to keep terminology straight (and I haven't
read Dawkins).  Is it proper to refer to the development of increasingly
complex chemical systems as "evolution"?   We could probably break 
down the reactions into polymerizations, condensations, etc. but I'm
uncomfortable calling this "evolution", because of the confusion
it might engender with biological evolution.  There has to be a more precise 
term, but I can't think of one at this moment.  Anybody?
	("Sophistication"?  "Complexation?")

	Jim Acker
	jgacker@neptune.gsfc.nasa.gov

Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: dave@hpdstma.ptp.hp.com (Dave Waller)
Subject: Re: Creationist CRAPOLA!
Organization: Hewlett Packard
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 19:52:34 GMT

In article <1992Sep30.115509.26590@city.cs>, lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
|> In article <714@oscar.UUCP> shouse@oscar.UUCP (claude shouse) writes:
|> >
|> >Hydrological sorting.  OK Lionel, I'll buy that if you can tell me
|> >two things:  1.  Where did all the water come from.  and  2.  Where
|> >did it go.  Remember, no miracles.  This is science not belief.
|> 
|> 1. The water came from the water vapour canopy around the earth.

Lionel, what is a water vapour [sic] canopy? Does it differ from water
vapor that constitutes clouds?

|> 2. The water ended up in the oceans.

Lionel, don't you see the big problem with this explanation? In order to
cover the earth completely with water, you must fill up the volume of the
oceans, and then ADD a considerable amount of additional water to cover the
rest of the exposed land.

In other words, if the water in the oceans is enough to just fill the oceans,
then it there is not enough to cover the exposed continents. Look for
yourself.

There are many, numerous, problems with the flood theory, but I'd like to
suggest one other and hear your explanation (seriously -- my mind is open,
and if you can provide an adequate explanation, it could be changed).

The oceans, which cove 3/4 of the globe, contain a rather substantial amount
of salt. Now, if the world were to be completely covered with water for
40 days, there would be plenty of time for this salt to be distributed
fairly evenly.

As the water evaporated, just as it does from the oceans today to give us
precipitation, the salt would be left behind.

Note that there are hundreds (maybe thousands?) of lakes throughout the
world that have seasonal streams feeding them, but no outlet whatsoever.
Lakes such as this can be found in ancient writings as well, so we know
they existed during the flood times.

When the sun came back out after the flood, and dried everything up, how
come these lakes are not salty, but instead are ALL fresh water lakes,
with no trace of salt anywhere to be found? What happened to the salt?

While there are a few salty, inland seas, standard geological explanations
can account for how they GOT their salt. However, a flood supporter, such
as yourself, must account for how there can be isolated fresh water lakes
that contain no salt, nor do they contain any record of there ever having
been any salt in their waters, based upon examination of the sedimentary
record that can be retrieved via core samples.

How do you account for this?

Also, how do you account for the disappearance of the water from the flood?
If you do not understand the error in your "it's in the oceans" argument,
I can elaborate further.

Anxiously awaiting your response,

-- 
Dave Waller
From: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Questions for Evolutionists
Date: 26 Sep 92 21:42:55 GMT
Organization: animal -- coelomate -- deuterostome

In article <1992Sep23.095952.4970@access.digex.com> huston@access.digex.com (Herb Huston) writes:

>Jared Diamond collected reactions to Sibley's and Ahlquist's work on
>applying the DNA clock to bird taxonomy:

>     "Their results are the Revealed Truth, and you better believe it."
>   (A geneticist.)
>     My own assessment is that the last view will prove to be the most
>   nearly correct one.

A big bonus of using DNA as tool for assessing phylogenies was that
each nucleotide change was taken to be an independant event. Hall's
recent work with directed mutagenesis showing multiple specific
mutations can occur (if the opportunity for positive selection to 
act is present) calls this assumption into question at least when
considering unicelluar organisms (and possibly plants).

>-- Herb Huston

Chris Colby
From: throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Holden omissions
Summary: Richard is right... I'll correct any future postings
Date: 04 Oct 92 23:39:45 GMT

::: From: news@fedfil.UUCP (news) (Ted Holden)
::: The seismosaur turns out to be a two-for-one, double-sized brontosaur,
::: and that says that you multiply the weight figure (35 tons) by eight.
:: From: throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
:: Message-ID: <717658769@sheol.UUCP> 
:: This is incorrect.  Ted has been corrected on this point many times. 
:: The seismosaur was a diplodicid sauropod.  The brontosaur was a
:: brachiodaurid sauropod.
: From: rh@smds.com (Richard Harter)
: Message-ID: <1992Sep30.081850.9218@smds.com>
: Er, Brontosaurus aka apatosaurus was not a brachiosaurid.  

"Er" indeed.  Richard is right, and I'll correct any future postings of
mine on the subject.  I plead confusion, because Ted had taken to
scaling up the Colbert masses for the brachiosaur, and (I think) slipping
in the brontosaur misled me. 

However, note that this is what _The_Dinosauria_ have to say about
apatosaurus (a diplodocid sauropod):

    The Dinosauria  Weishampel, Dodson, Osmolska   1990

    Apatosaurus Marsh, 1877b.  The anatomy of Apatosaurus (Marsh 1883; Riggs
    1903b; Gilmore 1936) is completely known except for the mandible. 
    Overall, it is similar to that of Diplodocus and Barosaurus, except that
    the bones, particularly of the neck and forelimb, are much more robust,
    the caudal vertebrae are shorter and less specialized, and the typical
    forked diplodocid chevrons less developed. 

That "are much more robust" bit is the technicalese for "the apatosaurus
is twice as heavy as other diplodocids, at least".  If you just look at
the skeletons of diplodocus, barosaurus, and apatosaurus, this is
apparent. 

My general point is still intact, which is that Ted regularly uses the
heavier sauropods to scale up for mass estimates for longer ones, and
that this gives him errors in his masses ranging from 2-to-1 (for his
most recent error of using 70 ft instead of 87.5 ft for diplodocus) to
4-to-1 and more (for his older error of using brachiosaurus as the
baseline for scaling). 
--
Wayne Throop  ...!mcnc!dg-rtp!sheol!throopw
From: gascan@dcst16.dc (Bill Gascoyne)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: a brief tirade
Date: 29 Sep 92 16:28:20 GMT
Reply-To: gascan@dcst16.dc
Organization: LSI Logic Corporation

In article 25854@city.cs, lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
> 
> Are you by any chance referring to the ever changing theory of
> evolution?
>

They probably are.  Those who hold to the theory of evolution, or any other
scientific theory, are not arrogant enough to believe that scientific theory
is absolute truth.  Because science does not believe it has, or will ever,
find abolute truth,* science is not content to stagnate.  This means that
theories will always be changing.  Does this make all scientific theories
wrong?  Perhaps it does.  If all scientific theories may be wrong, does that
necessarily mean that everything religion and creationism says is right?  NO!

*Science does not promise absolute truth, nor does it consider that such
a thing necessarily exists.  Science does not even promise that everything      
in the Universe is amenable to the scientific process.
        ISAAC ASIMOV

Inspect every piece of pseudoscience and you will find a security blanket,
a thumb to suck, a skirt to hold.  What have we to offer in exchange?
Uncertainty!  Insecurity!
        ISAAC ASIMOV

A failure is not always a mistake; it may simply be the                        
best one can do under the circumstances.  The real mistake is to stop trying.
        B.F. SKINNER

Science is always simple and always profound.
It is only the half-truths that are dangerous.
        GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

The religion that is afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide.      
        RALPH WALDO EMERSON

We keep, in science, getting a more and more sophisticated view                
of our essential ignorance.
        WARREN WEAVER
---
1. Bill Gascoyne
From: ksand@apple.com (Kent Sandvik)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Methinks it's like a weasel (Blind Watchmaker)
Date: 5 Oct 92 00:21:09 GMT
Followup-To: talk.origins
Organization: Apple

In article <1992Sep29.160042.232@cs.joensuu.fi>, asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi
(Antti Siivonen) wrote:
> amorgan@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Crunchy Frog) writes:
> >>	Yes, but the probability of evolution is the same as a monkey would 
> >>	type the whole Shakespeare. 

> >Whereinthehell did you get that figure?  Shakespeare wrote about 1000 pages
> >(off the cuff guess).  Each page contains 500 words (2500 characters) for
> >2.5 million characters.  Are you really saying that the probability of
> >evolution is 1e-350,000 ?????
 
> 	Yes.

As usually this individual states things without any backing. And then
he wonders why nobody believes him. It's a sad case.

Cheers,
Kent

Faith is often the boast of the man who is too lazy to	investigate. -F.M.
Knowles
-------------------
Kent Sandvik (UUCP: ....!apple!ksand; INTERNET: ksand@apple.com)
DISCLAIMER: Private activities on the Net.
From: throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Holden, mice, and ants
Summary: Ted's claim that max HN always goes down with increased size is false
Date: 4 Oct 92 23:39:50 GMT

Note that tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode) has made similar points
about strength factors of mice and ants.  Further, Ted has had it
pointed out to him several times that the Holden Number of an ant
lifting hundreds of times its weight is STILL only 5 or 10 or so. 

: From: news@fedfil.UUCP (news)
: Message-ID: <41@fedfil.UUCP>
: He's trying to 
: demonstrate that for truly large animals such as sauropod dinosaurs,
: effeciencies and things such as power to weight ratios GO UP.

I am not now, and never have been, pushing the notion that efficiencies
go up for very large animals *because* they are large.  This is a
frequent misinterpretation of what I've said that Ted presents as a
straw man.  My position is that known mechanisms of leverage, digestive
efficiency, and so on can *overcome* the inevitable square-cube problems
for creatures the size and shape of sauropods.

: We all know that in going from mice to men, or from ants to mice, these
: ratios go down.  

If by "these ratios" Ted means the maximum Holden Number, he is
incorrect.  For one example, ants performing their famous feats of
lifting and carrying up to hundreds of times their own weight, have
Holden Numbers less than 10.  (One can barely get 10 by using outrageous
assumptions in Ted's favor...  5 or less is more reasonable.)

: We know that 200 lb athletes cannot do iron crosses on
: the rings, that their power/weight ratios won't support it no matter how
: strong they might be...  

We don't know that.  We only know that Ted has claimed it.

: we know that ratios go down in going from 200 lb
: weight-lifters to your super heavyweights such as Kaz, even in cases in
: which the super heavyweight is carrying no extra or appreciable fat.

We also know that these ratios go down in going from 200 lb weight lifters
to "your" lightweights of 100 lbs or so.  And certainly the smaller
weightlifters aren't carrying extra fat.

Ted's thesis that the Holden Number uniformly improves for smaller
creatures is simply not true.  The true facts of the matter have been
posted several times over the last two years.  Ted continues to say
otherwise, but he can only consistently do so by ignoring the
above facts about ants and lightweight weightlifters.
--
Wayne Throop  ...!mcnc!dg-rtp!sheol!throopw
From: rh@smds.com (Richard Harter)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Yes, Virginia, Mutation is Enough (long!)
Keywords: artificial life, Tierra
Date: 27 Sep 92 11:40:09 GMT
Reply-To: rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter)
Organization: Software Maintenance & Development Systems, Inc.

In article <s9y-ZhB@engin.umich.edu> ingles@engin.umich.edu (Ray Ingles) writes:

>Tag: Richard Harter

> This is a repost of something I put up a while back. Since the notion
>has come up again that mutation and natural selection 'just are'
>insufficient to account for the complexity we see around us, I thought
>it might be worth it.

Long and interesting posting of "artificial life" project deleted.

-----

Me thinks that Ray feels that I am arguing that selection and mutation
cannot produce complexity or some such.  The artificial life project,
while very interesting, is rather beside the point.  What we need here
is a bit less computer science and a bit more biology.

The A.L. simulation is, of course, unrealistic in that living cells
must run a metabolism which the cell DNA must encode for. If we ignore
this point what we see is a plausible emulation of the prokaryote/virus
genetic world.

Prokaryotes are rather simpler in their genetic structure and their sex
lives than eukaryotes.  A prokaryote [typically] has a single DNA strand.
Prokaryote sex consists of DNA exchange between cells.

Eukaryotes are much more complex than prokaryotes.  They are hierarchically
structured with organelles.  They have chromosomes, meiosis, and mitosis.
They are larger than prokaryotes and have much more DNA.

The forms of multi-cellular life that we are familiar with, i.e. plants,
animals and fungi, are hierarchically differentiated complexes of
eukaryotes.

The arguments I made against the efficacy of mutation really only apply
to eukaryotes, and in particular to multi-cellular eukaryotes.
-- 
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: kmagnacca@eagle.wesleyan.edu
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: New Evidence for Creation!
Date: 5 Oct 92 20:42:09 GMT
Organization: Wesleyan University


   I'm surprised no one has mentioned the recent study which showed that
body temperature fluctuates throughout the day, going from about 98.4 to
99.9 over the course of a day (that's from memory so don't quote me on 
the figures).  
   BTW, given that very few people have survived fevers of over 108 
degrees I find it hard to believe that it was ever 122.  Or has people's
heat tolerance gone down too?

Karl
From: shouse@oscar.UUCP (claude shouse)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Deja vu all over agai
Date: 28 Sep 92 17:26:30 GMT

In article <emc.717532405@ro>, emc@doe.carleton.ca (Eli Chiprout) writes:
> 
> The line between Agnosticism and Atheism is actually very thin
> or nonexistant.  I suggest you tune in to alt.atheism.  If you
> post the same comment, you will find that many atheist disagree
> with you.  
> --
> Eli Chiprout
> Dept. of Electronics
> Carleton University	
> emc@doe.carleton.ca	

The argument that Agnosticism being virtually the same as Atheism is
simply not valid.  And the fact that you will find Agnostics over
on alt.atheism as a demonstration of your assertion is just plain
puerile.  As if you would expect to find Theist Agnostics there.

To put this question is perspective one must separate belief and
knowledge.  Being Theist or Atheist is a question of belief and
has nothing to do with being Agnostic which is a question of
knowledge.  My view is that True Believers (tm) very often take
belief to be equivalent to knowledge and that the failure to 
recognize the difference is the reason that many find them arrogant
and severely lacking in common sense.  The statement of Mr. Chiprout
above is a consequence of this failure.

Claude Shouse
From: hyde@cs.dal.ca (Bill Hyde)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Friesen on elastics and sauropod necks
Date: 6 Oct 92 23:44:18 GMT
Organization: Math, Stats & CS, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada

In article <59@fedfil.UUCP>, news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:

|> I can hold 60 or 70 lbs out from my body with my elbow at my side easily
|> enough...  for a few seconds.  Maybe even for a minute or so.  But all day?
|> 
|> I don't think so.
|> 
|> The giraffe can hold its neck out horizontally long enough to drink or 
|> perform some other function of short duration.  No problem.
|> 
|> But all day long?  I doubt it.
|> 
|> Scientists are now claiming that sauropod dinosaurs held their heads out
|> horizontally, all day long, every day of their lives, because they could
|> not have gotten blood to their brains otherwise.  
|> 
|> Get the picture?

	Yes.  You don't know the difference between an arm and
	a neck, between a tendon and a muscle, between a biped and
	a quadruped.  The picture is pretty clear.



						Bill Hyde
Department of Oceanography
Dalhousie University,
Halifax, Nova Scotia
hyde@Ice.ATM.Dal.Ca or hyde@dalac
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: ingles@engin.umich.edu (Ray Ingles)
Subject: Re: a clarification from Ted?
Date: Sun, 04 Oct 92 23:54:34 EDT
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor

In article <55@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
>In article <pwcprwd@lynx.unm.edu>, rsquires@cyclops.eece.unm.edu (Roger Squires) writes:
> 
>> >There were no animals on the southern hemisphere.  I mean, why live  
>> >in darkness when you could live in light [?]
> 
>> 	WHOA!  Hold on a second.  I can't see how else this could be  
>> interpreted, but I'll give you the chance to clairify anyway: Are you  
>> really saying there were no animals living in the southern hemisphere  
>> during the time of "reduced felt effect of gravity" - the time of  
>> dinosaurs and Pangea - i.e. the early Mesozoic (Triassic) in  
>> conventional geology - because there was no light?  
>
>No light, and no land to live on.  Think about it.  All the land was in
>one place, Pangaea, anmd all the land was directly under whatever had
>pulled it all into one place, the which location coincided with the
>North magnetic pole, since the whole thing was electromagnetic.
>
>Only a fish with a love of darkness would have been living in the southern
>hemisphere.
>
>Naturally, given such conditions, magnetic and geological poles were
 ^^^^^^^^^  ^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^  ^^^^^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^^
>the same.
 ^^^ ^^^^

 Now, wait a minute. A few points:
 
 A: Ted, did you notice my little post about what would be required
of the 'electromagnetic star' you propose? Any answers? I can repost
or email it, if you like...
 
 B: Part of the evidence that Pangaea existed is the lineup of various
magnetic ores along the boundaries of erstwhile neighbors. I.e. the
ores on the shore of South America from the time of Pangaea match the
ores on the shore of Africa.
 But *none* of these magnetic ores (to my knowledge, anyway) show
any signs of having been lined up in the way you describe here.
 
 This seems to be a place where your theory makes a testable prediction;
can you back it up with evidence? Do you know how the various magnetic
ores from that time line up? (It should be easy to see, since as you
admit the required fields would be... um... "huge" is an inadequate
term... "insanely colossal" comes close. I mean, any field that can
hold a planet inside the Roche limit can move some ores around.)
 These findings (including raw data) should have been published. Anyone
have any leads the Tedster could follow up on? I don't want to bother
looking them up (Ted's the one making the claim, after all) but I
suppose I could if I had to...

C: Was Pangaea really centered on the north pole? I nevr heard that
one before... I imagine Ted will say that the point where pangaea used
to be centered used to be the north pole, or something...

>Ted Holden

Sincerely,

Ray Ingles                  || The above opinions are probably
                            || not those of the University of
ingles@engin.umich.edu      || Michigan. Yet.
From: csfed@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu (Frank Doss)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Kazmaier and standing up at 200,000 lbs:  why it can't happen
Date: 3 Oct 92 18:53:07 GMT
Organization: Educational Computing Network

In article <45@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
>
>I have (sufficiently often), on t.o.  presented a rather simple and

Maybe "often," but not very well.  Your best response to the inquiries
of others is to insult them.  The evidence you present for your theories
could just as easily explained by "We came to this world from another
planet.  This explains blah blah blah..."

>fifty voices chiming in calling me an idiot and attempting to
>demonstrate that efficiencies for super large animals would be greater

I wonder that since the animals on the Saturn side of the earth were
very large because of the lessened felt effect of gravity, why 1)
weren't people roughly the same size?  2) were the animals on the
southern hemisphere considerably smaller than they are now?

>Is that a little bit easier to comprehend?

You are an insulting fool.

>Ted Holden
>HTE

Thanks for all the blank lines at the bottom of your article.

-- 

Frank Doss 
The above stated words are my opinions and do not reflect the opinions,
attitudes, or policies of my employer or any affilliated organizations.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen)
Subject: Re: Methinks it's like a weasel (Blind Watchmaker)
Organization: University of Joensuu
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 18:53:51 GMT

amorgan@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Crunchy Frog) writes:
>Yes.  This is, of course, using something akin to evolution to select
>sequences of letters.  What he is trying to show (IMHO) is that even
>something that is very unlikely to occur by pure chance, can nonetheless
>occur easily by pure chance and "natural selection".  Did you not
>read this part of the book?

	I read it, but I haven't yet criticized it. 

>This is relevant??????  Fergit apes, just assume you pick letters at
>random.

	Yes, but the probability of evolution is the same as a monkey would 
	type the whole Shakespeare. The probability of one sentence is 
	1 / 1+E40, which would lead to probability of 1/1+E12 per year per 
	planet. And this was only the first sentence. 
-- 

		Andreas - Siperian Sirri   Siberian Stint

	No ITU, love, evolution.           Tuusniemi ! Siis imein suut !
Newsgroups: talk.origins