HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: 11 Nov 92 20:41:41 GMT
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) writes:

> >Read the book.
> 
> Translation: "I'm too stupid to comprehend the least aspect of the
> proof, let alone that it's riddled with howlers and gaffes."
> 
> Go ahead, post the proof.

Read the book.

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)            |
       -------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: mmeyer@m2.dseg.ti.com (Mark Meyer)
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Organization: TI DSEG, Spring Creek, Plano, Tx.
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 20:38:20 GMT


	Can I play too?

In article <BeJ1TB1w165w@kalki33> kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
> Webster's 9th New Collegiate Dictionary 

	Y'all are slipping, Kalki of Borg.  I've GOT this book. :-)

> defines consciousness as follows: (first two definitions given here)
> 1a: ...
> 1b: the state or fact of being conscious of an external object, state or
> fact.

> Definition 1b is circular, using the word "conscious" to define
> consciousness. ...

	To pick a nit, no, it's not circular.  "Conscious" !=
"consciousness", mainly because the former is an adjective and the
latter a noun.  The definition for "conscious" in the dictionary does
not include "consciousness", ergo, it's not circular.

> Definition 1a uses the term "something within oneself" to
> denote the object of consciousness.  What is this "something"? What is
> this "oneself" and how can "something" be "within oneself"?

	Let me offer an example: When I read y'all's postings, I
become aware of a feeling of nausea within my stomach, which is inside
myself.  

> Granted that consciousness is some kind of "state" belonging to the
> genus "awareness", we then ask what is awareness? And so on. The point
> is that here is a real phenomenon that everyone has direct experience of
> but which is treated as if nonexistent by modern science.

	Others have addressed this as false: science DOES address
this.  One example: neurology.  Check out _The Man Who Mistook His
Wife for a Hat_ by Dr. Oliver Sacks.  Absolutely fascinating.

> ...

> We can say what consciousness is, but first we would like your opinion:
> what is it, what happens to it after death, and why?

	Okay, here's my opinion: Since y'all are posting to Usenet, I
am going to assume (dangerous, I know, but if I'm wrong I'm sure y'all
will correct me) that y'all are familiar with the difference between
hardware and software.  My brain is my hardware; my mind, my
"consciousness", is the software run by my brain.  When I die, my
"consciousness" permanently vanishes.  Why?  Because as my individual
brain cells die, they can no longer generate the electical impulses
whose configuration IS my consciousness.  Asking what happens to
consciousness when one dies is like asking what happens to my Turbo C
Development Environment when I turn off my computer.
	It doesn't seem terribly mysterious to me.

-- 
Mark Meyer                                               | mmeyer@dseg.ti.com |
Texas Instruments, Inc.                                  +--------------------+
Every day, Jerry Junkins is grateful that I don't speak for TI.
    WARNING: The Surgeon General is both a surgeon AND a general.  So watch it.
From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: What is consciousness?
Date: Fri, 06 Nov 92 16:23:35 EST
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

There are many biology textbooks which start out by attempting to give
definitions of "life". They usually enumerate a list of properties of
certain types of physical objects called "organisms". Commonly, things
such as reproduction, homeostasis, metabolism, presence of DNA/RNA,
etc., are mentioned as characteristics of "life".

To us, however, the most striking feature of life is the fact that it is
conscious. We observe consciousness in living beings. Although there may
be little or no physical difference between a living body and a body
which has recently died, we intuitively know that there is a difference:
in a living body there is consciousness, or a soul, and in a dead body
there is not.

What is consciousness?

Consider a body at the moment before and the moment after death. What is
it that is different between these two states? Except in cases of death
by massive trauma (such as being blown up), the structural integrity and
chemical constitution of the body are not very different at the two
instants. What, then, determines the instant of death?

We would answer by saying that the soul, or the consciousness, has
departed, and therefore the organism is no longer alive.

Your input is welcome.

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: jviv@usmi01.midland.chevron.com (John Viveiros)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Ted scores!
Date: 10 Nov 92 19:02:14 GMT
Organization: Chevron

>You're deriding me because my recent articles haven't included enough insult,
>invective, flamage, mud-slinging...  i.e. because they are not in keeping
>with the high standards of t.o, correct?  Sorry.  I do, however, keep the
>following series of quotes  (compiled by Mr. Richard D'Ippolitto) around
>as a kind of standard pablum for the unsated (such as yourself).  Ask, and
>thou shalt receive:

[much flamage by evolutionists deleted]

>Ted Holden

I do believe Ted scored a few points on you boys with this post.  I've
done it myself, too -- called them ignorant (or lunatics if they've
studied paleontology at all!).  But we shouldn't forget that these are
real people on the other end of the line, and I can't always understand
why, but they truly believe in what they say.  Try not giving the
knee-jerk reaction to their posts.  Admit where they have some validity,
then reason out your arguements.  I know it's been tried before (and it
is fun to watch the flame wars) but all that really happens is that a
wall is built, and people have to go to one side or the other.

I saw a flame of someone who called themselves an "old-earth
creationist" ('God made the Big Bang').  This contradicts no evidence.
Don't argue against faith, it will just drive people away.  Do you want
more (young-earth) creationists?

Let's try building bridges, not wall (trite, I know).
-- 
John Viveiros     (jviv@chevron.com)
Chevron USA        Standard disclaimer applies
Midland TX
From: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Date: 11 Nov 92 11:33:56 GMT
Reply-To: kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us
Organization: Kalki's Infoline BBS, Aiken, SC, USA

onar@hsr.no (Onar Aam) writes:

> >> I see. Are trees conscious? Is a virus conscious?
> >
> >Yes, trees and viruses are living beings, are they not?
> 
> Viruses alive????? Are you sure you aren't too much into New Age, Gaja and th
> stuff?

Yes, i'm sure.

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)            |
       -------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: keithd@well.sf.ca.us (Keith Doyle)
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 04:03:58 GMT



kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
>To us, however, the most striking feature of life is the fact that it is
>conscious. We observe consciousness in living beings.

Do we observe consciousness in bacteria?  Plankton?  Algae?  If not,
are these not alive?  If so, what characteristics of consciousness
have we observed in them?

>What is consciousness?

If you haven't figured that out yet, how do you know you've "observed
consciousness in living beings?".  Have you observed consciousness in
yourself?

Keith
From: skroger@zeus.calpoly.edu (Seth L. Kroger)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: 12 Nov 92 18:54:28 GMT
Organization: California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub) writes:
>In article <1992Nov10.005457.140369@zeus.calpoly.edu>, skroger@zeus.calpoly.edu
>(Seth L. Kroger) writes:
>> There's a very major error right there.  It presumes that the mechanism of
>> abiogenesis is known to be be of a porticular type.  Not only is the
>> mechanism not really known, virtually none of the theories in the running
>> use protiens (or, I assume, amino acids) as a starting point or as the
>> primary goal.  Wrong premise ==> Bogus conclusion.
>
>  Hold on.  We don't need to know what the actual event was, as long as we
>consider the probabilities of all possible mechanisms for abiogenesis.  If pn is
>the probability of abiogenisis under mechanism n, then the probability of
>abiogenesis was 1-product(1-pn) (where product(x) is to multiply x out for each
>n).

Point taken.  I'm probably guilty of prejudging this flaw in the "proof"
before I see it, but I've seen so many people start out like this I tend to
jump on it.

>  So as long as the author considered ALL possible mechanisms for abiogenesis
>this isn't a problem.
>
>  He did do that, Kalki, didn't he?

Although prior experience tells me that's very unlikely, I guess I'll give
him the benefit of the doubt.

>-|-  ___  Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub


|======================================================================|
| Seth Kroger                       "If God made us in His image we    |
| skroger@pan.calpoly.edu               have certianly returned the    |
| Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo             compliment."  -Voltaire        |
From: rybicki@uctvax.uct.ac.za
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: 9 Nov 92 14:30:11 +0200
Organization: University of Cape Town

In article <PJHRTB1w165w@kalki33>, kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
> 
>   The probability of evolution of higher life forms by known physical
> processes during a 4.5 billion year period is bounded by an UPPER limit
> of 10e-150000.
> 
>   The entire history of the earth would have to be repeated over and over
> again at least 10e150000 times for there to be a substantial chance that
> higher living entities would evolve even once.
> 
>   This shows that the standard dogma that evolution of higher life forms
> will occur "given enough time" is false, at least for any of the
> current estimates of the earth's age.
> 
>   These statements are from Mechanistic and Nonmechanistic Science, by
> Dr. Richard Thompson. His arguments are based on information theory
> and molecular biology. The proof is straightforward.

Sure, sure - you don't think, maybe, you left out some error margins there? 
Like of the order of 10exp10 or so?  Maybe higher?  And the Dr Th. wouldn't be
a Creationist, would he?  And he wouldn't have read (nor would you have) "The
Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins?  Making statements such as you have,
without the calculations or the assumptions, is asking for trouble.  Why should 
Thompson be right, and all the people who have worked on molecular evolution be
wrong?  Only if you BELIEVE....
 _________________________________________________________________________
|                                 |                                       |
|  Ed Rybicki                     |    Now you've got the hang of it      |
|  Dept Microbiology              | There's nothing you can't do with it  |
|  University of Cape Town        |         If you're very into it        |
|  PB Rondebosch 7700             |         You can't go wrong....        |
|  South Africa                   |                                       |
|  fax 27 21 650 4023             |              - Mad John               |
|  ed@micro.uct.ac.za             | (Ogden's Nut-Gone Flake, Small Faces) |
|_________________________________|_______________________________________|
From: 00prneubauer@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu (Paul Neubauer)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: noah's ark
Date: 6 Nov 92 21:43:20 GMT
Organization: Ball State U.

In article <1992Nov6.112019.1@woods.ulowell.edu>, 
 Ray Cote (cotera@woods.ulowell.edu) 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?

Ray, 

I suspect I will not win the race to post this, :-) but does this
imply that you are about to give us evidence that Noah's Ark *did* get
on top of a mountain?  Has it been found?  (Hint:  cite some physical
evidence if you can.)

Naaah.

-- 
Paul Neubauer   00prneubauer@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu  00prneubauer@bsuvax1.BITNET
                00prneubauer@bsu-ucs.UUCP       neubauer@bsu-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Reply-To: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Organization: The Aurora Group
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 92 17:20:28 GMT

In article <uVF4TB6w165w@kalki33> kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
>Yes, we agree that if matter is somehow manipulated under the control of
>a sufficiently advanced computer program . . . then the body of a living
>organism can be formed out of simple materials.
>But the best computer in the universe will do nothing without being
>programmed, . . .

Then, do you believe that the conditions within the Tierra simulation
were more complex (i.e., had a higher information content) than the
conditions on a primordial Earth?  You seem to have a great deal more
respect for a single programmer's ability than I do!
-- 
Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every
isaak@aurora.com      generation is humbled by nature." - Philip Lubin
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Subject: Re: Would you believe anyway ???
Reply-To: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Organization: The Aurora Group
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 92 19:02:07 GMT

In article <BxJz2K.zE@brunel.ac.uk> bm90ash@brunel.ac.uk (Adrian S Harvey) writes:
>If you really want to find out what is going on . . .

If you want to know what's going on, look at what's going on.  Reaching
out to God won't help you find anything but God.

>then reach out to God with a desire to know Him, then you'll know that
>He is there...

Not "He", but "She."

The Bible says, "Seek, and ye shall find."  It forgot to add that, if
you seek hard enough, you'll find things that aren't even there.
-- 
Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every
isaak@aurora.com      generation is humbled by nature." - Philip Lubin
From: keith@cco.caltech.edu (Keith Allan Schneider)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Probability of Evolution
Date: 14 Nov 1992 03:47:42 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: punisher.caltech.edu

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

>Yes, any probability is bounded by 0<p<1. But there are also sets of

Oh, so you are disallowing probabilities of 0 and 1?

keith

Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: bseymour@encore.com (Burch Seymour)
Subject: Re: Bales argument
Organization: Encore Computer Corporation
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 18:35:43 GMT


I would request that the Merritt v Bales be taken to e-mail. I doubt
many of us care to split semantic hairs about lies vs whatever. Thank you.


>In article <7540@tekig7.PEN.TEK.COM> bobb@tekig1.PEN.TEK.COM (Robert W Bales) writes:
>>
>>
>>When we study the fossil record, we do not see an "almost-human" species from
>>which humans could likely have evolved.  We see apes and we see humans.  We
>>see no evidence that any organism transitioned between them.  The fossil
>>agrees with what we would expect to see if man was separately created, but
>>not with what we would expect if man evolved.
>>

I've always felt that the lack of transitional forms was not a problem. 
What is the percentage of animal that have died, that became fossiles?
Pretty dang small I'd guess. Using common sense (which another member of 
this group has shown is very dangerous) I always thought that big steps
in the decent of the species would take place in very localized
populations. Then, when there was some disinct advantage, that group
spread around enough to be found in the fossile record. I believe that
is pretty much the same idea as "puntuated equilibrium". Not really a
major leap in thought.

To put it in terms Bales might understand (judging from his .sig),
when I was in high school all the ocillioscopes I saw were big,
vacuum tube monsters. Now all the 'scopes in our lab are semicondutor
(except for the display). Now how likely am I to find transitional
forms? If I went to the labs at Tektronix, I could probably find
test stands where the intermediate forms of instruments are being
built. But in the field we only see the previous generation and
the latest generation. Not the in-between stuff. Why? Becuase the
ain't much of it in the first place. And there is not opportunity
for it to be spread.

Think of a small area in the woods as the lab. Over time a new 
trait develops. It provides such a great advantage that that animal
start spreading the trait out of its area, until it becomes 
universal. The chances of finding that area, and it's transitional
fossiles is small. But these finds (as I understand it) do exist.

Corrections welcome.

-bs-
From: salem@pangea.Stanford.EDU (Bruce Salem)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Date: 8 Nov 1992 04:19:48 GMT
Organization: Stanford Univ. Earth Sciences
NNTP-Posting-Host: pangea.stanford.edu

	Thank You, Mr. Krishna Consciousness! You have very consisely
stated the prejudicial assumption that religionists have used to try
to set Life=Mankind apart from all else and to elevate him to trancendance,
even if it is just the backhanded complement in Western Religion known
as The Fall.

In article <1L7TTB1w165w@kalki33> kalki33!system@lakes.trenton.sc.us writes:
>There are many biology textbooks which start out by attempting to give
>definitions of "life". They usually enumerate a list of properties of
>certain types of physical objects called "organisms". Commonly, things
>such as reproduction, homeostasis, metabolism, presence of DNA/RNA,
>etc., are mentioned as characteristics of "life".

	But indeed tell this to all the pharmicutical companies who
manufacture small molecules that have these mericulious effects on
disease, or to the people who have found a whole suite of similar
small molecules that mediate the function of what you call consciousness
and explain the desease state of its misfunctions.

>To us, however, the most striking feature of life is the fact that it is
>conscious. We observe consciousness in living beings. Although there may
>be little or no physical difference between a living body and a body
>which has recently died, we intuitively know that there is a difference:
>in a living body there is consciousness, or a soul, and in a dead body
>there is not.

	But of course Life ~= Mankind, and people are alot more like
all the other the other animals than many religionists like to admit.

	This is part of the oldest argument around that spirit is in
everything but that Man is in a special place because of his cousciousness.
It is an argument from prejudice. Ther terms are fixed beforehand.

>What is consciousness?
>
>Consider a body at the moment before and the moment after death. What is
>it that is different between these two states? Except in cases of death
>by massive trauma (such as being blown up), the structural integrity and
>chemical constitution of the body are not very different at the two
>instants. What, then, determines the instant of death?
>
>We would answer by saying that the soul, or the consciousness, has
>departed, and therefore the organism is no longer alive.

	Life ~== Consciousness.  There are many living things that
are not conscious as far as we know, which qualification may further
damage our prejudice that we are so special, and people go on living
even though they are unconscious.

	Now I grant you that your beliefs can be accepted if stated
in a different context, using another language, subset of english,
but you are the one who has to be careful about setting that context
and not confusing terms.

Bruce Salem
From: johnc@porsche.cs.rpi.edu (John Colasante)
Subject: INFO-WANTED: Diet of Pre-historic man
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Computer Science, Troy NY
Distribution: talk.origins
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1992 19:28:04 GMT


I am looking for any articles or references on the subject of
diet of pre-historic European man, specifically Cro-Magnon; but
broader treatments will be appreciated.

Thanks in Advance,
John Colasante
--
                                     /\      johnc@cs.rpi.edu
          John Colasante           /(*\    johnc@gdstech.grumman.com
World Leader Pretend       /____\         or just holler
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: What is consciousness?
Date: 10 Nov 92 23:32:28 GMT
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode)

In article <1992Nov10.211028.19112@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>, tlode@nyx (trygve lode) writes:
>Well, my guess is that Kalki is an individual but, based on Kalki's
>continued reference to "themselves" as plural, Kalki must be either
>royalty, an editor, or currently carrying a tapeworm.  My current
>leaning is towards the last theory.

Could you be more specific?  Beef tapeworms hang out in your intestines,
looking for a free meal.  Pork tapeworms hang out in your central nervous
system, causing all sorts of seizures.
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)