Question about probabilities and the conditions of life

[BobRyan]

UTEOTW

So now all you have to do is to make a case that the odds of life are less than 1 to 1*10^50. I hope you have some peer reviewed references.

In the mean time I have an experiment for you to do. Take a deck of cards. Shuffle them or not. Now deal out all 52 cards and look at the order.

The odds against that particular order is about 8*10^67. This means that you have just done something that is 8*10^17 less likely than what you just told us was impossible odds.
http://www.baptistboard.com/showpost.php?p=814058&postcount=11

The bogus claim here is that statistical science shows the probability of your being able to do what you did – to be “impossible”.

But in fact the “Truth” is that Statistical science is upheld in this case and the antics of atheist Darwinism’s cultists in using misdirection and obfuscation using half truths – is transparently exposed in THEIR OWN example of “proof” that a hard science like statistics is not reliable as compared to the junk science “Story telling” of Abiogenesis.

 

[BobRyan]

Looking at it another way, let us suppose that substitution is freely allowed in nine-tenths of the loci or positions in the chain. That is, such a tremendous degree of variation is permissible that in a chain of 400, only 40 need be correct and the others can be anything. This would be a similar situation whether one considers a protein chain, or a gene of 400 codons. It is like an exam where all that matters is that you get 40 out of 400 right.

With this extreme amount of variability, the odds against success in a chance arrival at a usable set of either genes or proteins are still fantastic. This is true even at the speed postulated and using all the atoms of the universe in the attempt. Let’s consider the length of time in which just one-half of the required set of genes (or of proteins) might occur by random alignment. We will again measure that time by the number of complete universes the ameba can transport across the diameter of the universe one atom at a time at the unbelievably slow speed described a bit earlier. That number of universes is so large that if all the atoms of the universe were people counting steadily, it would take them 5,000 years just to count those universes which the ameba could carry during the average waiting time for one-half of a minimum gene or protein set to align in usable sequence.

The Single Law of Chance

Émile Borel, a distinguished French expert on probability, stated what he called “the single law of chance,” or merely “the law of chance,” in these words: “Events whose probability is extremely small never occur”29 He calculated that probabilities smaller than 1/1015 were negligible on the terrestrial scale, and, he said:

Could Chance Arrange the Code for One Gene?

​

“ We may be led to set at 10-50 the value of negligible probabilities on the cosmic scale. When the probability of an event is below this limit, the opposite event may be expected to occur with certainty, whatever the number of occasions presenting themselves in the entire universe.”

Émile Borel, Probabilities and Life (New York: Dover Publications, 1962), p. 28.
Regarding Borel’s use of the minus exponent, the reader may recall that this means the same as writing the number as a fraction with the figure 1 on top. 10-50 is the same as 1/1050 or 1 chance in a figure with 50 zeroes.

By “opposite event,” he means no event, or failure to occur. Under the single law of chance, therefore, even a single gene would never be arranged in any usable order in the entire universe, if we apply this statement by the eminent mathematician. One need only to compare the probability of one gene (10-236) with Borel’s 10-50 which he said is the limit of meaningful probabilities on the cosmic scale. What would he say to the figure we got for the minimum set for smallest life, namely, a probability of 10-57800? The ameba’s journeys have made it clear that our minds cannot grasp such an extremely small probability as that involved in the accidental arranging of even one gene (10-236). By the single law of chance, it will never occur.

http://www.creationsafaris.com/epoi_c10.htm

 

[UTEOTW]

As predicted, you completely ignored the data unfavorable to your position.

So, before we can continue, we need to set down a few things. I have no hope that you will actually respond to the following in a direct way, but your failure to do so will be a part of the contuing evidence that you never respond with facts and that you never respond directly to material that challenges your assertions.

First. Does your failure to make a case for banded iron assertions mean that you now accept my evidence that there was once a reducing atmosphere on the earth?

Second. Does your failure to respond to the material on reptile genetics mean that you now accept that you accidentally posted material that favors evolution because you did not know any better because of your lack of knowledge on the subject?

Next. Since you did not respond to my citations of how science has found that there are often trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of sequences that will satisfy a particular functional need mean that you now accept that your posts on the odds of getting a particular sequence are deeply flawed?

As for the equivocation that an enzyme is all you need to build a cell -- (the one that UTEOTW makes in the post above) - one has to wonder about the chiral orientation of all the "proteins" that UTEOTW proposes "to make".

Next. You have done nothing to refute my assertion that science says that the early stages leading to modern life included stages more basic than life we see today including a potential stage where RNA was the information carrying molecule and the enzymic molecule. Since you keep returning to your strawman of needing a fully functional, modern cell, does this mean that you assert that the only possible path for abiogenesis is one in which an essentially modern cell, with DNA and many proteins and organelles and all, pops out from a mix of raw materials? You say that there could have never been simpler systems that built up to what we see today? If so, you need to support this assertion of yours that there could not have been simpler systems. If not, then your whole argument goes out the window since I have shown you how some of these simpler systems may have worked including lab work that shows their plausibility and you have never addressed these posts to show why your think they would not have worked.

That should be enough for now. I have no hope that you will respond in a meaningful way so it is a waste of electrons to continue.

But your failure to respond will be another notch against you. For to respond in a meaningful way would be to abandon the comfort of your fallacies and the smoke and mirrors you use and to get bogged down in the world of facts. And the world of facts is where your arguments fall appart.

On the other hand, to not respond, or to ignore the material I have posted, would be a tacit admission that you have no answer for what science really asserts. This would be devestating to you.

My prediction is that you will take option two. You will ignore everything posted against your position and will just repeat you fallacies and lies and hope you can spin up a story that sounds good even if it has no relation to reality.

And when you do, I will be here to point out how you continue to flee from the facts and continue to not even respond to the facts I have put into play.

 

[BobRyan]

As predicted, you completely ignored the data unfavorable to your position.

Because you PROVIDE NO data unfavorable to my position!!

Get it?!!! you have to SHOW that the STATE of a single celled living creature is FULLY DERIVED - SUCCESSFULLY by some sequence - and you have NOT! You simply CLAIM that an enzyme exists that might be formed in more than one way??!!!

How misleading on your part.

How totally lacking for the data you NEED to show the living cell "result" -- a SINGLE LIVING CELL that is formed from an environment of NON-LIVING CELL -- hence it would be THE FIRST living cell!! -- you know "ABIOGENESIS"!!

Your bait and switch did not take on as you had expected UTEOTW!

So I show ONE of the difficult sequences above - WHICH you PREDICTABLY IGNORE.

Then I point out that Abiogenesis NEEDS to result in an ACTUAL living cell so that we can mutate-and-evolve it into multi-celled life forms (you know UTEOTW - evolutionism!!)

Why are these obvious concepts so difficult for you UTEOTW?

 

[UTEOTW]

As I predicted, you copmpletely ignored my post and the data presented.

You failed to make a meaningful response at all.

I can only conclude that you have given up on those areas identified in my last post since you still have not addressed any of them.

I didn't think I would live to see you admitting defeat on such a broad array of topics.

 

[BobRyan]

You have to SHOW that the STATE of a single celled living creature is FULLY DERIVED - SUCCESSFULLY by some sequence - and you have NOT!

You simply CLAIM that an enzyme exists that might be formed in more than one way??!!!

You want to CLAIM success where you have only failure - then you whine that I do not see your failure as "success".

What kind of strategy is that???

 

[BobRyan]

UTEOTW - your endless misdirection failed to respond substantively to this post given WEEKS ago!! (By that I mean July 16,2006)

http://www.baptistboard.com/showpost.php?p=814824&postcount=72


Looking at it another way, let us suppose that substitution is freely allowed in nine-tenths of the loci or positions in the chain. That is, such a tremendous degree of variation is permissible that in a chain of 400, only 40 need be correct and the others can be anything. This would be a similar situation whether one considers a protein chain, or a gene of 400 codons. It is like an exam where all that matters is that you get 40 out of 400 right.

With this extreme amount of variability, the odds against success in a chance arrival at a usable set of either genes or proteins are still fantastic. This is true even at the speed postulated and using all the atoms of the universe in the attempt. Let’s consider the length of time in which just one-half of the required set of genes (or of proteins) might occur by random alignment. We will again measure that time by the number of complete universes the ameba can transport across the diameter of the universe one atom at a time at the unbelievably slow speed described a bit earlier. That number of universes is so large that if all the atoms of the universe were people counting steadily, it would take them 5,000 years just to count those universes which the ameba could carry during the average waiting time for one-half of a minimum gene or protein set to align in usable sequence.

The Single Law of Chance

Émile Borel, a distinguished French expert on probability, stated what he called “the single law of chance,” or merely “the law of chance,” in these words: “Events whose probability is extremely small never occur”29 He calculated that probabilities smaller than 1/1015 were negligible on the terrestrial scale, and, he said:

Could Chance Arrange the Code for One Gene?​

Quote:
“ We may be led to set at 10-50 the value of negligible probabilities on the cosmic scale. When the probability of an event is below this limit, the opposite event may be expected to occur with certainty, whatever the number of occasions presenting themselves in the entire universe.”

Émile Borel, Probabilities and Life (New York: Dover Publications, 1962), p. 28.
Regarding Borel’s use of the minus exponent, the reader may recall that this means the same as writing the number as a fraction with the figure 1 on top. 10-50 is the same as 1/1050 or 1 chance in a figure with 50 zeroes.

By “opposite event,” he means no event, or failure to occur. Under the single law of chance, therefore, even a single gene would never be arranged in any usable order in the entire universe, if we apply this statement by the eminent mathematician. One need only to compare the probability of one gene (10-236) with Borel’s 10-50 which he said is the limit of meaningful probabilities on the cosmic scale. What would he say to the figure we got for the minimum set for smallest life, namely, a probability of 10-57800? The ameba’s journeys have made it clear that our minds cannot grasp such an extremely small probability as that involved in the accidental arranging of even one gene (10-236). By the single law of chance, it will never occur.

http://www.creationsafaris.com/epoi_c10.htm

 

[BobRyan]

How misleading on your part UTEOTW -- .

How totally lacking for the data you NEED to show the living cell "result" -- a SINGLE LIVING CELL that is formed from an environment of NON-LIVING CELL -- hence it would be THE FIRST living cell!! -- you know "ABIOGENESIS"!!

Your bait and switch did not take on as you had expected UTEOTW!

So I show ONE of the difficult sequences above - WHICH you PREDICTABLY IGNORE.

--------------------------

What???!!

Still no answer UTEOTW??

 

[BobRyan]

So I show ONE of the difficult sequences above - WHICH you PREDICTABLY IGNORE.

Then I point out that Abiogenesis NEEDS to result in an ACTUAL living cell so that we can mutate-and-evolve it into multi-celled life forms (you know UTEOTW - evolutionism!!)

Why are these obvious concepts so difficult for you UTEOTW?

-------------------------

What??

Still no answer UTEOTW??

How "unnexpected"

 

[UTEOTW]

What difficulties you have in reading and responding to a topic. Maybe it would be easier for you if I were to break it down into little pieces for you.

Let's take your calculation of the odds of getting some sequence.

You calculate the odds based on getting a single, specific sequence. I have shown you that this is an incorrect assumption because studies show that trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of differnet sequences are often suitable for a given task.

You have not responded to this.

If you will, please justify your methods of calculation in light of these results.

If you will not do so, then you are demonstrating to us, once again, that you cannot argue fact and instead prefer to argue your own warped view of the universe which has nothing to do at all with reality.

Here is a relevent post for you.

First reference. Ekland EH, and Bartel DP, RNA-catalysed RNA polymerization using nucleoside triphosphates. Nature, 383: 192, 1996

Ekland found that there are 2.5 * 10^112 different 220 amino acid long sequences that will function effectively as a ligase.

It should not be too hard to understand how far off you probability calculation would be if you considered only a single sequence and ignored the other 25 thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion combinations that would work.

But that is just what your calculation does.

Or try this reference. Yockey HP, On the information content of cytochrome c. J Theor Biol, 67: 345-76, 1977.

There are 3.8 * 10^61 different one hundred amino acid long sequences that will function effectively as cyctochrome C.

I could continue.

Unrau PJ, and Bartel DP, RNA-catalysed nucleotide synthesis. Nature, 395: 260-3, 1998.

Wiegand TW, Janssen RC, and Eaton BE, Selection of RNA amide synthases. Chem Biol, 4: 675-83, 1997.

Lohse PA, and Szostak JW, Ribozyme-catalysed amino-acid transfer reactions. Nature, 381: 442-4, 1996.

I can continue showing how big of a mistake you are making by assuming only a single sequence will do.

Every time your assertions are put to the test, they are found to be severely wanting. You must build up strawmen to continue some arguments as you cannot defeat my assertions on the facts.

Do you have any response to this information so devestating to your case?

I doubt it.

 

[BobRyan]

You calculate the odds based on getting a single, specific sequence. I have shown you that this is an incorrect assumption because studies show that trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of differnet sequences are often suitable for a given task.

I am MORE than happy to admit that if we SWITCH to a carefully selected simple NON-Abiogenesis "TASK" and look at IT -- INSTEAD of the aCTUAL problem of abiogenesis - then we might find many pathways that provide the SAME endpoint desired state.

But that multipath-solution has not even been shown ONCE in the case of an actual living cell!!!

EVEN WORSE - we CAN find SPECIFIC problems INSIDE the TASK of arriving at ONE SINGLE living cell (Such as the codon example ALREADY GIVEN in JULY of this year and faithful ignored by fact-challenged believers in atheist darwinism) - that SHOW the statistical impossibility that your storytelling faces in SPECIFIC problems even BELOW the level of the TASK of achieving the needed final state needed to prove the by-faith-alone doctrine of abiogenesis!!

So NOT ONLY are you NOT dealing with the TASK of Abiogenesis of actually deriving a protein-rich ACTUAL living cell - you are ALSO NOT dealing with the more obvious SUBTASKS that are SHOWN to provide MASSIVE problems for your favorite mythology "abiogenesis".

This simply could not be more obvious!

A child can get this!!

 

[UTEOTW]

We'll get back to the abiogenesis shortly.

Let's first deal with your statements about the odds of making a given protein sequence.

Your assertions fall apart when it is learned that trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of differnet sequences are often suitable for a given task.

Can you address this bit of fact or do you concede the point?

The references.

Again.

First reference. Ekland EH, and Bartel DP, RNA-catalysed RNA polymerization using nucleoside triphosphates. Nature, 383: 192, 1996

Ekland found that there are 2.5 * 10^112 different 220 amino acid long sequences that will function effectively as a ligase.

It should not be too hard to understand how far off you probability calculation would be if you considered only a single sequence and ignored the other 25 thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion combinations that would work.

But that is just what your calculation does.

Or try this reference. Yockey HP, On the information content of cytochrome c. J Theor Biol, 67: 345-76, 1977.

There are 3.8 * 10^61 different one hundred amino acid long sequences that will function effectively as cyctochrome C.

I could continue.

Unrau PJ, and Bartel DP, RNA-catalysed nucleotide synthesis. Nature, 395: 260-3, 1998.

Wiegand TW, Janssen RC, and Eaton BE, Selection of RNA amide synthases. Chem Biol, 4: 675-83, 1997.

Lohse PA, and Szostak JW, Ribozyme-catalysed amino-acid transfer reactions. Nature, 381: 442-4, 1996.

I can continue showing how big of a mistake you are making by assuming only a single sequence will do.

Every time your assertions are put to the test, they are found to be severely wanting. You must build up strawmen to continue some arguments as you cannot defeat my assertions on the facts.

Can you see what happens to the odds you calculate when instead of the one suitable sequence that you assume, there are really 25 thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion combinations that would work?

Your argument falls apart.

And you know it. That is why you refuse to even attempt to address this inconvenient fact.

How sad it must be in your world to try to argue a point that has not a single fact to support it.

 

[BobRyan]

I am MORE than happy to admit that if we SWITCH to a carefully selected simple NON-Abiogenesis "TASK" and look at IT -- INSTEAD of the aCTUAL problem of abiogenesis - then we might find many pathways that provide the SAME endpoint desired state.

But that multipath-solution has not even been shown ONCE in the case of an actual living cell!!!

 

[BobRyan]

You make this way toooo easy UTEOTW - because you keep raising a point whose answer is the post ALREADY glossed-over by you!

 

[BobRyan]

But that multipath-solution has not even been shown ONCE in the case of an actual living cell!!!

EVEN WORSE - we CAN find SPECIFIC problems INSIDE the TASK of arriving at ONE SINGLE living cell (Such as the codon example ALREADY GIVEN in JULY of this year and faithful ignored by fact-challenged believers in atheist darwinism) - that SHOW the statistical impossibility that your storytelling faces in SPECIFIC problems even BELOW the level of the TASK of achieving the needed final state needed to prove the by-faith-alone doctrine of abiogenesis!!

So NOT ONLY are you NOT dealing with the TASK of Abiogenesis of actually deriving a protein-rich ACTUAL living cell - you are ALSO NOT dealing with the more obvious SUBTASKS that are SHOWN to provide MASSIVE problems for your favorite mythology "abiogenesis".

This simply could not be more obvious!

A child can get this!!

 

[BobRyan]

UTEOTW - your endless misdirection failed to respond substantively to this post given WEEKS ago!! (By that I mean July 16,2006)

http://www.baptistboard.com/showpost...4&postcount=72


Looking at it another way, let us suppose that substitution is freely allowed in nine-tenths of the loci or positions in the chain. That is, such a tremendous degree of variation is permissible that in a chain of 400, only 40 need be correct and the others can be anything. This would be a similar situation whether one considers a protein chain, or a gene of 400 codons. It is like an exam where all that matters is that you get 40 out of 400 right.

With this extreme amount of variability, the odds against success in a chance arrival at a usable set of either genes or proteins are still fantastic. This is true even at the speed postulated and using all the atoms of the universe in the attempt. Let’s consider the length of time in which just one-half of the required set of genes (or of proteins) might occur by random alignment. We will again measure that time by the number of complete universes the ameba can transport across the diameter of the universe one atom at a time at the unbelievably slow speed described a bit earlier. That number of universes is so large that if all the atoms of the universe were people counting steadily, it would take them 5,000 years just to count those universes which the ameba could carry during the average waiting time for one-half of a minimum gene or protein set to align in usable sequence.

The Single Law of Chance

Émile Borel, a distinguished French expert on probability, stated what he called “the single law of chance,” or merely “the law of chance,” in these words: “Events whose probability is extremely small never occur”29 He calculated that probabilities smaller than 1/1015 were negligible on the terrestrial scale, and, he said:

Could Chance Arrange the Code for One Gene?​

Quote:
“ We may be led to set at 10-50 the value of negligible probabilities on the cosmic scale. When the probability of an event is below this limit, the opposite event may be expected to occur with certainty, whatever the number of occasions presenting themselves in the entire universe.”

Émile Borel, Probabilities and Life (New York: Dover Publications, 1962), p. 28.
Regarding Borel’s use of the minus exponent, the reader may recall that this means the same as writing the number as a fraction with the figure 1 on top. 10-50 is the same as 1/1050 or 1 chance in a figure with 50 zeroes.

By “opposite event,” he means no event, or failure to occur. Under the single law of chance, therefore, even a single gene would never be arranged in any usable order in the entire universe, if we apply this statement by the eminent mathematician. One need only to compare the probability of one gene (10-236) with Borel’s 10-50 which he said is the limit of meaningful probabilities on the cosmic scale. What would he say to the figure we got for the minimum set for smallest life, namely, a probability of 10-57800? The ameba’s journeys have made it clear that our minds cannot grasp such an extremely small probability as that involved in the accidental arranging of even one gene (10-236). By the single law of chance, it will never occur.

http://www.creationsafaris.com/epoi_c10.htm

 

[BobRyan]

Let's review the many-twisted turns of UTEOTW's argument on probability.

#1. He claims that probability science predicts that shuffling a deck of 52 cards and dealing them is "impossible" -- statistcally impossible!! He does this by EQUIVOCATING between the probability of PREDICTING the sequence of a 52 card shuffle (knowing what it is not possible to know) VS being ABLE to pick up a deck of cards and shuffle them!!

And of course - he "claims" that his cadre of believers in atheist darwinism swallow that line of thinking hook-line-and-sinker.

#2. UTEOTW also attacks Emile Borel the nobel winning Mathmatician for his 1:10-50th power limit on "What is possible in all of time" -- AS IF UTEOTW had a better grasp of math than Borel when in fact his 52 card blunder SHOWS that he does not!!

#3. When I point out this blunder - I SHOW that in the case of abiogenesis NOT ONLY can it NOT come up with the 52 card sequence that IS shown to be possible TO HAVE (at least we DO know for certain that ALL sequences for the 52 card shuffle ARE possible just not predictable) -- Abiogenesis has an IMPOSSIBLE result to GET let alone predict.

Like pouring a handfull of sand on the beach and instead of merely having to predict one pattern sequence out of a zillion zillion possible arrangements for each grain of sand that falls - abiogenesis must predict a COMBINATION with the beach sand that results in an exact replica of the Disney Castle!! I.e. A totally IMPOSSIBLE result GREATER than the sum of the parts!

Impossible to GET let alone PREDICT!

UTEOTW then argues that he has MORE than one possible solution for a single given enzyme pre-selected.

AS IF getting ONE simple enzyme IS the WHOLE ABIOGENESIS project!!

This is like saying that for any ONE given shuffle "result" of shuffling the deck of cards there are MORE than one shuffle "sequence of events" that will result in that same sequence of cards in the deck!

That does not solve the problem of PREDICTING the resulting sequence since THAT is what was determined by statistics to be "impossible". Multiple pathways to the SAME sequence IMPOSSIBLE to predict is STILL a sequence IMPOSSIBLE to predict!!

 

[UTEOTW]

Oh, Bob, do you even read your own posts? We know that you often don't read other's posts!

So the issue is the probability of generating a sequence of given length. I have pointed out that you make the mistake of assuming only one possible outcome when in reality there are often trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of possibilities.

In typical style, you respond with material from some website which borders on plagarism since there are few quote marks to set off your words from theirs, if you have any words of your own.

Now, the text at the beginning of your quote makes it sound like it addresses my concern. There is something in there about assuming that 90% of the positions do not matter. Where this number comes from is anyone's guess. In fact, that is what it is. It has no basis in fact.

Furthermore, no actual data is used at all, they chose an arbitrarily long 400 member sequence.

Nothing but assumptions with no basis in fact.

But then they turn around and calculate the odds for a gene. And you know what, they calculate the odds for a specific 400 base pair sequence!

Now, was this dishonesty on your part, by cutting and pasting from different parts and combining them in an inapproprate way.

Or was this dishonesty on the part of your source?

Either way, we learn once again that you cannot make factual posts. In this case, the text says one thing and the numbers another but they are combined to make it seem that things are not as they really are.

So sad that YEism can only make points through deceit.

 

[BobRyan]

UTEOTW - Why not actually respond to the posts?

Why be so adverse to actually quoting the argument's point and responding to it???

So the issue is the probability of generating a sequence of given length. I have pointed out that you make the mistake of assuming only one possible outcome when in reality there are often trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of possibilities.

"As already stated" this point of yours PRESUMES that you have more than one SUCCESSFUL pathway to the abiogenesis endpoint when in fact you have not demonstrated EVEN ONE!!!

Why is that obvious point so difficult for you to grasp??

You SHOW a claim to have a solution for A SINGLE ENZYME and claim that a solution to ONE ENZYME is the SAME as solving the entire ABIOGENSIS problem!! It is the fallacy of equivocation. It merely "proves" that you can misdirect, obfuscate and embrace logical fallacies instead of dealing with the point at hand!!

It also says nothing about the chiral purity of the resulting enzyme! (EVEN if we could pull off your "bait and switch" and focus on ONE simple enzyme INSTEAD of actual ABIOGENESIS!!)

I also point out that having MANY pathways to ONE of the 52 card deal "results" DOES NOT solve the problem of the IMPOSSIBILITY (statistically speaking) of predicting that outcome!!

Your "I believe I can work with one single enzyme if I carefully pick it and if we ignore actual lab results for chiral purity " alternative fails the entire topic!!

 

[BobRyan]

In typical style, you respond with material from some website which borders on plagarism since there are few quote marks to set off your words from theirs, if you have any words of your own.

Here again we have you attempting misdirection in "yet another" empty accusation.

The quote shows the reference and STILL you want to slander!!!