Creation of information

[Nils]

Nils wrote:
Yes, it is, but there are lot of much more complicated designs in biology.

I’m glad you have finally realized this!

Sorry, I forgot for a moment which forum I'm visiting. I should have written:
"there are lot of much more complicated apparent designs in biology"

Nils

[RickD]

Nils wrote:
Yes, it is, but there are lot of much more complicated designs in biology.

I’m glad you have finally realized this!

Sorry, I forgot for a moment which forum I'm visiting. I should have written:
"there are lot of much more complicated apparent designs in biology"

Nils

“Apparent design” is fine too!

[Nils]

DB,
let's discuss the example Cepheid variables. They are a class of stars with the nice property that their diameter and luminosity varies with time, 1-50 day period, and the period length is directly proportional to the mean luminosity. This makes them an important tool for measuring distances. If you know the period length and the brightness you get in a telescope you can calculate the distance, see also Wikipedia.

If you take for instance the photons a specific Cepheid sends during 100 days, they determine the mean luminosity of the star. Data about the photons give the information of the luminosity. Say that some of these photons arrive to the Earth 100 000 of years later and you measure them to get the period, the brightness, and the direction. You then have a lot of data and from that you can extract the information about the luminosity, the distance and the position in the Universe (relative to the Earth).

The source of the information is the star, its brightness and its position. This information is sent from the star in all directions and is coded by the behaviour of the photons. It can be extracted everywhere in a sphere that is 100 000 light years in radius at some time during the 100 000 years it take the photons to reach the Earth. The data about the photons can be measured and from that the information can be extracted.

Using the concepts of Shannon information theory the star is the sender of the information, the observer at the Earth is the receiver of it and the message is encoded in the behaviour of the photons.

You seem to think that information is created by an intelligence at the arrival of the data but I think that the Cepheid example (and my earlier examples) show why you are wrong.

Nils

[DBowling]

DB,
let's discuss the example Cepheid variables. They are a class of stars with the nice property that their diameter and luminosity varies with time, 1-50 day period, and the period length is directly proportional to the mean luminosity. This makes them an important tool for measuring distances. If you know the period length and the brightness you get in a telescope you can calculate the distance, see also Wikipedia.

If you take for instance the photons a specific Cepheid sends during 100 days, they determine the mean luminosity of the star. Data about the photons give the information of the luminosity. Say that some of these photons arrive to the Earth 100 000 of years later and you measure them to get the period, the brightness, and the direction. You then have a lot of data and from that you can extract the information about the luminosity, the distance and the position in the Universe (relative to the Earth).

The source of the information is the star, its brightness and its position. This information is sent from the star in all directions and is coded by the behaviour of the photons. It can be extracted everywhere in a sphere that is 100 000 light years in radius at some time during the 100 000 years it take the photons to reach the Earth. The data about the photons can be measured and from that the information can be extracted.

Using the concepts of Shannon information theory the star is the sender of the information, the observer at the Earth is the receiver of it and the message is encoded in the behaviour of the photons.

You seem to think that information is created by an intelligence at the arrival of the data but I think that the Cepheid example (and my earlier examples) show why you are wrong.

In this particular example there is no code and there is no meaning.

The star provides data, but not information.
There is structure and organization to the behavior of the star that are a function of the laws of nature, but there is no code, there is no meaning, there is no purpose.

The data from the star is useless or meaningless until an intelligence gathers and organizes the data from the star for some meaningful purpose, such as using the data from the star to measure distances.

Again... a key attribute of information is meaning or purpose. And meaning and purpose are functions of intelligence.

As I said earlier, I believe the order, structure, and yes design of the universe and the laws of nature which govern the universe are also indicators of intelligence.
So even though stars are not intelligent and do not create information, I do think that the non-random structure, organization, and behavior of stars are an indicator of an intelligent designer and creator of our universe.

[PaulSacramento]

Paul and Philip,
random mutations give no information. It is random mutations + natural selection that do the job. You should know.
Same as everyday trial and error. Trial is more and less random. Error is the feed back, a selection mechanism.
Nils

What drives natural selection? how does "nature select" ?

Don't you understand the evolution theory?? See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_selection. If you then have questions I will try to answer.
Nils

Yes, since you know how it works also.

I don't think I can explain it better than Wikipedia, but OK:

Explain how natural selection came to be?

It's an integral part of life. I don't think that life without natural selection is possible.

How does natural selection work? not the results, but the actual process.

All individuals are threatened losing there lives all the time. Those that survive so long that they get many descendants have the "best"genes and their descendants will inherit them.

How does it decide what is an advantageous trait ??

"Nature" doesn't decide, it just happens! It's part of living. See above. If you and your friend are chased by a lion, the fastest runner will survive.

Does it have intelligence?

Definitely not.

Questions?
Nils

IT
JUST
HAPPENS.

WOW.

[PaulSacramento]

There are TWO views of evolution VIA natural "selection".
One is the "adaptive" view in which, a random mutation causes a change that allows an organism to adapt to a change in the environment, ex:
Mutation causes wolf fur to grow thicker, wolf adapts to colder climate.
Mutation precedes adaptation which is driven by the environment and then, SOME HOW, "nature" "Selects" that mutation as beneficial. By CHANCE.

The other is that the environment drives mutations, which means that a random mutation in the gene is driven ( or is caused by) the environment:
Cold climate causes the wolf to grow thicker fur, thus adapting to the different environment.

Mutation as also "revert" to the past, to what they were ( thicker fur becomes thinner again) with changes in the environment.

HOW? supposedly it JUST HAPPENS.

[Nils]

DB,
let's discuss the example Cepheid variables. They are a class of stars with the nice property that their diameter and luminosity varies with time, 1-50 day period, and the period length is directly proportional to the mean luminosity. This makes them an important tool for measuring distances. If you know the period length and the brightness you get in a telescope you can calculate the distance, see also Wikipedia.

If you take for instance the photons a specific Cepheid sends during 100 days, they determine the mean luminosity of the star. Data about the photons give the information of the luminosity. Say that some of these photons arrive to the Earth 100 000 of years later and you measure them to get the period, the brightness, and the direction. You then have a lot of data and from that you can extract the information about the luminosity, the distance and the position in the Universe (relative to the Earth).

The source of the information is the star, its brightness and its position. This information is sent from the star in all directions and is coded by the behaviour of the photons. It can be extracted everywhere in a sphere that is 100 000 light years in radius at some time during the 100 000 years it take the photons to reach the Earth. The data about the photons can be measured and from that the information can be extracted.

Using the concepts of Shannon information theory the star is the sender of the information, the observer at the Earth is the receiver of it and the message is encoded in the behaviour of the photons.

You seem to think that information is created by an intelligence at the arrival of the data but I think that the Cepheid example (and my earlier examples) show why you are wrong.

In this particular example there is no code and there is no meaning.

The star provides data, but not information.
There is structure and organization to the behavior of the star that are a function of the laws of nature, but there is no code, there is no meaning, there is no purpose.

The data from the star is useless or meaningless until an intelligence gathers and organizes the data from the star for some meaningful purpose, such as using the data from the star to measure distances.

Again... a key attribute of information is meaning or purpose. And meaning and purpose are functions of intelligence.

The information is there, coded into the data. The coding is the same as in a FM radio where FM stands for frequency modulation. The brilliance of the star is modulated as a sinusoidal wave of brilliance variance and also by the number of photons.

There is information in the data. If you have an observer close to the star it can extract the information from the data as well as an observer 100 000 thousand years later can do on the Earth using the same data. Do you mean that you can get information from the data close to the star and then 100 000 years later from the same data but that the information doesn't exist during the time between? That assumes a strange definition of information.
https://www.diffen.com/difference/Data_vs_Information that you referred to before says:
"When data is processed, organized, structured or presented in a given context so as to make it useful, it is called information. " That doesn't mean that there is no information in the data, it only means that it has to be extracted.
Nils

[Nils]

What do you say about this quotation from Wikipedia /Information?
"The colored light reflected from a flower is too weak to do much photosynthetic work but the visual system of the bee detects it and the bee's nervous system uses the information to guide the bee to the flower, where the bee often finds nectar or pollen, which are causal inputs, serving a nutritional function. "
Nils

That looks like some pretty sophisticated design to me.

Here you say that the bee's nervous system processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information. This seems contradictory to your statement that
"b. The only observed causal agent (definer and creator) of information is intelligence."
The information here is created by the flower (my opinion) or the bee (your opinion) and neither is an intelligence I think.

Nils

Yes, it is, but there are lot of much more complicated designs in biology.

There is definitely lots of evidence of design in biology.

What's you comment on the use of 'information' here?

Here's how I look at it...
I don't see the sensory input as information.
I see the sensory input as data.
The bee's nervous system then processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information that the bee can use to find the flower.

The sensory input is useless to the bee until it is processed and organized by the bee's nervous system.

Here you say that the bee's nervous system processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information. This seems contradictory to your statement that
"b. The only observed causal agent (definer and creator) of information is intelligence."
The information here is created by the flower (my opinion) or the bee (your opinion) and neither is an intelligence I think.

Nils

[PaulSacramento]

DB,
let's discuss the example Cepheid variables. They are a class of stars with the nice property that their diameter and luminosity varies with time, 1-50 day period, and the period length is directly proportional to the mean luminosity. This makes them an important tool for measuring distances. If you know the period length and the brightness you get in a telescope you can calculate the distance, see also Wikipedia.

If you take for instance the photons a specific Cepheid sends during 100 days, they determine the mean luminosity of the star. Data about the photons give the information of the luminosity. Say that some of these photons arrive to the Earth 100 000 of years later and you measure them to get the period, the brightness, and the direction. You then have a lot of data and from that you can extract the information about the luminosity, the distance and the position in the Universe (relative to the Earth).

The source of the information is the star, its brightness and its position. This information is sent from the star in all directions and is coded by the behaviour of the photons. It can be extracted everywhere in a sphere that is 100 000 light years in radius at some time during the 100 000 years it take the photons to reach the Earth. The data about the photons can be measured and from that the information can be extracted.

Using the concepts of Shannon information theory the star is the sender of the information, the observer at the Earth is the receiver of it and the message is encoded in the behaviour of the photons.

You seem to think that information is created by an intelligence at the arrival of the data but I think that the Cepheid example (and my earlier examples) show why you are wrong.

In this particular example there is no code and there is no meaning.

The star provides data, but not information.
There is structure and organization to the behavior of the star that are a function of the laws of nature, but there is no code, there is no meaning, there is no purpose.

The data from the star is useless or meaningless until an intelligence gathers and organizes the data from the star for some meaningful purpose, such as using the data from the star to measure distances.

Again... a key attribute of information is meaning or purpose. And meaning and purpose are functions of intelligence.

The information is there, coded into the data. The coding is the same as in a FM radio where FM stands for frequency modulation. The brilliance of the star is modulated as a sinusoidal wave of brilliance variance and also by the number of photons.

There is information in the data. If you have an observer close to the star it can extract the information from the data as well as an observer 100 000 thousand years later can do on the Earth using the same data. Do you mean that you can get information from the data close to the star and then 100 000 years later from the same data but that the information doesn't exist during the time between? That assumes a strange definition of information.
https://www.diffen.com/difference/Data_vs_Information that you referred to before says:
"When data is processed, organized, structured or presented in a given context so as to make it useful, it is called information. " That doesn't mean that there is no information in the data, it only means that it has to be extracted.
Nils

How did it get "coded" into the "data"?

[Nils]

DB,
let's discuss the example Cepheid variables. They are a class of stars with the nice property that their diameter and luminosity varies with time, 1-50 day period, and the period length is directly proportional to the mean luminosity. This makes them an important tool for measuring distances. If you know the period length and the brightness you get in a telescope you can calculate the distance, see also Wikipedia.

If you take for instance the photons a specific Cepheid sends during 100 days, they determine the mean luminosity of the star. Data about the photons give the information of the luminosity. Say that some of these photons arrive to the Earth 100 000 of years later and you measure them to get the period, the brightness, and the direction. You then have a lot of data and from that you can extract the information about the luminosity, the distance and the position in the Universe (relative to the Earth).

The source of the information is the star, its brightness and its position. This information is sent from the star in all directions and is coded by the behaviour of the photons. It can be extracted everywhere in a sphere that is 100 000 light years in radius at some time during the 100 000 years it take the photons to reach the Earth. The data about the photons can be measured and from that the information can be extracted.

Using the concepts of Shannon information theory the star is the sender of the information, the observer at the Earth is the receiver of it and the message is encoded in the behaviour of the photons.

You seem to think that information is created by an intelligence at the arrival of the data but I think that the Cepheid example (and my earlier examples) show why you are wrong.

In this particular example there is no code and there is no meaning.

The star provides data, but not information.
There is structure and organization to the behavior of the star that are a function of the laws of nature, but there is no code, there is no meaning, there is no purpose.

The data from the star is useless or meaningless until an intelligence gathers and organizes the data from the star for some meaningful purpose, such as using the data from the star to measure distances.

Again... a key attribute of information is meaning or purpose. And meaning and purpose are functions of intelligence.

The information is there, coded into the data. The coding is the same as in a FM radio where FM stands for frequency modulation. The brilliance of the star is modulated as a sinusoidal wave of brilliance variance and also by the number of photons.

There is information in the data. If you have an observer close to the star it can extract the information from the data as well as an observer 100 000 thousand years later can do on the Earth using the same data. Do you mean that you can get information from the data close to the star and then 100 000 years later from the same data but that the information doesn't exist during the time between? That assumes a strange definition of information.
https://www.diffen.com/difference/Data_vs_Information that you referred to before says:
"When data is processed, organized, structured or presented in a given context so as to make it useful, it is called information. " That doesn't mean that there is no information in the data, it only means that it has to be extracted.
Nils

How did it get "coded" into the "data"?

By some physical process that I don't know.
Nils

[DBowling]

What do you say about this quotation from Wikipedia /Information?
"The colored light reflected from a flower is too weak to do much photosynthetic work but the visual system of the bee detects it and the bee's nervous system uses the information to guide the bee to the flower, where the bee often finds nectar or pollen, which are causal inputs, serving a nutritional function. "
Nils

That looks like some pretty sophisticated design to me.

Here you say that the bee's nervous system processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information. This seems contradictory to your statement that
"b. The only observed causal agent (definer and creator) of information is intelligence."
The information here is created by the flower (my opinion) or the bee (your opinion) and neither is an intelligence I think.

Nils

Yes, it is, but there are lot of much more complicated designs in biology.

There is definitely lots of evidence of design in biology.

What's you comment on the use of 'information' here?

Here's how I look at it...
I don't see the sensory input as information.
I see the sensory input as data.
The bee's nervous system then processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information that the bee can use to find the flower.

The sensory input is useless to the bee until it is processed and organized by the bee's nervous system.

Here you say that the bee's nervous system processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information. This seems contradictory to your statement that
"b. The only observed causal agent (definer and creator) of information is intelligence."
The information here is created by the flower (my opinion) or the bee (your opinion) and neither is an intelligence I think.

The bee example is very similar to your computer in a maze example.

The bee receives input data regarding its surroundings
The computer receives input data regarding its surroundings.

The bee's central nervous system processes the input data into information that can be used by the bee.
The computer's program processes the input data into information that can be used by the computer.

The design of the bee's central nervous system can be traced back to an intelligent designer.
The design of the computer's program can be traced back to an intelligent designer.

[PaulSacramento]

DB,
let's discuss the example Cepheid variables. They are a class of stars with the nice property that their diameter and luminosity varies with time, 1-50 day period, and the period length is directly proportional to the mean luminosity. This makes them an important tool for measuring distances. If you know the period length and the brightness you get in a telescope you can calculate the distance, see also Wikipedia.

If you take for instance the photons a specific Cepheid sends during 100 days, they determine the mean luminosity of the star. Data about the photons give the information of the luminosity. Say that some of these photons arrive to the Earth 100 000 of years later and you measure them to get the period, the brightness, and the direction. You then have a lot of data and from that you can extract the information about the luminosity, the distance and the position in the Universe (relative to the Earth).

The source of the information is the star, its brightness and its position. This information is sent from the star in all directions and is coded by the behaviour of the photons. It can be extracted everywhere in a sphere that is 100 000 light years in radius at some time during the 100 000 years it take the photons to reach the Earth. The data about the photons can be measured and from that the information can be extracted.

Using the concepts of Shannon information theory the star is the sender of the information, the observer at the Earth is the receiver of it and the message is encoded in the behaviour of the photons.

You seem to think that information is created by an intelligence at the arrival of the data but I think that the Cepheid example (and my earlier examples) show why you are wrong.

In this particular example there is no code and there is no meaning.

The star provides data, but not information.
There is structure and organization to the behavior of the star that are a function of the laws of nature, but there is no code, there is no meaning, there is no purpose.

The data from the star is useless or meaningless until an intelligence gathers and organizes the data from the star for some meaningful purpose, such as using the data from the star to measure distances.

Again... a key attribute of information is meaning or purpose. And meaning and purpose are functions of intelligence.

The information is there, coded into the data. The coding is the same as in a FM radio where FM stands for frequency modulation. The brilliance of the star is modulated as a sinusoidal wave of brilliance variance and also by the number of photons.

There is information in the data. If you have an observer close to the star it can extract the information from the data as well as an observer 100 000 thousand years later can do on the Earth using the same data. Do you mean that you can get information from the data close to the star and then 100 000 years later from the same data but that the information doesn't exist during the time between? That assumes a strange definition of information.
https://www.diffen.com/difference/Data_vs_Information that you referred to before says:
"When data is processed, organized, structured or presented in a given context so as to make it useful, it is called information. " That doesn't mean that there is no information in the data, it only means that it has to be extracted.
Nils

How did it get "coded" into the "data"?

By some physical process that I don't know.
Nils

Process?
1.
a series of actions or steps taken in order to achieve a particular end.

[Nils]

In this particular example there is no code and there is no meaning.

The star provides data, but not information.
There is structure and organization to the behavior of the star that are a function of the laws of nature, but there is no code, there is no meaning, there is no purpose.

The data from the star is useless or meaningless until an intelligence gathers and organizes the data from the star for some meaningful purpose, such as using the data from the star to measure distances.

Again... a key attribute of information is meaning or purpose. And meaning and purpose are functions of intelligence.

The information is there, coded into the data. The coding is the same as in a FM radio where FM stands for frequency modulation. The brilliance of the star is modulated as a sinusoidal wave of brilliance variance and also by the number of photons.

There is information in the data. If you have an observer close to the star it can extract the information from the data as well as an observer 100 000 thousand years later can do on the Earth using the same data. Do you mean that you can get information from the data close to the star and then 100 000 years later from the same data but that the information doesn't exist during the time between? That assumes a strange definition of information.
https://www.diffen.com/difference/Data_vs_Information that you referred to before says:
"When data is processed, organized, structured or presented in a given context so as to make it useful, it is called information. " That doesn't mean that there is no information in the data, it only means that it has to be extracted.
Nils

How did it get "coded" into the "data"?

By some physical process that I don't know.
Nils

Process?
1.
a series of actions or steps taken in order to achieve a particular end.

Rather (2): a continuing natural or biological activity or function
(https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/process)
Nils

[Nils]

That looks like some pretty sophisticated design to me.

Here you say that the bee's nervous system processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information. This seems contradictory to your statement that
"b. The only observed causal agent (definer and creator) of information is intelligence."
The information here is created by the flower (my opinion) or the bee (your opinion) and neither is an intelligence I think.

Nils

Yes, it is, but there are lot of much more complicated designs in biology.

There is definitely lots of evidence of design in biology.

What's you comment on the use of 'information' here?

Here's how I look at it...
I don't see the sensory input as information.
I see the sensory input as data.
The bee's nervous system then processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information that the bee can use to find the flower.

The sensory input is useless to the bee until it is processed and organized by the bee's nervous system.

Here you say that the bee's nervous system processes and organizes the input data into meaningful information. This seems contradictory to your statement that
"b. The only observed causal agent (definer and creator) of information is intelligence."
The information here is created by the flower (my opinion) or the bee (your opinion) and neither is an intelligence I think.

The bee example is very similar to your computer in a maze example.

The bee receives input data regarding its surroundings
The computer receives input data regarding its surroundings.

The bee's central nervous system processes the input data into information that can be used by the bee.
The computer's program processes the input data into information that can be used by the computer.

The design of the bee's central nervous system can be traced back to an intelligent designer.
The design of the computer's program can be traced back to an intelligent designer.

You say that the design of the bee's central nervous system can be traced back to an intelligent designer. I assume that you then think that
(1) any biological phenomenon in nature can be traced back to an intelligent designer.

In #42 I referred to two statements of Meyer:
6:32 "We know from our experience that information always arrives from an intelligence source." and
6:52 "Whenever we see information and we trace it back to a source it always comes to a mind not an undirected material process".

If what you say, (1), is correct the two statements are truisms, because then there are nothing biological that can't be traced back to an intelligence. If so, Meyer's two statements are useless to rebut the evolution theory because they are true independent of the truth of the evolution theory. Both the evolution theory and (1) can be true at the same time and then Meyer's arguments are useless. This is what I tried to explain before that (1) or similar statements prove too much. (This was the error in tracing information back to the source of the source which you insisted on).

I can't believe that (1) is an argument Meyer supports. He must have assumed some argument that isn't so strong namely that that material processes, for instance natural evolution, aren't capable to create information. But that is also wrong.
(Another way to say this is to refer to 6:52. The negation of this statement is that tracing backwards we may come to an undirected material process. That is what Meyer tries to rebut but there is no need to do that if (1) is thrue)

Nils

[DBowling]

The bee example is very similar to your computer in a maze example.

The bee receives input data regarding its surroundings
The computer receives input data regarding its surroundings.

The bee's central nervous system processes the input data into information that can be used by the bee.
The computer's program processes the input data into information that can be used by the computer.

The design of the bee's central nervous system can be traced back to an intelligent designer.
The design of the computer's program can be traced back to an intelligent designer.

You say that the design of the bee's central nervous system can be traced back to an intelligent designer. I assume that you then think that
(1) any biological phenomenon in nature can be traced back to an intelligent designer.

My position (based on empirical observation) is that design in general (biological or otherwise) can eventually be traced back to an intelligent designer.

In #42 I referred to two statements of Meyer:
6:32 "We know from our experience that information always arrives from an intelligence source." and
6:52 "Whenever we see information and we trace it back to a source it always comes to a mind not an undirected material process".

If what you say, (1), is correct the two statements are truisms, because then there are nothing biological that can't be traced back to an intelligence.

I would say that they are truth...
Based on empirical observation.

If so, Meyer's two statements are useless to rebut the evolution theory because they are true independent of the truth of the evolution theory.

I disagree...
Meyer's two statements are a function of empirical observation.
And Meyer's two statements directly refute the totally unverified premise that random mutation and natural selection alone are capable of infusing the biosphere with the information that we see in the fossil record and in the DNA of life today.