The CSI Challenge of snex

On Jun 30, 9:55 pm, snex <s...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I'm actually surprised to hear you make this argument in any case.
Especially since it is so commonly used in this forum by those in the
evolutionist camp - "Design explains everything . . . and therefore
nothing". Ever hear that one before? It's actually true.

what they mean, of course, is that the design being proposed by
"intelligent design" theorists explains everything. thats because they
are clearly talking about a supernatural force with no limits. when we
talk about the kinds of designs done by humans or other animals, the
limits are easy to find.

Yes, but SETI is looking for alien intelligences - which may be quite
superior to our own. Either way, the potential of intelligence, even
human intelligence, is hard to determine. Given enough time, even the
potential of human intelligence is close to limitless. This is not
true of known mindless processes when it comes to how certain kinds of
materials can me manipulated, shaped, and produced.

Perhaps Howard Hershey can help you out here? This is from a recent
exchange I just had with him in another thread:

________

IOW, SETI researchers do not work by looking for "complexity" or
"simplicity" or "design" in a signal. They look for signals that
appear not to be easily generated by any known natural mechanism but
that have the potential to be generated by entities with technology
that can be extrapolated from human technologies. That *requires*
that they know what type of signal cannot be generated in the absence
of humans. If you want to apply this to evolution, then the IDiots
need to "know" what types of signals cannot evolve in the absence of
humans or human-like entities. Not assume it on the basis that they
cannot think of how it would occur. Know it.

At least you are finally on the right track here, which is more than I
can say for Richard Forrest regarding this particular concept. Your
only problem now is one of asking for what sounds like absolute
certainty. That request goes beyond science. Science does not ask
for someone to "know it" with 100% certainty before "it" can be useful
as a valid scientific hypothesis - with better than even odds of
success.

___________


you keep using examples that always involve
knowing what the intelligent agent we are examining is capable of. how
about you use an example where we dont actually know the capabilities
of the proposed designer? for example, take my CSI challenge. why do
you keep avoiding it?

I don't recall seeing your CSI challenge. Have you ever presented it
to me?

ive presented it to the entire world. the only one from your side that
ever answers is pagano, and his main criticism is what word i use to
refer to the signals.

I've looked at your challenge (listed below).

The only real question is if an obvious pattern can be found which
naturally produced radiosignals would be unlikely to produce. Just
finding a "pattern" is not good enough. It isn't a matter of
"complexity" as defined in this context as apparent "randomness" or
"chaos". And, it isn't a matter of "order" either. What is required
is finding a type of pattern that naturally produced radiosignals are
unlikely to achieve.

Natural sources of radiosignals can produce both basic types of
signals - apparently random "white noise" type signals or rather
orderly signals as are produced by pulsars. However, it is very
unlikely that a natural source would produce a very "simple" sequence
in a narrow-band spectrum. Also, it would be very unlikely that the
type of "specificity" produced would follow a specific mathematical
pattern - like a series of prime numbers or pi. Such signals would be
very good evidence of deliberate artifact.

This is what is important about the concept of "specified
information". The specificity in question here isn't specific
relative to just any type of pattern, but relative to a type of
pattern that isn't remotely approximated by any known non-artifactual
manipulation of the material (radio waves in this case) in question.

You see, it takes some prior experience and investigation of the
material in question before a particular type of bias, once detected,
can be adequately used to support the hypothesis of ID. Given our
experience with the material of radio waves, certain types of biases,
if detected, can provide the hypothesis of ID very good predictive
value.

The same basic idea is true of any other material - even though what
works for one material may not work for another. For example,
determining a high degree of reflective symmetry may not be a good
criterion for intelligent design when it comes to iron pyrite, but it
is a very good criterion for determining ID when it comes to other
materials like granite or marble. See the difference? Do you
understand now why at least some prior experience with the material in
question is needed before the ID hypothesis can be adequately
formulated and supported?

Just one more thing, to illustrate (and I'll use base 10 numbers to
make it more clear). Consider the following representations of
hypothesized radiosignals:

Signal A:

29571068816213339501123873018477 . . .

Signal B:

555888555888555888555888555888555 . . .

Signal C:

31415926535897932384626433832795 . . .


Although Signal A might be artifactual, the hypothesis of deliberate
artifact might be relatively hard to support. Signal B, although very
predictable and obviously biased a potentially artifactual, might also
be non-artifactual in origin. However, if scientists were to ever get
something like Signal C, clearly coming from outer space, its
artifactual nature would be very clear to anyone with a mathematical
background.

You see, Signal C is both complex and specified relative to a pattern
that is very very unlikely to be produced by any natural source of
radiosignals beyond a certain relatively low threshold number of
character positions (i.e., complexity).

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com


The CSI Challenge of snex:

signal A:
110100000110111100101110010100100111101010101011001011001000111010000100
110110010000011101110100111001010111100000110101001001001111100100011001
100110011000101100001000001010011010111001000001111101010000100111110010
000110010110100001001100100110001001110111000001010011001001001100000101
101111111110110010000011111000101011000000101001011100010111100001111101
110101000010000110011111001111000101110100010110100001110111101111100110
101001011100111010110110110000111110101100000001011000100100011111010111
011100101101111001001011101111001101001001001010111011110101100000100001
100111100010000110101101011110110111100100011010101000100111000111110001
101001001011110110110011011111100110000111011000111100001010011111101101
011110011110000110111100010111110111000100010110111100100100111001011100
110111011001101100010100011111001001110100110010111001110010001100110100
001101010010110011100111101000010101010101010011001100010010111001011000
000101001110110100111110010001001111011100010101101010000000100111011110
010001001111110011011100101111101110110001000110011011111111100100000100
111010100010010001111011010110101110111001100110101111101010101010110110
100010101010011000111000101010001000111011011011000010001001010100110011
111100111111100000000110110100001001010101110101000111111010011010101001
1011110110000010101000110111


signal B:
010101010110100000100110011010010110010001100001110100010010000000110000
010101111000000101100100111101000010100101111100010101010011111101110010
001101100110101100011000011000000110000000110110100101000111010001101001
111011010110111101111100001010101101000110100100011011011001000101111111
000110110010101011110001111001101111011111001000011110101100111100001010
101000001010010101100100001000110110010001101101000100100100000001100101
001000101001010101100111001100110010111110000011010101001010000010011001
011100110000101100110111001000101101010110101100100110000110000011110010
010101101110000001010100101100101100011001100010011011010001011010100101
010000000110000110000000011011100011110100000111001001011110001001100100
000000110010101100100101001110110010001100100000011110001010101000110011
000011000000101110000001011000011110011010001001010111110011110001101100
111011000101001101100011000010000101001010111010011111111100010011110110
101011000110111001110100010111010100101010110000011000100111011101100011
011000010100110000010110000110011000000000101000110011010010110000101100
010110110101001111100011001101100000101000100001001010000001001100000111
110000101010101001101001001110100000010000100010010111010111011110000101
111001100110010010011001011101101111010001000100101001101101111101110000
1111110001110000100110101010




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