The Emergence of Crackpots from the SciForums Space-Time

The only current problems I'm aware of with GPS is the problem of the calculated grid of the GPS and the distance to ground. In areas where the distance continually changes, the on-board computations are not properly transformed correctly to the geographic terrestrial coordinates.

But, I believe they'll be testing a new concept, taking those geographical coordinates and transposing them to 3-dimensional grid. Kewl.

 

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Ben, what you've seen is nothing compared to the way it was before you arrived. Look for posts by Prosoothus, MacM, and CANGAS. They will make you want to scream. Emergence of crackpots? No, look back in the archives about 6 months (and earlier). Today, sciforums is enjoying a rennaisance by comparison.

I refer you to the following study of the psychology of the incompetent.

From the article:

"One reason that the ignorant also tend to be the blissfully self-assured, the researchers believe, is that the skills required for competence often are the same skills necessary to recognize competence.

The incompetent, therefore, suffer doubly, they suggested in a paper appearing in the December issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology."

 

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ooooo, putting me on the hotseat eh?

hmmmm. . .

i'm thinking.

i would suppose that reproduction would be the only requirement.
if the above is true then you would have to show how the molecule acquired carbon.

this comes down to semantics doesn't it?

 

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This is AWESOME.

And the title of the thread is kind of a high energy physics joke. Sorry if I'm a geek.

BUT emergence is kind of a buzzword in high energy theory today---it means that the existence of something naturally leads to the existence of something else. So, in that sense, the existence of SciForums naturally leads to the existence of crackpots.

 

Well, not really. I'm sure that only producing DNA exactly like it occurs in nature in a lab would be the proof required for some. It doesn't matter that self replication may be a generic feature of a certain class of molecules. We are afforded much freedom by the elements which occur in nature, and there's no telling if life that developed on Earth (i.e. carbon based) is a general feature of life in the universe, or not.

"Organic" chemistry is the chemistry of a certain class of carbon containing molecules---sp3 and sp2 hybridized carbon carbon bonds, specifically. If one were to replace all of the carbons with silicon, for example, I suppose that you could get at least SIMILAR chemistry. (This may be a bad example, but hopefully the point is clear.) In general, we would call such chemistry "Inorganic". The implication is that the compounds which are most important for life (i.e. organisms) are those that contain carbon.

So, suppose I go into the lab and engineer a molecule which is able to replicate itself, but looks nothing like DNA. From http://unenumerated.blogspot.com/2005/11/patent-goo-self-replicating-paxil.html :

The question is, does "life" necessarily have to lead to "intelligence" to prove evolution?

 

After reading the article Tom2, I have been overcome with a bout of self-inconfidence!

I don't think I'll ever tell a joke again...

 

And there is no one who cannot use this kind of fact in a self-serving fashion.

 

you would have to engineer it from the elements under the conditions that existed at the time of lifes emergence.

no.

 

I agree. At least one should create a reasonable environment.

So I agree with your original assertion that we haven't made something resembles DNA in the lab. But you must agree that we have observed chemical compounds with the general feature of self-replication. And because self-replication is a generic feature of "life", you have to agree that we are creating things that have the features of "life" in general. Now we only have to wait to fill in the details

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Fair enough?

 

That is quite a good question, Ben. Great topic.

 

Does that mean computer viruses that can self replicate are alive?

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I don't know...the current "Evolution is it right" thread has gone to almost 30 pages of posts.

I'll stick it in the back of my head and post it one day when I have more endurance

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Otherwise someone else can start the thread.

 

Yes, perhaps. But they can't write themselves, they still need an "Intelligent Designer". In this case "Designer" = 15 year old kid who listens to goth music and despises authority.

 

And molecules that self-replicate can "write themselves"?

 

I think that Bentheman here is an emerging crackpot.

 

sounds good to me.

reflecting back on your question "must life acquire intelligence to prove evolution" if the life science creates doesn't acquire intelligence then what does that mean for the evolution of man?

so, we are faced with two questions:
1. can life emerge by natural means from the primordial soup?
2. will that life acquire intelligence?

 

computer virii are written by an intelligent being.
they do not just appear.
they also do not evolve naturally, only by human intervention.

 

Only that it is unlikely, not that it is impossible. The universe is infinite, and if it is infinite, then all things happen somewhere. If intelligence isn't a general feature of life, then I'd say that programs like SETI are pretty doomed.

No, I think we are only faced with the first question. After all, we are the only intelligent species on Earth today, and only after a billion years of evolution.

 

No, but the argument is that in the "primordial soup", the fabrication of a self-replicating molecule only has to happen once. This is more likely, I think, than a computer virus spontaneously popping into existence.

 

The probability seems about equal, based on the current evidence.