ARCHIVE: Signals from space aliens or random chance?

[Redfin]

The amount of data sets you have available is irrelevant.

Then it's a good thing that my answer didn't address the amount of data sets.

The point is how and why do we come to the conclusion that a specific one is from an intelligent source. If you agree that it is more likely over a greater time period then you are admitting that any message, no matter how intelligent looking, could be the result of random effects.

Yes, I am admitting that.

However, I'd still believe it to be from an intelligent source.

The idea that something is more probable over a greater amount of time ignores the fact that we all recognise an intelligent source.

That is because those are two unrelated issues that have been brought into false conflict here.

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

Uh .. OK. I don't think you appreciate the fact that Knight was comparing the likelihood of his message as opposed to the likelihood of certain other events .. but thanks anyway ..

Which events specifically? Evolution? ThePhy's Marilyn Monroe problem?

Evolution is not analogous to Knight's conjoint probability message because it involves primarily linearly additive probabilities and has a built-in selection mechanism for retaining the random events that evolution progresses by.

In an extraterrestrial message there are no receiver-operator characteristics as occurs in evolution (look up receiver-operator or ROC theory). SETI can't use the information provided by part of the message to refine or select later signals like evolution can either.

I have to admit that I haven't read all of ThePhy's MM argument in the other thread and some of it seemed a bit muddled to me here and there (possibly due to my skipping around so much) but from what I read he seemed, at one point at least, to be proposing an ROC method of selecting for or against the random pixels that would tend to refine and produce an image of MM. I n another section he was arguing how the human brain would automatically interpolate images in random pixels just as we see patterns in the stars like constellations. He's right that imposing an intelligent agent on a message's recognition dramatically reduces operator complexity at the expense of high receiver complexity. Where you, Knight and ThePhy might have legitimately and innocently been talking past each other was where it seemed ThePhy was satisified with fuzzy incomplete image recognition by a human subject of MM juggling as opposed to the random generation of a crisp unambiguous picture of MM. Where I thought ThePhy was going was that he would say the intelligent fuzzy image recipient (the human) would refine future input signals (like natural selection in evolution) by tending to select and exchange pixels that more closely depicted the MM juggling that his mind already thought it recognized as more and more random pixels came in. Very quickly, the ROC characteristics would enable a very good image of MM juggling if the recipient had a duplicate model image for coherence or was a great artist capable of painting such a pixel picture from scratch. The chances of this happening by random chance (subject to human filtering) are far far greater than Knight's message because conjoint probability is exchanged for linear additive probability.

Nevertheless, I don't like using this type of illustration because it's hard to constrain and explain clearly and invites subjectivity and confusion.

 

[ThePhy]

27²¹¹ = the number of ways 211 characters can be arranged

which is less than

256^640x480 = the number of ways a 256 colour image can be arranged in 640 by 480 pixels.

Still think you have a relevant point?

I know the math. Does Knight?

 

[Stripe]

I know the math. Does Knight?

Yes. He said it was a far simpler exercise to get his message than it would be to get the image of MM.

In comparison to a picture of Marilyn Monroe Juggling Fish being generated via random pixels, or a tennis ball passing effortlessly through a brick wall..... yes... extremely simple compared to those things.

 

[Stripe]

Then it's a good thing that my answer didn't address the amount of data sets.

I'm not sure what you're trying to say overall, regardless, you said greater time = greater probability which is a potentially valid point only if you admit that greater time = more data sets.

 

[chickenman]

This was my original point regarding the appeal to the law of probabilities: One can calculate probability of x event occuring y times over the course of t time when the variables are consistent and/or known. In the case of creating life from non-life, the variables are not completely known and the quantities are inconsistent. It's like playing Yahtzee and making a mathematical case that says over the course of 100 rolls, I'll get five 3's p% of the time. But then after each roll, I add a die, take away a couple of die, put in different dice with letters on them, fewer or more sides, etc.

It doesn't appear that we will ever get on the same page about the point. So I'll ask another question.

Since the creation of life from non-life has NEVER been observed, then would the atheist admit that he/she has faith that it is true? I didn't observe God create life, so I accept it on faith, based on God's Word. Can the atheist admit to having faith in an idea and admit that the need for empirical evidence does not and cannot apply in this case? Therefore, he/she is willing to accept something without having obtained empirical evidence?

Thank you!

chickenman :chicken:

 

[ThePhy]

Well as a thought experiment you have to assume some constants.. like the same ball wall every time except the arrangement of the atoms. Or the ball/wall would wear out long before the atomic forces.

Don’t get to take anything with you into the next life (unless you happen to be an Egyptian Pharaoh whose tomb hasn’t been raided). So tennis balls and walls have to be bought on the other side. Best vendor is “Eternal Sports”, who also make flying flaming chariots and staffs that turn into snakes when thrown down. Make really good tennis balls, guaranteed for a minimum of 2 eternities.

 

[ThePhy]

... googleplex (10^100). …

Fine point of correction – the word is “googolplex” (with 3 “o”s), not googleplex (with 2 “o”s), and 10^100 is a googol, which is a bit smaller than a googolplex. (I highly advise no one try writing the number of zeros to be found after the 1 in a googolplex, which is 10^googol.)

 

[ThePhy]

Yes. He said it was a far simpler exercise to get his message than it would be to get the image of MM.

Knight making the assertion about the relative likelihoods does not demonstrate an understanding of the underlying math. For example, you mention the tennis ball – wall problem. Yet I suspect you actually don’t have the foggiest idea of even how to approach the math behind that problem, do you?

 

[zoo22]

Knight, I think I know what's going on... Did you intercept an alien transmission and are trying to determine whether it's real or random?

I told you not to stop wearing that tin foil hat!!

 

[chickenman]

I thought a googleplex was a movie theater that plays 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 movies?

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

It doesn't appear that we will ever get on the same page about the point. So I'll ask another question.

Right, because you can't admit you're wrong about your statistical understanding. You're obviously backtracking and avoiding the landmines you set for yourself in earlier posts. Conveniently forgotten now are they?

Since the creation of life from non-life has NEVER been observed, then would the atheist admit that he/she has faith that it is true? I didn't observe God create life, so I accept it on faith, based on God's Word. Can the atheist admit to having faith in an idea and admit that the need for empirical evidence does not and cannot apply in this case? Therefore, he/she is willing to accept something without having obtained empirical evidence?

That's a canard you true believers love to throw around and atheists are very very tired of it.

No it's not faith, that's believing in something without evidence. That evidence includes not only empirical evidence but formal logic. There are many things science has not observed and perhaps will never observe like the Big Bang. Unless we have a time machine or find the fossils of some missing transitional forms we'll never have empirical evidence for that either. We use induction and inference on evidence and knowledge we do have.

Without a time machine we'll never know exactly how abiogenesis occurred on earth. But we know enough knowledge of chemistry and physics as well as experiments that it is plausible. We've discovered primitive molecules that can self-catalyze and self-replicate. We've generated all the main chemical precusors of life (the building blocks of proteins, DNA, and RNA) in test tubes using a wide variety of postulated early-earth environments. We haven't discovered any naturalistic block to the formation of a primitive form of replicating molecule that could have evolved into more complex forms.

So we have a plausible hypothesis completely consistent with everything we can know and see and measure in the natural world without having to add the additional complexity and inexplicablility of miracles. If there was a more plausible theory of how life arose than I would change my mind but the supernatural God explanation cannot be logically superior without more plausible supernatural evidence. Logic supports parsimony. Logic supports trying to explain something by what we have access to understanding rather than that which you can never intrinsically understand.

On the surface your Goddidit seems like a simple explanation for everything but it really isn't because God must be greater than everything he creates. The whole must be greater than the sum of its parts. However improbable the universe must seem anything greater than the universe (i.e., the Universe + God) must be more improbable. Only evidence for God can conquer that and satisfactory evidence for God just isn't there.

So by my definitions I don't have faith in anything. I have trust in science reasoning and logic because they can be confirmed experimentally and by logic. They make useful predictions and do useful work. Faith offers none of that. It is an illusion that robs from reason, imitates evidence, and leads to delusion.

 

[Stripe]

Knight making the assertion about the relative likelihoods does not demonstrate an understanding of the underlying math.

You're determined to be right, aren't you. Or failing that someone else must be more wrong...

For example, you mention the tennis ball – wall problem. Yet I suspect you actually don’t have the foggiest idea of even how to approach the math behind that problem, do you?

Come on, ThePhy. The tennis ball problem will be far in away more unlikely than any of the other things we've discussed. I would know how to approach the maths if I were capable of determining the numbers involved.

 

[Stripe]

Right, because you can't admit you're wrong about your statistical understanding. You're obviously backtracking and avoiding the landmines you set for yourself in earlier posts. Conveniently forgotten now are they?

Not at all. Tell us how the probability of Knight's message being randomly generated is less likely than the probability of the image of MM being randomly generated and I'm sure Chickenman will admit to being wrong. I know I will.

There's a challenge for your Super-Statistical-Self!

 

[chickenman]

Right, because you can't admit you're wrong about your statistical understanding. You're obviously backtracking and avoiding the landmines you set for yourself in earlier posts. Conveniently forgotten now are they?

Uhhh...nay, nay oh faithless one. I could just as easily say the same thing about you. But the back and forth is proving fruitless. If you like, though, we can keep at the same 'ol same 'ol.

And by the way, I thought it was a petard? Now I'm laying landmines. Your religion is nuts, but I sure love the creativity in your metaphors. So thanks for working my right brain as well. It helps to soothe the headache on my left.

That's a canard you true believers love to throw around and atheists are very very tired of it.

No it's not faith, that's believing in something without evidence. That evidence includes not only empirical evidence but formal logic. There are many things science has not observed and perhaps will never observe like the Big Bang. Unless we have a time machine or find the fossils of some missing transitional forms we'll never have empirical evidence for that either. We use induction and inference on evidence and knowledge we do have.

Without a time machine we'll never know exactly how abiogenesis occurred on earth. But we know enough knowledge of chemistry and physics as well as experiments that it is plausible. We've discovered primitive molecules that can self-catalyze and self-replicate. We've generated all the main chemical precusors of life (the building blocks of proteins, DNA, and RNA) in test tubes using a wide variety of postulated early-earth environments. We haven't discovered any naturalistic block to the formation of a primitive form of replicating molecule that could have evolved into more complex forms.

So we have a plausible hypothesis completely consistent with everything we can know and see and measure in the natural world without having to add the additional complexity and inexplicablility of miracles. If there was a more plausible theory of how life arose than I would change my mind but the supernatural God explanation cannot be logically superior without more plausible supernatural evidence. Logic supports parsimony. Logic supports trying to explain something by what we have access to understanding rather than that which you can never intrinsically understand.

On the surface your Goddidit seems like a simple explanation for everything but it really isn't because God must be greater than everything he creates. The whole must be greater than the sum of its parts. However improbable the universe must seem anything greater than the universe (i.e., the Universe + God) must be more improbable. Only evidence for God can conquer that and satisfactory evidence for God just isn't there.

So by my definitions I don't have faith in anything. I have trust in science reasoning and logic because they can be confirmed experimentally and by logic. They make useful predictions and do useful work. Faith offers none of that. It is an illusion that robs from reason, imitates evidence, and leads to delusion.

That's a whole lot of fluff that only dances around the issue. Observance of activity in primitive molecules and "generating all the main chemical precursors of life" has never produced life from non-life. It has never produced a momentary life that quickly died. It has never produced an almost. You have evidence of a lot of things that you rationalize into supporting a ludicrous idea, but you have no proof. Therefore, by definition, you must accept it on faith. No need to be scared of the word. It is a fact of life.

 

[Nathon Detroit]

Knight making the assertion about the relative likelihoods does not demonstrate an understanding of the underlying math. For example, you mention the tennis ball – wall problem. Yet I suspect you actually don’t have the foggiest idea of even how to approach the math behind that problem, do you?

I am not a Mathematican. I have never claimed to be one.

But I am pretty sure that getting 40 words in the correct order is far more probable than getting 307,200 pixels in the correct order and all while having each pixel be the appropriate shade of 256 color variations (assuming we were only shooting for a "dumbed down" 8 bit image).

 

[Nathon Detroit]

How far off topic are we going to get? The degree of complexity in the message is a non-issue. The point is, when and why does one acknowledge an intelligent source?

Yeah... but if he makes a really long post with a bunch of numbers and wikipedia references he will look really, really smart.

 

[Stripe]

I am not a Mathematican. I have never claimed to be one.

But I am pretty sure that getting 40 letters in the correct order is far more probable than getting 307,200 pixels in the correct order and all while having each pixel be the appropriate shade of 256 color variations (assuming we were only shooting for a "dumbed down" 8 bit image).

27²¹¹ < 256^640x480

 

[Stripe]

Yeah... but if he makes a really long post with a bunch of numbers and wikipedia references he will look really, really smart.

Gosh. Where would one learn a silly approach to things like that from?

 

[FedUpWithFaith]

Yeah... but if he makes a really long post with a bunch of numbers and wikipedia references he will look really, really smart.

More hot air innuendo from you as usual. When will you directly address the argument rather than preach and insult? Because you can't. You either know I'm right and are too dishonest to admit it or you know you're not smart enough to disprove it. That's why you obfuscate with comments like the above and it's obvious to all thinking people, Christian and atheist alike. I don't care about the rest. Those who can't or refuse to think are hopeless.

I left very little to wikipedia except as a reference to show where I got SETI's signal measuring rates from in my calculations. All the other calculations were done de novo by SUTG or I.

It's put up or shut up time.

But it won't happen. Your self-righteous kind can never admit a mistake.