The wiring of the eye: Is it poor design?

[TaO!]

I've spent a fair few hours researching rod photoreceptor cells and I'm not convinced it's a bad 'design'. It does seem intuitive that the axons of photoreceptors are wired backwards, however it seems quite necessary considering shed rod outer segments (ROS) are phagocytosed by the retinal pigmented epithelium (RPE) and it provides and recycles retinal to the opsin. If the axons were to leave the eye distally, as seem logical to most people, the RPE, along with it's blood supply, would need to lie between the photoreptors and the pupil to do its job and it would pretty much obstruct all light from reaching the photoreceptive cells. Light would need to pass not only through layers of melanin, but through a vascular layer aswell. It makes more sense to have unmyelinated axons leave the retina, towards the inside.

I think saying it's 'bad design' because it's 'wired backwards' is a bit disingenuous. Thoughts?

[Dlx2]

Cephalopods seem to do just fine with their eyes wired the right way.

Our eyes are wired backwards due to developmental constraints, not because it's the most effective way of making an eye.

[TaO!]

Cephalopods have rhabdomeres and as far as we know only 1 species of cephalopod has any semblance of colour vision, we have rods and cones. They are functionally distinct. If cephalopods were to have functionally comparable rods and cones, they would need to redesign their eyes because of the shed ROS.

If 'doing just fine' is the measure of effectiveness, then our eyes are an effective design.

[Oolon Colluphid]

I think saying it's 'bad design' because it's 'wired backwards' is a bit disingenuous. Thoughts?
Sorry, but nonsense. Regardless of the cellular-level intricacies, there is no way that having a blind spot in something 'designed' to see can be called a good design.

This stuff sounds like it's based on Bergman's Impact article; there are sufficient comments on it here:
www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/2000/PSCF9-00Lahti.html
and in the TO 29 Evidences:
www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section3.html
Cephalopods have rhabdomeres and as far as we know only 1 species of cephalopod has any semblance of colour vision, we have rods and cones. They are functionally distinct.
Whooppee-do.
If cephalopods were to have functionally comparable rods and cones, they would need to redesign their eyes because of the shed ROS.
Assertion. Remember, we're supposedly dealing with a clever designer here, not evolutionary constraint.
If 'doing just fine' is the measure of effectiveness, then our eyes are an effective design.
Of course they are effective. But that is not the same as 'good' or 'sensible'. The cry of "it's not a bug, it's a feature! (http://www.jnd.org/dn.mss/when_bugs_becom.html)" is what's known colloquially as 'bullshit'.

[Dryhad]

If 'doing just fine' is the measure of effectiveness, then our eyes are an effective design.
Doing just fine is a measure of effectiveness that evolution selects for. It is not, however, the epitome of good design. You don't just throw a bunch of parts together and say "Well it works well enough, I'm done". Not only is it inefficient, it's potentially more difficult to do it that way than to plan it out to begin with. Intelligent Design advocates would have us believe that life on earth shows evidence of design, but this is simply not the case. The evidence shows designs that are not only far too inefficient to be designed by any intelligent being, but which look exactly as one would expect them to look if they arose from natural selection.

[TaO!]

Sorry, but nonsense. Regardless of the cellular-level intricacies, there is no way that having a blind spot in something 'designed' to see can be called a good design.

Wiring it the other way around would be worse. You can't say it's wired the wrong way and proclaim it's a bad design if you can't flip it the 'right' way and propose a mechanism to overcome the new cellular-level problems that arise from your supposedly better 'design'.

It's disingenuous to say "It's wired the wrong way and the blind spot is poor design" when the problem of the blind spot is largely overcome by visual processing. The brain fills in the blanks. To have the axons reversed is a decidedly WORSE way to do it.

You also can't say the designer isn't clever if you don't know the designer's purpose. It's not a case of "Well it works well enough, I'm done", the entire mechanism for sight serves it's purpose, hence is a good design.

Whooppee-do. bullshit

Is this what passes for criticism in the forums these days?

Also if I assessed a design and then said to the designer "Ahah, it's very effective, but is poorly designed". He'd say "What you said makes no sense". So go back and read your post, perhaps make it coherent next time.

Assertion.

No it isn't. As far as the argument goes, unless you have a more sophisticated version, it's "Because the axons leave the retina towards the inside of the eye, they have to exit the eye at some point causing a blind spot, this is a bad design". To reverse the axons would be detrimental and the argument either needs restating, or is plainly false.

[Ezkerraldean]

If 'doing just fine' is the measure of effectiveness, then our eyes are an effective design.
then why do half the world's population need glasses?


i remember reading somewhere that there are 6 muscles operating the lens, but only 3 are needed. is this true?

[TaO!]

The evidence shows designs that are not only far too inefficient to be designed by any intelligent being...

So show me the evidence it's inefficient and design something better.

[TaO!]

then why do half the world's population need glasses?

Because there are large populations live past reproductive age but I fail to see the relevance?

i remember reading somewhere that there are 6 muscles operating the lens, but only 3 are needed. is this true?

I don't know. Can you show us an eye with comparable function and only 3 muscles?

[Y.B]

Because large populations live past reproductive age but I fail to see the relevance? Children never need glasses? :rolleyes:

[Ezkerraldean]

Because there are large populations live past reproductive age but I fail to see the relevance?

surely if it was immaculately designed it would work perfectly indefinately.



I don't know. Can you show us an eye with comparable function and only 3 muscles?
no, i cant! i was asking if anyone could! i remember reading it, probably in some Dawkins

[JPD]

surely if it was immaculately designed it would work perfectly indefinately.


<creationist mode on>

Fall of Adam. Eyes used to function perfectly all the time and sharks only ate herbs. When they weren't organising sit-in protests in wigs.

[Ezkerraldean]

<creationist mode on>

Fall of Adam. Eyes used to function perfectly all the time and sharks only ate herbs. When they weren't organising sit-in protests in wigs.

this "god" guy must be such an evil twat. ruining everyone's eyes for all eternity just because someone ate an apple

[sbaii]

So I could blame Adam when my retina detached? How is that good design?

[JPD]

this "god" guy must be such an evil twat. ruining everyone's eyes for all eternity just because someone ate an apple

The story satisfies those of a more mentally challenged nature.

[JPD]

Because there are large populations live past reproductive age but I fail to see the relevance?


Indignance doesn't make an argument by itself. Clearly, as has been pointed out below, people across a wide age range require glasses. There is a general trend of increasing sight problems with increasing age of course but, as you well know, eyes are not only used for reproductive purposes.


I don't know. Can you show us an eye with comparable function and only 3 muscles?

This is somewhat more difficult. Given the right conditions it is not inconceivable that such a system should have been, or will be, in operation at some point. A wide range of different eye forms can be observed (!). But perhaps there is a comparable form at the current time - a Google search produced nothing but perhaps a specialist in the area has an insight?

Must avoid puns.

[JPD]

Typed "eye design form" into Google.

eyedesignbook.com was the third result - thought it looked promising until I found in the contents list a section called 'Controversy'. I know, I know, but its like a car crash - you can't help but look:

Quote:
Panicked Evolutionists:
The Stephen Meyer Controversy

The theory of evolution is a tottering house of ideological cards that is more about cherished mythology than honest intellectual endeavor. Evolutionists treat their cherished theory like a fragile object of veneration and worship--and so it is. Panic is a sure sign of intellectual insecurity, and evolutionists have every reason to be insecure, for their theory is falling apart.



Egad! They panic because they are envisaging the future of scientific endeavour in the hands of fools like Albert Mohler.

Later, apparently, we learn that:

Quote:
Dr. Stephen Meyer's article--and the controversy it has spawned--has caught evolutionary scientists with their intellectual pants down.

and

Quote:
Intelligent Design falls far short of requiring any affirmation of the doctrine of creation as revealed in the Bible. Nevertheless, it is a useful and important intellectual tool, and a scientific movement with great promise.

:rolling:

But on the other hand

:rolling:

[Oolon Colluphid]

TaO, I think you are still thinking like a biologist (assuming your profile is true), rather than someone who has a turbocharged designer up his sleeve to explain stuff.

Nobody is saying that the vertebrate eye is not efficient -- it plainly is.

But more crucially, neither is anybody saying that one could just rearrange the current parts and come up with something better! It is equally obvious that mucking around with the extant retina probably would cause problems! Doubtless that is why no vertebrate has evolved a cephalopod eye. Evolutionarily, it is a design constrained by its history.

But that ain't what a designer would have been doing, would he?! He would surely have been inventing things from scratch, yes? He was not tied by anything's history. Blank slate, fresh start for each baramin.

And one might suspect that if this designer were up to the job of making eyes in such intricacy at all, he would be smart enough to make the concepts work. Concepts like different cells with different pigments that could be wired to avoid a blind spot.

Or maybe I'm overestimating Him.
Wiring it the other way around would be worse.
Wiring rods and cones as we now know them probably would be, sure.
You can't say it's wired the wrong way and proclaim it's a bad design if you can't flip it the 'right' way and propose a mechanism to overcome the new cellular-level problems that arise from your supposedly better 'design'.
Yes I can, see below. It's not a bug, it's a feature, yeah?
It's disingenuous to say "It's wired the wrong way and the blind spot is poor design" when the problem of the blind spot is largely overcome by visual processing. The brain fills in the blanks.
It's incongruous with logic to call it anything else. An extra mechanism to fix a problem caused by a design is compounding the design flaw.

Perhaps you could -- should -- define 'good design' and 'poor design' as you are using the terms.
To have the axons reversed is a decidedly WORSE way to do it.
Sez you. And having a blind spot is the best the designer could come up with?
You also can't say the designer isn't clever if you don't know the designer's purpose.
Been there, done that. (http://oolon.awardspace.com/design.htm#whatisID) The Argument From Unknown Purpose means rejecting apparently good design too. Fine by me!
It's not a case of "Well it works well enough, I'm done", the entire mechanism for sight serves it's purpose, hence is a good design.
Please define the term. A window and a drainpipe may serve their purpose as a means of exiting a building. Personally, I prefer stairs and a door.
Is this what passes for criticism in the forums these days?
No, this is criticism; those were an indication of lack of impressèdness and a suitable adjective. I'm not wholly unsurprised that you couldn't tell the difference though.
Also if I assessed a design and then said to the designer "Ahah, it's very effective, but is poorly designed". He'd say "What you said makes no sense".
Yes, he probably would, because you had only asserted it. If you explained why, then he might respond differently. He should do this by explaining his reasoning further, or by going back to the drawing board.
So go back and read your post, perhaps make it coherent next time.
I do apologise. As you request, I shall aim a little lower on the reading comprehension scale.
So show me the evidence it's inefficient
It's an eye. It's got a fucking blind spot in it. You do the math.
and design something better.
No. We do not have to be able to design improvements ourselves to see that what's there is crappy. I do not need to know how to give a male spider a penis to see that pedipalps are not a sensible way to do the job; I do not need to know how to get a cow to synthesise cellulase to know that ruminants having to rely on gut bacteria is not a sensible answer; I don't have to know how to get off a mountain top to realise that jumping isn't necessarily an intelligent method.

[Stephen T-B]

This is going off at a tangent, somewhat, but as a general comment I would suggest that the design of any mechanical contrivance tends to be refined over time - unless of course it's abandoned because it was useless from the outset.
It is a form of evolution, and a railway museum, for example, preserves earlier versions of a thing so that the "evolution" from Mark I to Mark II to Mark III of the locomative or such can be seen and studied.

In biological terms (and in this context, I think biological systems can be likened to mechanical ones) the geological column acts rather like a museum, allowing us to observe how Mark I of an organism has evolved into Mark II - and so on. Further, the organisms themselves retain a record of design development (as in the eye).

Now, why I raise this is because it seems to me that mechanical and biological systems have this in common: they get improved over time.
Well, with mechanical systems that's hardly surprising, since the human designers who are responsible for therm aren't omniscient and won't get a perfect design straight off. Or are unlikely to.
But according to the IDers, the designer of biological systems is omniscient. This designer would know how to get the perfect design from the off, with no additiuonal tweakings.
So, the mere fact that we see millions of "tweakings" throughout the plant and animal kingdoms demonstrates no such omnisicent designer was ever involved.
In other words, it is not consistent for an IDer to concede that evolution occurs (because it implies successive refinements), yet they tend to present themselves as enlightened, rather than pond-life Creationists.
But their dogma shows that that is exactly what they.

[Worldtraveller]

Also if I assessed a design and then said to the designer "Ahah, it's very effective, but is poorly designed". He'd say "What you said makes no sense". So go back and read your post, perhaps make it coherent next time.
Assertion.
No it isn't. As far as the argument goes, unless you have a more sophisticated version, it's "Because the axons leave the retina towards the inside of the eye, they have to exit the eye at some point causing a blind spot, this is a bad design". To reverse the axons would be detrimental and the argument either needs restating, or is plainly false.
Ah, but the argument is more sophisticated than what you are (selectively) rebutting. Go back up and read the very next part of Oolon's post.
Assertion. Remember, we're supposedly dealing with a clever designer here, not evolutionary constraint.
That is the crux of the ID argument, yet they ignore it each and every time it's brought up. Remember, IDists are the ones who are proposing an intelligent (whatever that means) designer, not us. If we, mere mortal, fallible, humans that we are can easily envision even the possibility of a better design (like not having a blind spot) then how intelligent could the designer really be?

Sure, given the constraint of shedding cells (which I'm not even sure is really true, I'll leave that to others to digest) and given the constraint of somehow early photreceptors already being wired this way (due to blind luck, or some early evolutionary advantage), then it does 'make sense.' But if you'll notice, that's the argument that evolutionary theory makes, not ID.

Cheers,
Lane

[Sven]

As in nearly every thread on ID, we have the problem that the "intelligent" in ID isn't defined well.

Are we talking about "intelligent = smart" or about "intelligent = making conscious choices / intentional"?

TaO, would you please clarify this?

[Oolon Colluphid]

As in nearly every thread on ID, we have the problem that the "intelligent" in ID isn't defined well.

Are we talking about "intelligent = smart" or about "intelligent = making conscious choices / intentional"?

TaO, would you please clarify this?
Ah, the old 'smarter than a brick' defence :D.

Trouble is that, to paraphrase (http://www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk/dawkins/WorldOfDawkins-archive/Dawkins/Work/Books/climb.shtml) Dawkins, an IDer who ripostes that his designer is sublimely stupid has (not very) neatly evaded the issue, for a sufficiently simpleton designer, whatever other virtues he might have, would be too simple to be capable of designing a universe (to say nothing of forming flagella, blood clotting cascades and eyes, and the many other achievements variously ascribed to him). You cannot have it both ways. If your designer is capable of designing worlds and doing all the other designer-like things, he should be incapable of patent errors that even mere humans can see. (To say nothing of Dawkins's actual argument about positing such designers as being a non-explanation.)

[Oolon Colluphid]

It seems to me that the thrust of TaO's argument is that, in order to have rod-and-cone style colour vision, you must have the 'inverted' retina with its concomitant blind spot. If we had squid-like retinas, we couldn't see in colour.*

Now apart from the fact that I don't see why a designer of intricate biochemical pathways etc should be so constrained as to have no choice in this matter (enough to have to come up with the brain's interpolation work-around for the blind spot's missing information), there is a way of getting colour vision from 'rod' cells (ie cells that only respond to light in general, not its frequency). It is the way digital cameras work: a color filter array plus interpolation.
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/digital-camera1.htm

So something like a cephalopod eye does not have to be colourblind, at least in principle.


*Incidentally, I must thank TaO! for pointing out the lack of colour vision in cephalopods. I was unaware that they were colourblind, and in fact assumed they were not, because of their amazing colour-changing skin. I shall look into their apparent polarising abilities asap, but meanwhile, cheers!

[anders]

Because there are large populations live past reproductive age
I finally understood why I'm childless. I had to have glasses at the age of four, so obviously reproductive age was over way before it could begin!

[markfiend]

There's more than just the blind spot that's "wrong" with our eyes as it happens. Our brain is wired up to fool us into thinking we have good wide-angle colour vision, but in fact, the colour stuff is mostly in the middle of the visual field. Our peripheral vision is mostly monochromatic, and pretty much useless at anything other than movement detection anyway.

And of course the colour vision "switches off" at low light levels too. I'd prefer eyes that have fovea-like colour resolution right across the field of vision, plus the ability to see the colours when it's dark.

Is there an intelligent designer in the house that can provide us with such? Heh.

Of course the fact that vision better than we actually have is unnecessary evolutionarily speaking (or at least too costly to be selected for) speaks volumes.

A final thought; is the widespread need for spectacles noted above evidence that some degeneration is occurring in human vision? Is our species evolving poorer eyesight? I imagine that glasses remove most selective pressure that there may have been against poor vision (apart from sexual selection -- "men rarely make passes at girls who wear glasses" after all ;) )

[-RRH-]

This is why I don't try to claim whether one version or another version of the eye is better design. It's too subjective, and thus prone to the two sides just disagreeing on what is better.

What I prefer to focus on is the sheer number of species where the kind of eye they have correlates perfectly with whether or not they have a spine. Evolutionary theory explains this correlation, ID does not.

[ninewands]

Wiring it the other way around would be worse. You can't say it's wired the wrong way and proclaim it's a bad design if you can't flip it the 'right' way and propose a mechanism to overcome the new cellular-level problems that arise from your supposedly better 'design'.
Well, I have to disagree with you there. If the "Intelligent Designer" had been designing intelligently he/she/it would have overcome the cellular difficulties by designing the cells differently. You DO realize that the "designer" allegedly got to design EVERYTHING, don't you?
It's disingenuous to say "It's wired the wrong way and the blind spot is poor design" when the problem of the blind spot is largely overcome by visual processing. The brain fills in the blanks. To have the axons reversed is a decidedly WORSE way to do it.
Using software to compensate for defects in the design of the hardware is extraordinarily inefficient, just ask Intel. Those who had to use software floating-point math rather than accept the "approximations" provided by the hardware in the Pentium were quite unhappy with the designer saying "it works well enough, I'm done."
You also can't say the designer isn't clever if you don't know the designer's purpose. It's not a case of "Well it works well enough, I'm done", the entire mechanism for sight serves it's purpose, hence is a good design.
As an engineer, I can tell you that an intelligent designer's "purpose" is usually, generally, almost always the same. Produce the most functionality for the least cost. In the case of vision hardware this means high resolution and good acuity, both of which are made more difficult by the existing "design."
Also if I assessed a design and then said to the designer "Ahah, it's very effective, but is poorly designed". He'd say "What you said makes no sense". So go back and read your post, perhaps make it coherent next time.
No, badly designed products can be QUITE effective and still badly (read inefficiently) designed. Other instances of poor design by the alleged "Intelligent Designer" are the human spine, knee and dentition. The spine is great from a quadruped but terribly sub-optimal for a bipedal creature. The knee is too weak and prone to injury for a joint in such a critical location and there's just too damned many teeth in the human jaw (by four, to be exact). Since those who support Intelligent Design tend also to be creationists I would think their god would have done a better job since we're not evolved from any lower animals.
No it isn't. As far as the argument goes, unless you have a more sophisticated version, it's "Because the axons leave the retina towards the inside of the eye, they have to exit the eye at some point causing a blind spot, this is a bad design". To reverse the axons would be detrimental and the argument either needs restating, or is plainly false.
Reversing the axons would not be detrimental had the rods and cones been "intelligently designed." The argument is that if there WAS an "intelligent designer," he/she/it was plainly incompetent to design cameras. I think it's a good argument and STRONG evidence against there being such a "designer."

[Flint]

I guess the question being asked here is, Is there any possible way to construct an eye that does a better job of seeing than our eyes? In this context, a 'poor design' is a measure of a degree of suboptimality.

But what would be optimal? Sensitivity to a broader spectrum? How broad is possible? Higher resolution? How high is possible? Superior handling of color, brightness, contrast, motion (especially rapid motion)? Lack of obvious kludges like blind spots? Higher bandwidth optic nerve? Broader peripheral vision? Greater resistance to trauma (and more certain, and faster, healing after trauma)? Greater resistance to hardening with age, or other proof against degenerative vision problems?

How about Superman's X-Ray vision, or heat vision? Brin's speculative ability to project/reflect coherent light? More eyes? Relocated eyes? The list goes on and on.

Meanwhile, back almost to reality, I imagine that if I could trade eyes with an eagle or an octopus, I wouldn't want to trade back...

[igfm_spanky]

Using software to compensate for defects in the design of the hardware is extraordinarily inefficient, just ask Intel. Those who had to use software floating-point math rather than accept the "approximations" provided by the hardware in the Pentium were quite unhappy with the designer saying "it works well enough, I'm done."
Maybe ID's elusive definition of intelligence is "having the same competence as Intel".

[Ezkerraldean]

And of course the colour vision "switches off" at low light levels too.
i always thought things looked black-and-white in the dark.Maybe ID's elusive definition of intelligence is "having the same competence as Intel".
hahaha!

[Monad]

It seems to me that the thrust of TaO's argument is that, in order to have rod-and-cone style colour vision, you must have the 'inverted' retina with its concomitant blind spot. If we had squid-like retinas, we couldn't see in colour.*

Now apart from the fact that I don't see why a designer of intricate biochemical pathways etc should be so constrained as to have no choice in this matter (enough to have to come up with the brain's interpolation work-around for the blind spot's missing information), there is a way of getting colour vision from 'rod' cells (ie cells that only respond to light in general, not its frequency). It is the way digital cameras work: a color filter array plus interpolation.
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/digital-camera1.htm

So something like a cephalopod eye does not have to be colourblind, at least in principle.


*Incidentally, I must thank TaO! for pointing out the lack of colour vision in cephalopods. I was unaware that they were colourblind, and in fact assumed they were not, because of their amazing colour-changing skin. I shall look into their apparent polarising abilities asap, but meanwhile, cheers!

http://www.mbl.edu/inside/what/news/features/documents/mathger_etal_visres.pdf

http://www.mbl.edu/mrc/hanlon/coloration.html

Seems to me primate eyes can do some things cephalopod eyes can't and cephalopod eye's can do some things primate eyes can't. Getting into arguments as to which is better is pointless and as has been pointed out largely subjective (not for the first time either). Its similar to that other non starter - are vestigial organs useless? Both groups have adapted as well as possible to the requirements of their way of life and environments within the context of the constraints and opportunities imposed by their own evolutionary history and biology. In doing so there are areas where the have been opportunities to expand functionality such as the highly refined ability of cephalopods to pick out areas of contrast and see polarised light (presumably useful in catching transparent prey as well as for deeper sea species), or in the development of the primate visual system (discussed in detail by Dawkins in "The Ancestors tale"). But there have also been areas where workarounds have been needed to compensate for constraints imposed by that history - such as the way the mammalian brain has evolved to compensate for the blind spot. So each eye could be seen as working as well as can be under the circumstances - the circumstances being a consequence of history, not design (as there would not be such a history if creatures were designed and therefore would not be those constraints and opportunities).

Incidentally that last point "if we had squid-like retinas we couldn't see in colour" is disproved by Watasenia scintillans, the Firefly Squid, which does have 3 pigments and probably can see (to an unknown extent) in colour, though as a largely deep sea species (that comes to the surface in spectacular displays some nights to spawn) living in the dark most of the time there are significant differences to the mammalian version

Studies on the firefly squid, Watasenia scintillans, have shown that the eyes of deep-sea squid are most sensitive to the blue-green light produced by bioluminescent organisms, and that a combination of retinal thickenings and three separate visual pigments may even allow the firefly squid enough sensitivity to distinguish between species due to slight wavelength differences (Matsui et al. 1988, Michinomae et al. 1994).

http://www.tonmo.com/science/public/deepseacephs.php

[Dhaeron]

This thread perfectly demonstrates why ID just isn't science. It is not at all falsifiable. Whatever the evidence is, "the designer intended it that way" makes it fit to the theory.

[Ezkerraldean]

This thread perfectly demonstrates why ID just isn't science. It is not at all falsifiable. Whatever the evidence is, "the designer intended it that way" makes it fit to the theory.

just like the lame "god can do the impossible" cover. its al the same

[Sven]

Maybe ID's elusive definition of intelligence is "having the same competence as Intel".
You mean the guy who first invented ID was actually thinking about "Intel Design", and only the ones following him thought that it's an abbreviation for "Intelligent Design"?

Would explain a lot...

:D

[kingzfan2000]

Im still not understanding what the problem with human eyes is. For a person with 20/20 vision what exactly is the problem? Say I have 20/20 vision, how would my eyes being wired the more efficient way improve my vision?

As for the question about glasses, I think thats a relatively new problem that has risen from the many advances we have made in the pass few hundred years. Civilization is much more technologically advanced now than in the past and excellent vision is more important now then it was in previous times. We read more and good vision is more important in the medicinal, technological and more scientifically advanced fields we employ today than in the past when most societies were largely agrarian and hunter gatherer and most people did not read. Our eyes have been more then sufficient for most of human history due to the nature of the societies we lived in. Only very recently eyeglasses become a "necessity" due to the changes in the way we live. Even now I would say most of the earths population have eyes that are more than sufficient. To say that 50 percent of the population needs glasses is like saying that 50 percent of the earths population cannot function or live without glasses and this is not the case. Yes some people do have extremely poor eyesight, but most people have eyesight that would have been considered good if not great throughout most of human history.

[kingzfan2000]

This is going off at a tangent, somewhat, but as a general comment I would suggest that the design of any mechanical contrivance tends to be refined over time - unless of course it's abandoned because it was useless from the outset.
It is a form of evolution, and a railway museum, for example, preserves earlier versions of a thing so that the "evolution" from Mark I to Mark II to Mark III of the locomative or such can be seen and studied.

In biological terms (and in this context, I think biological systems can be likened to mechanical ones) the geological column acts rather like a museum, allowing us to observe how Mark I of an organism has evolved into Mark II - and so on. Further, the organisms themselves retain a record of design development (as in the eye).

Now, why I raise this is because it seems to me that mechanical and biological systems have this in common: they get improved over time.
Well, with mechanical systems that's hardly surprising, since the human designers who are responsible for therm aren't omniscient and won't get a perfect design straight off. Or are unlikely to.
But according to the IDers, the designer of biological systems is omniscient. This designer would know how to get the perfect design from the off, with no additiuonal tweakings.
So, the mere fact that we see millions of "tweakings" throughout the plant and animal kingdoms demonstrates no such omnisicent designer was ever involved.
In other words, it is not consistent for an IDer to concede that evolution occurs (because it implies successive refinements), yet they tend to present themselves as enlightened, rather than pond-life Creationists.
But their dogma shows that that is exactly what they.
Millions of tweakings?

[kingzfan2000]

This thread perfectly demonstrates why ID just isn't science. It is not at all falsifiable. Whatever the evidence is, "the designer intended it that way" makes it fit to the theory.
Why is it always assumed that the design is meant to be perfect? Perfect design is not the intent nor is it even logical.

[Y.B]

Why is it always assumed that the design is meant to be perfect? Perfect design is not the intent nor is it even logical.
I think Dhaeron's point was that ID creationists don't really make any predictions about the design. Whether the design is 'perfect', imperfect, or just plain bizarre, they can always say that it's just the way God the designer wanted or allowed it to be.

[Philosoft]

Im still not understanding what the problem with human eyes is. For a person with 20/20 vision what exactly is the problem? Say I have 20/20 vision, how would my eyes being wired the more efficient way improve my vision?
Have you even read the thread? Eliminating the physical blind spot, enhancing low-light color vision have already been mentioned. How about, say, quicker transition to night vision?

As for the question about glasses, I think thats a relatively new problem that has risen from the many advances we have made in the pass few hundred years. Civilization is much more technologically advanced now than in the past and excellent vision is more important now then it was in previous times. We read more and good vision is more important in the medicinal, technological and more scientifically advanced fields we employ today than in the past when most societies were largely agrarian and hunter gatherer and most people did not read. Our eyes have been more then sufficient for most of human history due to the nature of the societies we lived in. Only very recently eyeglasses become a "necessity" due to the changes in the way we live. Even now I would say most of the earths population have eyes that are more than sufficient. To say that 50 percent of the population needs glasses is like saying that 50 percent of the earths population cannot function or live without glasses and this is not the case. Yes some people do have extremely poor eyesight, but most people have eyesight that would have been considered good if not great throughout most of human history.
This is some shit you just made up, right?

[JLK]

In addition to the above mentioned points...
Say I have 20/20 vision, how would my eyes being wired the more efficient way improve my vision?20/20? You could easily have 20/2 vision because you could have an arbitrarily large fovea - the small patch of vertebrate retina where light is focused and the blood vessels and nerves have been pushed aside. Your patch must be small because of the nutrient requirements of the rest of your retina.
And you also would not be at ridiculous risk of retinal detachment.
And you would also not need the very fast blood flow through the tissues below and in the pigment layer to cool down the choroid. Instead of your fragile photoreceptors being right up against the source of damaging heat, you could have lower blood flow and the various vision problems associated with blood supplies should be minimized - macular degeneration, floaters, etc.
The brain does compensate for your “blind spots” by mapping both eyes, but if one goes bad you're goin to miss that quail. In short, "good design" doesn't just evaluate the state where everything continues to function perfectly. A more complicated kludge has more failure points than a more straightforward model. Although, as you say, the Designer might be an Enron-kinda CEO.
To say that 50 percent of the population needs glasses is like saying that 50 percent of the earths population cannot function or live without glasses and this is not the case.Demolishing the creationist "what good is a half an eye?" unevolvability argument is easy, isn't it?

[Dhaeron]

I think Dhaeron's point was that ID creationists don't really make any predictions about the design. Whether the design is 'perfect', imperfect, or just plain bizarre, they can always say that it's just the way God the designer wanted or allowed it to be.
Indeed. ID could save some miniscule semblance of science if it'd right-out state that a god is the designer, and because of that the design is perfect. Of course, that'd be falsifiable, which is what IDiots definitly don't want.
They just go ahead and in essence state they can detect design design by the method of "i just know when something is designed". Whatever design you find, be it perfect, imperfect or outright bad, it was just the way the designer wanted it to be. Without criteria however what is good or bad design, that makes ID non-falsifiable because there are no criteria for design and no design either, and that again makes ID bullshit, not science.

[kingzfan2000]

In addition to the above mentioned points...
20/20? You could easily have 20/2 vision because you could have an arbitrarily large fovea - the small patch of vertebrate retina where light is focused and the blood vessels and nerves have been pushed aside. Your patch must be small because of the nutrient requirements of the rest of your retina.
And you also would not be at ridiculous risk of retinal detachment.
And you would also not need the very fast blood flow through the tissues below and in the pigment layer to cool down the choroid. Instead of your fragile photoreceptors being right up against the source of damaging heat, you could have lower blood flow and the various vision problems associated with blood supplies should be minimized - macular degeneration, floaters, etc.
The brain does compensate for your “blind spots” by mapping both eyes, but if one goes bad you're goin to miss that quail. In short, "good design" doesn't just evaluate the state where everything continues to function perfectly. A more complicated kludge has more failure points than a more straightforward model. Although, as you say, the Designer might be an Enron-kinda CEO.

Okay so some vertebrates have eyesight much sharper than humans and much better nightvision. Is this because their eyes are wired the correct way? Of course the answer is no, so if humans could have better vision if their eyes were wired the correct way, why do some animals have eyesight that is much sharper than humans when their eyes are wired the same inefficient way?

[Sven]

Im still not understanding what the problem with human eyes is. For a person with 20/20 vision what exactly is the problem? Say I have 20/20 vision, how would my eyes being wired the more efficient way improve my vision?
Do you understand what the blind spot is? Do you understand that the brain continously has to compensate for the missing information? Do you understand that this is a waste of resources?

As for the question about glasses, I think thats a relatively new problem that has risen from the many advances we have made in the pass few hundred years. Civilization is much more technologically advanced now than in the past and excellent vision is more important now then it was in previous times.
You mean spotting a sabertooth at 100 meter distance is not more beneficial than only spotting it at 20 meter distance?

Even now I would say most of the earths population have eyes that are more than sufficient.
Hint: This isn't about "more than sufficient". This is about "could be better, but is not".

To say that 50 percent of the population needs glasses is like saying that 50 percent of the earths population cannot function or live without glasses and this is not the case.
Yeah, since no more sabertooths are around.

[Sven]

Why is it always assumed that the design is meant to be perfect? Perfect design is not the intent nor is it even logical.
So which kind of design was intended? Without knowing this, we have no hypotheses no test and thus no science.

[kingzfan2000]

Do you understand what the blind spot is? Do you understand that the brain continously has to compensate for the missing information? Do you understand that this is a waste of resources?

I do understand this and I also understand that the brain does a more than adequate job as long as both eyes are functional, which is the case for the vast majority of the earths population of living organisms, therefore it is not an issue.
You mean spotting a sabertooth at 100 meter distance is not more beneficial than only spotting it at 20 meter distance?

I believe most people would have no problem spotting a sabertooth from 100 yards away provided the cat wasnt hiding in tall grass. If you couldnt spot a sabertooth from 100 meters away, you were definately the exception and not the rule. The eyesight of most modern humans would be considered great throughout the length of human existance up until probably the twentieth century.
Hint: This isn't about "more than sufficient". This is about "could be better, but is not".
Could be better how? Enhanced acuity? Animals with the same wiring already have sharper vision so evidently its not due to the placement of photoreceptors that we dont have vision as sharp as some of these animals? Better night vision? Again, plenty of animals have excellent night vision with the same setup we have. Ive seen alot of problem listed but alot of problems that alot of people dont have. Yes problems do occur, but the majority of people and for that matter the majority of living organisms have eyes that serve their purpose for that creatures lifespan.

Can you design a self-lubricating, self-cleansing, self-repairing optical system that works continuously without any major malfunctions or stoppages for 60-100 years? I doubt it. Every member of these forums put together couldnt do it. You give me your description of what you think is a perfect optical system and I guarantee I could name a way in which it could be better. Because it could be better means it wasnt designed? If you say a well designed eye is an eye that can see a tiger from 100 meters I can say thats poor design and one that is well designed should be able to see tiger from a kilometer because 100 meters is not sufficient space for a human to get away from a charging tiger, then somebody else can come and say no 5 kilometers. No matter what the design of anything somebody can always think of a way it could be better. Do eyes perform their job well? The vast majority of the time the answer is yes. Could they be better? Of course, but do they really need to be better? Imo the answer is no.

[kingzfan2000]

So which kind of design was intended? Without knowing this, we have no hypotheses no test and thus no science.
Do you think perfect design is logical or even feasible? If you were a creator of numerous living things, would you create them to all be completely optimal or create them so that every aspect of every creature you created was perfect?

[RBH]

Do you think perfect design is logical or even feasible? If you were a creator of numerous living things, would you create them to all be completely optimal or create them so that every aspect of every creature you created was perfect?Yes. If I were the omniscient and omnipotent creator that religious folks invoke as responsible for the diversity of life on earth, I sure would. Otherwise I'm guilty of gratuitously building imperfect products leading to misery, pain, and death. Shows I'm not as benevolent as advertised.

RBH

[Febble]

Our peripheral vision is mostly monochromatic, and pretty much useless at anything other than movement detection anyway.

Well, what it's brilliant at is detecting stuff that is worth bringing into foveal vision. Never mind the blind spot, as markfiend says, it's only stuff that arrives at fovea that is recorded with any acuity. The rest of the retina drives the visual attentional system so that we automatically foveate stuff of interest.

Does anyone know anything about visual attention in cephalopods? Do they make saccadic eye movements?

[kingzfan2000]

Yes. If I were the omniscient and omnipotent creator that religious folks invoke as responsible for the diversity of life on earth, I sure would. Otherwise I'm guilty of gratuitously building imperfect products leading to misery, pain, and death. Shows I'm not as benevolent as advertised.

RBH
So how would you do it?

[Sven]

I do understand this and I also understand that the brain does a more than adequate job as long as both eyes are functional, which is the case for the vast majority of the earths population of living organisms, therefore it is not an issue.
Why is a waste of resources not an issue? Would you tell the same to your boss if he told you that there are more effective ways to do your job?

I believe most people would have no problem spotting a sabertooth from 100 yards away provided the cat wasnt hiding in tall grass. If you couldnt spot a sabertooth from 100 meters away, you were definately the exception and not the rule.
:rolleyes: The 100 meter were an example. Do you agree that you can see a sabertooth from longer distances with good eyes? Do you agree that good eyes therefore would have provided an advantage in the time when humans were mostly hunters? Please address the point rather than quibbling about numbers.

Could be better how? Enhanced acuity? Animals with the same wiring already have sharper vision so evidently its not due to the placement of photoreceptors that we dont have vision as sharp as some of these animals?
Interesting. You admit that there are animals with sharper vision, but at the same time ask how our vision could be better. :banghead:

Better night vision? Again, plenty of animals have excellent night vision with the same setup we have.
See above.

Yes problems do occur, but the majority of people and for that matter the majority of living organisms have eyes that serve their purpose for that creatures lifespan.
I just explained that this isn't about sufficiency. Why do you just repeat this?

Can you design a self-lubricating, self-cleansing, self-repairing optical system that works continuously without any major malfunctions or stoppages for 60-100 years? I doubt it. Every member of these forums put together couldnt do it.
And how exactly is this relevant? Is your claim that the designer is no more intelligent than the members of this forum? If not, I don't see any relevance.

You give me your description of what you think is a perfect optical system and I guarantee I could name a way in which it could be better.
Easy: A system which has just the right vision for every situation. If you would benefit from more sharpness, it would provide sharper pictures in this situtation. If you would need to see more colors in a situation, it would adjust itself to seeing more colors. And all this with needing no more resources than our eye.

Or, if we want to include theology: God's eyes. :Cheeky:

Because it could be better means it wasnt designed?
No. It means that the designer wasn't that intelligent. But that's not our problem, I guess.

[snip irrelevancies]
Could they be better? Of course, but do they really need to be better? Imo the answer is no.
Tell this to the countless people who died from sabertooth attacks - if you meet them in heaven.

[Sven]

Do you think perfect design is logical or even feasible? If you were a creator of numerous living things, would you create them to all be completely optimal or create them so that every aspect of every creature you created was perfect?
I see. Answering my question with irrelevant questions somehow is supposed to answer it.

And last time I looked "completely optimal" and "perfect" were synonymous.

[RBH]

Yes. If I were the omniscient and omnipotent creator that religious folks invoke as responsible for the diversity of life on earth, I sure would. Otherwise I'm guilty of gratuitously building imperfect products leading to misery, pain, and death. Shows I'm not as benevolent as advertised.

RBH
So how would you do it?I dunno -- persistent rumors to the contrary, I'm neither omniscient nor omnipotent and don't claim to be.

An interesting implication of kingzfan2000's question is that if I or some other human can't think of a better way, then whatever is, is the best that can be done. Kind of puts that alleged deity in a human box.

RBH

[kingzfan2000]

Why is a waste of resources not an issue? Would you tell the same to your boss if he told you that there are more effective ways to do your job?
I havent seen any demonstrations that it is a remarkable waste of resources. How do you know that wiring it the way you think it should be is completely optimal?
The 100 meter were an example. Do you agree that you can see a sabertooth from longer distances with good eyes? Do you agree that good eyes therefore would have provided an advantage in the time when humans were mostly hunters? Please address the point rather than quibbling about numbers.

Yeah I agree, but we are here and sabertooths are extinct, probably with a little bit of help from us. We have good eyes now and we had good eyes then. However I think visual sharpness is more important now then it was when we were mostly hunters, so I dont think you have a valid point. I think you need more visual accuity to perform laser eye surgery or perform open heart surgery then you do to see a 3000 pound buffalo or a deer. Im sure that our vision was more than adequate for the purpose of hunting or else we probably wouldnt be here. You are arguing that we dont have good vision and that hunting would have been a problem with all the problems with our eyes, but that doesnt seem to be the case.
Interesting. You admit that there are animals with sharper vision, but at the same time ask how our vision could be better.

Animals with sharper vision with the same eye setup we have.:banghead: You are arguing that if are eyes were wired more efficiently we would have better vision, yet animals with sharper vision than us have the same layout we do, therefore it seems that we have a fallacy of causation or correlation implies causation. Because our eyes are wired this way we dont have sharp eyesight. This is incorrect. Again animals have the same inefficient layout we do yet have eyesight many times better than us, therefore the placement of photoreceptors is not the reason our eyes are not as sharp as others creatures.
I just explained that this isn't about sufficiency. Why do you just repeat this?
Because it is about sufficiency. Its about what is sufficient for this organism to survive. What it isnt about is what could be better.
Tell this to the countless people who died from sabertooth attacks - if you meet them in heaven.
I doubt many people have died from sabertooth attacks. Not many people today die from big cat attacks, why would it be any different in the past?

[kingzfan2000]

I dunno -- persistent rumors to the contrary, I'm neither omniscient nor omnipotent and don't claim to be.

An interesting implication of kingzfan2000's question is that if I or some other human can't think of a better way, then whatever is, is the best that can be done. Kind of puts that alleged deity in a human box.

RBH
I asked do you think its logical or feasible. Thats a simple question. If you think its logical or feasible then how would you do it? You cant think something is possible and have no idea how to implement it.

[kingzfan2000]

I see. Answering my question with irrelevant questions somehow is supposed to answer it.

And last time I looked "completely optimal" and "perfect" were synonymous.
You asked what kind of design was intended. To answer that Ill say design that ensures survivability. You seem under the impression that an intelligent designer would design all things to be perfect. Since thats your belief Im asking how is that practical or even possible. Im asking you to justify your beliefs.

[RBH]

I asked do you think its logical or feasible. Thats a simple question. If you think its logical or feasible then how would you do it? You cant think something is possible and have no idea how to implement it.On the contrary, one can know something is possible and not know how to do it. For example, I think it's entirely possible that Windows could be made much more stable, even though I can't do it myself and don't know how since I don't have access to the source code. You are putting human limitations on your deity (a common human practice). If that deity is indeed omnipotent and omniscient, then I am absolutely certain that it must know stuff I don't and therefore can do stuff I can't. You seem to be saying otherwise: if a human can't think of a better way, neither can your deity. Interesting.

RBH

[kingzfan2000]

So do you think an intelligent designer would design all thinks perfectly?

[RBH]

So do you think an intelligent designer would design all thinks perfectly?I think a benevolent one would. The alternative is faulty design, which generates pain and misery.

RBH

[Martin B]

So do you think an intelligent designer would design all thinks perfectly?I think the concept of "design" is irrelevant to the question of an omnipotent deity who created the universe, that's for sure. Why should a god need to design things if he/she/it could just make all things work on magic? Designing things is a something that you do because you're not in control of the laws of nature, not something you do when you are the one who concomitantly created those very laws.

[kingzfan2000]

I think a benevolent one would. The alternative is faulty design, which generates pain and misery.

RBH
I think its easy to say an intelligent designer would design life to not experience pain and suffering. I think its alot harder to implement that design. I dont think life without pain is practical. But from a naturalistic veiwpoint, why would pain evolve? Suppose nobody can experience pain and a mutation occurs which causes a person to be able to experience pain. Is this individual now more fit then everyone else? Are organisms who can experience pain more fit than those who cant? Starting from a point where organisms dont experience pain, why would the capability to feel pain become the standard? How early did the capability evolve? At what level of life do organisms start to experience pain? What advantage does experiencing pain offer over not experiencing pain?

[RBH]

All living tissue is "irritable" (in the technical sense of that word). It may be hard to "implement" that design, but then, what is constraining an omni-everything deity? Either the purported designer is constrained by natural laws and is therefore not omni-anything, or it's not constrained, in which case it's vacuous as an explanatory construct.

RBH

[Dhaeron]

I think its alot harder to implement that design. I dont think life without pain is practical.
If there's a omnipotent designer, he shouldn't have any constraints to follow.
But anyway, that is besides the point. If ID wants to be science it needs to be falsifiable. In the case of detecting design there need to be criteria to distinguish between design and not design. It could be easy to set up. A perfect designer should logically produce perfect design. So, while we can't know what's perfect, if we find something that's obviously not perfect it'd be evidence against design.
ID however is not science, and does not operate like science. The conclusion, design, is set in stone a priori, so when a design is found that isn't perfect, ID does not state that this is evidence against a (perfect) designer but starts hand-waving about design constraints or different intent. That is of course, because for ID, it is already accepted that everything was designed, and ID "science" is just about making explanations up supporting it.
Unfortunately for ID proponents, it is easy to distinguish real science from post hoc rationalizations for a priori assumptions.
But from a naturalistic veiwpoint, why would pain evolve? Suppose nobody can experience pain and a mutation occurs which causes a person to be able to experience pain. Is this individual now more fit then everyone else?Yes. Pain is a response to damage to the indivdual something that is very beneficial. A dog that experience pain when stung by a bee because it tried to play with their nest will run away and survive, one that doesn't notice it until it got enough poison to die well, dies. And that's fairly long down the evolutionary road, at the start, i imagine, are things like flat-worm like creatures that move depending on light and heat sensations so as not to get burned.

[Superheavy]

Can you design a self-lubricating, self-cleansing, self-repairing optical system that works continuously without any major malfunctions or stoppages for 60-100 years? I doubt it. Every member of these forums put together couldnt do it. You give me your description of what you think is a perfect optical system and I guarantee I could name a way in which it could be better. Because it could be better means it wasnt designed? If you say a well designed eye is an eye that can see a tiger from 100 meters I can say thats poor design and one that is well designed should be able to see tiger from a kilometer because 100 meters is not sufficient space for a human to get away from a charging tiger, then somebody else can come and say no 5 kilometers. No matter what the design of anything somebody can always think of a way it could be better. Do eyes perform their job well? The vast majority of the time the answer is yes. Could they be better? Of course, but do they really need to be better? Imo the answer is no.
It's God we're talking about here, right? He could have designed our eyes to work fricking miraculously for all eternity. And I do mean that literally. Wiring? Screw it, a miracle happens and takes the signal to your soul (yes, soul). Lens? Screw it, a miracle happens and perfect acuity is achieved. Why worry about hardware problems? I don't see the point. Since when does God need matter to make stuff work?

EDIT: Dammit, I see Martin B beat me to it.

[Oolon Colluphid]

So do you think an intelligent designer would design all thinks perfectly?
The alternative you seem to be proposing is that something smart enough to, for instance, design a "self-lubricating, self-cleansing, self-repairing optical system that works continuously without any major malfunctions or stoppages for 60-100 years"... would deliberately include fuck-ups?

Okay, if you say so... :rolleyes: :banghead:

[Sven]

I havent seen any demonstrations that it is a remarkable waste of resources.
I see. Now you are putting word in my mouth. Nobody said that it's "remarkable". Would you please now address the point?

How do you know that wiring it the way you think it should be is completely optimal?
I provided you with a completely optimal eye - entirely without any reference to the wiring. So I see no obligation to address this.

Yeah I agree, but we are here and sabertooths are extinct, probably with a little bit of help from us.
And the people who died from them don't matter, yes?

We have good eyes now and we had good eyes then.
Hint: Just repeating an argument after it was thouroughly refuted does not help you.

However I think visual sharpness is more important now then it was when we were mostly hunters, so I dont think you have a valid point.
Tell this to the people who died. *shrug*

I think you need more visual accuity to perform laser eye surgery or perform open heart surgery then you do to see a 3000 pound buffalo or a deer.
Guess why we invented lots of additional machines for this? Our eyes alone don't help us, so this is irrelevant. It's even more irrelevant since laser eye surgerey and open heart surgerey very seldom is necessary for people who have not yet reproduced.

You are arguing that we dont have good vision
No, I'm not. Please stop this strawman finally. We are arguing that it could be better - this does not mean in any way that it isn't good right now.

and that hunting would have been a problem with all the problems with our eyes, but that doesnt seem to be the case.
Tell this to the people who died. *shrug*

Animals with sharper vision with the same eye setup we have.:banghead: You are arguing that if are eyes were wired more efficiently we would have better vision
Hint: This is not my argument. I don't care what others argue, but I have not said a bit about the wiring.

yet animals with sharper vision than us have the same layout we do, therefore it seems that we have a fallacy of causation or correlation implies causation. Because our eyes are wired this way we dont have sharp eyesight. This is incorrect.
This is maybe the reason why I don't use this argument. :wave:

Again animals have the same inefficient layout we do yet have eyesight many times better than us, therefore the placement of photoreceptors is not the reason our eyes are not as sharp as others creatures.
So, would you now please address the question why we don't have sharper vision?

Because it is about sufficiency. Its about what is sufficient for this organism to survive. What it isnt about is what could be better.
Problem is of course that our eyes are often not sufficient for survival. See above and below.
And you just told us what we would expect if human eyes evolved. If ID "theory" predicts exactly the same (although I've yet to see a logical argument from "ID" to "it's about sufficiency" - care to present one?), how are we supposed to determine which one is right?

I doubt many people have died from sabertooth attacks. Not many people today die from big cat attacks, why would it be any different in the past?
:rolling: :rolling: :thumbs:
Great joke!
Oh. You were actually serious...? :eek:
Hint: It's got something to do with the ratio of wild animals to humans. And with the way humans lived then and live today.

Apart from this, why does it matter if it was "many"? Even if it would have been only one, the fact remains that he would not have died with better eyes. You still have not addressed this simple fact.

[Sven]

You asked what kind of design was intended. To answer that Ill say design that ensures survivability.
Thanks. Why not the first time I asked.
Now please explain how this follows from ID "theory".

You seem under the impression that an intelligent designer would design all things to be perfect.
Umm, you were the one who said something about "completely optimal".

Since thats your belief Im asking how is that practical or even possible. Im asking you to justify your beliefs.
It's called "reductio ad absurdum". ID proponents usually believe in some kind of heaven. Usually, this concept incorporates some kind of perfect beings, living happily together. So within their belief, perfect beings are both practical and possible. We now go on and ask why this is not the case on Earth. What I believe to be possible is irrelevant in this argument.

[Oolon Colluphid]

I doubt many people have died from sabertooth attacks. Not many people today die from big cat attacks, why would it be any different in the past?
Ho ho ho!

http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/Sciences/LifeScience/PhysicalAnthropology/HumanGeneticEvolution/EarlyHominids/leopard_kill.gif
Leopard canines fit punctures in hominid skull from Swartkrans

Okay, so it's a leopard, but the point remains in the remains. Of course, now you'll say that that is not a human skull... ;)

[Flint]

So we're really arguing over the question: Can God design something so perfect He can't improve it?

Omniscience is so immediately self-refuting. Like saying "This sentence is false."

[Stephen T-B]

I may be wrong here, but I am under the impression that biological evolution is a process which leads organisms to being "fit for purpose". Those that aren't, fade away and those that are, thrive.

IDers, in that case, need to consider what "purpose" humans beings (for instance) are fit for, and whether their "fitness" for that purpose is optimal or just sufficiently marginal to allow their survival.

If it isn't optimal, why should that be the case, presuming a super-intelligence designed them?
What was this super-intelligence playing at?
Or do they think it is sub-super-intelligent, and did as good a job as it knew how?

On the other hand, perhaps they think that making humans with design flaws was part of the super-intelligent designer's long-term plan which we, as mere human beings, are not equipped to comprehend?

We need answers.

[-RRH-]

Im still not understanding what the problem with human eyes is. For a person with 20/20 vision what exactly is the problem? Say I have 20/20 vision, how would my eyes being wired the more efficient way improve my vision?No blind spot. I think it's also less prone to retinal detachment.


But yes. The question of whether this is "perfect" design is not really an evolution/creation thing, but a problem of evil thing. Bad eyes and earthquakes, both are natural evil, uncaused by human actions, but from which humans can suffer. If you can justify one, you can justify the other.


Now, the question of how doling out two kinds of eyes along strict taxonomic divides serves the ineffable purpose of this alleged creator, that's something I'd like to see a creationist try to answer.

[kingzfan2000]

If there's a omnipotent designer, he shouldn't have any constraints to follow.
But anyway, that is besides the point. If ID wants to be science it needs to be falsifiable. In the case of detecting design there need to be criteria to distinguish between design and not design. It could be easy to set up. A perfect designer should logically produce perfect design. So, while we can't know what's perfect, if we find something that's obviously not perfect it'd be evidence against design.
ID however is not science, and does not operate like science. The conclusion, design, is set in stone a priori, so when a design is found that isn't perfect, ID does not state that this is evidence against a (perfect) designer but starts hand-waving about design constraints or different intent. That is of course, because for ID, it is already accepted that everything was designed, and ID "science" is just about making explanations up supporting it.
Unfortunately for ID proponents, it is easy to distinguish real science from post hoc rationalizations for a priori assumptions.
Again, you assume that perfection is the intent. If I was a perfect designer and I wanted to design something perfectly I would do it. So for me to be a perfect designer and design something thats not perfect doesnt mean Im not a perfect designer, it means perfection was not my intent. Why? That would be for me to know and you to wonder about.
Yes. Pain is a response to damage to the indivdual something that is very beneficial. A dog that experience pain when stung by a bee because it tried to play with their nest will run away and survive, one that doesn't notice it until it got enough poison to die well, dies. And that's fairly long down the evolutionary road, at the start, i imagine, are things like flat-worm like creatures that move depending on light and heat sensations so as not to get burned.

So if pain is beneficial then why would a designer design creatures that couldnt feel pain? Could it be done? Yes, but obviously that isnt the designers intent. Again you presume that an intelligent designer would and should design things the way you think they should be designed. Why?

[kingzfan2000]

It's God we're talking about here, right? He could have designed our eyes to work fricking miraculously for all eternity. And I do mean that literally. Wiring? Screw it, a miracle happens and takes the signal to your soul (yes, soul). Lens? Screw it, a miracle happens and perfect acuity is achieved. Why worry about hardware problems? I don't see the point. Since when does God need matter to make stuff work?

EDIT: Dammit, I see Martin B beat me to it.
And if he did it any of those ways people would be saying well why didnt he do it another way. The designer could make it so that the sky was green and grass and trees were purple. Why didnt he? He didnt want to. Since when does god need matter to make stuff work? Before the big bang there was neither time, space, nor matter and yet there is a **** load of matter in the universe now so obviously he doesnt need matter to make stuff work. Thats just how he chose to do it.

[kingzfan2000]

The alternative you seem to be proposing is that something smart enough to, for instance, design a "self-lubricating, self-cleansing, self-repairing optical system that works continuously without any major malfunctions or stoppages for 60-100 years"... would deliberately include fuck-ups?

Okay, if you say so... :rolleyes: :banghead:
It was teh fall:redface:

[Sven]

So for me to be a perfect designer and design something thats not perfect doesnt mean Im not a perfect designer, it means perfection was not my intent. Why? That would be for me to know and you to wonder about.
Without an explanation for this, ID "theory" is empty.

So if pain is beneficial then why would a designer design creatures that couldnt feel pain?
It isn't always beneficial - as is the case for almost every biological phenomenon.

Why didnt he? He didnt want to. Since when does god need matter to make stuff work? [...] Thats just how he chose to do it.
And there are still people out there who claim that ID is science? :eek:

[Dhaeron]

Again you presume that an intelligent designer would and should design things the way you think they should be designed. Why?
Simple. Because if i can't recognize a designer by finding design that's similar to what i'd do, ID is bullshit. You're saying we can't know what the designer intended. Fine. Ok. That means we don't know what's good design and what's bad design right? But that means we don't know what's design and not design either. If any and all "designs" can be attributed to the designer because He Is Unfathomable, there is no way to know if what we see is unfathomable design, or no design.
In short: Without specifying the designer, ID is unfalsifiable. If it's unfalsifiable it's not science.

[kingzfan2000]

I see. Now you are putting word in my mouth. Nobody said that it's "remarkable". Would you please now address the point?
What was the point again?


I provided you with a completely optimal eye - entirely without any reference to the wiring. So I see no obligation to address this.

So your completely optimal eye works just because? It works by magic?
And the people who died from them don't matter, yes?

No they dont matter. Why should they? People die

Hint: Just repeating an argument after it was thouroughly refuted does not help you.
So that we have good eyes has been thouroughly refuted? Where??


Tell this to the people who died. *shrug*

So the only reason you can come up with for why our eyesight was not sufficient in the past is because of this pandemic of people getting killed by sabertooth tigers?? Thats pretty pathetic. Do you have any statics to show the numbers for people killed by sabertooth tigers in prehistoric times?


Guess why we invented lots of additional machines for this? Our eyes alone don't help us, so this is irrelevant. It's even more irrelevant since laser eye surgerey and open heart surgerey very seldom is necessary for people who have not yet reproduced.
So are you saying that peoples eyes usually work well for the most important part of peoples lives?


No, I'm not. Please stop this strawman finally. We are arguing that it could be better - this does not mean in any way that it isn't good right now.



So youre not arguing that we dont have good eyes but earlier when I said we have good eyes you said that statement had been thoroughly refuted:confused: Which is it do we have good eyes or dont we? Nevermind if they could be better because I have already conceded that they could. Do we have good eyes yes or no and Im not talking about in comparison to other creatures, just do we have good eyes or not?
Tell this to the people who died. *shrug*


:huh:
Hint: This is not my argument. I don't care what others argue, but I have not said a bit about the wiring.

But I thought thats what this discussion was about:confused: I thought we were discussing how the layout of the human eye was inefficient and a sign of bad design therefore a sign that it isnt the product of design.

This is maybe the reason why I don't use this argument.
Then what is your argument? Simply that our eyes could be better? Yes they could. Every aspect of every living thing on this planet could be better. There is not a perfect biological entity on this planet in the sense that any biological feature can be improved upon.

So, would you now please address the question why we don't have sharper vision?
No I think you should address it. Biologically why dont we have sharper vision?


Problem is of course that our eyes are often not sufficient for survival. See above and below.
Could you be more precise when you say often? Of the six or seven billion humans on earth, what percentage would you say dont survive because their eyes werent sufficient to ensure survival? Of the population of every human that has ever lived, what percentage would you guess didnt survive because their eyes were not sufficient to ensure survival?
And you just told us what we would expect if human eyes evolved. If ID "theory" predicts exactly the same (although I've yet to see a logical argument from "ID" to "it's about sufficiency" - care to present one?), how are we supposed to determine which one is right?

You stick with your answer and ill stick with mine and when we die we'll see who was right.

:rolling: :rolling: :thumbs:
Great joke!
Oh. You were actually serious...? :eek:
Hint: It's got something to do with the ratio of wild animals to humans. And with the way humans lived then and live today.

Apart from this, why does it matter if it was "many"? Even if it would have been only one, the fact remains that he would not have died with better eyes. You still have not addressed this simple fact.
How do you know that? Maybe they didnt see them because they werent paying attention and not because of limitations of vision. The way big cats hunt entails remaining unseen for the longest time possible. I would think better hearing or a better sense of smell would have been more valuable to detecting sabertooths than eyesight. Unless you can demonstrate that better vision would have resulted in fewer sabertooth tiger attacks, it is just a baseless assumption.

[kingzfan2000]

Ho ho ho!

http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/Sciences/LifeScience/PhysicalAnthropology/HumanGeneticEvolution/EarlyHominids/leopard_kill.gif
Leopard canines fit punctures in hominid skull from Swartkrans

Okay, so it's a leopard, but the point remains in the remains. Of course, now you'll say that that is not a human skull... ;)
Uhhh, I said I dont think many people died I didnt say no people. People get killed by lions and tigers today but Im sure more people kill big cats today than big cats kill people, and I think it would be the same in the past.

[kingzfan2000]

So we're really arguing over the question: Can God design something so perfect He can't improve it?

Omniscience is so immediately self-refuting. Like saying "This sentence is false."
This is true which is why omnipotence and maybe omniscience is not really possible in the truest sense of the word. There are things that even an all-powerful being couldnt do.

[kingzfan2000]

Simple. Because if i can't recognize a designer by finding design that's similar to what i'd do, ID is bullshit. You're saying we can't know what the designer intended. Fine. Ok. That means we don't know what's good design and what's bad design right? But that means we don't know what's design and not design either. If any and all "designs" can be attributed to the designer because He Is Unfathomable, there is no way to know if what we see is unfathomable design, or no design.
In short: Without specifying the designer, ID is unfalsifiable. If it's unfalsifiable it's not science.
okay so it isnt science. Thats fine with me.

[RBH]

kingzfan2000 wroteUhhh, I said I dont think many people died I didnt say no people. People get killed by lions and tigers today but Im sure more people kill big cats today than big cats kill people, and I think it would be the same in the past.Um, that's about as unlikely a notion as I've run into lately. Prior to the invention of effective firearms, a human was at a distinct disadvantage against any of the large predators.

RBH

[Dhaeron]

okay so it isnt science. Thats fine with me.
Great. :) Then we can stop any talk about Evolution vs. ID because not being science ID is no alternative to evolution. And whoever whishes to can join the great Dembski Church Of ID.
Agreed?

[Flint]

Maybe this is why the ape clade has generally done so poorly. Apes tend to be big yummy targets without any really terrific defenses.

[gregor]

Kingzfan, surely you must realize the problems with taking a position (our eyes are optimal) when you don't know the science, don't know the physiology of sight, and make non sequiturs along the lines of "I'm sure men have killed as many tigers in 2006 (with firearms) as they did in 3006 BCE with (pointed sticks)."

Please follow Twain's advise on keeping silent.

[Sven]

What was the point again?
Read it up.

So your completely optimal eye works just because? It works by magic?
Shifting the goal posts again? You asked for an optimal eye, not for an explanation how an optimal eye works. (Here is your challenge verbatim: "You give me your description of what you think is a perfect optical system and I guarantee I could name a way in which it could be better.")

Apart from this, didn't you just claim: "Since when does god need matter to make stuff work?". So you are apparently quite comfortable with magic. Where's the problem?

No they dont matter. Why should they? People die
I see. We have a supposedly omnipotent and omnibenevolent being, but it does not matter that people die. Cognitive dissonance at its best.
Apart from this, your statement that it does not matter that people die simply can not be serious - or are you really that profoundly inhuman? :eek:

So the only reason you can come up with for why our eyesight was not sufficient in the past is because of this pandemic of people getting killed by sabertooth tigers?? Thats pretty pathetic. Do you have any statics to show the numbers for people killed by sabertooth tigers in prehistoric times?

:rolleyes: Sabertooth were an example. You do know that there were (and still are) lots of other dangerous animals? But since you already claimed that people dying don't matter, I see no reason to continue this argument. I have a strong urge to vomit if I read inhuman statements like yours above.

So are you saying that peoples eyes usually work well for the most important part of peoples lives?
Depends on how you define "important". From the viewpoint of evolution, the part until reproduction is most important. From the viewpoint of individual humans, their life after having reached maturity certainly is important to them, too.

So youre not arguing that we dont have good eyes but earlier when I said we have good eyes you said that statement had been thoroughly refuted:confused: Which is it do we have good eyes or dont we? Nevermind if they could be better because I have already conceded that they could. Do we have good eyes yes or no and Im not talking about in comparison to other creatures, just do we have good eyes or not?
Sorry. My mistake. I felt that you were applying different meanings of good ("good" is, after all, a very subjective term). Using "good" as meaning "optimal", I would argue that this is wrong. Using "good" as meaning "sufficient", I would (at least for the most part) agree. Again, sorry. I should have thought better about this in my last post.
Having said this, I feel that (because of the subjectivity) the question "have we good eyes" can not be answered without a definition first.

But I thought thats what this discussion was about:confused: I thought we were discussing how the layout of the human eye was inefficient and a sign of bad design therefore a sign that it isnt the product of design.
The overall thread is about this, yes. But I did not address this anywhere in my posts. Apparently I should have said flat out that I don't care about this.

Then what is your argument? Simply that our eyes could be better? Yes they could. Every aspect of every living thing on this planet could be better. There is not a perfect biological entity on this planet in the sense that any biological feature can be improved upon.
Nice. Now please explain how this follows from ID "theory". Evolution predicts exactly this, how does ID do so?

No I think you should address it. Biologically why dont we have sharper vision?
Because from the perspective of evolution it's good enough. See above about the different meaning of "important".
Now please return the favor and explain how ID explains this.

Could you be more precise when you say often? Of the six or seven billion humans on earth, what percentage would you say dont survive because their eyes werent sufficient to ensure survival? Of the population of every human that has ever lived, what percentage would you guess didnt survive because their eyes were not sufficient to ensure survival?
Depends on the time you look at. But I guess in the stone age, the number could rise as high as 10%.
And if you had not made the inhuman statement above that people dying does not matter, I would greatly wonder here what's this quiblling about "often" is about - from my viewpoint, even a single human dying because of bad eyesight would be a bad thing.

You stick with your answer and ill stick with mine and when we die we'll see who was right.
:banghead:
You just completely evaded the central issue: How ID can claim to determine an intelligent designer.
Thanks for (once again!) proving the utter emptiness of ID "theory" :thumbs:

How do you know that? Maybe they didnt see them because they werent paying attention and not because of limitations of vision.
How do I know what?

The way big cats hunt entails remaining unseen for the longest time possible. I would think better hearing or a better sense of smell would have been more valuable to detecting sabertooths than eyesight. Unless you can demonstrate that better vision would have resulted in fewer sabertooth tiger attacks, it is just a baseless assumption.
More irrelevancies. As if only sabertooth were ever dangerous to humans.

[JLK]

Stumbling back to better and worse eyes...
why do some vertebrates have eyesight that is much sharper than humans when their eyes are wired the same inefficient way?Vertebrates with better visual accuity, like raptors, simply pack a greater density of photocells in their fovea((s) -raptors have 2 small ones in each eye). Of course the downside to this increasing vertebrate density is increases in the amount of wiring funneling back thru the optic disc, making a larger blindspot. Raptors' blindspot fields are larger than yours.
The sensible design is immune to this tradeoff. Crank up the density, crank up the fovea size, crank up the number of foveas per eye and Bob's still your uncle.
And I see you are still focused on healthy eyes and have ignored the "kludges have more possible failures" point, like retinal detachment, high blood flow nuisances, etc.

Look. This non-optimality argument is not meant to be a stand-alone definitive debunking of a Designer. It's merely demonstrating, as you've acknowledged, any presumed Designer must have very inscrutable intentions on the one hand, while on the other, the pattern of eyes fits both common descent and the process of evolutionary tinkering within historical constraints. It reveals a genuine explanation and exposes a non-explanation, set to the background of the Twilight Zone theme (http://tzone.the-croc.com/sounds/tzone11.zip):
"You're traveling thru an inscrutable dimension. A dimension of not only regularity and chance, but of Design. A journey into a phantasmical land whose only boundaries are that of imagination.
That's the signpost up ahead! Your next stop -- the Creationist Zone!"

[Stephen T-B]

My question is, how intelligent was the designer that designed an eye which could develop a hole in the macular, as has happened in one of my eyes?

[Oolon Colluphid]

The alternative you seem to be proposing is that something smart enough to, for instance, design a "self-lubricating, self-cleansing, self-repairing optical system that works continuously without any major malfunctions or stoppages for 60-100 years"... would deliberately include fuck-ups?

Okay, if you say so... :rolleyes: :banghead:
It was teh fall:redface:
I should think you would have a " : redface : " for saying that. I'd be embarrassed by such an idiotic statement too!

Oh, sorry, I see, you were joking! Ah, hahaha! Yes, very good, sorry for not 'getting' it at first! Erm: :redface:

:rolling: Yes, very good parody of what a really stupid creationist would say! :thumbs: (Because, of course, it means that the Fall somehow inverted Adam's retina... and inverted the retinas in all the separate 'kinds' of vertebrates too... but didn't affect squids... and did so in such a way as to leave it so damned well functioning that creationists dispute it being a flaw at all!)

So, well done, it deserves a "LOL!" :thumbs:

[Codec]

If I was designing an eye, I think I'd want at least zoom, split screen, infra red option and probably cross-fade...

Lister: Any problems?
Kryten: Well, just one or two. In fact I've compiled a little list if you'll indulge me. Now then, uh, my optical system doesn't appear to have a zoom function.
Lister: No, human eyes don't have a zoom.
Kryten: Well then, how do you bring a small object into sharp focus?
Lister: Well, you just move your head closer to the object.
Kryten: I see. Move your head ... closer, hmm, to the object. All right, okay. Well, what about other optical effects, like split screen, slow motion, Quantel[tm]?
Lister: No. We don't have them.
Kryten: You don't have them -- just the zoom? Hmm. Well, no, that's fine, that's great, no, no, that's really great, that's great. Now then, my nipples don't work.
Lister: Er, in what way `don't work'?
Kryten: Well, uh, when I was a mechanoid, the right nipple-nut was used to, uh, regulate body temperature, while the left nipple-nut was used mainly to, uh, pick up shortwave radio transmissions. Now, what I'm saying is, no matter how hard I twiddle it, I can't seem to pick up Jazz FM.

[TaO!]

Holy cow, all those responses. :eek:

I'm not saying it's intelligently designed so I can't really respond to any of the questions pertaining to that. I'm not a creationist.

My simple point was against the argument that it's a 'bad' design; that it's overly simplistic to suggest that simply rewiring the retina would present a better design because it wouldn't function at all, for one reason or another.

Sorry if this has been addressed already, I need more time to read the thread.

[Oolon Colluphid]

My simple point was against the argument that it's a 'bad' design; that it's overly simplistic to suggest that simply rewiring the retina would present a better design because it wouldn't function at all, for one reason or another.
Sure. But to summarise, my / our point is that it is a bad design... if it were a design! Rewiring it with the current components probably would screw it up completely.

But a designer would not need to "simply rewire" it. A designer would not be rewiring anything! He would be designing! He would be wiring it from scratch, with appropriate components that do work in that arrangement.

It is evolution that is constrained in what it uses and how. An actual designer need not be so contstrained, and certainly not the sort of designer that ID creationists posit. Real designers can nick designs from elsewhere and mix-n-match components. Like using NASA-developed aerodynamics technology to make better golf balls. Or this lot (http://www.thespaceplace.com/nasa/spinoffs.html).

Agreed?

[Wads4]

"Wiring it the other way around would be worse. You can't say it's wired the wrong way and proclaim it's a bad design if you can't flip it the 'right' way and propose a mechanism to overcome the new cellular-level problems that arise from your supposedly better 'design'.

It's disingenuous to say "It's wired the wrong way and the blind spot is poor design" when the problem of the blind spot is largely overcome by visual processing. The brain fills in the blanks. To have the axons reversed is a decidedly WORSE way to do it.

You also can't say the designer isn't clever if you don't know the designer's purpose. It's not a case of "Well it works well enough, I'm done", the entire mechanism for sight serves it's purpose, hence is a good design."[/quote]

So if my builder makes a lousy job of plumbing in my new dishwasher, and I complain about the shoddy plumbing design he can say, "Ah but, my shoddy workmanship allows that it can be corrected if you take a hose-pipe, attach one end to the road water main, hoist it up to the roof, wrap it twice round the chimney, down through the sitting-room past my mother-in-law, and into the door of the dishwasher, cleverley by-passing its usual input nozzle,--and it works just great, it serves its purpose, and is hence a good design.

[Oolon Colluphid]

And because I missed it before...
[...] it's overly simplistic to suggest that simply rewiring the retina would present a better design because it wouldn't function at all, for one reason or another.
Yes, true, it would be overly simplistic. But since that was not the suggestion, what you've got there is this chap:

http://www.movieprop.com/tvandmovie/reviews/wizardofscare.jpg

:Cheeky:

[kingzfan2000]

Here are two articles on why it is beneficial for the eye to be wired the way it is.
http://arn.org/docs/odesign/od192/invertedretina192.htm
http://arn.org/docs/odesign/od171/retina171.htm
Are they inaccurate or errant in their conclusions?

[Oolon Colluphid]

Kingzfan, go read the thread through again. The links' conclusions are irrelevant.

The designer -- any designer -- would have no need to use parts that would only work in their current configuration. He could use any parts he liked so as to avoid such a fundamental flaw in an eye as a bit of it that cannot see.

It is a design issue, not a functional one, and means that the designer was an idiot.

[pangloss]

I've spent a fair few hours researching rod photoreceptor cells and I'm not convinced it's a bad 'design'. It does seem intuitive that the axons of photoreceptors are wired backwards, however it seems quite necessary considering shed rod outer segments (ROS) are phagocytosed by the retinal pigmented epithelium (RPE) and it provides and recycles retinal to the opsin. If the axons were to leave the eye distally, as seem logical to most people, the RPE, along with it's blood supply, would need to lie between the photoreptors and the pupil to do its job and it would pretty much obstruct all light from reaching the photoreceptive cells. Light would need to pass not only through layers of melanin, but through a vascular layer aswell. It makes more sense to have unmyelinated axons leave the retina, towards the inside.

I think saying it's 'bad design' because it's 'wired backwards' is a bit disingenuous. Thoughts?

You seem to be assuming that the only way to 'wire' it correctly is to take the existing arrangement and flip it over.

Why do you assume that?

[pangloss]

Here are two articles on why it is beneficial for the eye to be wired the way it is.
http://arn.org/docs/odesign/od192/invertedretina192.htm
http://arn.org/docs/odesign/od171/retina171.htm
Are they inaccurate or errant in their conclusions?

They are spinning.

Creationists do that.

[gypsey]

my question would be if there is a designer why did he include astigmatism in there, what is the purpose of that? i couldn't see a raging elephant at 50 yards without glasses nor a sabertooth at 30, eye "design" really sucks sometimes!