Conceptualizing Design
by BradfordMike Gene has written about four criteria that can be used to assess a design inference – Analogy, Discontinuity, Rationality, and Foresight. At his blog The Design Matrix Mike posted an entry titled Detecting Design – Mind and Hands. In it he quotes Howard Van Til:
We speak often today of things that have been designed. Cars are designed; clothing is designed; buildings are designed. Suppose, then, we were to walk into the headquarters of a major automobile manufacturer and ask to observe the process of cars being designed. What kind of activity would we be shown? Would we be taken to the assembly line to see cars being put together by human hands and mechanical robots? No, we would be taken to the “design center” where we would see people working with their minds (augmented, of course, by computers and various means of modeling what their minds conceive) to conceptualize new cars of various styles to achieve the intentions of the manufacturer in the marketplace. In other words, to say that a car was designed is to say that a car was thoughtfully conceptualized to accomplish some well-defined purpose. In contemporary parlance, the action of design is performed by a mind, intentionally conceptualizing something for the accomplishment of a purpose.
This mind-like action of designing is clearly distinguishable from the hand-like action of actualizing (assembling, arranging, constructing) what had first been designed. On a tour of an automobile manufacturing facility, for instance, we would have no difficulty in distinguishing the mental work done at the design center from the manual work done on the assembly line.
Mike then goes on to comment:
The distinction between the mind-like action of designing and the hand-like action of actualizing is key. Conceptualization precedes actualization. Thus, detecting design is much more like detecting another mind than detecting busy hands. In fact, if you did not perceive the mind, the hands would not be detected as designing – they’d be detected as doing. Without making any serious and honest effort to detect the mind-like action of designing, a focus on the hand-like action of actualization will not signal design.
This is a useful and accurate observation. Conceptualization of design preceeds its implementation. Evidence for design frequently is viewed as restricted to an implementing physical process. In fact, evidence could include conceptualization. Data for that would be tangible.
March 12th, 2009 at 1:26 am
OK, but a "mind" is an imperfect tool for modelliing the external world – for quickly running thorugh simulations so you don't have to do everything by hand. What is quicker counting with your fingers or counting with your mind? Which is quicker – reading out loud or reading silently? But your mind can't provide a perfect simulation of the external world because no physical process can perfectly model another. That's why programs always have lots and lots of bugs. That's why designer have to build and perfect lots of prototypes, because their mind is not a perfect simulation of reality – The trade off is speed for accuracy. But there is no real difference between "mind-like" and "hand-like".
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 1:26 am
March 12th, 2009 at 7:24 am
We would see the manufacturing of *plans*. However, I think the point being made is that the mind has imagined some aspect of the design. Of course, we don't directly *observe* this, only the plans, or the final implementation.
With that *in mind*, we now consider a purported artifact. Being an artifact, there is a presumed link of causation between the artisan and the art. The question often raised is, absent evidence of these links, can we detect design by reference to the concept of "design" as an image in the mind?
Detecting design in this manner requires making some assumptions about the characteristics of the designer's mind, particularly its motives, characteristics that might lead to distinguishing and entailed empirical predictions—as well as a reasonable explanation concerning the absence of evidence of causation with reference to the means of implementation. For various reasons, ID Proponents resist any such attempt to so characterize the designer.
When we look at Mount Rushmore (perhaps long after the human species has disappeared), we notice that it resembles certain bilaterally symmetrical organisms, heads with openings for respiration, funnels for auditory sensation, and lenses for the focusing of light much like other organisms, extinct or extant, found on the planet, er, Earth I think it's called.
Perhaps Mount Rushmore was created by a hominid-loving cephalopoidal creature, such as those found on Europa. One Jovial scientist suggests it might have been formed by the hominids themselves, but that seems unlikely due to the hominid tendency to self-destruction (and general clumsiness).
The formation could also be due to some natural cause. Perhaps large hominids were entombed by vocanic ash, the hole infiltrated by sediments, then the ash eroded leaving the images. The poor quality of the images (especially when compared to the much more refined images of well-known Great Leaders such as the monumental Xotz-lith of Xeon), might just indicate chance erosion.
All scientists agree that each of these hypotheses should be subjected to further testing, particularly to identify the purported designer, and more evidence is needed to reach any firm conclusions.
Comment by Zachriel — March 12, 2009 @ 7:24 am
March 12th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
Of course there is a difference. A mind can conceive of a solution which hands can implement in many different ways. This very exchange serves to illustrate the point. I have ideas which I wish to communicate. I can choose among many different ways of stating the theme. All different varieties of expression convey the general concept I have in mind. As I look at what I just typed and ponder it I realize that I could have used my hands to say essentially the same thing in different ways. But all varieties have a commonality of message.
There are parallels in biology. Redundancy correlates to many means of expression while sharing a common function. Words, like codons, are symbols. The many words are parts of a whole having different properties from the individual letters composing them. Reminiscent of systems biology. There are also many different (hand) pathways to a conceptual end. Hands and minds are not the same and the same physical evidence can be distinguishing with respect to the two.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 1:38 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
Bradford, I read your comments, and in thinking about them a thought occured to me (so let me mention it first while pondering how to answer you directly.)
They say that the human hand is what seperates man from other animals, i.e. the ability to manipulate physical stuff. "What happens if I bend this or mold that or shape that? " Certainly if you think about a sculptor the distinction between brain and hands becomes less clear.
And it is not only evo-theorists to whom the significance of hands, (i.e. their specific structure in humans, with an opposable thumb etc.) would be quite apparent. Incidentally, in the Bible, God is always talking about his hands ("By my hand have I done all these things…") Certainly in cultures of that day (when they did not even know about the brain), people thought in terms of their hands doing things.
But what is a brain? Isn't it a physical tool for bending molding and shaping visual data? And it seems to me there's a good deal of trial and error involved in physical manipulation, be it with hands or brains. If you don't have any idea at all what you want, you try stuff at random. But once you hit upon a configuaration you like, you obviously stick with it, so such a configuration is preserved (either in the brain or externally) and if its contrived visual data in the brain (i.e. a thought), it serves to narrow subseqent searches by serving as a default starting point.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 5:52 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
"Hands" are used metaphorically. My understanding is that hands encompass any physical means, including tools of the trade, by which we attempt to effect a conceptual outcome.
I prefer to ask what is a mind? The observable effects of a mind and subsequent analysis of them are in most cases independent of our understanding of underlying neural cell activity associated with thinking and outcomes resulting from it.
I suspect human reason is not quite like algorithmic searches. Human creativity seems to be a function of logic, the capacity to conceptualize options and an ability to introduce out of left field a new paradigm not suggested directly by the object we consider but rather by mental constructs that we analogize to the physical world. In any case we are not confined to blind searches when pondering possibilities which has a bearing on the probability of an effected outcome. Improbability being inversely related to the capacity to accurately envision an outcome.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 6:26 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 6:27 pm
Bradford, something else occurs to me (and I am still working on direct response to you BTW)
I have been primarily talking about "brains" whereas you have be talking about "minds".
Actually, presuming even if you're a dualist, you must agree that the brain itself is a very complicated physical tool, so directly analgous in that sense to a hand which is also a very complicated physical tool.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 6:27 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
The brain is extremely complex but our understanding of its complex dynamics is not required to analyze whether or not conceptualization would preceed implementation.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 6:31 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 6:45 pm
You make it sound as though hands have a mind of their own
OK, so you're thinking a thought is not something tied to some physical expression, Rather you think a thought exists in some other platonic dimension, and that there are innumberable possible physical manifestations of this platonic non-physical thought. It almost sounds like you're saying that these alternate physical maninfestations are completely interchangeable, each serving equally well as a manifestation of your non-physical thought.
I don't know if this helps at all, but coming from a background of computer science, I tend to think in terms of mappings. So you have a high-level english-like program, and you have this complex process called a compiler that takes that high-level program and maps it to another equivalent form in machine language.
Say if you see something and you need to convey what you saw to someone else. So you have to map that thought from a visual reperensentation to another physical medium, that of the english language. And what form you use to convey this message, might have to do with how much detail you needed to convey. Do you just need to say, "I saw a tree" or "I saw a birch tree" or "I saw a tree yesterday" or "I saw a maple tree over 100 ft high still standing on Larchmont St. yesterday."
Abstract thought (if you have that in mind as well) does not necessitate a dualist understanding, IMO, So "Freedom" would be when people aren't coereced to live a certain way by people that have a lot of power. Such a concept needn't eminate from a transcendant non-physical realm. To me, abstract thought means using a small compact physical symbol to refer to a complex process.
Didn't undertstand how this tied to the other things you said.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 6:45 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
Bradoford:
Do you not understand that a computer equates to logic. A computer is AND GATES OR GATES and a feeback loop. That is a computer. An algorithmic search is logic.
But even so, randomness is always a crucial component in a search, that is to try the search from a completely different arbitrary angle, so you don't get stuck in a rut. That is why all computer games use a great deal of randomness. And randomness is essential to statistics as well for example (not implying you don't know that.)
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 6:54 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 6:55 pm
correction: A computer is AND GATES, NOT GATES and a feedback loop.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 6:55 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 7:03 pm
JT:
Is the capacity to map a thought to a physical construct not a consequence of a capacity to conceptualize? More to the point can mappings of symbols to physical constructs or functions not constitute evidence of prior conceptualization?
The physical symbol would be the physical manifestation of a thought process.
There are parallels in biology. Redundancy correlates to many means of expression while sharing a common function. Words, like codons, are symbols. The many words are parts of a whole having different properties from the individual letters composing them. Reminiscent of systems biology.
I mentioned biological phenomenon which I think are products of abstract conceptualizations. The redundancy theme is now being discussed in a separate thread. Systems biology themes need fleshing out and I intend to do that in distinct blog entries. Symbols can be viewed as intrinsically abstract in nature and causally connected to an intelligent source.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 7:03 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
I understand this. I also understand that this does not necessarily depict a process accurately describing our thinking even as the gates and loops are end products of our thinking.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 7:07 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
I understand this. I also understand that this does not necessarily depict a process accurately describing our thinking even as the gates and loops are end products of our thinking.Basically, what your saying is that "mind" does not have a description. Because a computer program is the most rigororous conception of a description. If a mind cannot be described, that is predicted (potentially) then what it is doing is random. But a mind is not random. We know that. So a mind must have a description.
I used to think that even if we have "spirits" that a spirit must itself be a mechanism, maybe not a physical mechanism. But if there is a spiritual dimension, there must be a definite description, i.e. a mechanism, a program to accurately characterize how the spiritual interacts with the physical and vice versa. Even if everything is determinisitic, if it goes on for eternity, and is basically good, and never boring, who cares? Its like one long continually fascinating movie, whether we're writing it (which we're not) or God's writing it.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 7:16 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
In the above post the following comment was Bradford's (don't know what happened to the formatting):
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 7:25 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 7:27 pm
Also on your comment above Bradford: A program can write a program. There isn't any progam that cannot be output by another program. However, the complexity of the second program says something about the complexity of the first – without a doubt.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 7:27 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
The mapping of interest with regards to design is not the mapping of thought to language, but the mapping of the world to thought, in other words, a mental model. The designer manipulates this internal representation of the world to discover new combinations of objects and forces.
Comment by Zachriel — March 12, 2009 @ 8:13 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
Descriptions of the mind's capacities are possible based on quantifiable results of testing. That's something aptitude and IQ tests take advantage of. We do not have reliable detailed models for thinking processes based on the "mechanics" of cellular biochemistry. The good news is we are still able to study minds without such models.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 10:08 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 10:21 pm
Looks like I've got a couple more posts to respond to – I'll get to those in a second, In the meantime –
So the writer would want to distinguish between the conceptual and implementation phases of a process, between white collar and blue collar. Lets face it – are not BOTH groups doing WORK??? Are the white collars doing something conceptually or ontologically DIFFERENT from the blue collars? The white collars are exercizing one physical organ, the brain and derive and end product – possibly a strategy a scheme, but without any doubt a physical object or objects, i.e. a program, charts, policies, equipment acquisitions and configuration, etc. So they produce a set of physical products which serve to constrain the labors of others, those that labor with the another complex organ – their hands.
But in thinking about planning, it is a stage prior to going "live", i.e. planning is the stage where mistakes can be made and corrected, in a context where the results of such mistakes will be minimized. Really plannig and design would be the accepted context for (drum roll) TRIAL and ERROR. SO in other words, planning, design and the work of the mind might be said to correspond to the gestation and juvenile stage of mammalian life.
But planning is a precise necessitated in part by our own fallibility. We have to hash out what might happen before imnplenting something, to simulate the process (imperfectly) to ascertain what errors might occur, i.e. to encounter those errors before the cost associated with them would be prohibitive.
But why would an infallible God for example need to plan or design things? Why coudln't he just materialize instantaneously whatever he wants?
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 10:21 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
Bradford:
Is a compiler conceptualizing when it takes a high level program and converts it to machine language. Incidentally, that's not a trivial process, in that the compiler will use sophisticated methods to optimize things the programmer has written. But the point is, the compiler will take one extremly complex sequence of symbols and map it to an entirely different form.
Why not a different physical manifestation of another physical manifestation. If you see something, it results in a complex chemical state in your brain that correlates, that maps to something physical external to you. And also just think about an image stored on your computer, encrypted or compressed or whatever, completely different form, but same thing.
The question is, from an operational standpoint, in assessing thing like planning and design, is it necessary to appeal to metaphysical concepts to understand what's going on.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 10:40 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
The physical symbol would be the physical manifestation of a thought process.
It is necessary to appeal to metaphysics in any case. The belief that symbols were generated incidentally by a series of undemonstrable and unidentifiable chemical reactions is an appeal to the metaphysics of materialism.
Comment by Bradford — March 12, 2009 @ 10:55 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 11:02 pm
But planning is a precise necessitated in part by =
"But planning is necessitated in part by"
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 11:02 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 11:33 pm
Zachriel:
(I think I subsequently said the same thing.)
If some process f(x) (with x being some state of affairs encountered by f and affecting the behaviorof f) results in some outcome y, then f(x) is just y in another form. If we say f(x) = y, what are we saying? Quite evidently that f(x) and y equate, i.e. are in some sense the same thing. So if someone designs via having an image in their mind which they seek to duplicate in the external world, then that image in their mind + certain other essential translational machinery extant in a human together equate to the designed object. That image in the mind + those extraneous attributes is f(x), and y is the designed object. f(x) = y. So how is any f(x) out there in the universe that results in y (if y = life) different from a thought in a person's brain? Isn't a thought or an image in a brain just a complex physical-chemical configuration? What could f(x) in the universe be, (i.e. one that resulted in life) other than presumably some complex physical chemical configuration ? How is that different from a "thought"? If a human comes from an embryonic cell, what is that cell – a complex physical-chemical configuration, one that doesn't look anything like the end product of a human, but still equates to it. Just as if a "thought" leads to a "designed" object then the thought equates to the designed object.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 11:33 pm
March 12th, 2009 at 11:53 pm
Of course if thoughts are metaphysical then it seems obvious they could not have originated on earth via a physical process.
Comment by JT — March 12, 2009 @ 11:53 pm
March 13th, 2009 at 12:09 am
Nobody is claiming thoughts are metaphysical. Metaphysical is an apt description of a materialist interpretive framework.
Comment by Bradford — March 13, 2009 @ 12:09 am
March 13th, 2009 at 12:21 am
Possibly you're right – I was thinking metaphysical meant "something other than physical."
Comment by JT — March 13, 2009 @ 12:21 am
March 13th, 2009 at 8:15 am
It isn't necessary to resolve that issue in order to reach some reasonable conclusions. Design is not always separate from implementation. A painter dabs a bit, stands back and dabs some more. But it is a reasonable distinction that there is a process of modeling that occurs in the mind, that allows one to plan the implementation.
Nevertheless, when examining a purported artifact, we need to know as much as possible about the artist and the art to reach any valid conclusions. It doesn't matter whether mind is metaphysical or not. Mount Rushmore does not support Dembski's view, but reveals the weakness of his argument.
Comment by Zachriel — March 13, 2009 @ 8:15 am