Re: Analog vs Digital

RobertMaas_at_YahooGroups.Com
Date: 06/23/04 

Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2004 16:06:36 +0000 (UTC)

> From: john_SPAM@wilkins.id.au (John Wilkins)
> The bird's wing, though, merely resembles human designed wings - it
> was not designed to reduce drag or maximise fuel efficiency. Those
> that did better than others and were hereditable spread to fixation
> in some ancestral population.

I agree. The *verb* "design" does not apply in this case.
There was no designing process involved.

> There *is* no design here.

I disagree. The *noun* "design" *does* apply in this case. The result
of the random process of mutation and selection was a "design" in the
sense of some pattern that is useful toward functionning of some
device. The "design" in a bird's wing is part anatomy and part
biochemistry. The principals of operation of a bird's wing are such and
such (involving neurotransmitters, muscle cells, tendons, leverage,
porous bones, feathers to catch air, tipping angle of attack to vary
drag and lift, overall balance, etc.). What single word, other than
"design", would you prefer for such principals of operation of a
naturally-evolved device (more correctly: an artifact of a
naturally-evolved genome)?

> Everybody *says* they are "really" talking about some process that is
> not intentional or forward looking, etc. But the language they use
> misleads them anyway, when they draw conclusions in ordinary terms.

I agree with you about the use of "design" as a *verb*, as the name of
a process. NS does not design a bird's wings, or DNA replicase, etc.
The process by which NS arrives at the design (noun: structure &
principals of operation) of a bird's wing should not be called design
(verb).

> I think Gould was mislead this way when he talked about morphometric
> space and Cambrian diversity.

I think Gould was wrong-thinking about Gaia, but I haven't seen/heard
any of his talk about morphometric space and Cambrian diversity and I'd
be curious to see anything online about that to judge for myself if he
was wrong there too.

> I think Dawkins is rife with it.

I'm not aware of Dawkins ever being significantly wrong about anything.
Please give me a few examples of his being rife with it.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: He-100 Part II- He P.1079 vs Me 509
    ... These Coefficient of Drag improvements were well within the ... An aircraft equiped with functioning surface cooling system is entirely ... transonic wing sections that reduce the rise in compressabillity drag. ... what its worth - my PhD was in 3D inverse aerodynamic design - I spent ...
    (rec.aviation.military)
  • Re: He-100 Part II- He P.1079 vs Me 509
    ... These Coefficient of Drag improvements were well within the ... what its worth - my PhD was in 3D inverse aerodynamic design - I spent ... fighter aircraft. ... Handley Page Victor crescent wing like appearence. ...
    (rec.aviation.military)
  • Re: Ostfront or fancy projects: German aircraft designers in 1944-1945
    ... look for a successful design that did that looks similar ... The J-35 engine was too large to fit in the P.1101 ... German personalities and the sequence ... As an example the X-5 could not land if the wing sweep was greater ...
    (rec.aviation.military)
  • Re: 52/1 Performance in a 15M ship at half the weight.
    ... Cole’s Sailplane factory is in Bend Oregon. ... Company, Cirrus Design, Lancair, and Adam Aircraft. ... Designs that can be made light with small wing areas offer improved ...
    (rec.aviation.soaring)
  • Re: 52/1 Performance in a 15M ship at half the weight.
    ... wasn't suitable for soaring. ... Cole’s Sailplane factory is in Bend Oregon. ... Company, Cirrus Design, Lancair, and Adam Aircraft. ... Designs that can be made light with small wing areas offer improved ...
    (rec.aviation.soaring)
Loading