The Fallacies of Intelligent Design Theory
In information theory, because data transmitted is indifferent to the message, one cannot use the message to point to an intelligent source. This suggests that, whatever the support for ID, the attempt to use evidence from information theory is invalid. Dembski does correctly view any meaningfulness of a string of letters as indicating a high probability of an intelligent author. Of course, to be consistent, he should apply this requirement to biological structures as well as to strings of letters. For example, DNA obviously carries information in nonrandom sequences of the four bases that code genetic information, but there is no way to assert that it carries a message. Thus, to use his own language, how can Dembski determine whether or not the information in DNA is "specified?" Doing so is just an unsubstantiated assumption.
The available data about the structure of DNA indicates that the DNA strand consists of both pieces that carry a genetic code and segments that do not seem to carry any such code. In fact, the human genome is littered with pseudogenes, gene fragments, "orphaned" genes, "junk" DNA, and so many repeated copies of pointless DNA sequences that it cannot be attributed to anything that resembles intelligent design. If we write down the entire genome, we might at first think it has a very high entropy (many bases with many more possible combinations). But once we find out which bases compose genes, we realize that those bases are arranged nonrandomly and that their entropy is close to 0 (or at least very much less than the entropy of an equivalent, random set of bases). That is, the genes contain information because their entropy is less than that of a random sequence of bases of the same length.
Dembski claims to prove that the generation of any information by natural processes and chance is impossible, not just complex specified information. Since the universe contains information, that information must have come about by other means, which he labels intelligent design. While he insists that this argument does not depend on any specific theological assumptions, he often promotes his interpretation that the design inferred is the work of the Christian god. In fact, the whole ID movement is being more than a little disingenuous when it claims that it has no religious agenda.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics and Natural Order
It turns out that the Shannon uncertainty and the physicist's notion of entropy are identical except for a trivial constant, a point that Dembski either does not recognize or chooses to hide. It is well known that entropy is a measure of "disorder." The Shannon uncertainty, as applied in communication theory, is likewise a measure of the disorder in a signal.
In physics, the second law of thermodynamics specifies that, on a macroscopic scale, the entropy of a closed system cannot decrease. Although Dembski does not admit it, his law of conservation of information is nothing more than "conservation of entropy," a special case of the second law that applies when no dissipative processes are present (which is a rare occurrence in everyday experience). In fact, entropy is created a million times a day by all human beings on earth each time any dissipative processes such as friction are present. "Dembski information" is not conserved in such a simple, natural process.
When Dembski claims that information cannot be generated naturally, he appears to be voicing just another mistaken version of the common creationist assertion that the second law forbids the generation of order by natural processes. Like others, he ignores the fact that the second law refers only to "closed systems." Open systems can and do become more orderly by their interaction with other systems. For example, as long as the sun provides energy to the earth, we are in an (localized) open system. In the process, both the sun and earth lose entropy; but this is compensated for by a corresponding gain in the total entropy of the expanding universe, which is the closed system for this purpose. The sun provides for the generation of order on earth, including that contained in living organisms. As an example, whenever a drop of water freezes into an ice crystal, we observe the creation of order by a mindless natural process. We don't need fancy information theory to tell us that. We can see it with our own two eyes. Dembski's law of conservation of information is not just pseudoscience; it is wrong pseudoscience.
ID advocates ignore another important point: thermodynamic disorder is not the opposite of evolutionary complexity. In some ways, complexity makes life acquire greater entropy. Some of man's greatest achievements have been in the power-generating sector, which degrades stored potential energy to waste heat. Just as convection currents may develop, complexity in evolution can be related to disorder, not opposed to it. ID advocates are wrong in trying to use the second law and entropy claims as support for their position.
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The Information Theory Case Against Evolution: Pages 1, 2, 3, (4), 5, 6, 7
