Doesn't Natural Selection lead to Specified Complexity?

Perhaps I now understand where my misunderstanding lies -- thankyou for that explanation.I was focussing on adaptation but thinking of it as gene distribution within a population -- I know understand them to be different things.I would still expect there to be some non-random element to drift though ... surely a purely random set of mutations would have no trend.Oh wait though ... if population size was very small and then expanded I suppose that would have an effect ... but then only if the individuals with a specific non-adaptive mutation were the most prevalent breeders -- and there should be some reason for that.By ignore drift I meant 'in the context of natural selection's capability for designing apparently specified entities' not ignore it as though it didn't exist.I think the focuss on drift has led to a drift away from specified complexity NOT being a marker for intelligent design at all.

It is the determinism of NS that makes the difference in evolution.Given the SAME set of mutations, but a different set of selective pressures the result will be different -- regardless of drift.So it is the selection that specifies the outcome.I don't remember mixing drift in with NS -- I added it as a kind of offset.Why is it a statistical inevitability that some non-selectable mutations will become fixed?If a mutation is purely random and not subject to selective pressure, why would it appear more than others?

I think I see what I have been missing -- thankyou.I was missing the fairly obvious point that the variants of a particular allele are mutually exclusive within a single individual.

Saw and replied to Dr. Addequate's post -- get that bit now.If drift could cause the same outcome, despite selective pressure then natural selection is a non-starter as an explanation for diversification in biological systems.I cannot implicitly include drift in natural selection while I am explicitly excluding it.I have also said that I segregate genetic mutation from all other events -- thus they are not included in my concept of environment -- they are included in my concept of genetic mutation.

Edited by Peter, : I am very poor at formatting ....

Hmmm ... see what you mean. I edited it a bit to try to help.

Please show me how I lumped drift and natural selection together when my psuedo code specifcally separates them.I show natural selection to be a function of environment and 'genetics' and drift to be a function of 'genetics' alone.In what precise way does that conflate them?My original point was that the filter which is natural selection can lead to results that are indistinguishable from Specified Complexity ... making Specified Complexity fail as an indicator of intelligent design.

You've stated that, rather than explained that.I posit natural selection as a function of environment and gene distribution and drift as a function solely of gene distribution.That the environment includes everything that happens was intended to mean at the same level of abstraction as 'population'.And I still don't really see what that disagreement has to do with the concept of natural selection generating specified complexity.

Hopefully that was simply from a mis-reading of my post ... herein re-written with parenthesis:(Natural selection is a function of environment and gene distribution) and (drift is a function of gene distribution)... and I think I have more 'talking' to do about that ...

I didn't say that gene distribution can predict drift, merely that drift is functionally dependent upon it.I place 'drift' in the position of the 'function' or 'process' acting upon 'gene distribution'.so (and neglecting the NS part for this and only this point):GeneDist[k] = drift(GeneDist[k-1])I have NOT commented on exactly what drift is or is not ... and only included it as an offset in principle because you mentioned it. I was merely trying to show where it fit into my thinking, and why, for this discussion, I was neglecting it.Determinism:You do know what deterministic means, don't you?You answered a question of mine previously in a manner which can only mean you accept that the process of natural selection is deterministic."complete and fully detailed" at the same level of abstraction as the population.

What I am actually trying to say is that the 'specified complexity' observed by IDists is, in fact, illusory.Natural selection is capable of 'designing' systems to such a degree that they appear to have 'specifiec complexity'

Drift 'function':As I have suggested before, the way I see it is that the 'process' of drift has far too many variables for us to model approriately.It is, for example, inevitably affected by natural selection.It is, by definition, not directly affected by environmental pressures on the population in question.To justify excluding it from a discussion on the 'specifying'/'designing' power of natural selection I added it as an offset. I concede that this is a rather large simplification.I consider it a distraction from the main point here.Determinism:So do you accept or reject 'universal determinism'? i.e. that what we see as random is actually the result of interactions too complex for us to comprehend.Leaving us to model as best we can (with full knowledge that we are using a best fit rather than a precise model).

Good. So we can draw a line under determinism and move on then.As for environment and drift:It is and remains my understanding that drift is about gene frequency within a population changing over time for no particular reason -- or rather not in response to a specific stimulus.I therefore regard it as a function purely of the gene distribution from the previous time quanta.It is affected by which genes (should I be saying alleles?) get into the gametes, and which gametes get into the next generation.There are, quite possibly, factors which affect this, but it appears to be a random process.Drift will affect small populations most, having the effect of reducing allele diversity (within the population).So I now say that a reasonable way to view it is:GeneDist[k] = NaturalSelection(Env, PopulationSize[k], GeneDist[k]) + Drift(PopulationSize[k-1],GeneDist[k-1])Which is a little different (thanks for the thought processes being triggered) but does NOT impact my original post:Natural Selection can produce entities that appear to have Specified Complexity.

No. In natural selection the pressures are on the current population therefore k not k - 1 (they obviously have an effect on subsequent population via iteration).I already stated that I had had to rethink some aspects of my position on drift, and that rethinking was what I intended to convey.

No k is the current generation, the gene distribution of which is a function of past changes and current changes due to survivability.