In a recent news release, the Discovery Institute trumpets the results of two new surveys conducted by Arnold Steinberg & Associates. These surveys appear to follow along the same lines as an earlier Zogby International survey conducted for the DI.
In both Steinberg surveys and the Zogby survey, respondents were asked whether public school biology teachers should “Teach the scientific evidence for and against [Darwin’s theory of evolution]” or “Teach only the scientific evidence for it.” In all three polls, between seventy and eighty persent of those responding selected the first answer. This question is a very nice example of a question that is intelligently designed to produce the answer that the people commissioning the survey wanted to hear.
The pollsters did not ask whether or not those responding knew of any evidence against evolution. Instead, they asked a question that contained the presumption that such evidence exists. 1 Based on the results of their carefully worded survey, they then claim that this level of public support for teaching “both sides” means that the objections that they have to evolution should be included in public school science curricula. This, of course, adds the assumption that their objections constitute scientific evidence against evolution to the preexisting assumption that there is any such evidence.
For the record, if I was aware of any credible scientific evidence against evolution, I would support teaching about it in the public schools. However, the material that the Discovery Institute presents as evidence against evolution hardly makes the grade. The vast majority of this “evidence” appears to be derived from a single book. Scathing reviews of this book have appeared in the two leading weekly scientific journals 2,3, among other places (see here for a listing of a few of the rebuttals to Wells’ book).
In the recent news release, the Discovery Institute’s Bruce Chapman attempts to deal with that issue indirectly, when he says:
“The only way the Darwin-only lobby can spin these kind of survey results,” added Chapman, “is to claim that the public is just ignorant. But that view is untenable in light of the more than 300 scientists who have publicly expressed their dissent from Darwinism, to say nothing of the many scientific articles that have been published critiquing the theory.”
While I would not use the word “ignorant”, there is good reason to believe that the public is not as well informed on scientific issues as they could be. A 2001 National Science Foundation Survey revealed that less than half of the population is aware that electrons are smaller than atoms, less than half of the population can explain what DNA is, and only 20% can correctly explain what a molecule is. Under those circumstances it does not seem reasonable to assume, as Chapman seems to, that all (or even most) of those responding to the polls commissioned by his organization are well versed in the details of evolutionary theory.
Chapman’s reference to his list of scientists who “dissent from Darwinism” does little to support his position that there is significan evidence against evolution. For comparison, the National Center for Science Education’s Project Steve currently has over 400 signatories, all of whom (have PhDs in fields related to evolution, and all of whom are named Steve.
Like Chapman, I will also “say nothing” about “the many scientific articles that have been published critiquing the theory”. There is simply nothing that can be said about those articles except for the basic fact that they don’t exist. (Unless, of course, “scientific articles” is redefined to include articles from sources outside the peer-reviewed journals.)
These latest Discovery Institute surveys are really nothing new. Like those that have gone before them, they contain the presumption that the Discovery Institute’s argument is valid. It is hardly a shock when the Discovery institute concludes as a result of these surveys that their argument really is valid. In the future, one would hope that the Discovery Institute sets a better example when it comes to scientific integrity. Perhaps they could start by conducing surveys that do not depend on the wording of the questions to produce the desired results.
—Mike Dunford
Footnotes
1: (In a 2003 American Prospect article, Chris Mooney discusses the question-writing habits of Zogby; he also has recently commented on this most recent DI press release on his own blog.)
2: Coyne, Jerry A. “Creationism by stealth” Nature 410,745-746 (12 April 2001)
3: Scott, Eugenie C. “Fatally Flawed Iconoclasm.” Science, 292:2257-2258, (22 June 2001)
92 Comments
Jeremy Stangroom · 9 May 2004
"While I would not use the word "ignorant""
Why not?
That survey shows that some 30% of respondents think that the Sun goes around the earth!
And there was a survey here in the UK a while back which showed that about the same proportion of people didn't know that hot air rises.
And during the GM debate over here it emerged that a large minority of people (I can't remember the exact figure) thought that living things only had genes if they had been interfered with by genetic engineers! Which is quite funny, really... kind of.
PZ Myers · 9 May 2004
If I were to answer such a poll, I'd give the same answer (teach evidence for and against), and I'm a thrice-damned liberal atheist evolutionist. As you note, though, that means finding evidence against it, which the Intelligent Design creationists have not done, and I'd also add that ID is not the scientific alternative to evolution.
Leighton · 9 May 2004
RBH · 9 May 2004
There is also the U. of Cincy/Case Western Reserve survey of Ohio science professors, in which 93% responded that they knew of no scientifically valid evidence that challenges the fundamental principles of the theory of evolution and 2% said "Don't know." 4% answered "Yes." Note that the poll included faculty at Bible colleges and institutions associated with evangelical and fundamentalist churches. 91% of the scientists responding said that ID is primarily a religious view.
And it's not only ignorance about evolutionary theory in the general public that's rampant. In a poll of the general public in Ohio (described at the same URL) at about the same time as the scientists poll, only 14% of the public answered "yes" to the question "Do you happen to know anything about the concept of 'intelligent design'?" and 84% responded "No." It's noteworthy that the poll was taken when Ohio's State Board of Education was engaged in a well-publicized dispute about whether to include intelligent design in the state science standards and ID disciples (including Jonathon Wells and Stephen Meyer) were making their pilgrimages to Ohio.
RBH
cs · 9 May 2004
Hi, I'm conducting a poll.
Do you think that news reports about the Discovery Institute should mention only the good things they do, or do you think the news reports should also note their numerous criminal activities?
Grumpy · 9 May 2004
Trouble with those surveys is that you can't complain to the questioner if the question is too complex to answer. They must rigorously ask the same question for each participant, and nothing but.
Andy Groves · 9 May 2004
Paging Paul Nelson.........paging Paul Nelson........ your comments on this would be appreciated....... thanks........
Steve Reuland · 9 May 2004
Steve Reuland · 9 May 2004
Leighton · 9 May 2004
Thanks for the link, Steve. I knew about their prior "100 scientists" claim (and on the list you linked to, I note several whose doctorates are in less relevant areas like philosophy). Is there also a list somewhere of the 300 dissenters worldwide (and if so, is it the link I stumbled upon?), or are they pulling the number out of thin air by making some kind of bizarre extrapolation?
Kevin · 9 May 2004
Since the poll was directed at the citizens of California, does that mean we can expect a push to include ID at the statewide level here?
shiva pennathur · 10 May 2004
The 300+ scientists who are "skeptical" of evolution include some rate scientists from many fields including life sciences. Apart from the terrific trio - Dembski, Wells, and Behe (throw in Johnson and it becomes the fab four) - there are notables such as Dale Schaefer at U.Cincy., the Nobel nominee (the list says so) Schaefer, Rob Kaita-Plasma Physis-Princeton, Walter Bradley-Texas A&M, Daniel Dix-Math-U.S.Carolina, etc. There are 100 names here http://www.discovery.org/articleFiles/PDFs/100ScientistsAd.pdf. I have been through the homepages of some from the list who are practising scientists at universities. There are others who hold a PhD but are not practising scientists (such as Wells) about whom we know little. There are pages and pages to go thru, but already there's a clear pattern - albeit unscientific. None of these scientists is doing any work on evolution much less ID or against evolution. Nobody has "discovered" much less published on intelligent design. Dale Schaefer for instance has a huge page full of quotes contrasting views of his corner of the social ring with those of the "other side". For those biologists who have become skeptical about evolution, maybe they need a refresher course on research and theory from the folks of Project Steve. Being good scietists I am sure they will learn from the evidence.
shiva · 10 May 2004
<> Sorry that should read <<....include some first rate scientists>>
Frank Schmidt · 10 May 2004
Brian Leiter http://webapp.utexas.edu/blogs/bleiter/ had a link Friday to Chris Mooney's examination of an aspect of the phenomenon ww.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=67755. Briefly, the national news media know that the decibel level goes way down when they are "fair" which means publicizing any dissenting opinion, no matter how self-serving or contrary to the evidence.
KeithB · 10 May 2004
Hate to be pedantic here, especially about quantum mechanics, but do electrons even *have* a "size"? Isn't this question based on "billiard ball" atomic theory?
Doesn't that "size" change with energy level?
If so, there may be some electrons larger than say, a hydrogen atom.
Jon Fleming · 10 May 2004
steve · 10 May 2004
Free online textbooks look like a really good thing for a number of reasons. I spent $500 this semester on old things which don't much change (stat mech, fundamentals of economics, etc) But it does make it easier for backwards districts influenced by ID people to cut controvertial things. Click click, "Are you sure you want to send Darwin to the recycle bin?" Perhaps free common bio textbooks could be licensed such that they can't be edited without permission?
Steve · 10 May 2004
CBS news just did a story on congress investigating degree mills. I wonder if it'll become illegal nationally? Will we be able to sue Hovind to make him stop calling himself Dr.?
steve · 10 May 2004
Maybe we could get lucky, and draw one of those judges who likes giving creative shame-based sentences, and the sentence is that Hovind has to identify himself for six months as "I'm Kent Hovind, I used a fake degree to make people think I am educated"
FRB · 10 May 2004
Steve Reuland · 10 May 2004
steve · 10 May 2004
about IDEA's page about just paying attention to the evidence, like I've said before, where do they get off thinking their evaluation of the evidence is worth anything at all? What would particle physicists say if a religious club got together, studied the evidence, and said that Quantum Field Theory is bad science? They'd say, sorry you don't understand it, but that's not our problem.
steve · 10 May 2004
Then their members would spend years arguing on Talk Particles, complaining of being suppressed in journals, asking for direct experimental proof that every particle in the universe obeys general relativity, claiming that "Nobody's ever witnessed an axial vector current..." etc.
KeithB · 11 May 2004
As quoted above it said "size" rather than "mass."
Matt Young · 11 May 2004
Regarding the comment by KeithB:
Size is an imprecise word; it is better to talk of the diameter. But never mind.
The diameter of, say, a hydrogen atom is the diameter of the wavefunction of the bound electron. The electron, however, is not the wave function, and the wave function is not the electron. The wave function tells you the probability of finding the electron at any point. The electron itself is presumably a small particle whose radius is roughly equal to the classical radius. Its diameter is therefore less than the diameter of the hydrogen atom.
Electrons are smaller than atoms.
Mark Perakh · 11 May 2004
Perhaps a little too far afield, so it may be ignored. The mass of an electron which is about 9.1*10^-31 kg is in fact the mass of a free electron. This damned guy we call electron can make a phisicist go crazy. As soon as an electron is in an electromagnetic field (as, for example, when it is in a crystalline lattice) it behaves in such a way as if its effective mass is rather different from the mass of a free electron. While I see nothing bad in asserting that an electron is smaller than an atom, the very concept of an electron's size (or diameter - which implies a sperical shape) is quite ambiguous. Atoms, on the other hand, indeed have definite sizes (but not diameters because they more often tnan not are not spherical) - using the scanning tunneling microscope, many atoms have been "seen" and they indeed have a definite shape and size. I don't believe, though, an electron can be ever "seen." To see it photons have to be reflected from an electron, but if a photon encounters an electron, often the electron simply jumps to a higher energy level, absorbing the photon (like when an electron is in an atom), or Compton effect takes place wherein both the photon's and the electron's energies change, so it is a very tricky thing to devise a method for "seeing" an electron. Size can be in principle determined through scattering experiments (as Rutherford did with atomic nuclei) but I can't imagine how it can be done with electrons. Of course, predicting what science will come up with in the future is impossible, but I guess to ever be able to define what an electron's size is may be impossible in principle. Still, since atoms contain a nucleus plus sometimes scores of electrons, the answer to the question at hand can legitimately be given that electron indeed may be said to be smaller than an atom.
Jack Shea · 11 May 2004
Jon:
What are you referring to when you write: "...the modern synthesis includes other mechanisms (than random mutation and natural selection) that contribute to accounting for the complexity of life." ? Does this "modern synthesis" include any ideas borrowed from ID?
Jon Fleming · 11 May 2004
KeithB · 11 May 2004
"Modern Synthesis" was when evolution was given *solid* mathematical footing when it was wedded to genetics. Now they are both essentially the same field of study.
shiva · 12 May 2004
The creationist "science" movement isn't targeting "Darwinism" alone. There is a thriving "Commonsense Science Movement" as well. Bob Lattimer one of the protagonists of creationist/ID/"science" in Ohio is close to the "creationist cosmology" folks as well and appears to believe in YEC. There was a big "creationist cosmology" confrence in Columbus, Ohio immediately following the Kavli-CERCA cosmology conference at the Case Physics Dept., Cleveland, in October 2003. While the Kavli-CERCA conference is available on streaming video for free, the "creationist cosmology" conference is available only on DVD for sale. Make what you will out of that. Dembski and the other "scientific" luminaries of the ID movement haven't made known their views on this branch of pseudoscience. Maybe if there is heat to be raised and a similar chorus of "growing scientific evidence against Einsteinism/Bohrism/Heisenbergism" can be trusted to deliver foot-soldiers for assorted causes the folks at ID/DI might just jump on. That will be fun to watch.
http://www.creationists.org/Downloads/CCC2003%20Daily%20Schedules.pdf
http://www.youngearth.org/current_speaker.htm
http://www.worldbydesign.org/cosmology2003/review.html
http://www.commonsensescience.org/index.htm?info.htm~mainAlthough conservatives have no monopoly on pseudoscience many among them tend to make common cause with the ID/DI folks. There is no shortage of conservative columnists who overestimate their scientific talents. Like this one here
http://www.nationalreview.com/kopel/kopel040402.asp
Heather · 12 May 2004
A quick reading of the list at http://www-acs.ucsd.edu/~idea/scidoubtevol.htm showed me 37 names (a majority are biological/chemical educators) of scientists who were included on the list because they agreed with the following statement: "a critical re-evaluation of Darwinism is both necessary and possible." Ummm, yes... Any true scientist evaluates, re-evaluates, and begins again. Any reasonable theory (and of course I list evolution among them) MUST stand up to re-evaluation. Can this even be counted as proof that these scientists are skeptical of Darwinism?
Jack Shea · 12 May 2004
Jon:
No, I wasn't kidding. I was wondering if the obvious truth that information input is required for living systems to emerge and evolve was on the verge of being recognized by the hard-pressed majority of professional neodarwinian evolutionists. I now realize that the "modern synthesis" is decades old and remains the science of calculating the distribution of pre-existent genetic information and answers no "first cause" questions.
Thanks for the links you supplied. They have shown me that things are still the same, and that only the terms have changed to accommodate new levels of detail.
Neutral Drift: According to this hypothesis, most of the changes in DNA inside individuals are the result of "genetic drift" -- random changes that go on all the time and aren't steered by natural selection in one direction or another.
Horizontal gene transfer: "...the ability of Bacteria and Archaea to adapt to new environments most often results from the acquistion of new genes through horizontal transfer rather than by the alteration of gene functions through numerous point mutations
So, I see the "modern synthesists" have still not tackled the problem of where or how complex, ordered genetic information is derived but still fascinate themselves with shuffling the pre-existent deck. All reference to the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics notwithstanding.
"ID has made no contributions to science"? Come on. At the very least ID has articulated some of the immense problems facing a strictly neodarwinian explanation for the origins of life and macroevolution.
Jack
Batman · 12 May 2004
Steve Reuland · 12 May 2004
Jack Shea · 12 May 2004
Ask any chemist if RNA and proteins could have come about simultaneously by accident. Or simplify the problem and just ask if chlorophyll -which took a Nobel laureate to figure out- could synthesize itself. It cannot happen. Without information the process cannot drive itself. Energy and atoms alone are insufficient. Information, ie Design, is the required third ingredient and is visible in the world around us. Neodarwinism proposes that information arises from undirected chaos which is of course absurd.
Neodarwinism is just spontaneous generation shifted from maggots in meat and applied to molecules in ooze. Neodarwinism states that the molecules responsible for the generation and transmission of Life emerge spontaneously, randomly, from no information source, with no direction. Maggots from nothing, life-molecules from nothing, it's the same thing. And just as absurd today as it was in the 19th century. The coding of genetic molecules is the source of Life and it did not, could not have come about by accident. We may search for the origins of the code but that the code is there is beyond dispute.
ID has articulated problems with neodarwinism. It has raised valid probability arguments, it has indicated the necessity of information as a parallel force with energy and molecules driving the origins and maintenance of living systems. ID has been brave enough to look at the complexity of the system under study and declare that accident is not the answer. Of course the system is intelligent. Look at the intelligence it takes just to unravel, let alone create it.
Jack
Reed A. Cartwright · 12 May 2004
Batman · 12 May 2004
Steve Reuland · 12 May 2004
Jon Fleming · 12 May 2004
Jack Shea · 12 May 2004
Reed: I know what neodarwinism is: "random mutation" plus "natural selection". You are the one who doesn't understand neoD. "Selection" does not, cannot produce information in a system. It just culls what is there. "Selection" is death, no more, no less. Where is the "evidence" you speak of? Just because the information and the complexity are there doesn't immediately connote neoD as an "explanation". ID and the laws of physics recognize that the complexity of the information precludes it from arising by spontaneous means.
Batman: You can take as much time as you like. The 2nd Law says it won't happen.
Can RNA or clorophyll assemble themselves from " . . . simple and common precursors . . . "? No.
"ID has "articulated" that because biologists haven't videotaped the evolution of every creature that ever walked on earth, that biologists are suckers." ID says no such thing. It just says "look at the laws of physics and chemistry . . . today".
"Needless to say, biologists have so much evidence to the contrary that they have written ID theorists off as a bunch of goofballs, albeit goofballs with an annoying political and religious agenda." --The "evidence" which biologists conveniently ignore is that the 2nd Law prohibits the formation of the complex molecules required for life without the addition of information. Without the "information" provided by organic chemists to the "dumb stuff" of their chemical precursors nothing would happen. There are something like 50 complex steps required to derive chlorophyll, a relatively simple molecule. RNA and proteins are another matter entirely. RNA will only form from instructions. The only question then is not "if" RNA was originally coded with "intent" but "how".
Steve: "Perhaps you are unaware, but unfathomable amounts of RNA are being synthesized every microsecond here on Earth. As as far as anyone can tell, it doesn't require anything other than energy and atoms." -- Please! RNA is information incarnate. It is synthesized every day not by its own accord but by the information stored within DNA. Once a system is set rolling, it rolls. The question is how it starts rolling in the first place. You're just begging the question.
"Acutally, that's a much better description of ID, which as far as anyone can tell, implies that things just "poof" out of nowhere when a divine something-or-other wills it thus. Neodarwinism actually proposes a specific mechanism, which can be applied to the history of living things to unravel detailed causal pathways. "--Have you guys read any ID? Or is it too scary? NeoD proposes a specific mechanism which is demonstrably incorrect, actually unscientific. It violates the laws of physics, probability, common sense, the observed world and its laws.
"No, it doesn't say that at all. It says that those molecules come from other molecules, and that information comes from other information, which then changes over time." --Pre-existent information can be shuffled around. But new information driving complex systems does not come about accidentally. It can't.
"Or do you believe that scientists have been proposing all these years that you, as a human, arose spontaneously, randomly" -- That is what scientists have been proposing. "I" am a process of random mutation, the culmination of millions of years of accidental gene shuffling. "I" am still here because natural selection has not killed me.
"you don't understand the first thing about neodarwinian theory." What's there to know? The principles are astoundingly simple. They just don't fit the facts.
"ID most certainly has not raised any valid probability arguments." You don't have to go just to ID to get these. There are dozens of estimates of the probability of the random formation of RNA from the ooze and they arrive at effectively zero probability.
Jon: "Ask any biologist if RNA and proteins must have come about simultaneously by accident to achieve abiogenesis." Ask them if they've ever seen it happen in a lab. It doesn't. Unless information, ie labwork, is applied to the process.
Why does it take so much human intelligence to unravel the complexities of a system which has supposed to come into existence through no intelligence whatsoever?
Jack
Reed A. Cartwright · 12 May 2004
MakeMineRed · 13 May 2004
Jack -
The only scientific rule you rely on to dismiss neodarwinism, based on your statments here, is the 2d Law of Thermodynamics. Your interpretation of that rule is incorrect. You are correct in inferring that information requires energy; however, you fail to realize that this energy is released by natural processes at all times.
MakeMineRed
Jack Shea · 13 May 2004
Reed:
Are you making up your own neodarwinist definition? What additional terms of definition do you have that the rest of the world is missing?
"Selection" is death, whether you want to call it that or not, either through relative nonfunctionality, elimination by the herd, reproductive failure. Weaker traits/organisms "die" in favor of stronger. "Death" is the only weapon in natural selection's arsenal.
As an evolutionary biologist studying selection you should know better than to try to pass off an old dog with a new name. "Natural selection" as "Differential reproduction" is a linguistic con. It's like "fighting war for peace". Read some George Orwell to learn how neologisms mask, not reveal truth. It is the last refuge of the scoundrel. Selection does not engage in reproduction in any way. It is a process of elimination, not a process of reproduction. Organisms not selected against may continue to reproduce. But "selection" has no active role to play in this reproduction. All the reproducing originates genetically. Or are you proposing some form of Lamarckism?
Mutations are, indeed, noise. Which is why living organisms are designed to mitigate against their irruption. As an evolutionary biologist you must be aware of the heroic adherence to original form which fruit flies have maintained over billions, perhaps trillions, of generations of deliberate mutation. Somehow these little heroes always remained fruit flies. Not a bluebottle or gnat emerged from the onslaught. In a neodarwinist world, where there is no inherent design in Nature, selection would have nothing but noise to work with. And it would be a freakish world indeed. In the world we see, however, natural selection has a wonderfully variegated array of more or less perfectly formed creatures to carve with its knife. Not a bizarre series of "hit or miss" aberrations formed in a blind cave but beautifully designed examples of the genius of Nature at work.
Are you referring to the "gradual, iterative process" of the Cambrian Explosion? Or do you allow that punctuated equilibrium, saltation, quantum speciation, hopeful monsters (take your pick, they all mean more or less the same, viz that the "gradual iterations" idea is dead in the water) might be the answer? As with much in the neodarwinian "just so" fantasy world, punk eek etcetera are merely linguistic cons. They are wild guesses, stabs in the dark. They purport to "explain" by the simple process of giving a new name to an old idea. The "old idea" being that Life literally explodes into existence, fully formed, perfect. Creationism anyone? Scientifically, these purported explanations are facile and empty. There is no "science" other than "we observe that this is the case --organisms emerge fully formed into existence with no obvious immediate significant precedents". There is no explanation of the physics and chemistry of the genetic processes involved, which is where neodarwinist evolutionary theory will make its final stand. And it will be final. Our detailed understanding of the staggering informational complexity of living organisms has brought evolutionary biology face to face with the laws of physics, chemistry and the principles of mathematics. Neodarwinism is already dead and it is only neodarwinists who haven't woken up to the fact.
Human intelligence is a subset of the Intelligence expressed in the natural world. Scientific intelligence is entirely derivative of the thing which it studies --the natural world. Is it possible to call any scientific discovery or theory "intelligent" when it is in toto merely a partial, fragmented, frequently incorrect representation of a natural system which the secondary, derived human scientific intelligence has labelled "unintelligent"? Food for thought.
Jack Shea · 13 May 2004
MakeMineRed:
I realize that "energy is released by natural processes all the time". I realize that in accordance with these energies a certain degree of self-assembled complexity can and does take place at molecular levels. "Life", however, represents a different order of energy management from simple chemistry. The complexity of living systems is many orders of magnitude greater than the complexity of inorganic systems. Within the boundaries of non-living chemical self-assembly there are definite limits to what can and cannot be achieved. Self-synthesis of RNA, chlorophyll, etc, is outside those boundaries. That is a fact, one which only the most insanely religious neodarwinists will attempt to deny (though deny they will!). Taking this as fact, any theory purporting to explain the origins of life (which will of necessity then have a bearing on the subsequent evolution of life) must recognize that an additional and unique form of energy is required to drive RNA synthesis, etc. "Information" is this higher-order energy. Where this Information comes from is ultimately unanswerable and is not my point. My point is that without the addition of "Information" inorganic molecules are incapable of self-assembling into even the "simple" molecular systems which characterize all living organisms -which are of course far from simple. I invoke the 2nd Law only because Life is such a magnificent albeit temporary and illusory thermodynamic lawbreaker that it suggests that some form of energy-organization (Information) must be present in order for things to get moving in the first place. Nothing in the energy structures of inorganic molecules possesses this organizational capacity.
Jack
Reed A. Cartwright · 13 May 2004
Jon Fleming · 13 May 2004
Pim van Meurs · 13 May 2004
Jack: Where this Information comes from is ultimately unanswerable and is not my point.
Luckily enough science has real answers to these questions, although it may come as a shock to some creationists.
Check out the work by Schneider or Adami
Evolution of biological information
Adami: evolution and biocomplexity
Pay special attention to the papers on
Evolution of biological complexity
The Evolutionary Origin of Complex Adaptive Features
While ID seems to appeal to ignorance, real science seems to be doing all the hard work.
Adam Marczyk · 13 May 2004
For further examples of how information can arise through a process of random mutation and selection, see my article:
Genetic Algorithms and Evolutionary Computation
Also, for an example of information arising in randomly formed RNA sequences (something this creationist poster seems to think impossible), see this post on talk.origins by Howard Hershey. In a millimole (about a thimbleful) of random RNA sequences, RNA enzymes showing a range of biologically interesting activities consistently arise.
Does any of this explain definitively how life began? No, it does not (and to be thorough, it is worth noting again that the origin of life is a separate field of science from the theory of evolution, and neither stands or falls on the success of the other). However, what it does show is that scientists are still searching for the answers, and progress is constantly being made. Creationists, by contrast, are in a rush to declare that we will never understand certain things simply because we do not fully understand them at present. Just think of how many scientific advances would never have come about if this deplorable attitude had existed in the past!
Heather · 14 May 2004
Jack Shea wrote "There is no explanation of the physics and chemistry of the genetic processes involved" Jack, if you are truly interested in learning about the chemistry and physics involved in gene mutation, follow this link: http://www.talkorigins.org/pdf/molecular-genetics.pdf to an article called Plagairized Errors and Molecular Genetics by E. E. Max. Pay particular attention to the diagrams and to the entire section labled "DNA Basics." I relearned quite a bit that I had forgotten. Very interesting.
MakeMineRed · 14 May 2004
Jack:
<< "Life", however, represents a different order of energy management from simple chemistry.
"Life" still uses simple chemistry; its management has evolved.
<
Sez you! Look, Adam had it right in his comment. And look at this story regarding RNA: http://www.carlzimmer.com/articles/2004/articles_2004_Before_DNA.html .
<
It's not a fact.
<<"Information" is this higher-order energy. Where this Information comes from is ultimately unanswerable and is not my point.
Seems to me that this is your point. You are questioning the origin of life here, not evolution, as Adam pointed out above.
<
See Adam, above.
<
Huh? Life doesn't break the 2d Law. Entropy increases whenever life is created.
<
An RNA world is the prevalent hypothesis for what came before the DNA world, and scientists are working on the questions this proposes. Seems to me that your argument will become more constrained over time.
MakeMineRed
Jack Shea · 14 May 2004
Reed:
False. Try a diallelic fertility selection model with parameters w11=0.9 w12=1 w22=0.9.
Ouch! Blinded by science! Is the answer 42? No, it's microevolution. No one denies the principles and mathematics of heredity, genetic drift, population genetics, etc.
.....Somehow these little heroes always remained fruit flies.
Yeah, so what? In the last few million years since humans, chimps, bonobos, gorillas, and orangutans have diverged from one another we all have remained great apes, primates, eutherians, .....
"Diverged" in theory. There is no evidence of any sort. Fruit flies and bacteria should have shown much greater tendency to speciate than they have. They show no such tendency despite many years of observation.
For animals, selection is strongest during development. That is why you don't see to many bizarre aberrations in nature; they perish before you have a chance to see them.
And there are brilliantly intelligent procedures taking place inside living organisms to make sure that things run smoothly and aberrations are held at bay. Organisms are resistant to mutation. They know it wreaks havoc. This is a profoundly intelligent system.
See this post of mine for more detail.
.......And it will be final.
LOL Can't you come up with something original? Creationists have been predicting the imminent demise of evolution for over a hundred years.
We're patient. I take the Einsteinian perspective: "There are those who believe nothing is a miracle and those who believe everything is a miracle. I am of the latter persuasion".
From you: "Evolutionary biology does not explain where the first self-replicating system came from, due to the simple fact that evolution cannot happen until after the first self-replicator comes into existence."
Still begging the question. The first self-replicator is the first step of evolution. It represents a new chemical paradigm --biochemistry, with its unique laws and potentials. Experience and observation teach us that once major paradigms are established --the four forces for example- they do not vary. This seems to be an overriding law of Nature, which thrives on indulgent pattern held in place by rigorous order. The principle seems to be one which utilizes simple basic units to produce complex effects, simple unit equations blossoming into extravagantly ordered arrays of those units. With the emergence of self-replicators "simple" inorganic chemistry enters an entirely unique domain --Life- an organic world where the old laws remain inviolate while at the same time new laws with new potentialities come into existence.
The interface of these two legal systems, set and subset, is where neodarwinist evolutionary difficulties arise. The recognized laws of inorganic chemistry do not include the potential to generate energy-as-replicable-information on the scale of complexity required by even the simplest self-replicating molecule. There seems to be general agreement on this. Put another way, it is impossible for the first step on the road to evolution to have been taken accidentally. The specific type of energy required --complex, replicable information- is not present in chemical soups. Therefore chance cannot have had any significant role to play in the formation of the first self-replicating molecules.
Since it is axiomatic that once Nature has established the initial boundaries of any system it does not vary those boundaries, it is fair to assume that the initial foundational procedures for living systems --molecularly-bound, complex, transferable information arising from a source other than the inorganic molecules comprising the system- will inevitably be carried through all subsequent living systems. Thus, if chance had a minor role to play in the formation of the first self-replicators it will continue to have a minor role in all subsequent evolution. Once first principles are established it is Nature's way to continue to enlist these principles for all subsequent developments within the limits of the system.
Life precedes and defines Death. Without Life, Death does not exist. Death cannot exist on its own. "Death" in fact can only be defined in terms of Life. When certain aspects of a living system cease to function an organism "dies". When certain aspects of a dead system cease to function (lose their "deadness") an organism does not "live". A living organism is never described as "a not-dead organism" but a dead organism is frequently described as "non-living". Death is, therefore, a secondary attribute of living systems. Death has no properties of its own whereas Life has abundant properties. Death is merely the absence of a quality; Life is the manifestation of a quality. Death comes from Life, Life does not come from Death.
Is it logical, then, that a secondary attribute of living systems would be given the primary role in shaping those living systems? Is it possible in Nature that the failure of Life, the cessation of Life, plays the role of the principal sculptor of the shape and continued existence of life on earth?
Jack Shea · 14 May 2004
. . . . . . it has indicated the necessity of information as a parallel force with energy and molecules driving the origins and maintenance of living systems.
Please elaborate! This sounds fascinating.
I think the Sun has a big role to play. Light as a conveyor of information. The five elements which make up 98% of the Sun's mass are the five elements at the root of all living systems. The importance of chlorophyll, the first photoreaction. Heliocentrism taken to the max. But the wonderful Persian poet Hafiz writes about "the Sun beyond the sun".
. . . . . . . . . Of course the system is intelligent. Look at the intelligence it takes just to unravel, let alone create it.
What's intelligent about a sightless eyeball, Jack? Seems downright stupid to me. If your God did design all the critters, he must have been smokin' crack when he did it. And why the obsession with bacteria????
Sightless eyeball? I guess you mean the Blind Watchmaker. I don't know. I mostly see eyeballs that see. For some reason the Universe wants to watch itself through our eyes. Who knows? Light plays a big role in any case. "Obsession with bacteria" . . . Umm . . . I don't know.
Jack Shea · 14 May 2004
That was for Batman.
Jack
Leighton · 14 May 2004
Jack, FYI, your posts would be a lot easier to parse if you used the quote tags.
Sean · 14 May 2004
Jack Shea · 14 May 2004
Jon:
Not personal incredulity, just a recognition of what actually comprises the mind. Scientific truths are measured against a pre-existent entity, the very entity which happens to be the role of science to understand. Science is the craft of discovery. Inventions follow of course but they are derived from principles which are accurate descriptions of the natural world. The natural world itself, therefore, is the superset of the subset human mind. Scientific thought approximates the reality. The scientific mind is composed of partial reflections derived from that reality. The "intelligence" then, is something which is already there, already exists as the natural world. The scientific mind is merely its reflection, not its creation. Without the natural world the scientific measure of that world could not take place. Whereas we know that the natural world has long predated human perception of it.
So where is the original intelligence?
Jack
Batman · 14 May 2004
Jack Shea · 14 May 2004
Sean · 14 May 2004
Reed A. Cartwright · 14 May 2004
Dave · 15 May 2004
I don't know for certain, but I think that I read that the signatories in Project Steve can come from any branch of science (computational science was mentioned as a fringe group), so long as they are doing peer-reviewed active research. It may be that they are required to be doing something related to biology (please correct me if I am wrong).
Jack Shea · 16 May 2004
Jack Shea · 16 May 2004
Sean · 16 May 2004
Sean · 16 May 2004
Jean Lee · 16 May 2004
"If I dig up the graves of every dead dog on earth I can put together a very plausible scenario of obvious speciation from the skeletal evidence."
Jack, just out of curiosity, do you need to know when the dogs were buried for your skeletal analysis?
Simple yes or now will suffice.
Matt Maloney · 16 May 2004
Mary Kate Olsen · 16 May 2004
"The intelligence present in atoms forms elements, the intelligence of elements forms molecules . . . you get the idea."
Yeah, I'm starting to see where you're coming from. By chance have you spoken to Jimi lately? I've got a few questions to ask him about the Isle of Wight.
"Scientific intelligence is nothing but a relatively impoverished facsimile of the sheer genius of the universe itself."
Dude that is so heavy.
"The word "genius" applied to the universe is, of course, an injustice."
I agree that you should be punished.
Jack Shea · 17 May 2004
Mary Kate:
I will presuppose that you are a scientist and that you are intelligent, though I may be making false and rash assumptions. What constitutes the contents of your scientific intelligence? Principles derived from the natural world. Nothing in the scientific mind exists without reference to the natural world. Science is measured against the natural world. The only way the universe can be said to be unintelligent is to say that all scientists are unintelligent, and to erase the word "intelligence" from our vocabulary since we will have stripped it of all meaning. Did E=mc2 come from Einstein's mind? In essence, no. The principle is lodged in natural law. Einstein's mind revealed it. The human mind, with all its complexities, is a reflection of pre-existing entities. Einstein himself realized that his own vast intelligence was but a poor reflection of the intelligence resident in the universe which he perceived, as do all scientists, through a glass darkly. If a mind of Einstein's calibre could recognize superintelligence in all workings of the universe at the very least it is a point of view deserving of some attention and respect, whether one agrees with it or not. Newton, Faraday, Hendrix, many other great geniuses have recognized that the universe is the work of superintelligence. It is so obvious that human life, human creative intelligence owes its existence to an infinitely greater intelligence I am amazed that it can be denied. Give it any name you like. It's damn smart, damn creative.
By the way there are much more intelligent ways you could have attacked this argument but you chose none of them.
Jack Shea · 17 May 2004
Reed A. Cartwright · 17 May 2004
They know that mutations wreak havoc.
They have a "correct" form.
They are holistic systems with a comprehensive genetic awareness of their correct form.
They are biologically self-referential synchronized systems that are programmed to resist radical mutative alteration.
These are all positive claims. The burden is on you to demonstrate their verity. As it stands now, it is a bunch of gobblety-gook that doesn't impress this geneticist. Please explain how descent with modification can begin prior to descent and modification? And that doesn't mean that Hamlet begins before Francisco is at his post. And Bozo the Clown can be seen as the epitome of tragedy. It doesn't mean that it is right. I asked you specifically for a scientific reference. Your failure to produce one tells me that you have no scientific support for your statements about information and evolution. How about you stop pontificating and produce some goods?Pete Dunkelberg · 17 May 2004
Jon Fleming · 17 May 2004
Brian · 18 May 2004
Hmmmm... You seem to think that evolution is fool proof. Please I strongly urge you to take a look at this site http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/qa.asp
This is for any of you who, whose hearts are not completely hardened. If you want to know what I mean by hardened, then look it up in the bible.
Jack Shea · 19 May 2004
Jack Shea · 19 May 2004
Jon:
My point is that scientific intelligence is a faithful, incomplete imprint of intelligence systems which pre-exist in the natural world. The more faithful the imprint from nature the more scientifically valid the intelligence. The "intelligence", the "scientific facts" do not originate in the scientist's mind. They are entirely derivative. As an analogy, consider the natural world as DNA, and science as RNA. The original intelligence/information is in the DNA and RNA is a reflection. Science is the legitimate plagiarist of a book that is already written.
Jack
Pim van Meurs · 19 May 2004
Jack: I don't see hominid fossils as evidence of anything except similarity of shape and many scientists agree. Prove otherwise. It can't be done. How much can a plaster cast of a man tell us about the man?
Quite a bit. Check out how scientists approach what to the layman may appear to be an insurmountable issue.
Of course science is not really about proof but about hypotheses, rejection/falsification. All Jack seems to have to offer is appeal to personal incredulity.
That's often the best ID has to offer imho.
As far as Jack's comments on DNA/RNA, I fail to really see any argument there.
But what is interesting is how the structure of RNA and protein networks both are 'scale free'. Scale free networks like found in RNA or proteins can be shown to arise from simple models of duplication followed by divergence. Not only do such networks lead to modularity but also evolvability, robustness and degeneracy. Fascinating data that show how at the level of DNA and RNA, information can arise helping us understand how evolution happened.
Pim van Meurs · 19 May 2004
More on fossil hominids
and PBS
Becoming Human
Check out how phylogenetic and cladistic analyses are used to support the arguments and claims. Perhaps Jack can tell us how he believes science has reached these conclusions?
It's hard work full of hypotheses, data analyses.
Pim van Meurs · 19 May 2004
More fascinating websites that show how paleontology works
BONES AND WHAT THEY CAN TELL YOU
TAPHONOMY AND ARCHAEOLOGY
EVOLUTION AND TAXONOMY
Evolutionary analysis
Cladistics
Cladistics: problems
Homidid evolution: anatomy
HUMAN ORIGINS: FOSSILS
Anthropology A105 (0361)Human Origins and Prehistory Syllabus
ANTHROPOLOGY f301
PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY TUTORIALS
Ed Darrell · 19 May 2004
Reed A. Cartwright · 19 May 2004
Pete Dunkelberg · 19 May 2004
Jack Shea · 21 May 2004
Pete:
Polar bear was your joke. I don't want a tapir-like animal. I don't want the hippo. I don't want giant walruses or tiny water shrews. They are all bogus sources for the existence of whales.
Taking vertebrates as an example, my alternative hypothesis is that 99% (very rough estimate of course) of vertebrate genotype is effectively locked against radical mutation. It is "locked" by a system of master genes which filter out random or any other mutations which would threaten the existence of all organic systems necessary for an organism's survival. Bilateralism, specific skeletal system, number, type and distribution of internal organs, in other words the bulk of the beast, are systems essential for survival and are therefore maintained within a protective genetic shield. A large degree of replicable stability is built into the system. Where the sytem fails, in the rare instances when it does, natural selection (ie death) cleans up. There is evidence, which neither you nor Reed care to comment on, for the existence of master genes against which all mutations are referenced before they are passed on to offspring. Even without this evidence it is clear that the existence of essential vertebrate systems and characteristics, taken as "given" in neodarwinist theories of evolution, is in fact not "given" at all. Stabilizing, master genetic systems work to ensure an adherence to gross morphology.
Bilateral symmetry, a feature of all vertebrates, has not "evolved". It has been there from the beginning. It is not "evolving" now. As a genetic system it is locked. The circulatory system is locked. The nervous system is locked. The metabolic system is locked. None of these vertebrate functions are unrestrictedly responsive to random mutation. The genetic system contains very specific instructions regarding the existence, organization and placement of the vast majority of an animal's characteristics. But there are such wide variations among vertebrates. Where does this variety come from?
Random mutations are allowed to occur in aspects of the animal which are not threatening to the animal's survival: colour, shape detail and size. Gene shuffling, point mutations, etc, relating to secondary characteristics are not screened by master genes in the same way as, say, the genes responsible for bilateral symmetry or the existence of a heart. It doesn't matter in stark survivability terms if a bear is dark or light brown. It does matter if it does or does not have a heart.
There are clearly two different modes of gene transfer taking place in vertebrates (as in all other living things). One, the "primary" genetic system, relates to systems essential for survival. These include an animal's basic morphology, its skeletal shape, distribution of organs and so on. These systems do not evolve in any major way by any random means. If they were subject to random mutation without master genetic screening we would see evidence of at least one species of vertebrate possessing, say, six legs. There is nothing inherently life-threatening in having six legs. Insects do fine with six legs. But it doesn't happen because vertebrate master genes do not let it happen. Two, the "secondary" genetic system relates to attributes which may enhance survivability but are not essential for survival. Colour, shape detail, size. Randomnness is given some rein, though even here random factors are kept in check and phenotype is most frequently the result of a mixing of pre-existent genetic material between males and female. Nature seems to abhor accident in living things as much as it abhors vacuum everywhere.
Dogs are the best example of randomly-produced variety existing within stable, non-random genetic systems:
"All dogs, regardless of breed, are essentially identical in anatomy. The skeleton of the domestic dog has about 321 bones, with variations in the number of bones in the tail and the presence of a dewclaw, an extra digit on the paw that not all breeds have. The rib cage consists of 13 pairs of ribs; the spine has 7 cervical vertebrae, 13 thoracic vertebrae, 7 lumbar vertebrae, and 3 sacral vertebrae. Rear paws have four complete digits and front paws have four or five digits. Most puppies have 28 temporary teeth, which are replaced with 42 permanent teeth at about six months of age. "
The same stable genetics required to maintain anatomical synchronicity in dogs, despite superficial variations, will be resistant to "evolving" into anything other than dogs. The primary genetic system is designed not to evolve randomly, since the haphazard invasion of the genetics responsible for the existence of an essential organ, for example, would endanger an animal's survivability. Most of an animal's genes are "hands off" to random effects, for the simple reason that they contain information necessary for the animal's living existence. We observe no evolutionary development in the existence/nonexistence of these systems. This invariability indicates the existence of a master control system: "All vertebrates will have four legs, two eyes.." and so forth.
It is obvious that the vast majority of a vertebrate's genetic system is "locked" in this way. The living system is designed to keep on living. Shuffling around the inessential bits of DNA and opening them up to the vagaries of sexual reproduction produces a multitude of different variations on a theme. But the theme is resistant to change, resistant to evolution produced by random means. Fruit flies will always be fruit flies, dogs will always be dogs.
Holger Czukay · 21 May 2004
Pete Dunkelberg · 22 May 2004
Jack Shea · 22 May 2004
Holger, Pete:
If you want to challenge the essentials of any of my posts, I'll be happy to engage in a discussion. It looks like the substance of what I've written is unassailable since no one ever goes for the jugular. I keep getting asked for science but I see no science in return. Even on those rare occasions when I proffer some sci evidence (Lysistrata or whatever it is master gene) the ball doesn't come back. I don't even see logical thinking. I see evasion. Phony questions. Slender comments, meaningless questions. Maybe I'm just seeing things that aren't there.
The beginning of vertebrates, Holder. See Reed for lessons on parsing sentences. Or better yet, show me some fossil or any other evidence for asymmetrical vertebrates. Then explain to me why bilateral symmetry is off the evolutionary map. Not a whiff of a change in 550 million years.
Pete: It is the science of the obvious that certain vertebrate systems ARE locked, in terms of their very existence, as I stated and as you gloss over. The existence of any aspect of vertebrate morphology cannot be taken as "given". In vertebrates we see that all major skeletal attributes and organic systems -symmetry, brain/nervous, circulatory, metabolic, organ placement, etc, ARE NOT EVOLVING, AND HAVE NOT EVOLVED in the fossil record. What is staring us in the face is the remarkably UNEVOLUTIONARY nature of the design, function and layout of the major componenets of vertebrate anatomy. We see change in organ shape, size, and perhaps details of chemistry but we see no new additions or alterations to the basic components, functions and layout of vertebrate systems. Their existence and general layout are "locked". Since they appear universally, without exception, in vertebrate phenotype, it follows that genetic locks must exist which do not permit variation (as existence/nonexistence) of these attributes and systems. We have found major aspects of vertebrate anatomy which do not evolve. The general systemic pattern is locked. That this has eluded us for so long is only because it is so obvious.
This is observed fact, therefore science. How are we to interpret this fact in light of neodarwinist explanations for evolution? There can be only one conclusion: certain vertebrate characteristics are not open to the free-form process of random mutation as an evolutionary tool. For 550 million years there has been no mutation of the basic systems, the foundational anatomical patterns, comprising vertebrates. How much more "locked" can you get? These locked systems are of course genetically derived and present in DNA before their expression.
I move into scientific hypothesis when I suggest that the observed unvarying stability of these genetic systems indicates that their resistance to change might be comprehensive. That is, the master gene which produces this unvarying stability would also work to prevent gills from turning into lungs, etc. Not a wild hypothesis given that this master gene system has already shown that its function is to keep to established patterns over vast amounts of time.
In other words, design is resident in vertebrate genes. Vertebrates are not shaped by chance alone but by inherent intention as well. Inherent intention is responsible for the basic structure of vertebrates, which does not vary anywhere in the phylum Chordata. The list of attributes shared by all members of Chordata is a list of gene functions that do not vary across a wide spectrum of very different-looking animals. We see here a fixed pattern, "locked" genes. There is no evidence of its random disruption. The pattern maintains its intent, distributes directed information in such a way that it establishes a template for its next stage of emergence.
Here the shape of Chordata diverges into new variety. Chordata splits into new definitions of itself. The Bears, the Deer, the Whale, the Mouse, the Platypus, the Dolphin, the Dog. Within these basic animal types we see much diversity. Many kinds of Bear, many kinds of Whale. We know that the exchange of genetic information between male and female in each of these animal groups results in observed changes in appearance over generations. We see elements of predictability resulting from these exchanges as well as productions which seem to emanate from random causes. We see immense variety in size, shape detail and coloration. A great deal of evolution within basic animal type is indeed taking place. Hundreds of different varieties of dog, but all Dog.
That these beasts look and behave differently from one another is undeniable. A mouse and a whale. A very specific, stable and organized system forms a template which has existed without variation since the first emergence of vertebrates on the earth. Every vertebrate possessess the same basic pattern, the same basic genotypic/phenotypic design. There is no variation at the level of primary systems. No evidence of evolutionary departure from the basic pattern. The design of the master gene(s) prevents it from happening. At a very basic level, form is fixed.
Where that design comes from is a separate question. I don't have the answer. The implication is that master gene templates emerge in an instant of phenomenally brilliant creativity . . . but in what do they emerge? What paper is The Book of the Snake written on? The Book of the Whale? In vertebrates we need an animal before we can have an egg. But it may be that there exist unicellular organisms which make good paper for someone with a knowledge of Creation's alphabet. What is required is energy and information, very high-order information and very subtle forms of energy. We come face to face with "we don't know". Nor will we ever know. The final answer is outwith the reach of science. There will always remain an "a priori", a new question which will be answerable and whose answer will generate a new question and so on. In science we can describe mechanisms but not origins. There are many names for the indefinable origins of existence but It has no name.
Holger Czukay · 22 May 2004
Pete Dunkelberg · 24 May 2004
Jack, I don't want to keep going back and forth with "It is" "It isn't", but you keep saying that such and such is science when it is not. You know that the things you assert here do not come from science books or research journals.
We were talking about whales, but now you say a lot about bilateral symmetry. It is quite remarkable that you look at the immense variety of animals that have descended from the earliest 'just barely a chordate' amphioxus like animal and say there has been no real change. We have bats and snakes, fish and whales, quick monkeys and slow sloths in the same trees and moles in the ground. Yes, they are bilaterally symmetric as are roaches, lobsters and spiders. Since that works well, why change it?
But let's get back to something more specific, namely whales. Are you now OK with the evolution of whales, because they have bilateral symmetry and hence haven't "really" changed much? Recall that we have fossils of the intermediate stages, and also various living animals showing that various degrees of adaptation (by mammals) to life in water are feasible, and of course whales have mammalian genes.
Bear in mind that your statements about genomes being "locked" and/or having "intent" are not based on scientific research. Instead, we know about genes that control the timing and amount of growth in a young organism, and we know that changes in these genes can drastically change the shape of the organism. For an example of this and of how much change you have probably observed yourself, just remember frogs. At first they are tadpoles, with gills and fish-like tails. Then later they develop legs and lungs. (Gills do not change into lungs. They are separate developments).
Also bear in mind that there is no scientific reason to think that the amount of change that is observed in a short time is all that can happen in a much longer time. Instead it is more like (but of course not exactly) this: if X amount of change can happen in 100 years, then ten X can happen in 1000 years and so on.
All in all, I see no reason for you not to accept the evolution of whales from land animals. Do you?
Pete
Pete Dunkelberg · 24 May 2004
Jack, I don't want to keep going back and forth with "It is" "It isn't", but you keep saying that such and such is science when it is not. You know that the things you assert here do not come from science books or research journals.
We were talking about whales, but now you say a lot about bilateral symmetry. It is quite remarkable that you look at the immense variety of animals that have descended from the earliest 'just barely a chordate' amphioxus like animal and say there has been no real change. We have bats and snakes, fish and whales, quick monkeys and slow sloths in the same trees and moles in the ground. Yes, they are bilaterally symmetric as are roaches, lobsters and spiders. Since that works well, why change it?
But let's get back to something more specific, namely whales. Are you now OK with the evolution of whales, because they have bilateral symmetry and hence haven't "really" changed much? Recall that we have fossils of the intermediate stages, and also various living animals showing that various degrees of adaptation (by mammals) to life in water are feasible, and of course whales have mammalian genes.
Bear in mind that your statements about genomes being "locked" and/or having "intent" are not based on scientific research. Instead, we know about genes that control the timing and amount of growth in a young organism, and we know that changes in these genes can drastically change the shape of the organism. For an example of this and of how much change you have probably observed yourself, just remember frogs. At first they are tadpoles, with gills and fish-like tails. Then later they develop legs and lungs. (Gills do not change into lungs. They are separate developments).
Also bear in mind that there is no scientific reason to think that the amount of change that is observed in a short time is all that can happen in a much longer time. Instead it is more like (but of course not exactly) this: if X amount of change can happen in 100 years, then ten X can happen in 1000 years and so on.
All in all, I see no reason for you not to accept the evolution of whales from land animals. Do you?
Pete
andrew · 12 November 2004
Question from someone who knows very little about intelligent design.
The proponents of intelligent design theory believe that all living organisms were designed, constructed, and placed into existence by a being or entity with intelligence.
Therefore they believe that it is POSSIBLE that life can be designed, constructed, and placed into existence by a being or entity with intelligence.
So does ID theory then support the possibility that humans (beings with intelligence), have the ability to design a machine that is considered alive?
Great White Wonder · 12 November 2004
Bob Maurus · 13 November 2004
GWW,
I think you're unfairly attributing something to Charlie that rightly should be laid at the feet of Horatio's Hypothesis, which pointed out the oversight in Nelson's Law, and showed that, indeed, in the absence of contrary evidence, humans designed all life on earth (including ourtselves) - and potentially much, much more.