2010

As you read these words a frenzy of activity is taking place as the light entering your eye triggers a dizzying sequence of actions, ultimately causing a signal to be sent to your brain. In fact, even a mere single photon can be detected in your vision system. It all starts with a photon interacting with a light-sensitive chromophore molecule. The interaction causes the chromophore to change configuration and this, in turn, influences the large, trans-membrane rhodopsin protein to which the chromophore is attached. This is just the beginning of the cellular signal transduction cascade.  Read more

Evolution has to be true, and yet it is not well supported scientifically. If you ask how evolution occurred, you will be told there are various theories grappling with the problem. But if you ask if evolution occurred, you will be told that, without a doubt, it is an unequivocal fact. Evolutionists have metaphysical certainty about the truth of evolution, in spite of the empirical evidence. This is a consistent theme in the evolution genre. Here, for example, is the opening paragraph in a journal paper from last year on the evolution of vision:  Read more

(Note: These are the key books, not science or media news. The Top Ten Darwin and Design Science News Stories for 2009 are here,  the Top Ten Darwin and Design Media News Stories for 2009 are here, and my comments on the latter are here. Also, to get the links, you must go here.) My comments follow. 9. Exhaustive Survey of Evolution Case Law by Casey Luskin. The legal journal Hamline University Law Review, Vol. 32(1):1-64 (Winter, 2009), published a comprehensive collation and summary of the relevant law cases regarding the teaching of biological origins. The teaching of biological origins in public schools remains a contentious scientific, cultural, and legal debate. With the increase of public interest in this topic, Read More ›

In a comment to a prior post Tom quotes a Darwinist article regarding the source of information at the origin of life: “The idea is to give them enough information wherewithal [genetic building blocks] so they can start inventing their own solutions rather than just optimizing existing solutions,” To which Tom responds: The key word here is information. The key issue is how does a philosophy (naturalism) explain the existence of information within the confines of its explanatory resources? Since the very definition of naturalism includes the idea that the universe is causally closed (that is all causes ultimately resolve in physical laws – NOT mind) and therefore that the laws of physics ONLY have explanatory power, how then do Read More ›

Textbook evolutionary theory holds that evolutionary change occurs gradually. It may speed up or slow down but change, when it occurs, takes small steps. But from the fossil record to observed adaptations in the field, biological data do not always cooperate with theory. In fact, populations do respond dramatically to environmental challenges in a time window measured in years—not millions of years—and single mutations or the management of existing genes effect such responses. A review from last week, entitled Revenge of the hopeful monster, summarized the situation as follows:  Read more

Here’s the reason I asked why human evolution should be taught in school:

I just came across this fact: Human evolution: Little is known other than basic outline

Contrary to widely heard huffing, there are huge gaps in our understanding of early humans. In Nature’s 2020 Visions (7 January 2010) Scroll down to Leslie C. Aiello, and we learn

Most of the recent effort in hominin palaeontology has been focused on Africa and Europe. But the announcement in 2004 of the small hominin Homo floresiensis in Indonesia was a warning that we are naive to assume we know more than the basic outline of human evolutionary history. … Go here for more.

Sorry to be so long judging this one, but there were 143 posts and I had several local issues to deal with at the same time. Now, to business: The winner is Collin at 8. His succinct entry appears below. I would also have awarded a prize to EvilSnack at 48, for this entry, but I only received one copy of David Berlinski’s The Deniable Darwin. I will see if I can procure another copy, but if not EvilSnack may contact me anyway. I have other prizes on my shelf.

Winners need to be in touch with me at oleary@sympatico.ca, with a valid postal address. Their names will not be added to a mailing list. There is no mailing list.

Here’s Collin:

Human evolution ought to be taught in schools because it is one of the best cases for common descent. This is probably a result of the extra interest among scientists concerning human evolution.

Even creationists and students sympathetic to ID ought to be taught the best argument for Darwinism so that if they want to argue against it they do so against the best scenario the opposition has to offer. Otherwise, those supportive of traditional Darwinism will sense a straw man argument and end up being inoculated against further, more refined and honest arguments.

Some careless creationists in the ’80s made this mistake causing further, more compelling arguments to be dismissed before being further evaluated.

Human evolution, being taught, does inform students of a lot of ideas that are not necessarily against ID or even creationism. Presumably even creationists (most of them) will concede that homo erectus did exist as some kind of now-extinct species. Students can be presented with the fact of the bones (or lack thereof) and they can make their own conclusions. My hope is that teachers will present evolution’s best arguments but not endeavor to indoctrinate students. Maybe that is a fine line, but it can be done, and is the honest way to go about it.

What swayed me was Collin’s emphasis on hearing both sides honestly represented by their own advocates. If schools do not teach students to evaluate on that basis, they are not worth the money we spend on them.

Consider a simple example: Most days, I ride the Toronto Transit System, which features a vast array of busboard ads and subway posters advocating every cell phone offer imaginable. You can be sure that the sales person will not emphasize strongly to the customer, “Our offer is the cheapest – but, of course, we do sign you up for three years, and it costs you $300 to cancel.”

The salesperson’s competitor does that. The competitor shouts from busboards, subway posters, and billboards, “No contract, no cancellation fee!” That sets the customer thinking about what to ask next time, doesn’t it?

Cell phones are a minor matter, of course. But later in life, the student will deal with job offers, marriage proposals, mortgage offers, investment advice, medical plans …. The advocate’s offer can only be evaluated by hearing alternatives, clearly spelled out.

One of my major objections to “Darwinism-only” biology education is that – apart from the fact that I don’t think it is true – it is not a good way to teach.

Other comments follow: Read More ›

Here, Access Research Network has published the Top Ten Darwin and Design Resources for 2009. Most interesting. As executive director Dennis Wagner comments, “I would never have predicted that an atheist would name a book about intelligent design as one of the top books of 2009, while another atheist would write a book defending intelligent design? This is a sign that open minds in the academic and scientific communities are beginning to take the evidence for intelligent design seriously,” (Note: The Top Ten Darwin and Design Science News Stories for 2009 are here, and the Top Ten Darwin and Design Media News Stories for 2009 are here, and my comments on the latter are here. Also, to get the links, Read More ›

“SAN DIEGO: Can life arise from nothing but a chaotic assortment of basic molecules? The answer is a lot closer following a series of ingenious experiments that have shown evolution at work in non-living molecules. For the first time, scientists have synthesized RNA enzymes – ribonucleic acid enzymes also known as ribozymes – that can replicate themselves without the help of any proteins or other cellular components. What’s more, these simple nucleic acids can act as catalysts and continue the process indefinitely. “There’s nothing in biology in this system: no proteins, no cells, no biological matter. We just provide them with the building blocks,” said molecular biologist Gerald Joyce of the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego.

The researchers began with ribozymes known to occur naturally, and put these in a growth medium, heated them and allowed the ribozymes to replicate.”

Read More ›

Science Daily reports on new work examining cellular motors: Life’s smallest motor — a protein that shuttles cargo within cells and helps cells divide — does so by rocking up and down like a seesaw, according to research conducted by scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Brandeis University. The researchers created high-resolution snapshots of a protein motor, called kinesin, as it walked along a microtubule, which are tube-shaped structures that form a cell’s “skeleton.” The result is the closest look yet at the structural changes kinesin proteins undergo as they ferry molecules within cells. “We see for the first time how kinesin’s atomic-scale moving parts allow it to pull itself and its cargo along Read More ›

I’ve evolved, and here’s my evolution: Richard Dawkins became Antony Flew who became C.S. Lewis. (Of course, I’m not in the same league as Flew or Lewis, and God forgive my Dawkins past.) Things that are made. I have a faint recollection of this phrase from some ancient text I once read. Things that are made are designed and engineered. We all can recognize them. I would like to offer the following hypothesis: The universe was rigged. It was designed for discovery (a thesis put forward in The Privileged Planet), but also designed in such a way that there would always be an escape clause in the contract for those who are committed, for whatever reason, to reject the obvious. Read More ›

My grandfather, about whom I have written before in these pages, was an extraordinary man.  Born in 1910, he left school after the second grade to go to work shortly after the great flu pandemic of 1918.  He was, however, a prodigious autodidact, and when he died his library ran into the thousands of volumes.  He had many talents, but his true genius lay in things mechanical.  He was a highly skilled tool and die maker at a multi-national manufacturing company, and it was ironic but not unusual for college educated engineers to consult with this second grade dropout on particularly thorny problems.

Papa also made machines for his own amusement, and what wonderful, whimsical, marvelous machines he made.  I remember one machine in particular.  On a large platform stood several mechanical men about six inches tall.  The men were animated by an electric motor attached to a series of pulleys and levers out of sight underneath the platform.  Read More ›

Two years ago, “the most primitive bat known” was reported in Nature. It was not primitive in its wings and body, but “the morphology of the ear region suggests that it could not echolocate, making it a possible intermediate link between bats and their non-flying, non-echolocating mammalian ancestors”. At the time, the find was suggested to settle the question as to which came first: flight or echolocation? The answer was a definite flight first. “The problem of understanding bat evolution dates back at least to Charles Darwin, who in The Origin of Species enumerated a list of difficulties he saw with the theory of evolution by natural selection. The example often discussed is the origin of the eye. But Darwin Read More ›

In a comment to a prior post lastyearon writes: I’m simply not understanding how it is possible to detect that certain things were the result of design if everything is the result of design. If you hold that the laws of nature were Fine-Tuned for life, then that position seems incompatible with the notion that it is possible to detect that certain things were the product of Intelligent Design. IDers say they can detect design by distinguishing designed objects from products of natural ‘undirected’ causes. But if natural causes were designed for life, then doesn’t that invalidate that claim? I reply: You seem to imply that “IDers” are the only ones who claim to be able to distinguish between designed Read More ›

In a prior thread mikev6 asked: “If God is required to be moral, and I don’t believe in God, does that make me immoral?” I responded: “mikev6. Just because you are an atheist you will not necessarily act in an immoral way. No one said you would. It is a fact, however, that you are unable to ground your morality on anything other than your whim at the moment.” Ov responded to me: “Barry Arrington, in response to mikev6, said: “It is a fact, however, that you are unable to ground your morality on anything other than your whim at the moment.” I agree that such morality having an absolute grounding is not the case, but calling what mikev6 holds Read More ›