2012

New research continues to reveal biology’s complex adaptation capabilities broadly referred to as epigenetics. Simply put, individuals not only respond physiologically to environmental challenges by modifying their DNA, they also pass such adaptations on to their progeny. It is, by any other name, the inheritance of acquired characteristics, a concept evolutionists have resisted for almost a century. Now researchers studying mice have found that a mother’s diet not only during pregnancy, but before pregnancy, causes intelligent adaptations to occur that are passed on to the offspring—a finding that once was cause for blackballing. Now, molecular machines that (i) sense environmental shifts, (ii) produce the desired response, and (iii) pass that response on to offspring arose by chance, and were later selected. What was Read More ›

Because science is a search for causes, its practitioners are ethically bound to keep an open mind about the nature of those causes. The whole point of investigating any given phenomenon is to find a reasonable answer to the question, “why is this happening?” or “why did it happen?” In that spirit, the researcher develops a rigorous methodology that will address a narrowly-focused problem and facilitate the process of finding the most plausible solution, regardless of whose interests might be served. This is just as true for the practice of medicine as it is for the study of life’s origins. If, for example, a physician is about to decide on the appropriate therapy for his patient, he will, if he Read More ›

Though evolutionists think of themselves as realists—ruthlessly objective investigators interested only in truth—their naturalistic constraint ultimately leaves them with only anti realism. This is because any a priorirestriction of the answer might exclude the true answer. If I decide my math homework must contain only odd numbered answers, then I’ll be wrong on those problems whose correct answer is an even number. I can round up, approximate, truncate, contort or whatever to obtain an odd number, but I will be wrong. For such problems, the only way to be right is to remove the a priori restriction. But evolutionists cannot do this. Foundational to their thinking is that the world must have arisen by itself, strictly via natural laws and processes. What most Read More ›

This morning, as I opened up my computer, the following Yahoo News headline leaped out: Will Science Someday Rule Out the Possibility of God? By Natalie Wolchover | LiveScience.com Over the past few centuries, science can be said to have gradually chipped away at the traditional grounds for believing in God. Much of what once seemed mysterious — the existence of humanity, the life-bearing perfection of Earth, the workings of the universe — can now be explained by biology, astronomy, physics and other domains of science. Although cosmic mysteries remain, Sean Carroll, a theoretical cosmologist at the California Institute of Technology, says there’s good reason to think science will ultimately arrive at a complete understanding of the universe that leaves Read More ›

At the Smithsonian: Why hominids evolved upright walking is one of the biggest questions in human evolution. One school of thought suggests that bipedalism was the most energetically efficient way for our ancestors to travel as grasslands expanded and forests shrank across Africa some five million to seven million years ago. A new study in the Journal of Human Evolution challenges that claim, concluding that the efficiency of human walking and running is not so different from other mammals. HT: Scott

UD commenter Joe notes: Alan [Fox] amuses by not understanding the definition of “default”. He thinks the design inference is the default even though it is reached via research, observations, knowledge and experiences. To put this ill-founded but longstanding objection to the design inference — it is tantamount to an accusation of question-begging —  to bed permanently, I note: ____________ >> . . . a year after Dr Liddle was repeatedly and specifically corrected that the inference to design is after rejecting not one but TWO defaults, that is still being raised as an objection over at TSZ. That speaks volumes. Let’s outline again, for those unable to understand a classic flowchart [even UML preserves a version of this . Read More ›

We have been discussing lately the idea that mutations, rather than being haphazard, may actually be directed by cellular machinery. In a recent volume of the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, several scientists presented evidence in favor of this view. One of these scientists has a paper on what he calls “mutation protocols” – that is, repeated patterns of mutations whose behavior is not only physical, but also logical. In other words, the pattern that the mutation follows is consistent with the overall architecture of the organism. You might call these design-consistent mutations. In any case, David King gives us examples of two mutation protocols – cut-and-paste functional segments, and tuning knobs. Tuning knobs are generally implemented Read More ›

Yesterday, following up from recent comment exchanges, I posted about the electron as an example of how we routinely deal with the invisible in science, and on how inductive — believe it or not that is now a fighting word — inference on sign is vital to science. This morning, I followed up on a remark by Joe in the UB thread that extends the same theme. I think this should be headlined, so let me clip (quickly, as I do have a draft to follow up on): ____________ >>I have a draft speech to follow up on, but could not resist this: [Joe:] the [Darwinist/Evolutionary Materialist] response is always “Eons of time cannot be reproduced in a lab and Read More ›

Engineering is, by definition, a teleological effort. Things are done in order that something else may happen. I have wondered how biology might be improved by taking ideas, practices, and methodologies from engineering and applying them to biology. Any ideas? NOTE – I accidentally used the word “approved” rather than “improved” in the post. This is fixed. Sorry for the confusion.

The Tektronix 465 Cathode Ray Oscilloscope is a classic of analogue oscilloscope design, one based on deflecting electron beams electrostatically to observe and measure electrical oscillations: But, wait a minute, are we ACTUALLY seeing electron beams? Nope, we are seeing a TRACE on the screen, where light is emitted by the phosphor as it is hit by the beams. Wait, again: are we actually seeing the electron beams? And more particularly, the electrons in the beams? Nope. No-one has ever actually seen that strange wavicle, the electron. It has never been directly observed. Never. So, why do we so confidently portray how a CRO works, if we cannot actually see the electrons that it is built around? Because, the invisible Read More ›

A couple of days ago I posted my opening statement to a formal online debate I’m currently engaged in with Christian neo-Darwinist Francis Smallwood at Musings Of A Scientific Nature. My opening statement can be found here, and his here. What follows are my opening thoughts on the question whether ID is ‘creationism in a cheap tuxedo’, or a valid scientific theory. At the bottom of this post you can find a link to Francis’ first response to me on his blog. Is Intelligent Design science or ‘creationism in a cheap tuxedo?‘ Joshua Gidney-Opening As I have already outlined in my opening statements, intelligent design theory states ‘that there are tell-tale features of living systems and the universe that are Read More ›

Today is the 11th Anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. Let us pause for a minute of silence, and remember. (My personal memorial is here.)

In a recent paper, Olivera et al analyze the venom of Cone snails, which represent a fairly large and diverse genus of venomous marine snails. What they found was very interesting. The venom genes had the following properties: The gene was hypermutable – in other words, within the genus, the variability of the venom was immensely more variable than other gene regions The hypermutability of the gene was localized – in other words, there was a specific target of hypermutability in the gene. There were some parts which were highly conserved. The localization of the hypermutability was not due to selection – in other words, it isn’t that the whole thing was hypermutable and selection only kept the ones which Read More ›

I was certain the Darwinists would spin the ENCODE findings, but even I am stunned at their sheer audacity. In response to my previous post, Critical Rationalist says that the ENCODE findings, which falsify a prediction Darwinists have been making for decades, far from being a crushing defeat for the theory and its proponents is a positively good thing for Darwinists. CR writes: “all theories contain errors of varying degree and that finding them is how knowledge grows . . . Surviving criticism and *not* surviving criticized is a win win situation, which doesn’t represent a blow to human intellect.” Then CR makes the outlandish suggestion that ENCODE is somehow a loss for ID. He writes: “[When ID] Merely assum[es] Read More ›

A recent issue of the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences has just been published, and the whole issue is stacked with topics that support ID ideas – specifically, the idea that genomic evolution, to the extent that it is beneficial, is largely teleological. The introductory paper refers to the “creative genome” which contain “organizational frameworks that affect genome behavior”. I have not read the papers, only the abstracts, so the information in this post is rather tentative. However, here are some papers that seem to be of interest to the ID community: parasites have a whole DNA library of surface proteins that they switch between, and a mutator that focuses the mutations in the right place to Read More ›