DonaldM

As we head into the new year and the impending Darwin bi-centennial on February 12th, we’re sure to be regaled with story after story of the wondrous things that Darwinian evolution hath wrought.  A friend e-mailed the following to me, and with his permission, I reproduce it here below the fold.  Perhaps pondering some of these questions might bring some balance to what is otherwise sure to be a lopsided Darwin love-fest for the next couple of months.  The original of this can be found at the University of California Santa Barbara Veritas Forum website Read More ›

Theodosius Dobzhansky once famously said that “nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.”   Except, of course, when biology doesn’t need to even consider evolution, which for practicle purposes is most of the time. 

Today, I had the privilege to have lunch with a research scientist who works in the area of bio-pharmaceuticals for a pharmaceutical company.  He told me about their research with proteins and genes that enable them to develop products that alleviate or cure a wide range of diseases at the cellular level.  Of great value to the research they do was the Human Genome Project because it made available the entire database to whoever needed it.  That information enabled them to move several projects forward.

He knew from our conversation that I had been involved in the Intelligent Design/Evolution debate, so I asked him

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An invitation to provide initial posts for discussion here at UD was recently extended to me.  My name is Donald M and for those who have posted here for a while, I’m probably not a stranger.  I’m a strong proponent of ID and I have serious doubts and reservations about several aspects of Darwinian evolution.  My main area of interest is in the Philosophy of Science and the philosophical assumptions of science and scientific practice.  While I am not a working scientist, I do hold a Masters degree in a scientific field.  I’m grateful for the opportunity to share some thoughts here, and hopefully provide some fodder for useful discussion among participants. 

With that brief intro, I’ll dive into my first contribution.

The January issue of Scientific American is focused entirely on the Evolution of Evolution. There are several articles on different aspects of Darwin and evolution. The article I want to focus on here is a critical piece by Eugenie Scott and Glenn Branch of the NCSE (National Center for Saving Evolution Science Education). Entitled The Latest Face of Creationism in the Classroom, the article laments the fact that Science still has to deal with “creationism”…the favored term over Intelligent Design for purely pejorative reasons. Read More ›