A friend writes to draw our attention to an interesting 2014 paper Thought Experiments in Biology, by Guillaume Schlaepfer and Marcel Weber: Unlike in physics, the category of thought experiment is not very common in biology. At least there are no classic examples that are as important and as well-known as the most famous thought Read More…
Evolutionary biology
Design Disquisitions: Critic’s Corner-Sahotra Sarkar
My latest ‘Critic’s Corner’ post is now up. This one features the work of ID critic Sahotra Sarkar. Sarkar is one of the more sophisticated critics of ID so his work is worth engaging with. I have responded to some of his arguments in a previous post and plan to do more in the future: Read More…
Salvador Cordova Talks about DNA and Non-DNA Inheritance
These are a pair of videos from the AM-Nat Biology conference. I have had lots of other things going on so I’ve been slow getting these up, but Salvador’s talks became more relevant as Dan Graur doubles down to try to prove that the genome is mostly junk. You can get the rest of the Read More…
Biologist Dan Graur Doubles Down
Down Graur, a critic of the ENCODE project, has doubled down on his statement that the genome is mostly non-functional. Graur has gone further to state that not only does he think that most of the genome is non-functional, he thinks that he has proven it to be a mathematical certainty.
Evolution posits origins in Europe? Scant evidence for mutations
“two fossils of an ape-like creature which had human-like teeth have been found in Bulgaria and Greece, dating to 7.2 million years ago.” vs “combined base changes can be counted on the fingers.”
Konrad Lorenz Institute: Following through on non-Darwinian biology
Does anyone remember the Altenberg 16, a group of dissenting evolution theorists who met so nervously at the Konrad Lorenz institute in Austria that they locked a journalist out of the meeting?* They seem to be continuing to write papers, according to Massimo Pigliucci, I have just spent three delightful days at the Konrad Lorenz Read More…
Design Disquisitions: On Perry Marshall’s ‘Evolution 2.0’ & Confusions About Design
This week’s article at Design Disquisitions is about Perry Marshall’s ‘Evolution 2.0’ thesis and his criticisms of intelligent design. This article responds to some of his recent writings on his blog and his interaction with Stephen Meyer a few weeks back. Bottom line is, his philosophy of science has significant problems and he has some Read More…
Taxonomically-Restricted Essential Genes
Here is the next video from the AM-Nat conference. In this video, Paul Nelson talks about genes that are both taxonomically-restricted (ORFan genes) and essential to the function of organisms. Then he describes the impact of these findings on common descent.
A Unifying Principle for the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis
There has been quite a controversy over the past few years over whether the extended evolutionary synthesis is a replacement of the modern synthesis or a refinement of it.
Programming by Accident – The Darwinian Paradigm
The last couple of days I have spent too much time trying to rescue a hard drive. This drive was intended for a Windows 10 system, but it would not appear anywhere in utilities. BIOS could recognize it was plugged in, but that was it. Nothing in Explorer, nothing in Disk Management, not even in Read More…
Design Disquisitions: Why the Question of Biological Origins Really Matters
Finally, I’ve managed to publish my first blog article! It’s been a rocky start as I had some technical difficulties. Nevertheless, it feels good to get the ball rolling. In this first article, I’ve chosen to take a step back and reflect upon whether or not intelligent design is an important problem to consider in Read More…
Darwinism: The steam engine of modern biology
In response to our Steampunk Darwin, David Klinghoffer observes, at Evolution News & Views, a classic example of the way in which mediocrities know they are right: Because they can attract a consensus of, mainly, themselves to end discussions of problematic new information: Shutting Down the Evolution Debate, the “Mainstream Science” Way We noted the other Read More…
Hubert Yockey, 1916-2016, and His Contributions to the Intelligent Design Movement
I was sad to recently realize that Hubert Yockey passed earlier (in January) this year. Hubert Yockey, though he personally was against Intelligent Design, made many contributions to science that many of us within the ID community view as pro-ID work. I wanted to take a moment to appreciate and reflect on his contributions as Read More…
Questions for Critics of Methodological Naturalism
The question of whether methodological naturalism is an idea worth holding onto in science has been one that the ID camp, as a whole, is not unified on. Some think that methodological naturalism is a perfectly valid way to define science, and that ID fits nicely within that scope. Others think that methodological naturalism is Read More…
Wayne Rossiter on teaching Darwin’s unquestionable truths
The claim that British moths “evolved” because of industrial pollution (microevolution) in recent centuries became an unquestionable truth of Darwin lobby textbooks in recent decades. But there are serious problems with that example (the peppered myth). From Waynesburg University (Pennsylvania) biology prof Wayne Rossiter, author of In the Shadow of Oz, a note: Note that Read More…