How’s this for ID research …

_{William Dembski

March 7, 2006

Intelligent Design}

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Check out the article below. It explicitly refers to a process that produces modified enzymes as “Intelligent Design.” Further, it distinguishes between directed evolution and the process introduced by these researchers: their process more thoughtfully chooses the residues to mutate. Both are in fact examples of Intelligent Design, but one has to appreciate, especially in the current climate of controversy, that the researchers are being up front about how intelligent design is at the center of their work and also that they resisted the urge to suck up to the establishment by offering ritualistic deference to Darwin and conventional evolutionary theory.

At Berkeley: Intelligently Designed Molecular Evolution
Contact: Lynn Yarris (510) 486-5375 lcyarris@lbl.gov

BERKELEY, CA Ã¢â‚¬â€ Evolutionary paths to new therapeutic drugs, as well as a wide assortment of other enzyme products, have been created through, of all things, intelligent design. A team of researchers with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California at Berkeley have developed a technique in which the evolution of an important class of proteins is steered towards a desired outcome.

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ftrp11: My point is that they manipulated natural mechanisms to engineer an evolutionary path. And THAT is the point. Also we don't know if it was an "evolutionary path". There isn't any data that would suggest what they engineered could occur without intervention. ftrp11: ID is about life being too complex to have material origins. Lol! THAT is what newspaper clippings and anti-IDists say about ID. The real ID is different. Also "The Privileged Planet" doesn't say anything about life's origins but is pro-ID. ftrp11: ID as amovement is not sbout humans intelligently designing life. Intelligent design begins with a seemingly innocuous question: Can objects, even if nothing is known about how they arose, exhibit features that reliably signal the action of an intelligent cause? Intelligent Design is the study of patterns in nature that are best explained as the result of intelligence. -- William A. Dembski ftrp11: In this case the mechanism was the blind random mutations that were put under intelligent selection pressure. According to the article that is false:
The Berkeley researchers identified the plasticity residues for the Grand fir sesquiterpene synthase, then systematically recombined mutations of these residues through site-directed mutagenesis, based on a mathematical model developed by Yoshikuni. Construction of the seven sesquiterpene synthases was accomplished with the screening of fewer than 2,500 mutants.
Joseph_{March 11, 2006
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And what does "Just as intelligence can recognize design, so intelligence can recognize the Ã¢â‚¬Å“fingerprintsÃ¢â‚¬Â of a particular designer." have to do with this discussion? The article was about scientists applying directed selection pressure to move evolution on a prescribed course. It says nothing about whether such artificial selection pressure is necessary to explain the spread of life on Earth. There are no metaphysical implications for this research. It is neither pro or anti ID. Humans can obviously intelligently design life. We have been doing so for over ten thousand years.ftrp11_{March 10, 2006
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No my name is John-Michael Davis and I have never used those screen names.ftrp11_{March 10, 2006
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Just as intelligence can recognize design, so intelligence can recognize the "fingerprints" of a particular designer. Is ftrp11 really keiths? woctor?Red Reader_{March 10, 2006
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My point is that they manipulated natural mechanisms to engineer an evolutionary path. ID is about life being too complex to have material origins. This work does not address that. ID as amovement is not sbout humans intelligently designing life. We have been doing that since the birth of civilization. There is zero controversy there. In this case the mechanism was the blind random mutations that were put under intelligent selection pressure. That is one thing that people seem to forget. The change may be random but the delection pressure is anything but.ftrp11_{March 10, 2006
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ftrp11 said: It is a little deceptive to imply that the basis of their work is intelligent design. It (their work) has ID written all over it. ftrp11 said: There work relies on ET not ID, but they are intelligently designing life. Their work relies on ID- that is being able to do what unintelligent, blind/ undirected process didn't/ couldn't/ wouldn't do. ID is NOT anti-evolution. There isn't anything in ID that states evolution doesn't occur. The "Debate" is all about the mechanism. In this case the mechanism was the genetic engineers rearranging genetic components to get a desired outcome. Perhaps we could take these same organisms- an untouched population- subject it to differing selection pressures and see if any of the designed changes can occur without intervention.Joseph_{March 10, 2006
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It is a little deceptive to imply that the basis of their work is intelligent design. There work relies on ET not ID, but they are intelligently designing life. Breeding dogs is also intelligently designing life though. Granted these reasearchers are dealing with more complexity, but the premise is the same. This research does not at all support or dispute the idea of life itself being intelligently designed. The use of the phrase intelligent design was a quip, and not meant to illustrate the basis of their ideas. Anyone who reads on sees an application of ET not ID. I am still not sure how one can apply ID outside of the metaphysical world but that is another matter. As far as not congratulating Darwin, that is true. Although I rarely come across a mention of Darwin in a serious journal. It is usually in pop science literature that people get into the cultural/metaphysical debate.ftrp11_{March 9, 2006
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Notwithstanding the fact that I have already answered Fross, I would like to point out another angle here. Fross wrote: "IsnÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t this more analogous to breeding than I.D.?" Perhaps. And breeding is a) undirected, b) intelligent design? But to throw him a bone, I think Fross makes a valid point. I will use Fross' point to make a REAL ID point. New theraputic drugs and new enzymes were only evolutionary in exactly the same sense that hybrid cattle are evolutionary. NO new genetic information is or was created in either case. This is "Micro" not "Macro" E. Even when the "evolution" (micro-evolution) is *directed*, no NEW information is being developed: information is being retrieved and refined that is already there. Niether are new biological mechanisms developed in the process. Even gene splicing takes information from one organism and grafts it to another: still no NEW information. So, the ID point: if goal-oriented and rigorously forced "directed evolution" under ideal conditions does not actually generate NEW information, "undirected evolution" isn't going to do it "in the wild" for reasons that have been hashed to death on the 2nd LoT threads here recently. Where did all of the information come from in the first place? ID says the existence of information in living (and/or cosmic) systems is BEST explained as the result of an Intelligent Cause. A dumb rock really IS "stuck on stupid".Red Reader_{March 9, 2006
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Fross wrote: "Can someone point out to me how this relates to I.D?" This is what I mean by deliberate ignorance. Did you READ Dr. Dembski's comments? No. Or if you did you chose to play dumb and act like it all makes no sense to you. Read Dr. Dembski's quote. If you understand ID, you understand that the Darwinists have assualted ID beyond the bounds of science and have made it an issue in cultural, legal, educational, even religious spheres. So, here's how this topic relates (read and grasp): "...but one has to appreciate, especially in the current climate of controversy, that the researchers are being up front about how intelligent design is at the center of their work and also that they resisted the urge to suck up to the establishment by offering ritualistic deference to Darwin and conventional evolutionary theory." To reiterate: don't be stuck on stupid.Red Reader_{March 9, 2006
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The two items I found in the article that bolster ID are these. 1."In nature.... Multiple combinations of many different amino acid substitutions are tested in promiscuous enzymes until an evolutionary path that achieves a desired result is found." Um, from what I understand, achieving a 'desired' result indicates intelligence, isn't evolution supposed to be undirected? 2."An alterative approach, called directed evolution or molecular breeding, that is currently being tested at other laboratories, requires the screening of tens of thousands to a million or more mutants." In other words, using an intelligent agent we are able to acutally get something to work, whereas with blind evoltuion we're shooting at a moving target hoping something hits. Just my thoughts.mr_flood_{March 9, 2006
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Joseph I realize that and agree completely. The point is that even the most ardent Darwinist wouldn't have a problem with this. As I said before, it doesn't surprise biologists that we can tinker with life's natural mechanisms to reach a targeted outcome. It is a great feat of scientific insight and technique, but not altogether earth shaking.ftrp11_{March 9, 2006
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ftrp11: No one doubts that life can be intelligently engineered but that fact has zero relevancy to the origin question. We have to start somewhere. True tinkering with already existing CSI does not explain its origins, but it does allow us to at least try to grasp the operational aspect of "simple" life. Once we understand that we should gain some insight as to its (life's) origins. This might sound like a novel concept but we have to work with what we have. And try to understand it (life in this case) the best we can via any methodology we can muster. Look at where we are as far as OoL- the RNA World- which isn't looking too good...Joseph_{March 9, 2006
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Fross asks: I was wondering how this study relates to I.D. From the article: Ã¢â‚¬Å“The enzyme synthase was there ready to be evolved, and with our methodology, we were able to rapidly and efficiently evolve it down a pathway of our choice,Ã¢â‚¬Â Keasling said. Ã¢â‚¬Å“We are recapitulating evolution into intelligent design. In the case of this particular Grand fir enzyme synthase, it naturally makes a soup of small amounts of 52 different products. We were able to focus it instead on making large amounts of one of seven of those products.Ã¢â‚¬Â This is an example of intelligent agencies fiddling with what exists to reach a desired outcome- THAT is what ID is all about- what intelligent agencies can do as compared to what unintelligent, blind/ undirected processes can do.Joseph_{March 9, 2006
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Red Reader, I'm sorry, I think you misunderstood my post. I was wondering how this study relates to I.D. You have a nice day too. :)Fross_{March 8, 2006
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The article stated: "According to the theory of divergent molecular evolution, primordial enzymes and other proteins started out as Ã¢â‚¬Å“promiscuousÃ¢â‚¬Â so that primitive organisms would be better able to adapt to their environment. Driven by selective pressures, these promiscuous enzymes and other proteins evolved along divergent lines to acquire the specialized functions needed by a host organism to survive. Ã¢â‚¬Å“This process is highly dependent on the fact that the functions of promiscuous proteins can be altered with just a small number of amino acid substitutions, a property known as plasticity,Ã¢â‚¬Â said Keasling. Ã¢â‚¬Å“It was our contention that the application of the theory of divergent molecular evolution to promiscuous enzymes would enable us to design enzymes with greater specificity and higher activity.Ã¢â‚¬Â" They are using the theory of divergent molecular evolution which is itself a strand of ET to "design enzymes with greater specificity and higher activity.Ã¢â‚¬Â" No one doubts that life can be intelligently engineered but that fact has zero relevancy to the origin question.ftrp11_{March 8, 2006
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I'm pretty sure this is Dembski cracking a joke, although it's hard to tell with him. I think it's funny either way, though.Kibitz_{March 8, 2006
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ftrp11 wrote: "I fail to see..." Correct!Red Reader_{March 8, 2006
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Fross wrote: "Pardon my confusion." Sorry. Deliberate confusion is unpardonable. Also, hairsplitting, arrogance and contrived stupidity. Have a nice day.Red Reader_{March 8, 2006
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"If anything it is a little damning because these scientists are achieving results based on predictions from a primary strand of contemporary ET" Can you point me to those predictions? Or list them?Michaels7_{March 8, 2006
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I fail to see how this is relevant to ID. If anything it is a little damning because these scientists are achieving results based on predictions from a primary strand of contemporary ET. Synthetic biology is suppossed to put us behind the reigns of evolution making humans intelligent designers, but it doesn't have much to say about the origin of life.ftrp11_{March 8, 2006
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Over on KCFS "DSr" Joe Meert posted the following and I responded pretty much like Wm Dembski: Intelligent design succeeds again - OK via evolutionary mechanisms Of course "Dr" Joe Meert was trying to use the article as evidence for NDE but that was changed in a hurry.Joseph_{March 8, 2006
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Pardon my confusion. Can someone point out to me how this relates to I.D? From what I understand, these guys are guiding which variants continue to reproduce to fit a desired outcome. Isn't this more analogous to breeding than I.D.? For instance, if these guys used this same process to create a flagellum.... well I can just see the battle now. "See only design can create a flagellum" "No, this shows a direct step by step natural pathway, it shows how natural selection might have done it" "no, it wasn't natural, because human intelligence guided it" "yes" "no" "yes" ad infinitum Or am I overanalyzing this post and Dembski is merely pointing out the humor that these guys are calling directed evolution "Intelligent design"? The reason I wonder is because Dembski says that "they resisted the urge to suck up to the establishment by offering ritualistic deference to Darwin and conventional evolutionary theory." Yet the article states: "According to the theory of divergent molecular evolution, primordial enzymes and other proteins started out as Ã¢â‚¬Å“promiscuousÃ¢â‚¬Â so that primitive organisms would be better able to adapt to their environment. Driven by selective pressures, these promiscuous enzymes and other proteins evolved along divergent lines to acquire the specialized functions needed by a host organism to survive." That sounds pretty conventional to me, so can someone enlighten me? Am I missing something, or does Dembski have a particular type of sense of humor that's a little ambiguous? Look at his picture up there. See that smirk? I know he's thinking of something funny. :)Fross_{March 7, 2006
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From the article:
The idea would be to one day be able to design an enzyme synthase that would evolve along a specific functional pathway to yield a desired molecular product, then introduce it into microbes for mass production. In addition to synthesizing therapeutic drugs, other possible applications would include flavors, fragrances and nutraceuticals.
So let's say 500 from now all records of this of this research are lost, but the molecular products are still out there and are discovered. Would a future scientist assume it was produced by evolution and construct an evolutionary history accordingly, or would there be hallmarks of its intelligently designed origin? If it is the latter, then why assume that nothing we observe today could have the same intelligently designed origin. If it is the former, then clearly the history of its origin is incorrect. 500 years from now, would it still be the case that the correct, intelligently designed origin hypthesis would be considered religious, but the the incorrect evolutionary origin story would be considered scientific? Makes me wonder...DonaldM_{March 7, 2006
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From the article "...a wide assortment of other enzyme products, have been created through, of all things, intelligent design" Yes, I can affirm that in molecular research (my area) Intelligent Design is the most compelling theoretical framework for numerous discoveries and deliberate molecular designs; for example to temporarily block the assembly of a specific protein for new medical treatments and therapies. That's where we are now.Fer_{March 7, 2006
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