Design Disquisitions: William Dembski Moves on From ID: Some Reflections

_{Joshua Gidney

February 19, 2017

General interest, Intelligent Design}

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There’s a new article posted at my blog. I know this one is old news now, but my blog wasn’t around in 2015 and didn’t see any coverage on it here or at ENV. I wanted to take note of Dembski’s decision, and some of the reaction to it.

Everyone who has taken part in the intelligent design debate will know of William Dembski. For those who aren’t familiar, Dembski is the primary architect with regard to the theoretical underpinnings of ID. Since his involvement with the movement, he has published extensively in books, papers, and blogs, and has vigorously championed his ideas in many public lectures and debates.(1)

Back in 2005, Dembski wrote a sarcastic blog post on Uncommon Descent, announcing his retirement from ID, due to the ‘rancour and daily vilification'(2) by many critics of his views. Fast forward to ten years later, and again, Dembski announces that he is retiring from intelligent design, only this time it’s no joke.

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Comments

TA, that is false today and it was false at the time, e.g. there was to my recall at the time a paper by Loennig on jumping genes. Minnich also had published work. Even Dembski had books at the time which were monographs subjected to peer review as part of the editorial process. And that is to ignore the other half of ID, cosmology -- going strong since 1953. Further, the issue of peer review is tainted by the problem that emerged across 2004, of evident censorship so that when an open-minded editor did publish an article within the ambit of his journal there was a blatant piece of abusive behaviour implicating the Smithsonian. Going on, no research -- in the face of both Behe and Minnich right there in the courtroom? That is beyond error, that is a plain out and out lie and a slander. As for no testing, this too is a lie, irreducible complexity is routinely testable and was tested by Minnich as testified to in open court, as in knock out the protein, no motility, put back in, motility returns, across IIRC 30 or so flagellar proteins. What do you think the routine technique of gene knockout studies relies on, except for irreducible complexity? And the functionally specific complex organisation and associated information criterion is blatantly open to test: produce FSCO/I by blind chance and/or mechanical necessity and it fails, of course the problem is there are trillions of cases of FSCO/I observed as design, and NIL, NIL, NIL by blind chance and mechanical necessity, backed up by the search challenge in vast config spaces. It is telling on want of a credible anti-ID case that after over ten years post Dover, we see people still refusing to accept such simple facts. The assertions you cite over a decade later are little more than copy-catting the false assertions of an interested party with a reputation for less than being straight with facts, ACLU and/or NCSE. This was a kangaroo court and a travesty of natural justice. KFkairosfocus_{February 21, 2017
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Behe's concept of irreducible complexity is an unavoidable fact of biology -- and yes, this conclusion is very much recorded in the peer literature. If Dover II ever comes to pass*, this tactic will not work a second time. :) * I, like other ID advocates, did not agree with the politics of Dover, but the court proceedings were a sham.Upright BiPed_{February 21, 2017
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KF @16: "(Don’t forget, as just one instance: the Judge was presented with actual ID publications in the peer reviewed literature, but tried to deny that such existed, following the ACLU/NCSE blindly." From the Dover judge's decision: On cross-examination, Professor Behe admitted that: "There are no peer reviewed articles by anyone advocating for intelligent design supported by pertinent experiments or calculations which provide detailed rigorous accounts of how intelligent design of any biological system occurred." (22:22-23 (Behe)). Additionally, Professor Behe conceded that there are no peer-reviewed papers supporting his claims that complex molecular systems, like the bacterial flagellum, the blood-clotting cascade, and the immune system, were intelligently designed. (21:61-62 (complex molecular systems), 23:4-5 (immune system), and 22:124-25 (blood-clotting cascade) (Behe)). In that regard, there are no peer-reviewed articles supporting Professor Behe's argument that certain complex molecular structures are "irreducibly complex."17 (21:62, 22:124-25 (Behe)). In addition to failing to produce papers in peer-reviewed journals, ID also features no scientific research or testing. (28:114-15 (Fuller); 18:22-23, 105-06 (Behe)).timothya_{February 20, 2017
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RVB8, remember, I was around discussing ID at the time and recall the matter live. Cf here in my always linked and onwards for documentary proof of wholesale copying and minor verbal changes on the pivotal issues. THIS INCLUDES MAJOR, IN COME CASES BLATANT ERRORS OF FACT, ASSERTION AND INTENT ETC THAT UTTERLY BIASED THE RULING AND MADE IT UTTERLY INJUDICIOUS. (Don't forget, as just one instance: the Judge was presented with actual ID publications in the peer reviewed literature, but tried to deny that such existed, following the ACLU/NCSE blindly. Indeed, Scott Minnich -- an ID researcher with a lab's worth of results [specifically on irreducible complexity . . . routinely used in knockout techniques of research BTW], was there in the court room, testifying.) I vividly remember Xmas 2006 for that breaking news. Note the date on my remarks. KF PS: Gooshy, welcome. Apparently judges can do that, but that is not advisable praxis. In this case, long run, it will come back to haunt those who so praised the Dover ruling. PPS: Notice, how RVB8 has quietly let slide his attempt to dismiss the post Dover Dembski and Marks corpus? Have a look here at evo info: http://www.evoinfo.org/publications.htmlkairosfocus_{February 20, 2017
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*delurk* hi guys! Newbie here. My only experience here is an environmental law course I had to take - mostly superfund stuff and commerce clause. I never saw this in SC majority or dissenting opinions. Cites can get long, but you don't cite counsel. Perhaps our host will weigh in.gooshy_{February 20, 2017
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Florabama, I wouldn't say judges are lazy, but they are very busy, and if one of the lawyers has set out very clearly the arguments and conclusions that the judge has adopted then, yes, they will cut and paste whole chunks of submissions. It makes sense. There is no point rewriting something in your own words if you believe that it already precisely sets out the facts and proper legal conclusions. Also, most judges have clerks that write their judgments in any case. The judge just signs off on it.Pindi_{February 20, 2017
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Pindi @ 9, I do appreciate you patiently deigning to offer me enlightenment in regard to judicial proceedings, but I take a bit of exception to yours and others characterization of the case. As I said, he didn't just quote from it. That is myth. He pasted the entire ACLU brief, almost word for word. Would you not agree, that there's a bit of a difference from quoting lines from, or pertinent portions of a brief, and inserting the whole thing, almost word for word in the place where you the judge are supposed to explain your own reasoning in deciding the case? Either Jones was supremely lazy or he was not bright enough to think and communicate for himself. The result was a judicial ruling that had no connection to reason or the Constitution.Florabama_{February 20, 2017
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Douglas Axe - The Research (Part 1) 10-29-2016 by Paul Giem - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mp9UlC3oE3A&index=10&list=PLHDSWJBW3DNUx3ngrgTIQyl-B2TaQBoq8 Douglas Axe - The Research (Part 2) 11-5-2016 by Paul Giem https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRj8vUMp03o&index=11&list=PLHDSWJBW3DNUx3ngrgTIQyl-B2TaQBoq8 Douglas Axe - The Research (Part 3) 11-12-2016 by Paul Giem https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1kmw9u3ljo&index=12&list=PLHDSWJBW3DNUx3ngrgTIQyl-B2TaQBoq8 Douglas Axe - The Research (Part 4) 11-19-2016 by Paul Giem https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k83I98AMGUo&list=PLHDSWJBW3DNUx3ngrgTIQyl-B2TaQBoq8&index=13
bornagain77_{February 20, 2017
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Axe, D. D. 2000. Extreme Functional Sensitivity to Conservative Amino Acid Changes on Enzyme Exteriors. J Mol Biol 301: 585-595. Available at: http://www.toriah.org/articles/axe-2000.pdf Axe, D. D., N. W. Foster, and A. R. Ferscht. 1996. Active barnase variants with completely random hydrophobic cores. PNAS 93: 5590-5594. Available at: http://www.pnas.org/content/93/11/5590.full.pdf Axe, D. D., N. W. Foster, and A. R. Ferscht. 1998. A search for single substitutions that eliminate enzymatic function in a bacterial ribonuclease. Biochem 37: 7157-7166. Available at: http://www.binf.gmu.edu/mmasso/barn1.pdf Axe, D. D., N. W. Foster, and A. R. Ferscht. 1999. An irregular ?-bulge common to a group of bacterial RNases is an important determinant of stability and function in barnase. J Mol Biol 286: 1471-1485. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alan_Fersht/publication/13225370_An_irregular_beta-bulge_common_to_a_group_of_bacterial_RNases_is_an_important_determinant_of_stability_and_function_in_barnase/links/0912f5120a11713ef7000000.pdf Axe, D. D. 2004. Estimating the Prevalence of Protein Sequences Adopting Functional Enzyme Folds. J Mol Biol 341: 1295-1315. Available at http://www.toriah.org/articles/axe-2004.pdf Axe, D. D. 2010. The limits of complex adaptation: An analysis based on a simple model of structured bacterial populations. BIO-Complexity 2010(4): 1-10. Available at http://www.bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/viewFile/BIO-C.2010.4/BIO-C.2010.4 Gauger, A. K. and D. D. Axe. 2011. The evolutionary accessibility of new enzyme functions: a case study from the biotin pathway. BIO-Complexity 2011(1): 1-17. Available at http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/viewFile/BIO-C.2011.1/BIO-C.2011.1 Lynch, M. and A. Abegg. 2010. The rate of establishment of complex adaptations. Mol Biol Evol 27: 1404-1414. Available at http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/content/27/6/1404.long Gauger, A. K., S. Ebnet, P. F. Fahey, and R. Seelke. 2010. Reductive evolution can prevent populations from taking simple adaptive paths to high fitness. BIO-Complexity 2010(2): 1-9. Available at http://www.bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2010.2/BIO-C.2010.2
bornagain77_{February 20, 2017
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At some point the work is done. Rebutting the 'counter-arguments' grows weary. You move on because there is nothing left to be said. In his book 'Undeniable' Douglas Axe is saying something quite similar:
Nevertheless, my expectation that this would compel evolutionary biologists to hang “Out of Business” signs on their doors proved unrealistic. The stream of scientific consensus continued to flow in Darwin’s direction throughout 2004, and it still does. I continue to press for the change of thinking I was pressing for then, and this change is as unwelcome now as ever. Real science is nothing like the utopian version I held at the beginning of my journey. The flag of materialism I mentioned in chapter 1 still flies proudly over the academy, and people working under that banner are expected to show due respect. Any serious opposition will bring the color guard out in full force, to the sound of blowing whistles. That much is obvious to me. The harder question is how to advance the truth in the face of this opposition. My early recognition of the need to put Darwin’s theory to a rigorous technical test compelled me to devote two decades of my career to that need. I’m convinced those were years well spent, and yet I’ve also become convinced of this equally important complementary need: since most people will never master technical arguments, there is a desperate need for a nontechnical argument that stands on its own merits, independent of any technical work. As an expert who has been directly involved in many of the scientific studies described in the following chapters, I know the conclusions my coworkers and I have drawn are correct, and I know why the good work of others that gets used to argue against our work doesn’t support those arguments. I could try to impart this knowledge to readers of this book, I suppose, but no matter how many chapters I devote to this, nonexperts will still be nonexperts after they turn the last page. Does this matter? I’d like to say that it doesn’t, and yet I have to admit that it does. I am just one expert among many, most of whom either disagree with my conclusion or are reluctant to admit that they agree. The simple accounts of protein research I give in the coming chapters are therefore sure to be criticized by other experts, which will leave nonexperts in the position of trying to figure out which scientists to believe. Now, if Darwin was as wrong as I believe he was, his theory can’t possibly be defended as clearly and convincingly as it can be refuted. I will devote a whole chapter to that point. Nevertheless even poor arguments might seem to benefit from the status of the people making them. When all is said and done, then, nonexpert observers inevitably find themselves unable to do anything better with technical debates than trying to follow them and score them. That never settles the matter, though, because being scored the winner of a debate isn’t the same thing as being correct. For me there is no debate. The scientific facts are in complete harmony with the universal design intuition. The work my colleagues and I have done on proteins has completely resolved the internal conflict—for me. [Axe, 'Undeniable', ch.5]
Origenes_{February 20, 2017
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Hi Florabama, you will find it is not uncommon for judges to quote extensively from the submissions of the party who's arguments they find most compellingPindi_{February 19, 2017
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I read extensively about the Dover case and the judge didn't just quote from the ACLU brief, he cut and pasted massive amounts of it, word for word. In fact almost all the meat of his ruling was plagiarized word for word, from the ACLU brief. The judge's ruling was decided long before any arguments.Florabama_{February 19, 2017
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No, the judicial joke was at Scopes where God won. At Dover science won and we're all better of for it.rvb8_{February 19, 2017
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Dembski is a hero. Dover was a judicial joke.bornagain77_{February 19, 2017
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OT:
Melania Trump FIRST Public Speech as First Lady FLORIDA Rally 2/18/2017 - 3:57 minute mark https://youtu.be/TcXtg7effQU?t=237
bornagain77_{February 19, 2017
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Demski had seemed frustrated in the last few pronouncements I've seen from him. He attacked creationists for not accepting and fighting for I.D. and for taking exception with some I.D. proponents on issues that were not readily compatible with creationism. This troubled me, and recently I've seen the same from Klinghoffer who, in a February 6 article, accused creationists of being in "bromance" with Darwinism. I fear the "creationist" label may be too much for some I.D. proponents, and an effort is underfoot by some to distance I.D. from even the appearance of an allied relationship with creationism. This is a mistake in my opinion. I'm a biblical creationist but I fully support the work of I.D. and send money every month to Discovery Institute even though I know that many who call themselves I.D. proponents would hold positions untenable to me. I hope that I'm wrong and that Demski and Kinghoffer are unrelated and not part of a larger problem. We are on the same side. The side of truth.Florabama_{February 19, 2017
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'K', the 'copy paste' nonsense has ben answered several times. The simple answer is that trial judges often quote at length from the winning argument because it was the sounder of the two. And one question, how on earth do you defend the inane childish video of a federal court judge, rediculously voiced over by Dembski himself? I often go through the archives here and reread the utter pandomonium unleashed at UD with the ruling. If you cross referance the dates with Pandas, then Dembski and all of his supporters are shown to be less than honest in their approach to plaintiffs, while ignoring the deficiencies of the defense. The ruling 'K', said that ID could not be seperated from its purely theological first principles, and it stii can't. Therefore tax payers money was going to subsidize a religious position; unconstitutional. The Judge also did not ban ID, he said it was perfectly alright to study the idea in Social Studies, or Religious Studies, just not science class, as it plainly isn't. Try reading some real History: "The Devil In Dover" by Lauri Lebo is the account of the whole trial from incompetent School Board inception, to shame faced Bonsell/Buckingham retreat. The account is all th more persusive as the writer is a resident, and intimate part of the Dover community, and a strong science supporter and church goer.rvb8_{February 19, 2017
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RVB8, spin, not sound assessment. Many of the Dembski-Marks series of significant peer-reviewed papers were developed in the decade after Dover, just for a baseline fact. I also suggest to you that your characterisation of the Dover trial is wrong from the outset, as by a year after the trial it was evident the judge simply copy-pasted and slightly modified submissions from the ACLU/NCSE (gross errors and all), leading to an utterly warped and fundamentally injudicious ruling. Worse, by his own confession, he set himself in the mood by watching the wretched hatchet job, Inherit the Wind. When a man's enemies have the sort of track record that we have seen with anti-ID forces, even the old inquisition was inclined to set aside their accusations. You would profit by doing some drastic rethinking. KF PS: In any case, none of this affects the core ID inferences: it still remains the case that on a trillion member base, functionally specific complex organisation and/or associated information is an utterly reliable empirical sign of design as credible cause, with the configuration space, search challenge analysis backing up the observations. Next, since 1953, as was pointed out to you specifically, we find in the living cell complex coded, alphabetic, algorithmic text, i.e. language. Which has just one credible causal explanation. All this simply has no explanation of any cogency on blind chance and mechanical necessity, which is decisive in this context of inference to best empirically grounded explanation.kairosfocus_{February 19, 2017
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Dembski retired in December 2005 because of the Dover fiasco. His hubris pre-trial concerning a 'good ole boy Bush appointed judge', was followed by lame fart videos supposedly mocking the Judge, but in fact reflecting much more poorly on Denbski, his understanding of humour, and the DI generally. He was resurrected in January 2006 with some hard hitting (Heh:), posts that were ignored by the world, except those here. "Theoretical underpinnings", of ID you say. Replace that with 'philosophical/theologcal vagueries', and you've hit the nail on the head. His last thunderbolt at the heart of Evolutionary Science was a vanity press book; and he left after experiencing less of the solidarity of the heady days of 1999, and the egregious Wedge Document. Although you're new to ID, it doesn't excuse you goeing to Dembski's comments here through the years. Many of these a mean spirited, childish, vindictive, and just plain nasty. Check out the archive at Panda's and TalkOrigins for the real William Dembski, the reality belies the myth, as in so many cases.rvb8_{February 19, 2017
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