I just checked the most popular tables and saw how VJT’s UD James Tour article got 30,000 or so hits within a few days.
Why?
Reddit and Facebook etc atheists are suddenly screaming (and don’t seem to know that Dr Tour DID meet with someone for private discussion and . . . by implication, has not found a satisfactory answer) — per Groovamos at 9, this was a mis-impression on my part) but, again, why?
Then Google popped up: VJT has republished the article at Science News on Feb. 18. [–> He was credited as author, it seems there has been an auto-publishing.]
We are getting the back-wash of that spreading publicity.
All to the good.
Let those who would dismiss Dr Tour’s concerns answer to points such as this, from the man who built the molecular car.
First, his Veritas Forum Talk:
[youtube PZrxTH-UUdI]
Second, a key claim highlighted by VJT:
James Tour’s molecular nanocar 2
… I will tell you as a scientist and a synthetic chemist: if anybody should be able to understand evolution, it is me, because I make molecules for a living, and I don’t just buy a kit, and mix this and mix this, and get that. I mean, ab initio, I make molecules. I understand how hard it is to make molecules. I understand that if I take Nature’s tool kit, it could be much easier, because all the tools are already there, and I just mix it in the proportions, and I do it under these conditions, but ab initio is very, very hard.
I don’t understand evolution, and I will confess that to you. Is that OK, for me to say, “I don’t understand this”? Is that all right? I know that there’s a lot of people out there that don’t understand anything about organic synthesis, but they understand evolution. I understand a lot about making molecules; I don’t understand evolution. And you would just say that, wow, I must be really unusual.
Let me tell you what goes on in the back rooms of science – with National Academy members, with Nobel Prize winners. I have sat with them, and when I get them alone, not in public – because it’s a scary thing, if you say what I just said – I say, “Do you understand all of this, where all of this came from, and how this happens?” Every time that I have sat with people who are synthetic chemists, who understand this, they go “Uh-uh. Nope.” These people are just so far off, on how to believe this stuff came together. I’ve sat with National Academy members, with Nobel Prize winners. Sometimes I will say, “Do you understand this?”And if they’re afraid to say “Yes,” they say nothing. They just stare at me, because they can’t sincerely do it.
I was once brought in by the Dean of the Department, many years ago, and he was a chemist. He was kind of concerned about some things. I said, “Let me ask you something. You’re a chemist. Do you understand this? How do you get DNA without a cell membrane? And how do you get a cell membrane without a DNA? And how does all this come together from this piece of jelly?” We have no idea, we have no idea. I said, “Isn’t it interesting that you, the Dean of science, and I, the chemistry professor, can talk about this quietly in your office, but we can’t go out there and talk about this?”
If you understand evolution, I am fine with that. I’m not going to try to change you – not at all. In fact, I wish I had the understanding that you have.
But about seven or eight years ago I posted on my Web site that I don’t understand. And I said, “I will buy lunch for anyone that will sit with me and explain to me evolution, and I won’t argue with you until I don’t understand something – I will ask you to clarify. But you can’t wave by and say, “This enzyme does that.” You’ve got to get down in the details of where molecules are built, for me. Nobody has come forward.
The Atheist Society contacted me. They said that they will buy the lunch, and they challenged the Atheist Society, “Go down to Houston and have lunch with this guy, and talk to him.” Nobody has come! Now remember, because I’m just going to ask, when I stop understanding what you’re talking about, I will ask. So I sincerely want to know. I would like to believe it. But I just can’t.
Now, I understand microevolution, I really do. We do this all the time in the lab. I understand this. But when you have speciation changes, when you have organs changing, when you have to have concerted lines of evolution, all happening in the same place and time – not just one line – concerted lines, all at the same place, all in the same environment … this is very hard to fathom.
I was in Israel not too long ago, talking with a bio-engineer, and [he was] describing to me the ear, and he was studying the different changes in the modulus of the ear, and I said, “How does this come about?” And he says, “Oh, Jim, you know, we all believe in evolution, but we have no idea how it happened.” Now there’s a good Jewish professor for you. I mean, that’s what it is. So that’s where I am. Have I answered the question? (52:00 to 56:44)
While we are it, the UD pro-darwinism essay challenge is still open:
provide a 6,000 word feature-length article that justifies the Darwinist tree of life from its OOL roots up through the Cambrian revo — as in Darwin’s Doubt territory — and other major formation of body plans up to and including our own origins, and we will host it here at UD, one of the leading ID blogs in the world. We are perfectly willing to host a parallel post with another site. Only, you must provide thesis and observation based evidence that solidly justifies your conclusions in light of inference to best explanation, the vera causa principle and other basic principles of sound scientific induction. Also, you must actually argue the case in outline, a summing up if you will. You must strive to avoid Lewontin’s a priori evolutionary materialism, and if you would redefine science on such terms you will have to reasonably justify why that is not a question-begging definition, in a way that is historically and philosophically soundly informed. Of course, you may link sources elsewhere, but you must engage the task of providing a coherent, non-question-begging, cogent argument in summary at the level of a feature-length serious magazine article . . . no literature bluffs in short.
If the goods were out there, there would have been dozens of eager applicants.
Suffice to say, that apart from attempts to get back to the usual Darwinist attack-rhetoric tactics, we had no serious take-up after a full year. I put together a very unsatisfactory composite from in-thread exchanges as a measure of where the matter stands.
Let’s see if the oh so eager Darwinists can do better now. So, Reddit, Facebook, TSZ, ATBC, Anti-Evo, etc Darwinists and atheists, what is your answer on the merits? END
F/N, Mar 16: Kindly cf my markup of Sewell’s clip on the 1980 Field Museum closed doors meeting of a top circle of 150, here. It’s all there, evo as fact, stasis and gaps, usage of macro and micro evo in the context of the top dogs, even the attempt to read the genetic code as an argument from homology to common descent, and more.
Comments
164,012kairosfocus
March 18, 2014
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161,581 -- a clear breakoutkairosfocus
March 17, 2014
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F/N: Kindly cf. my markup on Sewell's smoking gun clip from the 1980 Field Museum top 150 closed doors meeting, here. It’s all there, evo as fact, stasis and gaps, usage of macro and micro evo in the context of the top dogs, even the attempt to read the genetic code as an argument from homology to common descent, and more. Added to OP. KFkairosfocus
March 16, 2014
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158,283kairosfocus
March 16, 2014
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Oops, 152,446kairosfocus
March 14, 2014
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150,184kairosfocus
March 14, 2014
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150,179kairosfocus
March 14, 2014
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142,877kairosfocus
March 13, 2014
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The OP mentioned the True Atheism (as opposed to False Atheism, I guess) thread on Reddit. In my experience, if the internet is a large city then Reddit is the trailer park at the city limits.Barb
March 12, 2014
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ROY JOINS OUR LIST OF HECKLERS, STRIKE THREE -- KF
--> To understand his tactics, cf here
–> And as for you “Roy,” you are now on notice that you too have some apologising and making of amends to do.
Nor am I a confederate of Nick Matzke. We have never met, have never spoken, and (unless he’s replied to one of my few posts at The Panda’s Thumb) never communicated on-line. Nor can I be an enabler, since Nick posted long before I did. Those are also false accusations.
--> Lets just note accessories after the fact are enablers
--> Roy also continues the twistabout tactic, note he does not actually deal with the immediate or longstanding problem
--> This is Alinsky's all on the other side are devils, only angels on our side. In fact NM has been involved in smear tactics for years that have contributed to court injustice and to career busting, and the underlying accusations of "gish Gallop" are both false on substance and an attempt to smear a decent man now silenced by the grave, a man who won the vast majority of hundreds of debates by laying out inconvenient fossil record based facts. KF
–> your denial in the teeth of facts shown to the contrary simply, sadly, further demonstrates your status. At minimum, you are an enabler, and your behaviour in co-ordination or support may indicate, confederate. I cannot even eliminate sock puppet given the patterns and behaviour in view. Sorry, but your say-so, given your patterns of behaviour, is not good enough.
I have no need to apologise, nor to comment further.
RoyRoy
March 12, 2014
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135,600kairosfocus
March 12, 2014
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The uptick seems to be affecting the WAC's also, pickup maybe 100 or so in a day or two. Faster than its normal rate.kairosfocus
March 12, 2014
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129,582kairosfocus
March 12, 2014
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Emphasis mine:
In this particular case, in a previous thread, he and confederates/ enablers falsely accused me of Gish Gallop (triggered by a point-wise summary at 23) [cf 31 which specifically addresses rude disruptiveness] and quote mining [which I corrected at 51 on here by making an extensive citation proving the contrary; observe round-up at 75 which I was forced to make on Christmas Day], which when he “vanished” was then taken up by a sock puppet or confederate or enabler.
I am not a sock puppet of Nick Matzke. Your suggestion that Nick uses sock puppet accounts, implying deceitfulness, is not only false but also completely unjustified. You owe Nick Matzke a retraction and an apology.
--> Au Contraire, your behaviour shows that you fit the categories [recall, three-fold . . . denoting a range of possibilities], in fact for instance, you may be a persona of one of the denizens of a cluster of notorious sites that are known to explicitly collaborate on tactics and moves, or to informally support and enable. As for NM, he has been long since demonstrated dishonest starting with the lies circulated by NCSE while he was their publicist. Lies that have materially contributed to unjust court decision and unjustified career busting. In the more immediate context of the past few months, as shown above with links, his false accusation of "Gish Gallop" which led to my finally dealing with him as a heckler, is a further case in point.
--> I also have not failed to notice, that you have tried to deny and dismiss the slanders that have been documented on NM's part, whilst trying to twist about and further falsely accuse me. Typical.
--> Let me also make something clear about the range of meanings of the term sock puppet, per Wikipedia:
>>A sockpuppet is an online identity used for purposes of deception. The term—a reference to the manipulation of a simple hand puppet made from a sock—originally referred to a false identity assumed by a member of an internet community who spoke to, or about, himself while pretending to be another person.[1] The term now includes other misleading uses of online identities, such as those created to praise, defend or support a person or organization,[2] or to circumvent a suspension or ban from a website. A significant difference between the use of a pseudonym[3] and the creation of a sockpuppet is that the sockpuppet poses as an independent third-party unaffiliated with the puppeteer. Many online communities attempt to block sockpuppets.>>
--> The point should be clear enough: you popped up as "second" after NM vanished in a thread, now, more than one. You are using an effectively anonymous identity and are posing as an unaffiliated third party. But, your function in a context of trying to dismiss demonstrated problems with NM and to resort to twistabout personal attack, smearing false accusation tactics comes straight out of the Alinskyite astro-turf [as in not grassroots] tactics book.
--> And as for you "Roy," you are now on notice that you too have some apologising and making of amends to do.
Nor am I a confederate of Nick Matzke. We have never met, have never spoken, and (unless he's replied to one of my few posts at The Panda's Thumb) never communicated on-line. Nor can I be an enabler, since Nick posted long before I did. Those are also false accusations.
--> your denial in the teeth of facts shown to the contrary simply, sadly, further demonstrates your status. At minimum, you are an enabler, and your behaviour in co-ordination or support may indicate, confederate. I cannot even eliminate sock puppet given the patterns and behaviour in view. Sorry, but your say-so, given your patterns of behaviour, is not good enough.
There is no right to be rude or to make false accusations, ...
Then desist.
--> A compounding, turnabout false accusation.
--> Strike 2. If you do not make amends, you have the choice (a) remove yourself from threads I own, or (b) be treated as a disruptive, false-accusation making heckler.
--> And, I take the step of marking up your comment to show the serious nature of what you are doing. KF
RoyRoy
March 11, 2014
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109,158kairosfocus
March 10, 2014
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DiEb: The Reddit link is in the context of the Sci News reposting a year after the original article, which had gone dormant. I gather there were also Facebook postings.I don't doubt things popped up elsewhere too. That is the going viral part, which BTW is from briefings on mass media from decades ago, is the mark of a successful media exposure . . . a buzz is triggered and things spread by interpersonal discussions (now being increasingly done via social media). Thing is, any number of UD articles have doubtless hit Reddit, Facebook, Twitter etc. I think the trigger is the combination of celebrity power (Tour's earned stripes as a Chemist . . . and of course his topical focus) multiplied by the Sci News reposting and onward triggered discussions. The surge shape seems to be the fad spike and plateau pattern familiar from marketing.* KF
PS: I first met this as "filling the tackle boxes." The plateau in that case then was from replacements as a good bait found use until it was lost and a new one was bought.kairosfocus
March 10, 2014
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107,345kairosfocus
March 10, 2014
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105,036kairosfocus
March 9, 2014
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104,273kairosfocus
March 9, 2014
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103,952kairosfocus
March 9, 2014
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102,790kairosfocus
March 9, 2014
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F/N: News highlights an exchange at Reddit in which one of the participants points to the Talk Origins discussion of "macroevolution" here; also note that notorious site's discussion of microevo here, which begins: >>Microevolution and macroevolution are different things, but they involve mostly the same processes. Microevolution is defined as the change of allele frequencies (that is, genetic variation due to processes such as selection, mutation, genetic drift, or even migration) within a population. >>. Of course TO tries the same linear extrapolation stunt as Wiki but it is significant that it admits the reality and distinction of macro and micro evo. Where micro evo is a case of being too vague in many respects, but it does cover an empirical phenomenon. Macro is an extrapolation that too often is loaded with questionable assumptions. The focal level for discussion is body plan origination, which takes us beyond about the level of the family in the taxonomy hierarchy. KFkairosfocus
March 9, 2014
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102,286kairosfocus
March 9, 2014
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101,896kairosfocus
March 8, 2014
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100,259kairosfocus
March 8, 2014
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F/N: Let me cross-post, on micro vs macro evo:
__________
>> wiki struggles mightily to paper over the problems.
Article, microevolution:
Microevolution is the changes in allele frequencies that occur over time within a population.[1] This change is due to four different processes: mutation, selection (natural and artificial), gene flow, and genetic drift.
Population genetics is the branch of biology that provides the mathematical structure for the study of the process of microevolution. Ecological genetics concerns itself with observing microevolution in the wild. Typically, observable instances of evolution are examples of microevolution; for example, bacterial strains that have antibiotic resistance.
Microevolution over time may lead to speciation or the appearance of novel structure, sometimes classified as macroevolution.[2] Contrary to claims by creationists however, macro and microevolution describe fundamentally identical processes on different time scales.[2][3] . . . .
Microevolution can be contrasted with macroevolution, which is the occurrence of large-scale changes in gene frequencies in a population over a geological time period (i.e. consisting of extended microevolution). The difference is largely one of approach. Microevolution is reductionist, but macroevolution is holistic. Each approach offers different insights into the evolution process. Macroevolution can be seen as the sum of long periods of microevolution, and thus the two are qualitatively identical while being quantitatively different.
Let’s draw out a few observations, in steps:
1 –> Wiki is forced to acknowledge the existence and use of the terms as legitimate terms. So much for the, it’s only those dumb or dishonest Creationists . . .
2 –> It identifies that micro evo describes pop changes regarding allelle frequencies, where allele means: “one of a number of alternative forms of the same gene or same genetic locus.[1][2] It is the alternative form of a gene for a character producing different effects. Sometimes, different alleles can result in different observable phenotypic traits, such as different pigmentation. However, many genetic variations result in little or no observable variation.”
3 –> So, if in a pop of moths, we move from mostly mottled white to mostly mottled black, that is “evolution.” (Never mind the varieties were there all along and never mind later reversion to the original dominance once cleanup happened.)
4 –> The observed cases of “evolution” are overwhelmingly micro. (That is already a significant point, macro is inferred or assumed as cumulation of micro, not generally directly observed.)
5 –> Cases of micro seem to take up the usual trumpeted cases of observation, so it is in the interests of adherents to extrapolate.
6 –> Has anyone actually seen the most relevant form of macro, formation of body plans? Nope.
7 –> So, then, how do we know macro is simply mostly linear accumulation across the tree of life? We don’t, it is a built in assumption.
8 –> Also, is it generally so that one can modify a complex functional object incrementally into something quite disparate, preserving advantageous function every step of the way . . . no long range foresight allowed? Not generally, this is an extremely constraining assumption.
9 –> So the extrapolation thesis, once we move beyond the often debatable species etc level . . . think Red Deer and American Elk turning out to be interfertile in New Zealand, or the interfertility discovered across Galapagos species in the ’80s, etc . . . to creating major novel body plan features such as flight with wings [Wallace, co-founder of Evolutionary theory cited this case in his book arguing intelligent evolution], muscles, feathers and control systems, or vision, or the like.including the human verbal language and reasoning capacity.
10 –> We are back to the challenge to actually empirically ground the tree of life icon.
11 –> And we have only touched on how even macro evo is compatible with a design view, and how the challenge to empirically show blind watchmaker macro evo at body plan level is unmet>>
_________
This should serve as a bottomline for the talking point that tries to pretend that micro vs macro evo is not a real matter.
KFkairosfocus
March 8, 2014
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Let's capture the moment:
>>Popular Posts
A world-famous chemist tells the truth: there’s no… (100,000)
Frequently raised but weak arguments against Intelligent… (31,532)
A Whale of a Problem for Evolution: Ancient Whale Jawbone… (17,647)
10 + 1 Questions For Professor Myers (15,569)
Richard Dawkins On His Recent Encounter With John Lennox… (14,727)>>
Folks, that is the impact of the derided Sci News.
KFkairosfocus
March 8, 2014
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100,000 flatkairosfocus
March 8, 2014
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99,955kairosfocus
March 8, 2014
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‘PPS: The surge, of course, also documents that Sci News has credibly had significant impact.’
Call me skeptic: there are other articles here at Uncommon Descentwhich have been linked to by "Scientific News", like New Age medic Deepak Chopra responds to Darwin’s man Jerry Coyne in The New Republic. Warning: Messy. and To recognize design is to recognize products of a like-minded process, identifying the real probability in question, Part I. They didn't go viral - at least they didn't make the list of most popular articles.
On the other hand, reddit is well known to be able to generate quite an impact.DiEb
