Irreducible complexity in the Krebs cycle convinces a biologist of design in nature

Here's where Michael Behe says that metabolic pathways are not irreducibly complex. Note that the citric acid cycle (TCA cycle, Krebs cycle) is NOT irreducibly complex according to Behe. This is just another example of how Intelligent Design Creationism is so irrational that even its proponents don't understand it. "The second and more important point is that, while the paper is very interesting, it doesn’t address irreducible complexity. Either Miller hasn’t read what I said in my book about metabolic pathways, or he is deliberately ignoring it. I clearly stated in Darwin’s Black Box metabolic pathways are not irreducibly complex (Behe 1996) (pp. 141-142; 150-151), because components can be gradually added to a previous pathway. Thus metabolic pathways simply aren’t in the same category as the blood clotting cascade or the bacterial flagellum. Although Miller somehow misses the distinction, other scientists do not. In a recent paper Thornhill and Ussery write that something they call serial-direct-Darwinian-evolution “cannot generate irreducibly complex structures.” But they think it may be able to generate a reducible structure, “such as the TCA cycle (Behe, 1996 a, b).” (Thornhill and Ussery 2000) In other words Thornhill and Ussery acknowledge the TCA cycle is not irreducibly complex, as I wrote in my book. Miller seems unable or unwilling to grasp that point." https://www.discovery.org Larry Moran

The important point with respect to the podcast is that Jorn Dyerberg expresses astonishment that these enzymes could be just sitting around in the cell waiting for the entire cyclic pathway to evolve. In fact, we have lots and lots of examples of species that have most of these enzymes but don't have a complete cycle. The fact that Dyersberg doesn't know about these species means that he has not made a serious effort to study the citric acid cycle and its evolution. He might have started with an undergraduate biochemistry textbook. Larry Moran

Michael Behe and a few other ID proponents have been smart enough to discount the citric acid cycle as irreducibly complex. That's because the definition of irreducibly complex REQUIRES that it cannot possibly have evolved. As soon as we propose a reasonable pathway for the evolution of a potential IR structure then it has to be abandoned by Intelligent Design Creationists. Such a pathway for the evolution of the citric acid cycle has been around for many decades and any biochemist who doesn't know about it has simply not made any effort to find out. Here's an example from my 2011 UNDERGRADUATE textbook of biochemistry. https://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2017/01/the-evolution-of-citric-acid-cycle.html Larry Moran

His characterization of the the evolution of the TCAC is that as it evolved, the enzymes had to sit there and wait until all ten were in existence. Coming from someone with his knowledge in biochemsitry, this is an outright lie. It completely ignores the fact that these enzymes do not just play a role in the breakdown of carbon chains, they also play a role in the conversion between various amino acids, which does not require the entire cycle. His argument is classic ID pseudoscience. Sven Mil

I would point to the overall cell metabolism network, compared to say a petroleum refinery. kairosfocus

3 Sven Mil

Wonder how much the DI had to pay him to say things that are so incorrect.

Care to correct them? Truthfreedom

Wonder how much the DI had to pay him to say things that are so incorrect. Sven Mil

EvilSnack

when someone claims that Darwinism is necessary to understand nature.

Especially when according to evo/ materialists, whose ideology leads to epistemological failure/ skepticism, we cannot understand anything at all because we are always being "cheated by evolution" (except miraculous specimens as Mr. Darwin and his horrible doubt, or Mr. Dawkins, or Mr. Coyne, who are capable of escaping the clutches of the evolutionary goddess ). Truthfreedom

The Krebs cycle is also something you can point to when someone claims that Darwinism is necessary to understand nature. I really would like the people who claim this to explain how being ignorant of everything Darwin wrote precludes me from understanding the Krebs Cycle. EvilSnack