Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

And now for the good news … somebody spoke up

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In a column in Nature (17 May 2012), “Reach out to defend evolution,” palaeontologist Russell Garwood warns, “Creationists seize on any perceived gaps in our knowledge of evolutionary processes. But scientists can and should fight back, … ”

His evidence? The Tennessee schools bill which just gives teachers the right to consider both sides of explicitly science questions. He takes up one such question in his article: Does the fact that some dinosaurs had feathers establish that birds are descended from them? What about convergent evolution of feathers? He is clearly impatient with the scientists who are unconvinced, and would like them to just not be around – visibly failing to join in the consensus.

As further evidence of the evil that is done under the sun, he offers: “The national biology curriculum of Pakistan, for example, dictates that students be taught ‘that Allah … is the Creator and Sustainer of the universe.’” So? What possible proposition in real science would that statement prevent anyone from researching? Of course, if one wanted to use the science curriculum to teach atheism, yes, that statement could signal a problem. But whose problem is it, exactly? The parents’? The students’? The atheist’s? Guess!

If the curriculum had said, “It is an article of faith with us that there are 427 gods, and no one knows which one makes the rules on any given day,” yes, one can foresee problems with teaching science. But monotheism has, if anything, always been an incentive to science, not a disincentive.

It goes on. The good news is that some commenters are taking issue with the nonsense underlying of Garwood’s position:

One of our authors, David Tyler notes pacifically there,

:Russell Garwood wrote: “yet good science thrives on unanswered questions. That papers frankly assess and admit shortcomings in current knowledge is vital.”

Yes, this is exactly right.

You also wrote: “the US state of Tennessee passed a creationist bill that encourages teachers to discuss the “weaknesses” of evolution.”

This is misinformation.
The bill reads: “Shall endeavor to assist teachers to find effective ways to present the science curriculum as it addresses scientific controversies. Toward this end, teachers shall be permitted to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught.”

The bill does not take sides on controversial issues, but legitimises the work of teachers who are helping students develop a critical understanding of the issues.

I think this bill is implementing the ideas expressed in your article!

Yes, but if it weren’t for stuff like misrepresenting the Tennessee bill to Brits, the American Darwin-in-the-schools lobby wouldn’t have much of a strategy left.

Comments
Collin,
Here’s what I mean by my analogy. Many people, including people who do not believe in intelligent design, confess that life looks designed.Yes, life does look designed. Now, this could have been done somehow, at some time past or present, by agencies unknown (other than they design life), by mechanisms unguessable. No question about this. And indeed, I and many others would very much like to see empirical efforts to identify the agencies and their methods. However, a TESTABLE alternative has been proposed - that the designing agency is a complex adaptive feedback process acting over long periods of time. There is of course no way to prove that this is the designing agency, but those consiliant results I mentioned show that such an agency (1) is fully capable of producing all known observations; and (2) can be seen operating in practice. So the question then becomes, which is more compelling, a known agency we can test and observe wich fully explains life as we know it, or an unknown agency working with unknown means, which cannot be isolated through tests? Your call, of course.
I do not think that there is any example in nature, other than in the cell, where you can find delicate moving machinery that has not been created by an intelligent agent.
In this regard, we can say that there are two agencies creating this "delicate moving machinery" - people (we have no difficulty identifying the efforts of people), and, uh, NOT people. Clearly people do not design life. So at least to me, projecting human-style design practices onto life reflects both paucity of imagination, and willing disregard for the processes that DO design life, which are thoroughly observed and well understood, but which are not human efforts. The notion of confecting a kind of immortal, super-intelligent superman because we just simply find ourselves unable to credit non-human design processes seems vain.
So after many years of experience with the creation of machinery by intelligent agents
No, with PEOPLE.
and many years of dealing with languages and instructions,
No, with HUMAN languages and instructions.
we find what looks like machinery and languages in the cell
But only by analogy to HUMAN machinery and languages. In actual fact, the analogy breaks down completely on even cursory examination. Human designs do not replicate.
then we have warrant to believe that we may also be dealing with an intelligent agent.
No, with an intelligent HUMAN agent, in every salient respect. As I said, you are arguing by loose analogy. The closest you can actually come is that (1) some human designs are in fact copied from nature, not the other way around; and (2) some useful human design techniques are imitations of evolutionary processes.
Intelligent design theorists are trying to work out the methods and tools that we should use for trying to decide if something (like DNA or the bacterial flagellum) are designed.
Not to my knowledge, which is admitted limited. My reading is that there are some ID proponents attempting to argue that they can "see" design, therefore there must be a Designer. Behe admitted on the witness stand that a certain religious orientation is required to "see" this design, and the judge quite properly noted that this Design is a religious doctrine, not a scientific observation in any way.
But they only get discouragement from the scientific community. Michael Behe is not allowed to respond in journals to criticism directed specifically at his ideas, for example.
What? This is simply not the case. Behe is in fact invited to respond. He is bombarded with questions which continue to await answers after two decades of his doing NO scientific research. His refusal to respond is frustrating, but it's certainly not due to not being permitted!
I think that Behe and others should be given cautious encouragement, the same encouragement (mingled with skepticism) given to all scientists.
Absolutely! Don't forget the Templeton Foundation's willingness to fund him. Don't forget the Discovery Institute's research budget (Behe is a fellow there). Don't forget he is a tenured professor able to do any academic research he cares to do. Don't forget that the peer reviewed journals stand ready and willing to publish any genuine scientific research he might ever again attempt. But even such requests as producing a single testable way to find the Designer is met with silence. So really, Collin, here we have what is supposed to be a scientific theory that there is an intelligent designer, and NO testable hypotheses whatsoever that speak to this very core of the idea. After 20 years, when the underbrush is cleared away, what we have is a religious sect saying "sure looks designed to me". And on deeper examination, you find that the religious faith drives the "look of design". Now, I have no problem with the need to find one's god hiding somehow in the cell. But ASSUMING it's there and generating poor analogies with human engineering does not constitute either a theory or a research program. And it's quite true that the scientific enterprise has little patience with non-researchers with non-hypotheses repeatedly asserting untestable beliefs. Yes, without question those beliefs are sincere. Now, let's see this designer at work.
David W. Gibson
May 22, 2012
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David, Until we have the genetic data, speculations on the fossil record will always be just that- unscientific speculations.Joe
May 22, 2012
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Collin, First of all, we do actually know a lot about how the Egyptians 'did it'. The left records. It's a popular myth that it's all a big mystery. Secondly we know there were Egyptians around at the time. We can see how the craft of pyramid building progressed over the centuries. Yes, centuries. Egypt is strewned with a physical record of their evolving building styles. Inferring a designer is fine. But, aside from the objects you're trying to assert were designed you've got no physical evidence that there was a designer about capable of . . . well . . . what are you saying the designer did exactly? You do need to specify something about the designer: when was s/he operating? What materials were available? How were the designs implemented? All those things add to the plausibility of the design inference. I'm really interested in finding out what the ID community is really saying about when and how the designer designed. I think Dr Behe is getting closer to being that specific which is good. He may be painting himself in a corner though. I think he's heading towards suggesting that there was a designer operating over at least hundreds of millions of years but leaving no evidence other than their creations. But at least he's getting down to something specific.Jerad
May 21, 2012
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Mr. Gibson, You need to read some of the basic literature about intelligent design. Many testable hypotheses have been proposed. And many of the posters on this site have shown how the current theory of evolution is very difficult to falsify because both a positive and negative result show that evolution is true. I believe that the millions of consiliant explanations have been made to fit into square holes. Here's what I mean by my analogy. Many people, including people who do not believe in intelligent design, confess that life looks designed. I do not think that there is any example in nature, other than in the cell, where you can find delicate moving machinery that has not been created by an intelligent agent. So after many years of experience with the creation of machinery by intelligent agents, and many years of dealing with languages and instructions, we find what looks like machinery and languages in the cell, then we have warrant to believe that we may also be dealing with an intelligent agent. Intelligent design theorists are trying to work out the methods and tools that we should use for trying to decide if something (like DNA or the bacterial flagellum) are designed. But they only get discouragement from the scientific community. Michael Behe is not allowed to respond in journals to criticism directed specifically at his ideas, for example. I think that Behe and others should be given cautious encouragement, the same encouragement (mingled with skepticism) given to all scientists. I think you should not say that intelligent design is resorting to "goddidit." You could tell an archeologist to not resort to saying, "The egyptians did it." We know that the pyramids were created by the Egyptians but we actually do not necessarily know exactly how they did it. The mechanism is not strictly necessary. I know that this is an inapt analogy because we do not know the identity of the designer, whereas we know the identity of the Egyptians, but I still think we can find the hallmarks of design in artifacts without knowing very much about the designer.Collin
May 21, 2012
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The explanation for the fossil record is some of the organisms that once existed, died and were preserved.
So the explanation for the fossil record is that there are fossils? Is that it? Just like the explanation for a student's poor academic record is that he got low grades, right?David W. Gibson
May 21, 2012
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Collin, I admit I don't understand your analogy. Can you decode it for me? And maybe my analogy wasn't clear. More explicly, I'm saying that the biological principles of evolution have been derived from observation. We see them happening, which is where our explanations come from. From there, we build models which must account for all known observations, or at least not be inconsistent with any of them. Now, let's say our model not only predicts but requires a certain pattern of future observations. And let's say new observations flow in every day, and EVERY ONE is consistent with our model. After 150 years of diligent investigation, our model is probably very solid. And what that means is, an alternative model has some serious 'splainin' to do! It not only must be consistent with literally many millions of consiliant observations, but must make better predictions. A tall order. (And, to head off some difficulties at the pass, I'll cheerfully admit that Intelligent Design can NEVER be ruled out. Proposals not based on evidence cannot be refuted with evidence, and Intelligent Design is essentially a religious doctrine in this sense. It may very well be correct, but it can't be tested. Most scientists regard ringing in Divine Intervention and Miracle as equivalent to waving a magic wand and saying POOF! Look ma, no mechanisms, no process, no theory, no hypotheses, no tests. Just straight magic. This is regarded as having the advantages of (1) not being possible to refute; and (2) not requiring all this annoying research, or education or knowledge or need to admit error. These are wonderful advantages. Aren't they?)David W. Gibson
May 21, 2012
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The explanation for the fossil record is some of the organisms that once existed, died and were preserved.Joe
May 21, 2012
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Joe,
They cannot. Fossils do not necessarily say when something arose.
They say when something arose by though. And if there's a fossil which exhibits a form slightly further back then it's possible to get a rough estimate. Unless you believe that forms were just plonked down whenever and the linear appearance of the fossil record is just chance. I only asked 'cause you haven't told me your alternate theory in any detail yet. How do you explain the fossil record? Specifically. Why would a designer create Tiktaalik especially if it was 'out of sequence'?
And the modern synthesis is too vague to have any contradictions.
But not too vague to argue against I guess. What specific part of descent with modification are you arguing against then? Give me something I can actually hold onto and examine scientifically. Some explanation for the fossil record.Jerad
May 21, 2012
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Mr. Gibson, "The only species able to survive these changes did so because they began with that capability. So the pattern is clear – evolution tracks environmental changes through speciation. Whole species don’t adapt." Congradulations on becoming a Baraminologist! I'm kidding. I think I understand what you are saying, but I could also see a creation scientist's ready response to this statement. "Scientists also make logical errors, but correct them when they’re pointed out. Creationists cannot be corrected, because correction removes the necessity for their god from the evolutionary process. Note that it does not remove their god from the process; science can never do that. But it removes the necessity of a god." I think that if you were to review some of the more recent creationistic (and certainly ID-only) literature, you would see that there have been some strong attempts to admit what cannot be denied while still making the case for creation. See Hugh Ross's work, for example. Concerning FCSI, I would say a better analogy is this: Imagine that there are no tables and that the only thing on earth with 4 legs are dogs. The only thing with 4 legs that we've seen for hundreds of thousands of years have all been dogs. Maybe this new thing that we've discovered which also has four legs may also be a dog. What principles can we use to determine if it is a dog or some other new thing?Collin
May 21, 2012
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Collin, Good to discuss this with you, because I can see that we come at this from very different directions, and this takes a LOT of unpacking!
This is where we disagree. I do not see why a species should stop defending its mean/integrity in order to allow a new prototypical to develop. That implies forsight imo.
This statement implies a very very different understanding of the speciation process. Take some species (considered for now as an interbreeding population). I know some particularly dedicated people have done this with populations of birds, turtles, and other animals with banding and testing. What they find is that while the population nominally interbreeds, the breeding is never evenly distributed. So organisms with different migration patterns might be far more likely to interbreed with those following the same patterns, even though breeding is all done at the same time and in the same place. Let's say that at some given time, we find that 80% of the breeding is intra-migration-pattern, and only 20% is inter-migration pattern. So we see a trend toward breeding isolation. Can we project that eventually this will lead to total breeding isolation? Well, no, sometimes these divisions are temporary and are observed to grow less divisive. But sometimes it moves to completion, and the two populations do not interbreed at all. Even if we don't know why, and can't figure out how the turtles or birds or whatever tell the difference, researchers see that it happens. What we're witnessing is a speciation event in process. So these two new populations, due to non-sharing of mutations, gradually diverge. One of them might be better adapted to some other niche or to changing conditions, and it might not. Once the branching event is complete (paleontologists estimate it takes about 20% of the lifetime of a species to complete the branch), each population defends its "prototypical", but these are slightly different typicals being defended. Now, what I've described here is called sympatric speciation. The other common type is allopatric speciation - for example, if a river changes course and divides a population of non-river-crossers into two breeding groups. There are other kinds of speciation. But the point is the original population does not "allow" it to happen, it just happens. Almost surely Australia's animals are mostly marsupials, which mostly got outcompeted elsewhere, is because a marsupial ancestor colonized it long ago, and it's isloated enough for that to have been a rare unlikely event. So when I say a species defends its integrity, I mean that the entire population is unlikely to drift, not that new species are unlikely to branch off. I read that what is now Wyoming was once a shallow warm sea. Over about 15 million years, Wyoming gradually rose thousands of feet, moved north, and became quite arid. So paleontologists identified species of fossils at the start of this process, and traced them all through to the present. And even though the geological changes were easily slow enough for species to track, none of them did. They stuck to their identities until they went extinct. Meanwhile, new better-adapted species branched off, became stable, and then stuck to their identities in turn. Wyoming kept changing, and eventually they went extinct as well. The only species able to survive these changes did so because they began with that capability. So the pattern is clear - evolution tracks environmental changes through speciation. Whole species don't adapt.
What I mean to say is that the poor reasoning and quote-mining of some creationists in the 1980s had a general and unintended affect on the scientific community making it resistent to creationistic claims. The same thing has happened with other fields that are labeled pseudoscience (even if the researchers are rigorously using the scientific method) like telepathy, UFO-ology etc.
I would disagree, at least with what I think you're saying here. Creationist claims are not resisted because some earlier creationists are regarded as having been dishonest. They are resisted because either the claims can't be tested (can't test any gods), or because the claims are testable, have been tested, failed the tests, and the creationists are unwilling to drop the claim. I mean, hey, the number of things a global flood would do that are not found is in the millions, and the number of things a global flood would not do that are found is also in the millions. There was no such flood. Yet some creationists continue making that claim for nonscientific reasons. Which is fine, but the scientific enterprise isn't going to consider such claims scientific.
Regarding specificity in FCSI, I share your concern. I have always wondered what the specification is supposed to be for DNA. Does the connection between RNA and proteins show FCSI? I have never been quite satisfied on that score. But I have not read Dempski’s books or Meyer’s Signature in the Cell. Perhaps it is clarified.
Alas, it's more of the same. The problem is, inferring design entails an inescapable logical error. Just because design processes produce objects, doesn't mean objects imply design processes. This is the logical equivalent of saying all dogs have 4 legs, this table has 4 legs, therefore this table is a dog! You can't work backwards to infer design. And this also relates to the disdain scientists tend to hold for creationist claims. Scientists also make logical errors, but correct them when they're pointed out. Creationists cannot be corrected, because correction removes the necessity for their god from the evolutionary process. Note that it does not remove their god from the process; science can never do that. But it removes the necessity of a god.
I did just read “Contact” by Carl Sagan and he seems to believe that (spoiler alert) if we received a repeating signal of prime numbers (in binary), then we have good reason to believe it is being sent by intelligent beings. Why does this atheist think that that shows an intelligent source? All he says is that it would be unlikely for a natural phenomenon to create repeating prime numbers. Why not? And why is it not unlikely for nature to create DNA, a vastly more complex code than prime numbers.
A good question, I think. We infer design, as I've written earlier, because we know a lot of the context, history, and background of designed objects. Sagan (IMO) is saying that because nobody is capable of dreaming up any natural process that would generate prime numbers, we'd more likely be correct in assuming as a default that such a process isn't natural. Of course we could be wrong. And while DNA is indeed a vastly more complex code, it is also a lot more accessible than signals from space. We might take ID-style design (that is, designed by an intelligent designing agent, not simply designed by a dynamic system of environmental constraints) as the default for DNA, and I think that would be reasonable as a starting point. But if we can identify, examine, and test natural processes that could generate the DNA code, then this becomes a more compelling explanation. And in fact, as technology improves and gene sequencing of whole genomes is reduced from years to hours, the evolution of the genetic code becomes clearer and more detailed.David W. Gibson
May 21, 2012
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Mr. Gibson, "And speciation (branching) means there is a new “prototypical” developing. By the time this development is complete, complete breeding isolation has occurred and the new species begins defending its integrity all over again." This is where we disagree. I do not see why a species should stop defending its mean/integrity in order to allow a new prototypical to develop. That implies forsight imo. By the way, I wanted to quickly respond to your comment about "innoculation" and that it sounded like conspiracy talk to you. That's not what I meant. What I mean to say is that the poor reasoning and quote-mining of some creationists in the 1980s had a general and unintended affect on the scientific community making it resistent to creationistic claims. The same thing has happened with other fields that are labeled pseudoscience (even if the researchers are rigorously using the scientific method) like telepathy, UFO-ology etc. Regarding specificity in FCSI, I share your concern. I have always wondered what the specification is supposed to be for DNA. Does the connection between RNA and proteins show FCSI? I have never been quite satisfied on that score. But I have not read Dempski's books or Meyer's Signature in the Cell. Perhaps it is clarified. I did just read "Contact" by Carl Sagan and he seems to believe that (spoiler alert) if we received a repeating signal of prime numbers (in binary), then we have good reason to believe it is being sent by intelligent beings. Why does this atheist think that that shows an intelligent source? All he says is that it would be unlikely for a natural phenomenon to create repeating prime numbers. Why not? And why is it not unlikely for nature to create DNA, a vastly more complex code than prime numbers.Collin
May 21, 2012
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The rates and the fossil record just give us estimates of when changes occurred.
They cannot. Fossils do not necessarily say when something arose. And the modern synthesis is too vague to have any contradictions.Joe
May 21, 2012
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Joe,
1- The fossil record is incomplete and cannot tell us when the inovation arose. 2- Mutation rates do not support the phenotypic changes required
The rates and the fossil record just give us estimates of when changes occurred.
They are fossils, not biological.
They are partial copies of biological forms. Like a three dimensional photograph. I know you disagree but the fossil and genetic record don't contradict the modern evolutionary synthesis. Gaps are not contradictions.Jerad
May 21, 2012
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Well, since the fossils can be dated it can give us an estimate. And the mutation rate can be measured and used as a rough metric.
1- The fossil record is incomplete and cannot tell us when the inovation arose. 2- Mutation rates do not support the phenotypic changes required
How is the fossil record NOT biological evidence as it is a record of once living flora and fauna?
They are fossils, not biological.
The fossil record is one of the lines of evidence that descent with modification has occurred.
That is the propaganda. However there still isn't any way to confirm it.
Darwin himself argued along more than one line and since then we’ve got genetic evidence for common ancestry to add in support.
There isn't any genetic evidence to link to the transformations required. We don't even know what makes a human a human other than two humans mate and a baby human appears some 9 months later.Joe
May 21, 2012
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Joe,
Except the fossil record can’t tell us how long it takes. And there isn’t any genetic evidence to suport the changes required.
Well, since the fossils can be dated it can give us an estimate. And the mutation rate can be measured and used as a rough metric.
A biological theory requires biological evidence. And the fossil record cannot say anything about a mechanism nor even if evolutiondidit.
How is the fossil record NOT biological evidence as it is a record of once living flora and fauna? The fossil record is one of the lines of evidence that descent with modification has occurred. Darwin himself argued along more than one line and since then we've got genetic evidence for common ancestry to add in support.Jerad
May 21, 2012
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I don’t understand what this means. All processes take time. Are you trying to argue that slow processes, by virtue of being slow, are not processes?
I am saying if those processes cannot be shown to do what you say they can, then your claim is unscientific. Saying we cannot test the processes because too much time is involved is unscientific.Joe
May 21, 2012
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Palentologists have found literally dozens of close relatives within recent history, like within only the last million years. Probably half of those are classified as genus homo. So from our perspective, our lineage has speciated quite a bit.
A biological theory requires biological evidence. And the fossil record cannot say anything about a mechanism nor even if evolutiondidit. Ya see there is no way to confirm the speculation about the fossils. Therefor said speculation is useless.Joe
May 21, 2012
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The theory of evolution is the current best-fit explanation for everything in biology
The "theory" of evolutuion is too vague to be of any use. In a nutshell the "theory" sez that something happened some time in the past and things kept happening and here we are. The "theory" cannot be tested. All that can be tested is that populations change or they stay the same, ie stasis.Joe
May 21, 2012
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But we do have some ideas of how long some modifications have taken based on the fossil record and the genetic evidence.
Except the fossil record can't tell us how long it takes. And there isn't any genetic evidence to suport the changes required.Joe
May 21, 2012
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Joe,
As for common descent we see fish giving rise to fish with no known mechanism of changing them into anything but fish. The same goes for humans. And throwing time around isn’t science. The point being is that you don’t have any idea how long it would take and seem happy as a child to sleep under the warm blanket of father time.
But we do have some ideas of how long some modifications have taken based on the fossil record and the genetic evidence. Also we have seen how long it has taken to generate all the existing breeds of dogs and plants in the brassica line. Have you looked at the brassicas? Some amazing morphological changes in the last hundreds of years. Via selective/intelligent breeding but no direct manipulation of the genome.Jerad
May 20, 2012
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Collin, You raise some interesting points. I'll respond as well as I can, so bear with me...
Well, I think we both agreethat the Templeton prize could not be accepted because, as you say, most people who believe in design, believe that the Designer was God and He cannot be revealed without His permission. Nor are His ways likely to be discoverable through science.
But the Templeton Foundation was, perhaps optimistically, looking for any scientific support for Intelligent Design. The entire field.
But I think that ID is on to something that you should carefully look at. It posits that design (from a Designer) can be detected. This is an interesting idea that I think can be tested. Or at least, has the potential to be testable.
I agree within certain limits. Design, as I see it, is a process, not an object. Objects are the by-products of the design process, just as organisms are by-products of the process of evolution and knowledge is the by-product of the scientific method. The processes in each case are what matter. And THAT means you can't look at something and deduce that it was designed in isolation. You MUST know something of the context, the provenance and history of the object, so that you can reconstruct the design process that was used. Here is where I think the idea of complex specified information is valuable, because it makes clear that you cannot deduce design unless you know the specification, and the specification is the operationalization of the designer's goals. I recall Behe in Dover, testifying (in my words, which may be my misunderstandings!) that he saw design as a property of an object, like mass or color. But later he admitted that those who didn't share his religious orientation, couldn't see this property at all! And I think this is important, because it has been my (admittedly limited) experience that the only people who can "see" the design in an object, do so by placing that object within a context external to the object itself. They can see it's designed because they already know it's designed for reasons not inherent in the object.
I wonder if goldfish are less robust than carp? My knowledge of breeding of dogs (from what I read) is that the more rigorously bred a dog is and the farther it gets away from its “wolf-like” form, the more health problems it has.
My reading is, this is often the case but not necessarily the case. Breeders of course are working to isolate and concentrate specific alleles which produce the desired morphological variation. And the problem is generally that alleles come as "package deals". In other words, genes map to morphology in a many-to-many fashion, where no feature is the result of a single gene, and every single gene is involved in more than one feature. And THAT means that to get the desired feature, you must accept all the associated stuff. Which often is detrimental to the organism when distorted this way. But over very long periods of time, selective breeding is more than isolating pre-existing alleles, it is also enforcing breeding isolation, so that new mutations can be added to the process. Perhaps the gold color was a mutation in some carp, and could be isolated without making the strain less robust. I don't know, because most goldfish are bred for a lot more than gold color - breeders also want big eyes, big fancy fins, etc.
The Great Dane has hip displasia, bloat, cancer, etc. The chihuahua is known to kill her babies. Shar Pei’s get skin infections due to their baggy skin. Don’t get me started with Daschunds. But the Karelian and the Collie are among the healthiest breeds. I think this supports Baraminology (spelling?). The dogs that stay closer to the prototype are the most healthy.
I think your observation is correct, but I would draw a different conclusion. Evolution has, over time, selected for much larger genomes than organisms strictly need. Variation survives, for many reasons, so the potential to vary is beneficial. Selective breeding reduces the variation in the genome. So it's true that the closer to the "original" the healthier. Selective breeding is a process that accelerates evolution to a rate that exceeds the ability of natural mutation processes to keep up with. In nature, species facing environmental pressures must await some mutation that will allow speciation of a better-adapted child species. Sometimes this happens before the parent goes extinct, sometimes it doesn't.
This is also supported by the fact that the computerized average of 100 women is more beautiful than most of the 100 women. (I’ll try to find the study). Our sense of beauty is an innate response.
I've read this and in fact seen it done by superimposing many photographs. The further from the average, the less attractive we find one another.
There is a prototypical woman and in order for our species survive, we have an attraction to the woman that most resembles her. In this way, the species doesn’t stray too far from the mean and become unhealthy.
I think you are wandering into much deeper waters here than we have space for. This is a very interesting subject, I think. Yes, species tend to defend their integrity even unto extinction. And speciation (branching) means there is a new "prototypical" developing. By the time this development is complete, complete breeding isolation has occurred and the new species begins defending its integrity all over again. So while it may be the case that this defense of integrity prevents wandering too far from a healthy medium, it also means the species fails to adapt. And it means that newly branched species must establish a new medium to stay close to.David W. Gibson
May 20, 2012
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Joe,
We see common design all around us- houses, cars, computers. Seeing that the majority of genes are for sustaining cellular function, I would expect a degree of genetic similarity. So we take the clues and put them in the framework we know via observation and experience.
Yes indeed. And then we make predictions based on this framework, then we formulate testable hypotheses based on the predictions, and then we do the tests. Often, our results surprise us. It's an aphorism in science that every single answer generates more than a single new question.
As for common descent we see fish giving rise to fish with no known mechanism of changing them into anything but fish.
Yes, we see fish giving rise to fish. We do indeed have a known mechanism for gradual change, but my understanding is that this mechanism is very very slow, and the descendent of a fish will always have fish ancestors. As a thought experiment, imagine trees observing primates. Yeah, primates have some minor variation, there's gorillas and people and dogs and cats and such, but really, they're still all primates, so where's the evolution? The trees might not see any!
The same goes for humans.
Oh my no! Palentologists have found literally dozens of close relatives within recent history, like within only the last million years. Probably half of those are classified as genus homo. So from our perspective, our lineage has speciated quite a bit.
And throwing time around isn’t science.
I don't understand what this means. All processes take time. Are you trying to argue that slow processes, by virtue of being slow, are not processes?
The point being is that you don’t have any idea how long it would take and seem happy as a child to sleep under the warm blanket of father time.
I don't understand the point you are making. What does "it" refer to here? The more specific you can be, the easier it is to decide which evidence is relevant.
BTW what predictions are borne from accumulations of genetic accidents? What practical value does the “theory” of evolution offer? Please do tell…
I guess this is one of those cases where if you have to ask, then I can't explain. Kind of like claiming that vehicles don't actually GO anywhere, and then asking what practical value they have. The theory of evolution is the current best-fit explanation for everything in biology, for all of life, for development and reproduction and inheritance and disease and health and nutrition, for everything from why there are so many different organisms to what would happen if the bacteria in your gut were to die. I really don't know how to respond to you.David W. Gibson
May 20, 2012
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David, Well, I think we both agreethat the Templeton prize could not be accepted because, as you say, most people who believe in design, believe that the Designer was God and He cannot be revealed without His permission. Nor are His ways likely to be discoverable through science. But I think that ID is on to something that you should carefully look at. It posits that design (from a Designer) can be detected. This is an interesting idea that I think can be tested. Or at least, has the potential to be testable. I wonder if goldfish are less robust than carp? My knowledge of breeding of dogs (from what I read) is that the more rigorously bred a dog is and the farther it gets away from its "wolf-like" form, the more health problems it has. The Great Dane has hip displasia, bloat, cancer, etc. The chihuahua is known to kill her babies. Shar Pei's get skin infections due to their baggy skin. Don't get me started with Daschunds. But the Karelian and the Collie are among the healthiest breeds. I think this supports Baraminology (spelling?). The dogs that stay closer to the prototype are the most healthy. This is also supported by the fact that the computerized average of 100 women is more beautiful than most of the 100 women. (I'll try to find the study). Our sense of beauty is an innate response. There is a prototypical woman and in order for our species survive, we have an attraction to the woman that most resembles her. In this way, the species doesn't stray too far from the mean and become unhealthy.Collin
May 20, 2012
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David, We see common design all around us- houses, cars, computers. Seeing that the majority of genes are for sustaining cellular function, I would expect a degree of genetic similarity. So we take the clues and put them in the framework we know via observation and experience. As for common descent we see fish giving rise to fish with no known mechanism of changing them into anything but fish. The same goes for humans. And throwing time around isn't science. The point being is that you don't have any idea how long it would take and seem happy as a child to sleep under the warm blanket of father time. BTW what predictions are borne from accumulations of genetic accidents? What practical value does the "theory" of evolution offer? Please do tell...Joe
May 20, 2012
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Collin, I try to respond, but it does take some time and reading. I am nowhere near the scholar in these matters that many here obviously are.
Thanks for responding. I wonder if you believe that science has the capability of ascertaining if life exhibits signs of design or not.
This strikes me as much more a matter of definition than of science. I personally consider evolution to be a design process, and living organisms to be the outputs of that process, the side-effects. I see every organism as designed by the environmental constraints and stochastic accidents that comprise its history. I see desert sandstone sculptures as having been designed by a combination of geological history and the forces of erosion. But you may define "design" differently.
Could science be used to discover if a virus were designed by a bio-terrorist? If so, then does it cease to be science if we are trying to discover evidence of a “primordial” designer?
Both are subject to scientific investigation in the traditional sense, I think. So both are science. The cover article of the latest edition of Science News is about the search for the first life or proto-life in the Hadeon eon, over 3.8 billion years ago. This is a real challenge, because in that much time most land masses have returned to the molten mantle at least once, and when they re-emerge they are vastly changed. The article says only enough material from the Hadeon has been found to fit on the head of a thimble. Not much to work with. Knowing what to look for is another challenge. But the effort is being made.
Please consider another analogy/scenario. Let’s say that in the early 20th century, a group of creationists decided that they did not like the idea of a steady state universe, so they employed poor reasoning, quote-mining and bad science to disprove it and argue for the existence of a beginning of the universe. Eventually the public and the scientific community became inoculated against the idea of a beginning of the universe, so that when evidence of the Big Bang was discovered, the scientific community was resistant to it. They had become invested in an argument against the creationists. Because of this, only friends of the creationists, (maybe creationists that wear cheap tuxedos) were willing to endure the scorn of the main stream community and argue that there was a beginning to the universe. Could such a situation be going on in biology today?
Sure. Indeed, it's going on all the time, wherever you look, perhaps not so broadly as your example, but it happens. It has been written (IMO accurately) that the way important scientific views change is NOT because of refuting data, but because those individuals holding the ideas die off and are not replaced. That doesn't mean the data are irrelevant at all, it means that once one has a model in mind, the data are MADE to fit whether they do or not. Mental models become impervious to change. I am again bothered, I admit, by the subtle odor of conspiracy theory here. The steady state started losing support with the discovery of the red shift, and still clung on until the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation. I'm going to argue here, perhaps quixotically, that the enterprise of scientific research is much too competitive, too full of personal animosities and disputes and competing approaches, for any vast "inoculation" to withstand it. And I might point out that biology in fact went through exactly what you describe. In Darwin's day, Divine Creation was the default, both taken for granted and strongly defended. Darwin's ideas were resisted for a couple of generations after Origin, until the sheer weight of evidence crushed the opposition. Which didn't go down easy, and the history shows that much of the research that ended up ratifying Darwin's ideas was actually performed by opponents trying desperately to prove he was wrong! Nonetheless, let's say that your scenario is accurate, and that there is this broad impenetrable resistance to intelligent design ideas. Historically, it seems clear that the only way to overcome this is with good solid replicable positive evidence that some other explanation fits the facts better. Because you're right - the first hospital physician who insisted on washing his hands and made others do the same, was denigrated as anal, attacked as a time-waster, accused of being superstitious, etc. Others adopted his practice only when it became clear that he lost FAR fewer patients than anyone else, and all that hand-washing was the only thing he did differently. New ideas always meet resistance. As I'm sure you're aware, even in this thread people have pointed out that if you're right, the way to make the point is by rigorously producing the Designer, demonstrating the efficacy of the method, replicating that method, constructing hypothesis of the "if evolution X, if ID then Y" and performing the experiments to see which one you get. I grant that even with resoundingly unambiguous confirming results, it would be a hard sell - but the sale WOULD get closed. As things stand, ID seems more armchair speculation about what MIGHT be the case, without anyone going out there and doing the heavy lifting. I read some time back that the Templeton Foundation offered research grant money to anyone who could produce a positive, testable hypothesis to show the designer or its methods. No takers. After a decade or two, no takers. And if you look at the Discovery Institute's budget, you find almost nothing going into biological research, and millions going into public relations, political lobbying, publishing apologetics around the net, etc. To me, this indicates that ID is not a scientific program, it's a social/religious/political program. And THAT isn't going to change how biologists understand biology.David W. Gibson
May 20, 2012
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Joe, While you may be right, I get the sense that you are asking too much. Like a child looking at a skyscraper and "knowing" you can't pile blocks that high without them falling over. But people have taken ordinary plain guppies and turned them into real show fish. Same with betas. Goldfish began as ordinary carp, corn couldn't even survive in the wild, it's been so completely altered by selective breeding. All of these things have happened within recorded history, which in the natural world is an evolutionary eyeblink. You seem impatient. I raised the issue of common genes. Humans share many with fish. Common ancestry and common design are competing hypotheses, but common ancestry is somewhat testable - we can produce new generations and notice common genes between offspring and parents. We can take similar organisms and notice degrees of genetic similarity corresponding roughly with similar morphology. So these are clues, which is better than total ignorance. If people had bred fish for podia rather than for beauty, we'd probably have seen some considerable change in that direction over 10,000 years. Certainly not within the time frame of your usual funded lab experiment. Or within a human lifetime. And even if the theory is wrong, in the real world of biological research it is fundamental, used to guide every hypothesis being tested, worldwide. Many of which prove quite predictive, so the theory isn't completely useless. Its "hit rate" of accurate predictions is much too high for it to be completely wrong, but in terms of practical value, it has plenty.David W. Gibson
May 20, 2012
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Mr. Gibson, Thanks for responding. I wonder if you believe that science has the capability of ascertaining if life exhibits signs of design or not. Could science be used to discover if a virus were designed by a bio-terrorist? If so, then does it cease to be science if we are trying to discover evidence of a "primordial" designer? Please consider another analogy/scenario. Let's say that in the early 20th century, a group of creationists decided that they did not like the idea of a steady state universe, so they employed poor reasoning, quote-mining and bad science to disprove it and argue for the existence of a beginning of the universe. Eventually the public and the scientific community became inoculated against the idea of a beginning of the universe, so that when evidence of the Big Bang was discovered, the scientific community was resistant to it. They had become invested in an argument against the creationists. Because of this, only friends of the creationists, (maybe creationists that wear cheap tuxedos) were willing to endure the scorn of the main stream community and argue that there was a beginning to the universe. Could such a situation be going on in biology today?Collin
May 20, 2012
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David, There isn't anything about the observed processes that we can extrapolate such that new, functional multi-protein configurations are constructed. Nothing to suggest a prokaryote can evolve into something other than a prokaryote. Nothing to suggest fish can evolve into something other than fish. You would think that we could take fish embryos, subject them to targeted mutagenesis- target the devolopmental genes and see if we can get a fish-a-pod to develop. If we can't do that then the "theory" has absolutely no practical value and is a useless heuristic.Joe
May 20, 2012
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Collin,
You are basically using ad hominem reasoning. You are questioning the assertions of design theory because of the motivations of those asserting it. In arithmetic, I could have very bad motives to argue that 2 plus 2 is 4, but I would still be right.
In that case, I didn't express myself very well. Perhaps expressing myself well is beyond me! But from my perspective, intelligent design requires an intelligent designer. If life is intelligently designed, this makes the designer at least ancient. It also attributes purposes to the designer. And to me, this makes the designer indinguishable from a god. And THAT necessarily requires that ID rest on religious precepts. I see no way around this. The assertions of intelligent design may be correct, but this does not decouple those assertions from their religious basis.
I have been told that when Big Bang theory was first proposed, it was opposed by some because it implied a creator. I mention this because you seem to believe that motives go only one way; the religious stifle science due to their a priori positions. Clearly, it works the other way as well.
I agree. In science, hypotheses are proposed with full expectation that they'll prove to be correct. Most of the time they aren't, but a priori this is not the expectation. So the question becomes, what relationship should exist between a priori presumptions and empirical observation? Should it be possible for observation to overcome such presumptions, or should such presumptions render refuting observations impossible, not credible, etc? I personally feel that knowledge is only possible when those pursuing it are willing and able to admit error. And that takes a posture toward evidence which elevates evidence above even the most devout belief. Not at all an easy challenge for any human being.
With regards to your contrasting with engineering, I think that the examples you cite only make the case more difficult for undirected evolution. The more working parts, the more complexity, the more likely a small error will cause significant problems.
Well, my point was that this is most definitely the case with software engineering, and clearly NOT AT ALL the case with biological variation. So my conclusion was that there simply is no valid analogy between software engineering and biology, and attempting to force such an analogy leads to serious category errors. But I may be wrong.
So the solution is to have error correction mechanisms, yet this compounds the problem because error correction mechanisms cannot evolve without errors (mutations).
My understanding is that error correction itself has evolved. Too strict, adaptation doesn't happen and extinction results. Too loose, and the sheer scope of variation renders an organism nonviable. And interestingly enough, models today indicate that the efficacy of error correction approaches the Goldilocks ideal, not too strict and not too lose, but very very close to just right. (And I can't avoid the suspicion that if we took some fairly simple computer program written by a software engineer, and a couple hundred thousand computers making imperfect copies with small random variations, and keeping the few that didn't crash, and iterating this indefinitely, we could come back in a few years and find that those programs currently running did something completely different from the original, and completely unanticipated by the original coder. To continue this particular analogy, we start to notice some very significant differences between this approach and GilDodgen's approach. First, we have replication with inheritance. Second, we have variation and selection. Third, the program need not DO anything except run (i.e. survive). There is no target functionality beyond running. And at that point, we begin to approach biological reality.)David W. Gibson
May 20, 2012
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What is observable, traces of the past and processes in the present, would warrant the strong conclusion that functionally specific, complex organisation and associated information [FSCO/I] is a reliable sign of design.
I'm not quite sure what the word "design" is intended to encompass here. Certainly I can view environmental constraints shaping the selection of continuous variation as a design process. I would say without question it IS a design process. So I guess we're in agreement here.
At least, if we were to genuinely respect Newton’s uniformity principle that in absence of counter evidence, we should infer that the reliably tested adequate cause for an observed effect, can be generalised to cases where we may not observe the causal process directly. (Cf. here on.)
Yes, this seems straightforeward. We observe environmental constraints shaping continuous variation in survivable directions. We can even sharpen and focus these constraints in the lab, and observe that the shaping process accelerates. And not having any good reason to believe that there was a time in the past without any environment, we can legitimately extrapolate as Newton recommended. So we're still in agreement.
On years of discussion, what hinders this well-supported inference to best explanation is not the methods of science proper. No, it is the a priori imposition of materialistic constraints on scientific reasoning, often disguised as methodological principles.
Here, your terminology borders on a jargon whose intended meanings I'm not very familiar with. I would say that science does have a priori materialistic constraints, since materials are all that can be observed and tested using the scientific method. Since I don't follow you here, could you provide an illustration of a scientific investigation that is free of materialistic constraints? Let's say, just arbitrarily, that you wanted to determine whether a chemical reaction that occurs in a nitrogen atmosphere, would also occur the same way in an argon atmosphere. But you do not wish to be constrained by materialism. How would you go about it?David W. Gibson
May 20, 2012
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