April 24, 2008

Expelled: No Intelligence Offered - part 1 (Win Ben Stein's Monkey Trial!)

Hatched by Dafydd

(For Brad Linaweaver's review, see here now!)

Conservative anti-evolution activist Ben Stein has a monkey on his back; perhaps I should say a monkey is haunting Stein, the monkey of "Darwinism." It climbs through his window at night and, pace Poe, attacks him in his dreams.

I have just suffered through 90 minutes of being informed that not only was I a Nazi, but a Communist and a eugenicist. I have been told I don't believe in free will, and that I actively suppress brilliant scientists whose only "crime" is to "raise the question" of Intelligent Design (ID). And I have been thus attacked by a man who I still support and defend on many other issues, and who I have long respected as an otherwise rational person. But on this subject, Ben Stein has truly gone off the rails.

He has released a documentary called Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed; it's getting a lot of favorable buzz in conservative circles -- for all the wrong reasons: Not because it persuades (it doesn't); not because it bridges the divide between science and faith (rather, it deepens it); and certainly not because it is fair or just or truth-seeking, as it claims... because on those civic virtues, Expelled is more akin to Fahrenheit 9/11 than to the Path to 9/11.

The reason for its near ecstatic reception on the right is mostly (I believe) that it reaffirms the anti-evolution bias of a great many conservatives. Many (but not all) conservatives passionately believe that the theory of evolution by random mutation and natural selection is a boondoggle that "Big Science" -- yes, Stein uses the term in the advertising -- has somehow foised upon the world for nearly 150 years.

(This piece is long, so I will post it in two halves; the second should appear sometime late tonight.)

Intelligent Design dates to about 1993; it stems from a group of religious Christians and some Jews who reject modern evolutionary theory -- which they insist upon calling "Darwinism," or sometimes neo-Darwinism, as if it hadn't, well, evolved in the 149 years since Charles Darwin published the Origin of Species. The driving force behind it was Phillip Johnson, a lawyer and a very religious Christian at UC Berkeley; Johnson published Darwin on Trial in that year (and a number of other similar books since). Darwin on Trial spends some time arguing that there is no good evidence for evolution; but the conclusion of the book argues a very different point: That "Darwinism" is actually a materialist religion; and that the study of evolutionary theory leads directly to atheism. Thus Johnson posited a great divide between science (materialist religion) and faith (Creator-based religion)... and you must pick one or the other.

Ben Stein has clearly bought into the same fallacy; he believes that religious faith and science, or at least evolutionary theory, form a dichotomy -- which the movie symbolizes by the Berlin wall. Everybody is either on one side or the other. No Mugwumps allowed! He is a very partisan supporter of Intelligent Design (often abbreviated ID by its supporters); so partisan that virtually everything he says sounds suspect... even those points that are true!

I will not mince words: The movie is a monstrous and deadly lie. This piece, part review, part response, will show why Expelled is a lie -- and why it is so dangerous not only to society but even to mainstream religion...

Fit the first: Strategy and tactics

The first disappointment is that Ben Stein squanders the greatest asset that conservatives generally hold over liberals: fundamental fairness. The shorthand is that liberals use the appeal to emotion, while conservatives argue from the mind.

But in Expelled, Stein builds his thesis in the sensationalist and tendentious fashion of Michael Moore: He carefully controls the argument so that those he agrees with are allowed to endlessly explain their positions while tugging at our heartstrings, while those in the enemy camp have their words creatively clipped to provide maximal confusion. It's easy to win a debate when you get to script both sides; likewise, it's just as easy to win when you run the edit bay.

The core of Expelled is the "parade of horribles": He shows us number of (we are told) eminent scientists who have been "fired" (or "expelled," as Stein puts it) merely because they "questioned" the "dominant paradigm" and showed that the emperor has no clothes. Easy to understand; equally easy to misunderstand.

Each of these putative scientists is allowed to tell his or her tale of woe uninterrupted and clearly planned and rehearsed, while their counterparts get only a minute or so of raw, scary-lit footage at the very end to rebut.

Too, each interviewee who supports the "firing" of one of the ID-supporting "scientists" is hit with explicit questions about the situation with no warning, no chance to refresh his memory about the case, and no opportunity to gather his notes... a perfect conservative analog to the "60 Minutes" style. And Stein doesn't note for the audience another very important point: The squirming "neo-Darwinist" is legally restrained from defending his actions due to employee-privacy laws.

If he said what he really believed, the supposed victims could sue him and his university or governmental employer. That certainly dampens any enthusiasm the evolutionists might have to defend their decisions.

Those on the side of "Big Science" must fight with their tongues tied behind their backs, a perfect microcosm of the fundamental unfairness of the rest of the documentary. But wait... aren't the scientists, as clearly depicted in the movie, bad guys who "unfairly exclude" ID from the discussion? If so, then it's only right, some anti-evolution viewers argue, that ID gets a chance to do the same.

Is that the argument? If so, then Stein is really saying, Sure, we're being totally unfair to mainstream scientists; but if you believe the scurrilous charges we hurl at them, they deserve to be treated unfairly!

This is not an inspiring message. Worse, it's not a conservative message; it's "liberal logic," the same kind that gives us affirmative action: Blacks were wrongfully discriminated against for so long, isn't it about time we started wrongfully discriminating against whites, to even things out?

Truth would have been better served if Stein had allowed both sides a fair chance at making their points. If he complains that "Big Science" has discriminated against ID, the solution is not to discriminate in favor of ID instead. Alas, this is the paradigm of the entire movie Expelled. One reason this review expanded into a response is just that: no intelligent response allowed in the movie itself.

Fit the second: Absence of evidence is evidence of conspiracy

The reader has probably noticed that I've used terms like "putative" and "so called," along with scare-quotes, when I describe the supporers of Intelligent Design depicted in the movie as scientists. That is because many are medical doctors, rather than academics or working scientists; one is a philosopher; and another is actually a journalist, not a scientist. And even among those with some level of scientific credentials, none is shown even to be an adequate researcher, let alone eminent in his field. I can't say they're not, but Stein gives us no reason to believe they are, beyond his personal say-so.

A word about Ben Stein himself. He has no science background, unless one counts economics; he wasn't even a high-school science teacher, though he played one on TV. Even so, he should realize that merely calling someone top notch or brilliant is meaningless without some more substantial evidence.

Stein took his first university degree in economics, from Columbia College, then attended Yale Law School; like Phillip Johnson, founder of ID, Stein is a lawyer. But in both those two very respected fields, economics and the law, "truth" is an elusive concept.

At law, for every argument, there is a counterargument; neither can be said to be absolutely wrong. While a judge may decide against one side, the next year, the same judge may decide against the other. Nothing is fully resolved except by power-play: When a big enough court decides an issue, it can enforce its decision -- whether "right" or "wrong" in some cosmic sense (think of Dred Scott v. John Sanford or Roe v. Wade).

Similarly, in ecnomics -- especially back in the 60s, when Stein was learning the field at Columbia -- everybody has his own theory; nobody can prove, within the field of economics, that one economic theory is better than any other. Great economists have included free-market economists (Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman) and absolute statists (John Maynard Keynes, John Kenneth Galbraith), or "neoliberals" like the contemporary Robert Reich, Bill Clinton's Secretary of Labor; all five still have followers in academe.

But no working, respected, frequently cited physicist today rejects special relativity or quantum mechanics in favor of pure Newtonian mechanics. Newton's theories still hold true in limited cases; outside those limits, newer theories prevail; and nobody in the field stubbornly clings to the old ideas.

In science, there are no absolute proofs of hypotheses, but there are absolute refutations. Once you show that, i.e., Newtonian mechanics cannot explain the planet Mercury's orbital precession or the bending of starlight as it passes close to the sun, it's finished as a universal theory of everything (even though parts of Newtonian mechanics are still useful in special cases). Scientists are constantly refining our understanding of, for example, how best to model an atom; but no chemist or physicist disbelieves that molecules are composed of atoms and harkens back to the four "elements" of antiquity -- earth, water, air, and fire.

Ben Stein is unequipped by his education to deal in the realm of absolutes in nature. I'm sure he accepts what he calls "absolutes" in morality -- but there, he means absolute in the sense of divine revelation, the word of God. He does not understand that science is filled with a different kind of absolute, the natural absolute of mathematical and experimental evidence.

Judging from this movie, he thinks that it's "only fair" that ID gets to win some of the arguments, some of the time. After all, those "eminent" scientists who were "expelled" from Big Science are so passionate and sincere!

But they're passionately wrong.

This point is vital to Stein's thesis. If the academic employees whose contracts were not renewed were less than fully competent by the objective standards of science, then isn't that a perfectly valid reason to let them go? We need not look for some deeper conspiracy -- suppression of dissenting opinion and neo-Darwinist corruption, as Stein suggests. And here he means literal corruption; he explicitly charges that Big Science dangles grant money to bribe scientists into supporting evolutionary theory. Presumably, absent the big bucks, scientists would reject evolution as charlatanry, just as many conservative lawyers and economists do.

But if that were the case, then what caused scientists to accept evolutionary theory in the first place? All the establishments of the nineteenth century opposed it for decades. And why haven't we seen a flood of new, young researchers, who don't yet have established grant empires, overturning evolutionary theory in order to make their bones? Again, no need to posit a vast, Darwinian conspiracy: Evolutionary theory as explicated by Charles Darwin prevailed in the nineteenth century, and continues to hold sway today, because the evidence of scientific observation thoroughly supports it; and two hundred years of evidence (the earliest predating Darwin's solution by more than 50 years) could not be explained by any competing scientific theory.

This is a point that conservatives especially should understand better than they do. After all, conservatives have used the very same argument to defend President George W. Bush from conspiracy charges in his decision not to renew the appointments of some United States Attorneys. On that occasion, liberals led the crusade to accuse Bush of conspiring to suppress information by "firing" USAs who investigated the "Republican culture of corruption."

The charge was ludicrous then, and its brother is ludicrous now, even if a conservative makes it.

Fit the third: The vague-abond king

One of Expelled's biggest failings is that none of its "bad boy" ID proponents actually explains why evolution could not have occurred, why Intelligent Design is a better hypothesis to explain the rise of species than variation and natural selection, why ID is scientific, or even what, exactly, ID theory actually claims.

At what point in the evolution of life is the intelligent Designer supposed to have intervened? And how exactly -- by what physical mechanism -- did He do so? Is there any evidence for this intervention beyond the "argument by personal incredulity" ("I just can't imagine how X could have occurred naturally, so it must not have.")

None of these issues is even addressed: Not only do Stein's subjects never offer evidence for ID (or even against mainstream evolutionary theory), none of the expert witnesses can even define Intelligent Design in the first place!

The irony is that one ID proponent in the flick carefully and accurately defines traditional evolutionary theory; then another ID expert at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute, the Mecca of Intelligent Design, is shown bitterly lamenting that reporters always misstate the claims of ID. He tells us what he thinks ID does not claim -- that some structures of life are "too complex" to be explained by traditional evolutionary theory; yet he never tells us what ID actually does claim.

Thus Stein leaves the audience in the dark -- what, specifically, is the argument actually about? We don't learn from Expelled; we only learn that it isn't about whether evolution can create complexity.

Which is a breathtaking assertion... because the chief scientist-architect of ID -- Dr. Michael Behe -- in fact explicitly claims that ID's best argument is the "irreducible complexity" of some biological structures, such as the mammalian eye, the bacterial flagellum (a "nanomotor" that allow bacteria to move by themselves), and the human blot-clotting cascade. Isn't "irreducible complexity" an argument from complexity?

Behe asserts that such complex structures, which comprise many separate components (simple structures or proteins), are "irreducible." By this, Behe means that complex structures could not have evolved by random mutation, because (he argues) every component would have to evolve simultaneously for the structure to work properly, thus to provide any survival advantage to the organism.

He tries to make his case by noting that if you chemically suppress, for example, any of the dozen proteins involved in blood clotting or any of the 40 or so proteins used by bacterial flagella, the entire system fails. Since, he says, the individual components themselves confer no advantage without all the others, how could they have evolved in the first place?

While Behe relies mostly upon the flagellum example, lawyers like Michael Medved prefer to use the mammalian eye -- likely because they can't understand Behe's argument about flagella or clotting cascades, having never studied biology or any other science. Medved often notes that a retina all by itself, without an optic nerve or lense or cornea, is useless. Likewise, a lens all by itself, without the other components, has no function, and so forth. The problem with this example (and why Behe rarely uses it), is that even Darwin himself presented a very persuasive, step by step way that the eye could have evolved. Since then, of course, the evolution of the eye has been extensively researched; scientists, unlike Michael Medved, know almost exactly how the modern eye came into being.

If you're incredibly interested, there are entire books published on the subject; but Francis Collins has a succinct sketch in the Language of God, pp. 191-2. Anybody interested in this debate cannot skip this book, no matter which side the reader is on; I will return to it over and over. Collins himself is a world-renowned geneticist and physician -- he headed the Human Genome Project -- but he is also a traditional, scripture-believing Christian. He had been an atheist until he was converted in 1976 by reading several works by C.S. Lewis.

I will return to Behe's primary example, bacterial flagella, later. For now, it's enough to note that his argument is that some structures are "irreducibly complex," so could not have evolved by random mutation coupled with natural selection.

This seems remarkably well described by the shorthand, "some structure in life are too complex to be explained by traditional evolutionary theory;" I don't know why the chap from the Discovery Institute is so exercised. Stein leaves theater-goers tip-toeing on eggshells, trying not to misquote IDers, but with the uneasy feeling that whatever we think we know about ID is necessarily wrong.

There is a good reason this movie, arguably the most important (and unarguably the best funded) media support for Intelligent Design ever, does not actually define Intelligent Design: ID proponents refuse to define it themsleves. Trying to get IDers to clearly state their core theses is like trying to nail Jell-O to the wall. Reading the ID literature looking for anything deeper than an intense loathing of "Darwinism" is an exercise in futility: You're groping in the dark for a black cat who isn't there.

Do they argue that organisms don't change over time? No; they believe in "microevolution." Do they say that even the slightest change in an organism is personally directed by some intelligent designer? Definitely not. Is the Designer God? They won't say publicly (but they spilled the beans in an internal Discovery Institute memo that leaked).

Do they argue that the sheer complexity of life proves the existence of ID? Apparently not -- that is the very "misunderstanding" that so exercised the director of the Discovery Institute, though it appears to be a perfectly respectable journalistic shorthand for Behe's "irreducible complexity."

Well, what specifically does ID claim? Where does it differ from mainstream evolutionary theory? They're too coy to say. In fact, supporters of ID only seem comfortable arguing one thing for certain: Whatever really occured to produce all the species now living on Planet Earth, it couldn't have been caused by random variation and natural selection, by "Darwinism."

Fit the fourth: Cult of poisonality

Stein's refusal to call evolutionary theory by its correct name is not simple truculence: By linking evolutionary science inextricably with one man (and one book, the Origin of Species), he reduces science to a religious-like sect... or even to a political cult.

What other general systems (as opposed to technical terms like Newtonian mechanics LaPlace transforms) are identified by a proper noun followed by a variant on "-ism or -ite?" Those I can think of are either religious movements -- Lutheranism, Paulite, Franciscan; political movements -- Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, Hitlerism, Jeffersonian, Stirnerite, Reaganism; or bizarre cults of various stripes -- Nietschean, Fullerism, Chompskian, Keynesianism.

What do all of the above, forgetting Darwinism for the moment, have in common? They are systems of thought, philosophies, that follow the teachings of some leader... a guru, if you will. Each constitutes to some extent a cult of personality; in some cases benign or even beneficial, such as Lutheranism and Reaganism; in others dangerous or repellant, as with Maoism and Wahhabism. But in each case, acolytes attempt to follow to the letter the goals and principles of the founder, which are held to be eternal verities.

And then there's "Darwinism." As they sang on Sesame Street, "one of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn't belong."

Contrary to what Expelled would have us believe, evolutionary scientists do not seek to promote the teachings of Charles Darwin, any more than modern physicists do not practice Newtonism and contemporary chemists do not engage in Boyleism.

Fit the fifth: Science of unreason

Ben Stein believes and wants to convince moviegoers that modern evolutionary scientists act as Mediaeval thrones, powers, and cherubim, singing endless praise of Charles Darwin, god of evolution. But this is a grotesque misunderstanding of science. There is no "Newtonism," "Boyleism," or "Mendelism;" the greats of science are not worshipped, nor are they considered inerrant or their systems eternal.

By the very nature of science, nothing is eternal; by definition, all is tentative -- that is to say mutative, ever changing. The core idea of evolutionary theory remains constant -- that natural variation or mutation in an organism's genetic code, coupled with an environment that privileges a few variations while punishing most, leads to evolution over time of one species into another. Yet the differences between what Charles Darwin wrote and what contemporary evolutionary scientists believe are myriad. It has been nearly a century and a half, and science never stands still even for a minute.

Evolutionists do not continue to believe in evolutionary theory simply because they have been seduced, either by the weight of tradition or by the lure of research grants. They continue to believe evolution because every experiment, every measurement, every observation without exception confirms, over and over, that the theory is a still-valid model of physical reality... even while the details of that model are constantly readjusted.

But still it is not eternal. Biologists, geneticists, and other evolutionary scientists are always aware that Darwin's ideas could (in theory) be overturned in a moment, even after standing for centuries. After all, that's exactly what Albert Einstein and Werner Heisenberg, et al, did in physics with relativity and quantum mechanics; and that's even what Kurt Gödel did for mathematical logic with his famous Incompleteness Theorem (see Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter).

Evolutionary theory's continued existence depends utterly upon the evidence from experiment and observation; if that ever stops supporting it, if some new way of measuring contradicts what the theory predicts, then down it goes, in flames.

Yet proponents of Intelligent Design have made no headway whatsoever into the scientific community. Ben Stein tells us that it is they are suppressed, repressed, and oppressed by the scientific establishment. This is partially true; Big Science does tune ID out, ignore what they say, and refuse to sanction Intelligent Design as being on a par with mainstream evolutionary theory... but not because scientists reject freedom of speech. Rather, ID is dismissed because it is not a science, it was not developed scientifically, and its proponents have no positive, scientific evidence to offer. (They claim boatloads of evidence, mostly of the "how do you explain this niggling little detail?" variety; but again to paraphrase Fred Pohl on a different subject, "You and I have completely different ideas of what constitutes 'evidence.'")

What does Expelled give us to resolve this intellectual quagmire? A few scraps of suggestive firings (or contracts not renewed); an occasional angy atheist who is also an evolutionist; and the reassurances of partisans that they're right and the other side is wrong.

Of course, scientists say they're right and ID is wrong; it's he-said, she-said -- let's split it down the middle and give both sides equal weight! That is certainly the position Ben Stein takes; but would conservatives agree if the subject were not evolution but the war against global caliphism? Bin Laden and Zawahiri want to turn the entire world into one giant caliphate, destroying all democracies along the way; we say this is evil incarnate, and we'll fight them every step of the way. Is that just he-said, he-said? Do we split it down the middle and invite al-Qaeda to create a hemispherical caliphate?

Conservatives normally argue that just because two people disagree doesn't mean the truth necessarily lies somewhere between them. Sometimes (not always), one side is right and the other wrong, end of story. Yet too many folks on the right will not even entertain the possibility that "Big Science" might be right and Intelligent Design wrong, that evolutionary theory dominates the sciences because it's one of the most well-documented and persuasively evidenced theory in the history of science. Conservatives would do well to remember what Oliver Cromwell once wrote:

I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.

Scientists live by this motto; there is not a scientist alive who has not seen a beloved pet theory collapse due to some observations that he expected to go the other way. He is forced to abandon his theory and start over from scratch; it's a normal part of life in the scientific world. But in the realm of philosophy and religion, this almost never happens -- for such systems never die by disproof, but only through ennui.

This subset of conservatives also refuses to address another charge: That the only purpose of ID is to throw sand at evolution for purely religious reasons: Some Christians (and a few Jews) have talked themselves into believing that evolution denies the two creation passages in Genesis. Expelled can't even see this question and the potential it has to destroy the very idea of ID; if ID is nothing but Biblical Creationism tarted up to look scientific, then who but the most anti-American religious zealot would demand it be taught as science? Would you demand we teach as science the doctrine of the Trinity?

But this is not to say that Stein doesn't see a religious dynamic at issue here; he does. And not very surprising, given his legal background, the movie spends much of its time warning against the same deadly threat that Phillip Johnson associated with "Darwinism."

Ben Stein's primary thesis in Expelled is of course that Big Science hasn't given Intelligent Design a fair hearing, that it stifles and suppresses them for sundry unsavory reasons. But his secondary thesis, nearly as important, is the claim, made explicit throughout the movie, that merely by studying evolutionary theory -- or, one surmises, any science at all -- faith in God is chipped away until, in the end, the student is left shorn of belief in deity, in transcendence, even in free will. The young become easy pickin's for Progressivists who ache to create the "New Socialist Man," per one of Adolf Hitler's speeches that Stein helpfully shows us.

(Given all the Nazi references in the movie, my brother wondered whether Ben Stein had utterly "Godwinized" himself.")

Let's take each of these in turn, starting with whether establishment science -- the "dominant paradigm," as Stein puts it, using the language of Thomas Kuhn's the Structure of Scientific Revolutions -- has really suppressed mountains of evidence pointing to Intelligent Design, all in order to prevent a paradigm shift that would leave the establishment no longer king of the anthill.

Here endeth the part the first; part the second will arriveth anon...

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, April 24, 2008, at the time of 6:28 PM

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» Semi-Intelligent Design from Big Lizards
(Review of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed from Premise Media Corporation 2008; for Dafydd's review, see here now -- and then see here now!) Ben Stein's witty agit-prop documentary is not primarily about science. It is about the politics of science.... [Read More]

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» Medved Runs False-Flag Operation... from Big Lizards
I almost got snookered by Michael Medved today. He had a guest, a mathematician named David Berlinski, who was flogging a new book titled the Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions. It sounded pretty interesting: Berlinski argues that... [Read More]

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» Michael Medved: Still Liberal After All These Years from Big Lizards
(But of course, I think most of us already knew that.) I was listening to Mr. M. today; in his first segment, he examined the phenomenon of blacks as monkeys... well, to be fair, the phenomenon of blacks claiming that... [Read More]

Tracked on February 24, 2009 3:34 PM

Comments

The following hissed in response by: MikeR

Didn't see the movie and probably won't. I know I'm not addressing most of your points, Dafydd. But the only issue I'm interested in is, Is science today suppressing dissent? I think that lots of us conservatives feel that it is on the Global Warming issue, that scientists are afraid to do science because they'll be punished. Anyhow, lots of scientists have said so. Is that happening here?
To hear you tell it, that would be perfectly justifiable: All us real scientists know the answer to this question, therefore anyone working to attack the Theory of Evolution is a crackpot and by definition unworthy to publish in a scientific journal. No suppression, just rejecting obvious garbage.
But there's been some real science done on the flagella question, defending evolution against Behe's attack. Seems it's an interesting idea, worth talking about; presumably we all are learning something in the process. Let scientists do science without raging into political battles in its defense. I expect the science will survive.
Just saw on jerrypournelle.com that he got several letters concerning ID from scientists afraid to allow their names to be published. Don't like that too much. And Dawkins seems pretty angry and scornful to me. Might people like him make life difficult for anyone who questions their ideas?

The above hissed in response by: MikeR [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 24, 2008 7:58 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

MikeR:

First, there is no evidence that anyone is suppressing ID. Rather, peer-reviewed, refereed journals of biology and suchlike disciplines always receive far more submissions than they can possibly publish. They have to pick and choose anyway... so why should they waste a slot that could go to real science by filling it with pseudoscience?

Would anyone expect an astonomy journal to accept a paper on astrology?

Second, bear in mind that Richard Dawkins hasn't been a working scientist for decades; he's a science writer now. And I have no idea how eminent he could have been prior to the 70s, when he shifted more towards journalism. So regardless of how truculent he may be (and he sounds like a pleasant guy, though he may be a bulldog in a debate), he's just a guy. A real scientist isn't afraid of contention anyway... it's a normal part of the profession.

Finally, I don't know Jerry's reaction to all this; I haven't seen him with any regularity since I stopped attending LASFS nearly two decades.

But I have a deep and abiding suspicion of all anonymous sources; why would a real scientist worry about letting his name be known, even if he were (scientifically) investigating something related to ID? Perhaps debunking the claims of ID, or maybe conducting a psychological study of people who believe in it.

But someone who was not really functioning as a scientist (regardless of his credentials), but rather as a believer, might very well not want his name known. He could get in a lot of trouble with his employer or for misuse of grant money.

The point is that it is not possible to promote ID in a scientific way, because ID is not science. As above, it's like taking grant money to study astronomy and spending it promoting astrology instead. I cover this in part 2, which I hope to post late tonight.

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 24, 2008 10:25 PM

The following hissed in response by: nash

Ben Stein's primary thesis in Expelled is of course that Big Science hasn't given Intelligent Design a fair hearing, that it stifles and suppresses them for sundry unsavory reasons. But his secondary thesis, nearly as important, is the claim, made explicit throughout the movie, that merely by studying evolutionary theory -- or, one surmises, any science at all -- faith in God is chipped away until, in the end, the student is left shorn of belief in deity, in transcendence, even in free will. The young become easy pickin's for Progressivists who ache to create the "New Socialist Man," per one of Adolf Hitler's speeches that Stein helpfully shows us.

This was the only worthwhile paragraph in your whole essay.

Point by point:

1. You seem to engage in the same strategy and tactics you accuse the producers of the documentary to be using.

2. "A word about Ben Stein himself. He has no science background, unless one counts economics." Okay, Bub, let's hear your scientific credentials while you're judging other people's competency.

3. I guess you could make the same general criticisms about String Theory. Nobody has really defined it. It can't be tested. Therefore, it must not be science.

4. The documentary does give a reason for differentiating "Darwinism" from evolution. Maybe you missed it.

5. Supporters of anthropogenic global warming worship Al Gore. So it's not hard for a layman to be skeptical about Scientific fervor over evolution.

The above hissed in response by: nash [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 24, 2008 11:36 PM

The following hissed in response by: nk

The above hissed in response by: nk [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 25, 2008 7:47 AM

The following hissed in response by: Zelsdorf2

You were not called a Nazi or a communist. What he said was Nazi's practiced Darwinism. That is only the strongest survive. Upon what is the belief in the Big Bang "theory". Science at its farthest reaches is based upon faith. Speed of light, theory of relativity, what black holes consist of. All based upon faith. Eye witnesses to UFO's are scoffed at because eye witnesses are unreliable. But speculation about something beyond imagination is called science. If you think this was by chance, bon chance'

The above hissed in response by: Zelsdorf2 [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 25, 2008 9:47 AM

The following hissed in response by: nk

Not so. Read Dafydd's post again. Taking your speed of light example, the speed of light has actually been measured in different media -- space, air, water. "Best guess based on availabe information" is not faith. Because the scientific method, by definition, is inquisitive and will correct its guess when more and better information is available.

Mysticism, which is truly what ID is, only pretends to inquire. It is a hollow sphere in which ideas run around in circles and since none of them can escape and no information which may alter them is allowed to enter, they are called Truth.

Every religion has waged wars to defend its preconceptions against observable and provable facts. The ones that accepted surrender gracefully remained religions. The ones who did not stopped being religions and degenerated into witchcraft.

The above hissed in response by: nk [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 25, 2008 11:07 AM

The following hissed in response by: Baggi

First, there is no evidence that anyone is suppressing ID.

This goes a long way to show just how closed minded you are to this discussion. It's why this whole issue has become such a large controversy.

Richard Sternberg was clearly suppressed. You may conclude something different from the evidence than what was concluded by the office of the special counsel but to say there is "no evidence" is just plain ludicrous.

Rather, peer-reviewed, refereed journals of biology and suchlike disciplines always receive far more submissions than they can possibly publish.

This isn't the case of what happened to the Meyer paper. Sternberg had it peer reviewed by three other scientists who put forward advice for minor changes but were otherwise content with the paper.

Then he was railroaded out of the Smithsonian.

so why should they waste a slot that could go to real science by filling it with pseudoscience?

And therein lies the rub. We can dismiss all the scientists who put forward real scientific, peer-reviewed papers on ID as long as we continue to call it pseudoscience.

That the only purpose of ID is to throw sand at evolution for purely religious reasons:

Yes, we probably do so because we realize who we are dealing with here. Seriously Dafydd, is there any convincing you otherwise?

If you want to be honest you'll tell us all that your mind is already made up about ID, so why should we continue this conversation with you?

Your questions aren't meant in honesty, they are rhetorical ploys to win an argument.

The above hissed in response by: Baggi [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 25, 2008 11:12 AM

The following hissed in response by: hunter

As a Christian who believes evolution is no problem, I am faced with a dilemma or two:
1 - I believe the Universe was created and that God did cause things to go the way they have.
2- I believe God has and does intervene in human and cosmic affairs.
3- I believe that science is inspired by God- that it has been a source of great good for people.
Am I a 'Creationist'? Am I an "ID" proponent? Am I unworthy of being interested in. or unqualified to an opinion in, science?
I am not a 'creationist' or 'ID' in the sense of this debate. I think God is larger and more capable than we can possibly imagine. Evolution, Big Bang, etc., are not hinderances at all to God.
But do I think we are capabel of 'trapping god' of catching him at work? No. I also beleive that understanding something of the physics behind an event or process does not make it any less a work of God.
It is a matter of faith. I think those who wish to interpret the Bible as if it were an engineering project management handbook are abusing the intent and reality of the Book, and turning it into something magical. If you read the Bible closely, one thing you do not see is a magic show. It is about as down to earth and brutal about human nature and human conflict as is possible to get. But it is not a science book.
A few thoughts on the fly.. gotta go.

The above hissed in response by: hunter [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 25, 2008 2:35 PM

The following hissed in response by: Bart Johnson

"The movie is a monstrous and deadly lie."
Who died? I hadn't heard of this.

When the periodic table was invented, it predicted the physical characteristics of several elements
not yet discovered. How many such predictions has the theory of evolution correctly published?

If reproducible testing is a requirement to be considered 'science', how has evolution been tested?
Is it 'science'?

Evolution is a reasonable theory to explain some observations. Which observations prove that
ID is not true?

Just asking...

The above hissed in response by: Bart Johnson [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 26, 2008 11:41 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Bart Johnson:

"The movie is a monstrous and deadly lie."

Who died? I hadn't heard of this.

Convincing society that science and faith are enemies of each other could bring down modern civilization... and at the very least, it would fundamentally alter America as we know it today in a very bad way -- especially for faith.

If a movement like the one that both Ben Stein and Richard Dawkins demand actually took over this country, it would turn us into a North American version of Sweden or the Netherlands... in which case, without the bulwark of an America that is both modern and also religious, militant Islamism will end up sweeping much of the world.

Perhaps that's unimportant to you. To each his own.

When the periodic table was invented, it predicted the physical characteristics of several elements not yet discovered. How many such predictions has the theory of evolution correctly published?

Tens of thousands.

If reproducible testing is a requirement to be considered 'science', how has evolution been tested?

Is it 'science'?

By tens of thousands of measurements, observations, and experiments, in dozens of different scientific fields, from biology to microbiology to genetics to paleontology to astronomy to astrophysics to geology to nuclear physics.

Yes, evolutionary theory is a science.

Evolution is a reasonable theory to explain some observations. Which observations prove that ID is not true?

ID makes the extraordinary claim; it's not up to evolutionary scientists to disprove ID (though that has been done; why don't you read the post before responding to it?)... it's up to ID to prove that it is a better model than what it seeks to replace.

Just asking...

But are you interested in the answers, or will you just ignore them and ask more questions?

We'll find out soon, I reckon.

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 27, 2008 1:54 AM

The following hissed in response by: Bart Johnson

We are not antagonists. At least, I'm not.
You clearly have more information on this topic than I, but some of your comments do not seem
informative. As an example, I asked "Who died?"
You replied with a hypothetical situation that has not happened, and I hope it does not.
BTW, I support both religion and science. There is no conflict between the two as I see them.
I responded to as much of your post as was shown at the time I replied. Your further comments had
not yet appeared.
Let me rephrase my question: Which observations are inconsistent with ID? (ID does not deny
evolution as I see it. Rather, it expands the framework under which evolution works.

Of course I'm interested in the answers. 42. I would be surprised that any of your readers
are not interested in the answers.

The above hissed in response by: Bart Johnson [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 27, 2008 4:44 PM

The following hissed in response by: DM

Dafydd: Stein may be a conservative and a flat-out creationist, and ID is certainly no theory of any kind as of yet. It is but an idea and if a million scientists liked the idea of ID, it still wouldn't be science or a theory.

Still, I think you have fallen prey to one of the worst aspects of the issue. The political aspect. Politics, especially that liberal-conservative polarity--seems to corrupt all that it touches. Chairman Mao was right: opposites become each other, and fascist left is different from fascist right only in the god-terms. There is no inherent relationship between conservatism--if that is what Stein is--and love of ID or antipathy towards evolution. Ostensibly, the ideals of the architects of this nation are what a conservative wants to conserve. And what they had in mind was a free competition among religions and free choice among the citizens. No religion was to be given government sanction, none was to be denied expression of its doctrine. Instead of banning religious displays on public land, according to the Framer's ideals, all religious displays should be encouraged. At the same time, this religious freedom is maintained by secular law, law that is absolutely indifferent to a person's religion, be he ID or Darwinist, like the popularist Dawkins.

I'm a Darwinian so far as it makes sense--which I believe is so far as we are talking about random mutations that serve or fail adaptation, and not if we are talking about all lifeform adaptation. The kind of reductionism that takes us to Dawkins' view of humans as the gene's taxicab makes no sense to me. Nor do I think it's science; it's more akin to journalistic misanthropy. There are obviously lifeform adaptations of intelligent design because that's what they are. For example, the behavior of the newly hatched chick that freezes or flees when the shadow of a predatory bird--and only such shadows--pass over head is not the product of random mutation. There haven't been that many generations of chicks to make such a mutation even remotely possible. Obviously, those so-called "instincts" are learned, genetically encoded and passed on through generations. We need not posit some deity as a designer; only that lifeforms are users of their experience, and that usage can never be reduced to its material bases. To cite an old battle cry, "Given the structure, we cannot predict the function." Watch a carpenter use his hammer. At times the hammer is a nail driver, a nail puller, a back scratcher, a vermin exterminator (here in the southwest where scorpions are often on the underside of lumber), or in his home, possibly, the hammer solves a domestic quarrel as a murder weapon. And these are not all that different from a chimp running a stick down into an anthill to collect and eat the ants. Where does Darwin fit into this adaptation? He doesn't and I don't think he intended to. It is not surprising that intelligent design should appear to be the case in life-form adaptations, and I think it is silly to deny it. Whether it's the intelligence of the life forms or of some god (or of Life qua God) is anyone's faith (guess). I don't think we need to debase politics any more than it already has been by the politicians. I don't think that the stereotypes of conservatism religious fundamentalism and deaf, blind and dumb to the intellect and science advances either science or the debate.


The above hissed in response by: DM [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 27, 2008 7:09 PM

The following hissed in response by: johnh

Bart Johnson:

If reproducible testing is a requirement to be considered 'science', how has evolution been tested?

Bart's question is a reasonable one. Here is a snippet from an article in the Washington Post, New Analyses Bolster Central Tenets of Evolution Theory:

"What makes evolution a scientific explanation is that it makes testable predictions," Lander said. "You only believe theories when they make non-obvious predictions that are confirmed by scientific evidence."

Lander's experiment tested a quirky prediction of evolutionary theory: that a harmful mutation is unlikely to persist if it is serious enough to reduce an individual's odds of leaving descendants by an amount that is greater than the number one divided by the population of that species.

The rule proved true not only for mice and chimps, Lander said. A new and still unpublished analysis of the canine genome has found that dogs, whose numbers have historically been greater than those of apes but smaller than for mice, have an intermediate number of harmful mutations -- again, just as evolution predicts.

"Evolution is a way of understanding the world that continues to hold up day after day to scientific tests," Lander said.

By contrast, said Alan Leshner, chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Intelligent Design offers nothing in the way of testable predictions.

I'd be interested to learn about similar non-obvious predictions made by ID theory and confirmed via observations.

The above hissed in response by: johnh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 28, 2008 2:49 AM

The following hissed in response by: eliXelx

YOU didn't like it! YOU disagreed with it!

Now the lizard-god of the forked tongue hath hissed his his verdict--It's lies, all lies, damned lies!

Did you HAVE to post this endless, tedious,inane garbage to tell us that?

Why do you have to bore us?

Re-examine your priorities, Daffydd, before you end up alone and friendless!

The above hissed in response by: eliXelx [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 28, 2008 11:49 AM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Bart Johnson:

Let me rephrase my question: Which observations are inconsistent with ID?

Tell me a claim specific to ID, and I'll tell you what observations are inconsistent with it.

DM:

There is no inherent relationship between conservatism--if that is what Stein is--and love of ID or antipathy towards evolution.

Of course there is: "Correlation" is a kind of relationship. The vast majority of those who reject evolution and embrace ID are conservatives -- in particular, religious conservatives.

At the same time, this religious freedom is maintained by secular law, law that is absolutely indifferent to a person's religion, be he ID or Darwinist, like the popularist Dawkins.

There is no religion called "Darwinism." As far as faith, Richard Dawkins is an atheist; his belief in evolutionary theory is not a religion, it's a rational conclusion drawn from science.

There are obviously lifeform adaptations of intelligent design because that's what they are.

"Intelligent Design" does not mean "design adaptations that are complex and work really well." By ID postulate, "Intelligent Design" means "adaptations that cannot have arisen naturally, because they are irreducibly complex, so must have been explicitly created by an aware, self-conscious, intelligent designer -- not by chance mutation and natural selection."

EliXelx:

Re-examine your priorities, Daffydd, before you end up alone and friendless!

We'll always have each other, eliXelx...

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 28, 2008 2:05 PM

The following hissed in response by: johnh

Daftdd:

Tell me a claim specific to ID, and I'll tell you what observations are inconsistent with it.

Hmmm.... In my opinion, the ID's scientific hurdle is that it is not falsifiable. There can be no reasonable test for a theory unless said theory is falsifiable. A theory is not falsifiable unless you can design a test that it can fail. (Not being falsifiable is the equivalent to being untestable.) A theory cannot be a scientific theory unless it can be tested.

The above hissed in response by: johnh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 28, 2008 4:08 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"Everybody is either on one side or the other. No Mugwumps allowed!"

I haven't seen the movie, but I intend to.

However, I have seen the trailer and listened to a couple of interviews of Stein. In them the contention is that anyone who deviates from the accepted (and totally unproven) hypotheses of Macro evolution, and especially if his work hints of belief in a Creator, is thrown out on his ear, regardless of the quality of his work.

If the movie remains faithful to what I have already seen, then what you say is totally false. He isn't against teaching evolution, or even having someone remain undecided. The issue he keeps stressing is that it is the neo-Darwinists don't permit either. They kick you out if you don't believe in the Macro-Evolutionary fantasy de jour, and they kick you out if you're a mugwump, because they can't tolerate the fact that I.D. doesn't bother you.

From your frantic and wildly irrational statements on the topic, I would say that it's you who has the monkey on your back. So, I would hope that when your rant is over, and you regain your sanity, that you don't forget to clean your cage.

Here are a few references for the more thoughtful, including scientists who were just too big to be "expelled."

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 28, 2008 6:50 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"Hmmm.... In my opinion, the ID's scientific hurdle is that it is not falsifiable." -- johnh

And Macro evolution IS??!!

If the macro-evolutionists (M.E.'s) could clearly demonstrate a mechanism for producing the complexity that's seen, in the time frame it had to occur during, then the I.D. arguments would become completely extraneous. There would be no discussion. But that is NOT the case.

The M.E.'s merely hypothesize that what the I.D.ers call "irreducible complexity" isn't really, and that it happened all by itself simply because it exists. That is ALL the "proof" they have, and it is most definitely NOT science. And, as if that's not enough, they then they go and call it a "theory" to deceive people into thinking that it has substance when it is nothing but pure fantasy - an hypothesis, at best.

(That doesn't mean that in the future someone might be able to succeed, but no one has yet. More importantly, they don't even know if it is possible, especially since the more they learn the less likely it looks. And, if that can't be done, then I.D. starts looking pretty darn good.)

Look, if nothing else, I.D.ers are asking important questions that evolutionists are ignoring, but MUST answer if they ever want to make an honest "theory" of their bag of dust and bones. It isn't now, because the processes they believe occurred by the vague rules they think were at work are (1)-unobservable, and (2)-untestable.

As my physics prof used to say, once you have framed the question properly, the problem practically answers itself. The I.D.ers are asking the questions that need to be answered. So, if they really had answers, then what are the evolutionists afraid of, already?

My money is on the group that isn't afraid to ask the questions, not the one that wants to pretend they have answers when they don't.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 28, 2008 7:36 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Yonason:

If the movie remains faithful to what I have already seen, then what you say is totally false.

An alternative way of saying that is, if what I say is not totally false, then the trailer did not do a good job of conveying what the movie actually depicts.

Here are a few references for the more thoughtful, including scientists who were just too big to be "expelled."

You didn't actually read these two posts, did you? Come on, 'fess up... otherwise you would have noticed my extensive references to and quotations of Dr. Francis Collins.

Don't now who that is? Well, next time try reading the post before attacking it in the comments!

If the macro-evolutionists (M.E.'s) could clearly demonstrate a mechanism for producing the complexity that's seen, in the time frame it had to occur during, then the I.D. arguments would become completely extraneous. There would be no discussion. But that is NOT the case.

The M.E.'s merely hypothesize that what the I.D.ers call "irreducible complexity" isn't really, and that it happened all by itself simply because it exists. That is ALL the "proof" they have, and it is most definitely NOT science.

Ah. And you've also never read a single biology text or popularization written by someone who is not a creationist or ID proponent. That too is pretty clear from this comment of yours.

Really, I've read a lot of creationist and ID literature; can't you bestir yourself to read some from the other side? I would start with the book I recommended by Collins -- but you'll have to actually break down and read this post and its companion to find out what it is...

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 3:15 AM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

Dafydd

And you've also never read a single biology text or popularization written by someone who is not a creationist or ID proponent.
I have a MA in Biophyisics from Johns Hopkins, which, incidentally, is where Dr. Lee Spetner happened to do his initial work that led him to conclude that M.E. is a load of crap - wish I could have been there then.
"...can't you bestir yourself to read some from the other side?"
I have, and Like Spetner, I also came to the conclusion it was a crock (not comparing myself to him in quality or quantity, just direction), and that was long before I became religious (Orthodox Jew, as himself).

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 6:50 AM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

Oh, and you do raise some seemingly valid concerns about the movie's methodology, but I won't know until I see the whole thing whether I agree, or not. Still, even if your criticism that I'm sympathetic with is valid, the movie may not be invalidated by that.

Also, ...

If the movie remains faithful to what I have already seen, then what you say is totally false.

An alternative way of saying that is, if what I say is not totally false, then the trailer did not do a good job of conveying what the movie actually depicts.

Actually, no.
Nice try, though.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 7:25 AM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

oops, contrapositive - point Dafydd

brain fog (2 hrs sleep) - Yeah, I know, no excuse.

But...

My assertion was that if the trailer and movie correspond, then your statement, and in that post I was specifically referring only to that one statement I quoted, was false. Actually, the way you stated it, it can only be either true or false, not some if it true and some of it false. "you are either on one side or the other." ("no mugwumps...." being just a restatement of that.) What struck me about that statement was that it didn't correspond at all to anything he says in either the trailer or the interviews he gave, in which he claimed to have no problem with teaching macro-evolution (micro is pretty well established) as long as scientists aren't discriminated against for their belief in G-d or for questioning any "theory" that is declared "true" based on circumstancial evidence, which really is all M.E. is. It's ok to speculate (just not on my carpet, please) as long as you don't pretend it is anything more than that. So, if it turns out that he really wants to silence the other sided, even though from what I've heard he says he doesn't, then sure, there's a real problem with that. As soon as the movie gets within 20 miles of where I am, I'll go see it and get back to you.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 9:26 AM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Yonason:

You say you are an expert in biology:

I have a MA in Biophyisics from Johns Hopkins, which, incidentally, is where Dr. Lee Spetner happened to do his initial work that led him to conclude that M.E. is a load of crap - wish I could have been there then.

And yet you earlier wrote this:

The M.E.'s merely hypothesize that what the I.D.ers call "irreducible complexity" isn't really, and that it happened all by itself simply because it exists. That is ALL the "proof" they have, and it is most definitely NOT science.

Now I find this even more disturbing that my original conclusion, that you just didn't know about recent research in this field. (Wait... when did you do your graduate work at JH?)

It's one thing not to have kept up with the field; maybe it's been a while since you last looked at this question. But if you are aware of this research, yet still chose to mischaracterize it as you did... well, that is something yet again.

It's one thing to dispute the findings, to say they concluded X, but I think the research actually shows Y. But it appears impossible to me to honestly claim that evolutionary biologists have not even tried to present new research on complexity -- that they "merely hypothesize" that complexity is not "irreducible," and declare their speculation to be proof.

That is an extraordinary accusation. It's like a trial lawyer claiming that during the O.J. Simpson criminal trial, the prosecution never even presented a case, that they just yelled and screamed that O.J. was guilty because it was obvious he was guilty.

This is such an outrageous misstatement of the research that I originally concluded you knew nothing about it. If in fact you are well aware of the recent research, yet you chose to caricature it that way... well, that raises much graver possibilities.

I really need a statement from you about why you wrote what you did:

  • Why you accused specific scientists of falsifying their research;
  • Accused the journals that published it of aiding and abetting the falsification;
  • And accused all the geneticists and biologists who read it of such scientific incompetence that they would mistake mindless assertion -- which is all you claim has been done -- for important research on the earlier survival advantages posed by some of the proteins that now help create the flagellum, or research on the evolution of the mammalian eye... research you now say was never done, in fact never even attempted. Faked, in other words.

If you cannot explain the huge discrepency between what you wrote -- assuming you wrote in full knowledge of this research -- and what what an eminent scientist like Francis Collins says the research itself actually claims, then there is no point to continuing this discussion.

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 1:22 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"Now I find this even more disturbing that my original conclusion, that you just didn't know about recent research in this field."

You do make a LOT of assumptions, don't you?

I merely mentioned my graduate degree to counter your assinine, and totally unfounded accusation, that I had never read a biology text, just because I feel that ID may have some merit. And now you assume I am cognizant of a recent development you think is important, but that doesn't have anything to do with any area I've ever worked in, let alone now that I'm retired. Then you extrapolate that to my certainly having been knowledgable enough about it to accuse me of lying in order to slander them!

You really are disturbed, all right.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 1:37 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

Oh, one final comment. Your "logic" is that of the evolutionists. If you haven't got the facts, no problem, just make them up. Perfect illustration of the "thought" process that goes into those "theories."

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 1:41 PM

The following hissed in response by: minimalist

Gee, yonason, just a short while ago you were confident enough in your "expertise" to declare that the research didn't exist. Now that you've been called on it, you whine that it's outside 'your area' and you shouldn't be held to account.

You can't have it both ways.

Still waiting for you to demonstrate any sort of depth of knowledge about biology at all. Still waiting on an operational definition of "biological information", or indeed anything more specific than the generic creationist blather.

The above hissed in response by: minimalist [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 2:23 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"Gee, yonason, just a short while ago you were confident enough in your "expertise" to declare that the research didn't exist"

Say what?

As Spetner says, if you make the claim, you must show the proof. I am not responsible for disproving what you don't supply. So your challenge is really meaningless unless, as I said above, you (royal) tell me what you are proving, and supply what you believe to be a "proof." I am not a mind-reader.

I am also not trying to pass myself off as an expert. What I AM confident of is the expertise of people like Spetner, and Dr. Arthur S. Lodge who are straight with their readers, and hence have earned my trust.

And as to what I mean by "information," see Spetner's work. He's an information scientist who got his degree from MIT. It was later when he was investigating evolution while at Hopkins that he applied what he knew to that field and found it wanting. For now, you can look at this section [#4, first col on right] of an exchange between him and another fellow with whom I disagree, but highly respect because of his integrity.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 5:00 PM

The following hissed in response by: minimalist

"As Spetner says, if you make the claim, you must show the proof. I am not responsible for disproving what you don't supply."

Nor is anyone here responsible for doing your homework for you. If you claim to be some sort of "scientist", then I presume you are capable of a simple PubMed search. You made an absurdly sweeping claim that

The M.E.'s merely hypothesize that what the I.D.ers call "irreducible complexity" isn't really, and that it happened all by itself simply because it exists. That is ALL the "proof" they have, and it is most definitely NOT science.

which is flatly false. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of published peer review papers addressing the origin of so-called "irreducible complexity". Behe flatly ignored them. He 'conveniently' left out facts such as the strong sequence homologies between blood clotting factors that strongly indicated a common origin. There is no excuse for that, or for you (except that you are obviously getting your only information filtered through creationist sources like Behe and Spetner).

Heck, it's not like "irreducible complexity" is a new idea -- Gunter Muller predicted it in 1918 -- as a consequence of evolution!

As for that so-called definition of "information", it's ridiculously nonspecific and nonquantifiable. For Spetner, it apparently boils down to "I know it when I see it." Not only that, he makes the claim that "Evolution A cannot be achieved by mutations that only degrade enzyme functionality." Like Gert, I have no quibble with this, because such mutations are not the only mutations.

Take the Apo A-1 "Milano" mutation. This mutation adds to the structure of a protein complex (allowing dimerization) and in fact vastly enhances the anti-atherosclerotic activity of Apo A-1, enhancing the cardiac health of the people with the mutation.

So, how much information was gained or lost with that mutation?

The above hissed in response by: minimalist [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 7:11 PM

The following hissed in response by: minimalist

What I AM confident of is the expertise of people like Spetner, and Dr. Arthur S. Lodge who are straight with their readers, and hence have earned my trust.

I think you mean "who have appealed to my prejudices." That webpage by Locke basically just regurgitates Behe, Spetner, Wells(!), and other crackpots.

Seriously, Wells? Wells is the bottom of the barrel as far as creationists go.

And how can you fairly say someone has "expertise" in an area when the guy is apparently a physicist, and the vast majority of his website is simply citing the ID crowd uncritically.

The above hissed in response by: minimalist [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 7:18 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

Ring species "prove" evolution?

They change too quickly. Dogs have been bred for thousands of years, and can still interbreed and they remain dogs. If left alone, they revert to wild type within a few generations. Who would say a Pekingese and a Mastiff are different species? Nonsense! So why are two butterflies with different color wings, or two salamanders with different strips but which can interbreed, considered more separate than dogs of wildly different morphologies? Within a couple of generations finch beaks can change from short to long, and then back again to adapt to their environment. But they remain finches. Calling that change "evolution" (Macro or type A or whatever allegedly supports a Darwinian style up-from-the-slime mechanism) is nonsense UNLESS the genetics is understood to agree with the evolution hypothesis. Just saying that the DNA has changed tells us nothing. If the animal has changed, then the DNA has. It's a tautology. Are any of them asking what the mechanism of that change is? Is most of the DNA already there? If so, how long has it been conserved? If not, how the hell can it change so fast in some species (without killing them), while not in others? Are any enzymes involved in the process of change? If so, what are they, and how are they activated? Is it triggered by factors in the environment? If so, what are they? Just waving the "natural selection" wand as an excuse for their precious ignorance isn't a valid response. If dogs all over the world are stable, why aren't finches warblers or newts? Is anyone asking these questions, and more importantly actually looking for the answers? Or are they content to see that someone has noticed that a critter has changed slightly, and then goes and reclassifies it as a new species based on that, all the while content at how clever they are to appreciate such wisdom?

When I ask for answers, none of the little geniuses here can address any of those questions, or come up with any others. They can't be bothered to actually think about the subject. They prefer to hurl insults, spout off code words they used to mechanically pass their exams (if they are even students at all) and refer those who disagree with them to websites they don't even understand, all the while thinking that is "scholarship."

Well, guess what! You are not scholars. You are not even close.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 29, 2008 10:50 PM

The following hissed in response by: minimalist

Who even brought up ring species in this thread??

And there we have it, folks: spank a creationist on Claim A, and they'll drop it to make Claim B. Address Claim B and they'll flee back to Claim A and whine that it hasn't been adequately addressed.

I'm not playing that game. Not anymore.

You've been shown for what you are: empty bluster, undefined terms, and false claims to authority. There's no need to beat a dead horse here, so I'm done with you.

Unless, of course, you want to stay on topic and address the scientific evidence for the evolution of "irreducible complexity" and "information", in a rigorous and straightforward fashion.

Hah!

The above hissed in response by: minimalist [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 8:10 AM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"Who even brought up ring species in this thread??" -- minimalist

ZZBlack at April 29, 2008 10:31 PM
JoshuaZ at April 29, 2008 8:08 PM

(and, yes, fit the second is just a continuation of fit the first, so it is part of this thread, though I do admit I had intended to put it there)

"..."microevolution" vs. "macroevolution" is a distinction that only creationists make." -- minimalist at April 30, 2008 7:59 AM

Ready, shoot, aim.

"I'm done with you"

Fine with me.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 9:41 AM

The following hissed in response by: minimalist

1.) That's the other thread, champ. Your inability to answer direct questions or defend the assertions you made in this thread (or the other one) is perpetually noted.

2.) Oh my god where did you find that link? Oh yeah, I posted it. Smashing detective work, Holmes.

Is Microevolution distinct from Macroevolution and vice versa? We concluded that this depends very much on what is meant by "distinct" and so forth. All phenomena of microevolution – evolution below the species level – must necessarily have some effect above the species level. But whether this is an additive effect or not depends on the complexity of the relationships between the two levels in each case. At least some macroevolution is the result of microevolutionary processes. So we are only asking now if all is.

So you pick one badly phrased sentence out of a paragraph that makes it clear that scientists DID invent the terms, but the distinction drawn by creationists is incorrect. And you think this proves...?

3.) Okay, I can't resist: "If left alone, they revert to wild type within a few generations." Exactly what do you mean by this? You think they revert to wolves in a few generations, or what?

I do not think you know what the term "wild type" even means. That's pretty comical.

The above hissed in response by: minimalist [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 11:10 AM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"This piece is long, so I will post it in two halves;..." -- Dafydd
So, yes it's the same topic, and even though I posted it here rather than there, it's not that big a deal.
"Those terms actually were used by biologists once, but not very much anymore -- not for decades, really." -- minimalist
But, in the link mini-me himself provided (last updated 2006) it says...
"Macroevolution is at least evolution at or above the level of speciation, but it remains an open debate among scientists whether or not it is solely the end product of microevolutionary processes or there is some other set of processes that causes higher level trends and patterns. It is this writer's opinion that macroevolutionary processes are just the vector sum of microevolutionary processes in conjunction with large scale changes in geology and the environment, but this is only one of several opinions held by specialists."
Riddle - How are an "open question/debate" and an "obsolete concept" the same? (Is it anything like ME doesn't = MA, except when it does? ... or 2 organisms that can interbreed are the same species, except when they aren't? ... or, ...well, you get the picture. Oh, wait, you don't. And that's the problem.)

Also, here's a definition of the term WILD TYPE, as I am using it with referance to feral dogs.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 12:55 PM

The following hissed in response by: minimalist

Uh, there are hundreds of dog breeds in the world, with distinct phenotypic and genotypic differences. And they can retain these characteristics through several generations. Any dog fancier can tell you "within a few generations" what breeds have gone into a mix -- bit of sheltie, bit of dobie, bit of whatever.

The idea that there is some sort of generic, or Platonic ideal of "dog" that can be achieved through interbreeding in just a few generations is silly. Any definition of "wild-type" dog that could encompass any of the thousands of possible mixings would necessarily have to encompass every single pure breed as well.

Which is how it really is, because "wild-type" as used by scientists (which you apparently still hilariously claim to be) use it to distinguish laboratory mutations from consensus sequences that take natural genetic polymorphism into account anyway.

In short, you used a silly and ultimately redundant way to restate "breeds of dog can interbreed." And keep in mind, I'm being generous in assuming you don't think that the act of going feral induces genetic changes that cause it to revert to some sort of primal ur-dog state. Your thinking is so muddled, it's hard to tell. You certainly don't use terms the way biologists do -- and wild-type is one of the most basic ones.

The above hissed in response by: minimalist [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 6:11 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

Feral dogs don't discriminate between breeds. "WHAT?! Your mother was a SCHNAUZER?! And we rubbed noses!! EEEeeeuuuu!!" isn't part of their world view.

General Biology, Reproduction, and Behavior -- Feral dogs are highly adaptable, social carnivores. Most are about the size of a coyote or slightly larger. Many breeds of dogs are capable of existing in the wild, but after a few generations of uncontrolled breeding, a generalized mongrel tends to develop. Often it has a German shepherd or husky-like appearance.
Sorry I don't have a better reference, but that's all I could find on it on short notice. I first heard about it on a NOVA special on dogs, or some other PBS show about them. And, no, I did not mean that they would be genetically the same as the original wild dog, just that they begin to revert when the selective pressure is removed.
"Your thinking is so muddled, it's hard to tell."
LOL. Funny, that's how I see you guys, especially when you use fuzzy terminology that can mean one thing one day and the opposite another the next. But with the term "wild-type" I'm only "wrong" because they don't (can't) fully revert (only a matter of degree, not an outright contradiction).

And the reason they can't completely revert is that a lot of the original genetic information has become lost in the breeding process [aside: note that for what Spetner prefers to call "evolution-A," rather than "Macro.E., can't work unless information is gained]. But the fact that they approach wild dogs morphologically and behaviorally seemed to justify using the term. Maybe this definition will help?

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 8:53 PM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

FINAL FOR TODAY, JUST FOR FUN...
_______________________________________

THE FIRST CELL, ...almost

The sign read, "ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING TONIGHT AT CELL CENTER - byoATP"

moderator - Thank you all for coming to this important meeting on our future. Out of concern for the rapid proliferation of protocells, and the threat they pose by consuming available nutrients, some of our members have suggested that our collective should increase it's chances of survival by improving its efficiency. Perhaps the most direct way to achieve this would be by coming up with ways of dismantling and canabalizing other protocells for our needs, rather than continuing to rely on simple diffusion of dwindling external resources. But in order to do this we would require a more central authority, and so I would like to propose that ...

Suddenly, before the proposal could even be presented, protesters began to raise objections.

protester1 - their protoplasm will be on your atoms!
protester2 - decrease consumption! decerease waste!
protester3 - nature is all!
protester4 - the nucleus would be an apartheid regime!
protester5 - down with neo-germs!
protester6 - what the @#%$# is ATP?

As the meeting's organizers were anxiously waiting for the chaos to dissipate on it's own, they didn't notice the approach of the cell which had resolved that very dispute barely eons before, (after it had undergone just a tad bit of reorganization) in favor of improved efficiency.

g'night

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at April 30, 2008 9:08 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Primal Ur-dogs! Where can I get one?

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at May 1, 2008 3:19 AM

The following hissed in response by: yonason

"I have just suffered through 90 minutes of being informed that not only was I a Nazi, but a Communist and a eugenicist."

Well, you may not be, but many are. Here is just a bit of information on how in-bed the Fascists Liberals are with Darwin, like it or not.

The founder of Planned Parenthood in her own words.

On blacks, immigrants and indigents:
"...human weeds,' 'reckless breeders,' 'spawning... human beings who never should have been born." Pivot of Civilization, referring to immigrants and poor people. "We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don't want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population…" Margaret Sanger's December 19, 1939 letter to Dr. Clarence Gamble - Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College: Massachusetts.

See, also, Planned Parenthood and Nazi Eugenics (and Maggie!)

And, don't miss ENGINEERING EVOLUTION: THE ALCHEMY OF EUGENICS

Why you take the connection so personally makes me wonder if you had ever thought about it. If you had, I would have assumed you would have said something like, "sure they are connected, but..." and then offer us some wisdom on why a philosophy rooted in materialistic atheism, and which bears such evil fruit, is otherwise justifiable, especially when no proof can be offered for it's cornerstone, abiogenesis. And don't let them slither out of defending that point. If it isn't true, than their whole deck of cards comes crashing down. If it is, then hey, there is no absolute morality and being "right" or "wrong" is just a matter of who's the strongest.

Here is as good a summary as any I've read.

"As long as you retain your atheistic belief, then your are considered smart. But relinquish that belief, even ever so slightly as [Anthony] Flew did, and then you’re washed up, senile, diminished, dead meat. So, the same man, same IQ, same scientific method, same mathematics and statistics, same evidence, who once was considered by Dawkins profound because of his atheism, now relinquishes his atheism, and, despite all of his other attributes and talents unchanged, is now portrayed by Dawkins as doddering and unintelligent. What gives? You can clearly see that in atheism’s dog-eat-dog world, all that matters is atheism. Godlessness. Aptitude or logic are not important. Only the presupposition and conclusion of atheism. Nothing else.

Therefore, our response to Dawkins should not be to try to sit down and reason with the man. He’ll never hear it."

So far, the evidence supports Stein's contention. Anyway, I promise that before I comment any more I will watch the whole movie.

The above hissed in response by: yonason [TypeKey Profile Page] at May 1, 2008 1:35 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

Yonason:

I know you're not a mathematician, but perhaps you can still answer this question. Assume that "All Nazis are social Darwinists." Which of the following does that assumption imply?

  1. All evolutionary biologists are Nazis;
  2. All Nazis are evolutionary biologists;
  3. All evolutionary biologists are social Darwinists;
  4. All evolutionary biologists are atheists;
  5. All evolutionary biologists are liberals;
  6. All liberals are Nazis;
  7. All evolutionary biologists are eugenicists;
  8. The great majority of evolutionary biologists are eugenicists;
  9. Most evolutionary biologists are eugenicists;
  10. Some evolutionary biologists are eugenicists;
  11. A few evolutionary biologists are eugenicists;
  12. At least one evolutionary biologist is a eugenicist.

Caution: This could be a trick question...

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at May 1, 2008 5:46 PM

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