Another Conservative Drinks From the Wrong Bottle

Granville Sewell has written a piece for Human Events, titled Intelligent Design Theories Gaining Steam in Scientific Circles.  As nearly as I can tell, he has gotten everything wrong.  Lets start with who Granville Sewell is.  He is a mathematics professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and a long-time supporter of intelligent design.

First, the title is indefensible.  Whether or not he, himself, came up with it, there is no evidence whatsoever that intelligent design is gaining ground in scientific circles.  In fact, there is contra-evidence.  There have been no intelligent design-based articles published in any of the mainstream journals and the only journal that is devoted to it, Bio-Complexity, has had one article and two critical reviews published for the entire year of 2013.  The article is co-written by two members of the editorial staff, to boot.

 He writes:

Darwin thought he could explain all of this apparent design through natural selection of random variations. In spite of the fact that there is no direct evidence that natural selection can explain anything other than very minor adaptations, his theory has gained widespread popularity in the scientific world, simply because no one can come up with a more plausible theory to explain evolution, other than intelligent design, which is dismissed by most scientists as “unscientific.”

This is ignorant nonsense with an arrogant tone attached to it.  The theory of evolution has gained widespread popularity because, as a theory, it is incredibly robust, with over 150 years of evidence to back it up, coming from the fields of biology, palaeontology, biogeography, microbiology, molecular biology, geology and others.  Every year, the evidence for evolution continues to pile up as we fill in more pieces of the jigsaw puzzle.  Witness recent discoveries that have shown that the first tetrapods evolved in the late Devonian in shallow seas, that feathers evolved and diversified in dinosaurs as a means of insulation before they evolved into a means of flight, or that the femur of Orrorin tugenensis shows transitional characteristics between late Miocene apes and the earliest hominins.  These are not minor adaptations.  They show selection and evolution across taxonomic levels and reflect predictions about what would be found in the fossil record IF evolution were true.

He writes: 

But, in recent years, as scientific research has continually revealed the astonishing dimensions of the complexity of life, especially at the microscopic level, support for Darwin’s implausible theory has continued to weaken, and since the publication in 1996 of Darwin’s Black Box by Lehigh University biochemist Michael Behe, a growing minority of scientists have concluded, with Behe, that there is no possible explanation for the complexity of life other than intelligent design.

Really?

Contrast the publication record of Bio-Complexity with the journal Evolution which, in 2013 alone, published 200 articles. Furthermore, Journal Citation Reports lists 29 journals that have "evolution" in the title. This does not even count those that publish articles on evolution, such as The American Journal of Physical Anthropology, Cell and Systematic Biology to name just a few.

With regard to the "growing minority of scientists,"  if he is referring to the "Dissent From Darwin" list put out by the Discovery Institute, that constitutes no evidence against evolution whatever.  When I analyzed the list a few years back, I found:

13 physicists, 1 plasma physicist, 10 biochemists, 24 chemists, 8 engineers, 7 mathematicians, 2 psychologists, 13 geneticists, and 5 medical doctors.

There are only five geologists on the list, and one lone palaeontologist on it. 

Like most ID writers such as David Berlinski, Cornelius Hunter and David Klinghoffer, he argues that there is dichotomy between accepting evolution and ID:

If you believe that a few fundamental, unintelligent forces of physics alone could have rearranged the basic particles of physics into Apple iPhones, you are probably not an ID proponent, even if you believe in God. But if you believe there must have been more than unintelligent forces at work somewhere, somehow, in the whole process: congratulations, you are one of us after all!

Here is one-dimensional, reductionistic thinking on display. it is either/or. There is no third option, the evolutionary creationist, who argues that the evidence for evolution of life, in all of its 3.5 billion year existence, can be explained as the work of a fantastically inventive and creative God, who took great joy in watching his creation unfold. It is also the thinking of someone who has taken no time to actually learn the basics of evolution and what the evidence is that supports it.  As long as this is the case, we will continue to be subjected to substandard prose such as this offering by Dr. Sewell. 

Gonzalez Won't Teach ID

Guillermo Gonzalez has made a public attestation that he will not teach intelligent design at Ball State University.  As the Muncie Star Press reports:

Gonzalez, who was hired by BSU this summer as an assistant professor in the department of physics and astronomy, is best known for his advocacy of intelligent design.

“As I communicated to members of the department during my interviews, I plan to continue my research on astrobiology and stellar astrophysics,” Gonzalez said in a statement issued this week.

The statement reported that he will not be discussing intelligent design in the classroom, and that he did not discuss intelligent design when he taught at Iowa State University, either

That may not be enough to soothe folks like Coyne and Harris but it is a huge step forward to placate the faculty at Ball State, I am sure. It is important for him to distance himself from the modern ID movement in this sense and for them to understand that. The anti-science comments made by the faculty at Iowa State are not without merit.

It is one thing for ID supporters to believe that the universe is created and guided by an intelligence. It is another for modern ID supporters to, having no theoretical constructs of their own, take pot shots at organized science in support of their ideas.  At least "mainstream" creationism, warts and all, has a testable framework. You can test the hypothesis "the earth was created six-thousand years ago." That's easy. Trying to test the hypothesis "God created the heavens and the earth," That's hard.  Add to that the fact that the public face of ID as purveyed by people like David Klinghoffer, Cornelius Hunter, William Dembski and David Berlinski is rabidly "anti-Darwinian," and you have a science credibility problem.  Gonzalez is wise to stay well away from that. 

Transgenerationally Acquired Resistance?

A new article by Rechavi et al, in the journal Cell (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2011.10.042) is reporting on research involving the introduction of a flockhouse virus into a nematode, which then triggered an immune response to suppress the virus. This response, apparently was then transmitted to its offspring in a non-Mendelian fashion. As the authors put it:

We have described here a series of genetic experiments that provide support for the existence of non-Mendelian, multigenerational inheritance of extrachromosomal information. This information is transmitted in the form of small RNAs, viRNAs, which are induced by an episode of viral replication and which are propagated through the germline in a non-template-dependent manner. Our results therefore support the Lamarckian concept of the inheritance of an acquired trait.

This will, no doubt, raise eyebrows and spawn a number of independent tests to confirm the results. Cornelius Hunter hopped on the bandwagon, writing:

This is of course reminiscent of the pre Darwin theory proposed by Jean Baptiste Larmarck that evolution occurs via traits developing not via random change but in response to need, and then the passing of these traits to later generations. Evolutionists harshly criticized, ridiculed and blackballed Larmarckism in the last century but now even they are finding it difficult to deny the accumulation of evidence.

Three things Hunter overlooks here is that Lamarck came up with his theory of acquired inheritance in absence of any other model out there to explain biological descent with modification, he was looking at large order traits such as appendage length, hair color and whatnot and that, despite some growing evidence for epigenetic evolution, there is still a vast amount of evidence for evolution based on the well-heeled processes of mutation, selection, drift and flow. It should, nonetheless, be interesting to see what comes of this.

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Cornelius Hunter and the Nature of Science

Cornelius Hunter has an interesting piece on his blog "Darwin's God." He waxes about the nature of science and how theory is constructed. Then he, inexplicably fails to apply these insights to the one theory he apparently hates so much: evolution. I once heard a comedian talk about someone that was so narrow-minded he could "look through a keyhole with both eyes." Here, the myopia is extreme. He writes:

A friend of mine likes to invest in stocks. He understands computer companies so he trades only those stocks. This limitation makes for a simple and straightforward investing strategy. Evolutionists also limit themselves. They investigate only those phenomena that are the result of strictly natural causes. This limitation makes for a simple and straightforward research strategy, though it does create a blind spot.

An investor who buys only computer company stocks can easily identify those companies. He can find companies that build computers, computer components, computer software, and so forth. But how can evolutionists know whether the causes of a past event are strictly natural? How can evolutionists decide which phenomena fall into their research program?

The answer is they can't. Evolutionists have no test for naturalism. They have no way of knowing whether a phenomenon is the result of strictly natural causes.

First, the analogy doesn't hold. His friend only invests in tech stocks. But he could invest in other stocks if he wanted to. Why? Because other stocks behave the same way that tech stocks do. They are all part of the sector of the economy known as the stock market, which follows known patterns. Evolution doesn't limit itself to naturalistic explanations any more than any other scientific discipline.

It soon becomes clear that, when using the term 'evolutionist,' Hunter means modern science in general, since he imputes this problem to all scientific disciplines. What seems lost on him is that this applies to his own area of research, biochemistry. Hunter's argument is that, because we have no test for naturalism, we have no way of testing whether an unsolved problem is simply that: an unsolved problem, or whether it is an unsolvable problem requiring a paradigm shift. He continues:

How can we decide when a scientific problem is not a research problem, but a paradigm problem? Naturalism has no criteria, no set of rules by which to make such a judgment. And no one wants to turn science's attention away from the future discoveries. In fact, phenomena that are more daunting for naturalism are also more tantalizing, for their explanations will be more surprising and dramatic. Not only does science have a blind spot, not knowing if it has stumbled upon an unsolvable problem, but there is a certain allure of such problems. No one knows what will be science's next "Neptune."

This helps to explain the hesitancy of scientists to admit that non natural phenomena might exist. In science we follow Descartes' prescription and approach everything using naturalistic explanations. It also helps to explain the tolerance for improbable theories. Historical theories, no matter how erroneous they may seem, could be just a "Neptune" away from falling into place.

All of this helps to explain how such an implausible theory as evolution persists. It is underwritten not only by theological conviction that natural causes must suffice, but by a philosophy of science that cannot abide any other possibility, no matter how implausible evolution becomes.

Notice the segue from "this is how science operates" to "in doing science we put up with some junk" to "evolution is junk." He provides no evidence for this, merely a blanket statement that evolution is not science. We are supposed to take it on face value that he is correct. In his musings on paradigm shifts, though, he has forgotten something: paradigm shifts only happen when a truly intractable problem affects central tenets of a theory. Such a paradigm shift occurred when Alfred Wegener proposed a solution to many unanswered questions in the form of continental drift. It was a radical change in the understanding of how land masses behaved. Unfortunately, evidence for this did not come to light until the 1950s, when plate tectonics was discovered.

The only major paradigm shift in evolution occurred in the early part of the twentieth century with the discovery of genes and how they functioned. Up until that time, Darwin and others knew that evolution was taking place, but had no understanding of exactly how. Since that time, evolutionary theory has only become more robust. To be sure, there have been changes in understanding regarding tempo and mode and the recent emphasis on evolutionary development, but there are extremely few naturalists or palaeontologists who are not convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that evolution is and has happened throughout the history of this planet. If Hunter wishes to relegate evolution to junk science, he will have to do better than this.

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Cornelius Hunter, Pseudogenes and the Nature of Science

Cornelius Hunter wrote a piece a few days ago that I had not had a chance to respond to. In this piece, Hunter argues (as he usually does) that there are hidden assumptions in all "Darwinian" scenarios. He begins:

Another school year is set to begin at high schools and colleges where the next round of biology students will be filled with evolutionary misinformation. At the center of this propaganda campaign are the many biology textbooks used to indoctrinate young minds with old dogma. These textbooks contain the latest evolutionary newspeak, but the underlying lies are no different.

In overall demeanor, Hunter is considerably more sarcastic and strident than most of the other folks at the DI and one has to wade through that to get at what he is trying to say. The topic of the day is shared pseudogenes, which, when found in two related organisms, are generally considered to be evidence of common ancestry since a progressive creation model would be forced to explain how two related organisms just happen, against all probability, to share the same genetics mistakes at exactly the same place in the genome. Hunter writes of this:

This claim, that such shared errors indicate, or demonstrate, or reveal common ancestry, is the result of an implicit truth claim which does not, and cannot, come from science. It is the claim that evolution and only evolution can explain such evidences. It is the equivalent of what is known as an IF-AND-ONLY-IF claim. Science makes IF-THEN statements (if evolution is true, then species with recent common ancestors should have similarities between them). IF-AND-ONLY-IF statements (if and only if evolution is true, then species with recent common ancestors should have similarities between them) cannot be known from science.

This is a peculiar misunderstanding of the scientific method. Science posits hypothetical questions to explain observed data. It also acts on the principles of parsimony and Occam's Razor. All other things being equal, the simplest explanation for any given phenomenon is likely to be the correct one. The idea that shared pseudogenes reflect common ancestry is not an IF-AND-ONLY-IF statement. It is simply the best explanation that we have. There might be other explanations for these data but, given the evidence from other areas of study (palaeobiology, palaentology, evolutionary development) common ancestry is the best explanation that we currently have. Hunter has failed to make this distinction.

He continues:

In their text The Living World (Fifth Edition, McGraw Hill, 2008) evolutionists George Johnson and Jonathan Losos rehearse the usual teachings. Students are told that “Microevolution Leads to Macroevolution” with the giraffe’s neck serving as the example of how small change is supposed to accumulate to the large-scale change evolution needs.

Of course this is a long-standing, well-known problem for evolution. Mechanisms for large-scale change are speculative for it does not appear merely to be the result of repeated rounds of microevolution. Johnson and Losos, of course, inform the student of none of this.

Hunter also fails to inform us that one particularly good reason to think that evolution is responsible for the giraffe's long neck is the placement of the laryngeal nerve. In all animals, the nerve runs from the brain down through the aortic loop to the throat. In simple organisms, this is roughly a straight line but as you go to more complex organisms, the path of this nerve gets longer. In humans, it runs more than a foot longer than it needs to be for it to be efficient. In giraffes, this nerve runs a full fifteen feet longer than would be efficient. Why does this happen? Because the nerve develops the same way embryologically in all organisms. It is during post natal development that the length appears. The nerve cannot restructure itself, so it goes along for the ride.

As far as the evidence for this is concerned, there is no problem for evolution, whatever. From the transitional fossil FAQ in Talk Origins, we have this:

Giraffes: Branched off from the deer just after Eumeryx. The first giraffids were Climacoceras (very earliest Miocene) and then Canthumeryx (also very early Miocene), then Paleomeryx (early Miocene), then Palaeotragus (early Miocene) a short-necked giraffid complete with short skin-covered horns. From here the giraffe lineage goes through Samotherium (late Miocene), another short-necked giraffe, and then split into Okapia (one species is still alive, the okapi, essentially a living Miocene short-necked giraffe), and Giraffa (Pliocene), the modern long-necked giraffe.

Along the way, the neck continues to get longer. What mechanism would Hunter propose to explain this? He presents none. Hunter continually castigates Johnson and Losos for providing what they see to be the best explanation for the evidence. He writes:

The apologists make a failed attempt to enlist the fossil record as powerful evidence for evolution, and end up with only the usual metaphysics. They write:

"If the theory of evolution is not correct, on the other hand, then such orderly change is not expected."

Very interesting. And how do evolutionists know so much? From where did Johnson and Losos learn such ultimate truths? If evolution is not correct then such orderly change is not expected? Tell us more.

Aside from the snark, Hunter fails to inform the reader what the "failed attempt" is since he provides no evidence to support his position. This is nothing more than name-calling. Since he won't provide the evidence, the quote from the book is completely out of context. He ends his post by writing:

But this is nothing new in evolutionary circles. Only evolutionists teach such a biased version of science.

This is simply incorrect. I can think of numerous postings on Answers in Genesis, for a start, that recycle the same, tired wrong statements about the fossil and geological records: no transitional fossils, evidence of a recent creation of the earth, evidence for a world-wide flood—arguments that do not stand up to even rudimentary scientific scrutiny. Any bias that is practiced by evolutionists pales in comparison to these canards. Furthermore, the Discovery Institute, itself, has not been above stretching the truth to the point of breaking (here, here, here, and here.)

More peculiar thinking from a Discovery Institute fellow.


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