1. Meeting students and faculty at Biola University
So the hyperbolic description of the event claims that the organizers "assembled a powerful group of credentialed critics of Meyer’s “Intelligent Design” position to let him have it with both barrels." That "group" consisted of myself and Art Hunt, a professor at the University of Kentucky and expert on RNA processing and genomics in plants. One of our major goals in participating in the show was to have the chance to meet each other (we have similar interests in undergraduate science education and in the control of gene expression), and we spent quality time discussing grant proposals and collaborative opportunities. In addition, Art had volunteered to give a lecture to students at Biola on Friday before the party on Friday night. I tagged along and enjoyed his lecture on small RNAs, given to an overstuffed room full of students and some faculty. We then enjoyed lunch with two smart and friendly young Biola science profs. My only regret from the trip is that it was Art and not me who had made this proposal (to visit the campus and meet students and faculty). Biola is a member of the CCCU, a consortium that includes Calvin, and although I decry Biola's eager support for the vacuous agenda of the Discovery Institute, I see its faculty as colleagues and potential collaborators in Christian higher education. Props to Art for his outreach and to Biola's faculty for hospitality. Nice place!
2. Meeting Paul Nelson
Only for a minute, but Paul is close by (in Chicago) and claims to want me to write more here on the blog. Nice guy. I've long wanted to propose some collaborative work (perhaps on protein evolution) with some young-earth creationist scientists. He'll hear from me soon.
3. The Event: Preliminaries and Meyer's talk
So the big show started with some super-slick introductory stuff and then a preview of a new DVD called "Darwin's Dilemma," from the same outfit that brought us other ID filmreels from the culture-war front. It's about the Cambrian Explosion and I thoroughly enjoyed the animated depictions of Anomalocaris with all the loud scary music.
The whole thing was projected as it was being broadcast, with fancy graphics already added (e.g., where to Twitter your questions). Really slick. I mean, I'm a biologist wearing jeans and boots. I didn't even redo my hair or buff my earring. Sigh.
Meyer's talk was exactly what I expected, which is sad. Because I haven't blogged on the key chapters yet, I can't explain in detail how the book ends up making its case, but here's the basic idea.
- DNA and genetic control systems exhibit an ill-defined trait called "specified complexity." Basically, DNA contains coded information which bears similarity to computer programs and other suitably impressive systems.
- Origin-of-life theories have not explained the origins of genetic information systems.
- But when we look, today, at things that contain coded information which bears similarity to computer programs, we can always trace the origins of such things to a mind. A programmer, for example.
- Since we have no complete explanation for the origin of genetic information systems, and we know that minds can and do create "specified complexity," we can and should conclude that a mind directed the development of such systems (at least). In other words, we should embrace intelligent design.
Now, I probably shouldn't have to point out the weakness in this line of argument. Namely, the second assertion is seriously misleading. It's true, undoubtedly, but it's misleading. It may be the case that we don't have a complete account of the origin of life, and it's certainly true that we don't have a complete account of the origin of genetic information control systems. But such an admission implies nothing about whether such an account is possible or even likely, and that's where Meyer would have to do his philosophical work in order to help his case. In other words, to assert that "we haven't explained X" is most assuredly not to assert that "we cannot explain X." Think about it: there would be no such thing as science if this were the case. Scientists are all about asserting that "we haven't explained X," then proposing a way to change that.
Anyway, Meyer spent a lot of time explaining why it matters that certain origin-of-life postulates are ineffective, but he never bothered to show that the current theories are in fact ineffective. What he did instead was attack a strawman (random flying-together of biological structures) at length, then erect a second one (a crude caricature of self-organization ideas) and attack it more briefly. Current thought focuses on the RNA World, and Meyer completely omitted any discussion of it. He meant to mislead the audience, and I think he was successful.
I find it both sad and alarming that the audience was willing to laugh out loud at serious scientific ideas that have been proposed by intelligent and informed scientists and thinkers. As I'll relate in the next post on the Q&A session that followed Meyer's talk, we had little time to address errors and omissions by Meyer, in the book and in the lecture. But here's what I would have said to the audience if I'd had the time.
Anyway, Meyer spent a lot of time explaining why it matters that certain origin-of-life postulates are ineffective, but he never bothered to show that the current theories are in fact ineffective. What he did instead was attack a strawman (random flying-together of biological structures) at length, then erect a second one (a crude caricature of self-organization ideas) and attack it more briefly. Current thought focuses on the RNA World, and Meyer completely omitted any discussion of it. He meant to mislead the audience, and I think he was successful.
I find it both sad and alarming that the audience was willing to laugh out loud at serious scientific ideas that have been proposed by intelligent and informed scientists and thinkers. As I'll relate in the next post on the Q&A session that followed Meyer's talk, we had little time to address errors and omissions by Meyer, in the book and in the lecture. But here's what I would have said to the audience if I'd had the time.
You were just induced to laugh scornfully at a set of ideas that have been seriously entertained by scientists and other theorists over the past few decades. Specifically, you were told that this set of ideas was little more than a textbook example of question-begging, exhibiting errors so basic that only a fool would seriously entertain the notions that were proposed. Dr. Meyer induced you to conclude that scientists who think about the origin of life are mostly idiots.Next posts, Parts II and III, will deal with the Q&A session, first with the exchange that the DI is trumpeting as some kind of weird concession on my part and then with the revealing behavior of Steve Meyer when asked questions about the scientific predictions and ideas that have been spawned by ID.
You are unwise to think that such ideas are so easily dismissed or that the people who study origins are so easily written off. Consider how unwise it would be for you to wander into any other area of serious technical inquiry and laugh at the conclusions of its practitioners. Consider how foolish it would be for you to assume that the ideas of an entire scientific discipline can be discredited with a single paragraph of rhetoric from a speaker without expertise in that discipline. The point, friends, is not that you should believe every scientific theory, or accept every scientific pronouncement, merely on the basis of the expertise of the speaker. The point is that you should be suspicious – very suspicious – of someone who tries to convince you that such theories and claims can be idly and effortlessly dismissed. Dr. Meyer took advantage of you tonight, and there are at least three people in this gymnasium who know that.
52 comments:
"In other words, to assert that "we haven't explained X" is most assuredly not to assert that "we cannot explain X." Think about it: there would be no such thing as science if this were the case."
If I were having a public dialogue with an ID critic about abiogenesis, this is exactly the kind of statement I would look for. Are we supposed to stay the course with unintelligent mechanisms for the origin of life even after various hypotheses are tried and failed? And if this is in fact the case, at what point do we decide that material causes to the OoL have no plausible efficacy?
If what you're saying is true, then it doesn't sound like the explanations put forth by critics of Meyer are falsifiable.
"Scientists are all about asserting that "we haven't explained X," then proposing a way to change that."
I'm pretty sure this was the entire purpose of Meyers book.
"What he did instead was attack a strawman (random flying-together of biological structures) at length, then erect a second one (a crude caricature of self-organization ideas) and attack it more briefly."
I've asked this before, but didn't get a response. To the best of my knowledge the comment wasn't even approved yet as of this writing. Are you suggesting that selection can somehow operate under pre-biotic conditions when no cell yet exists to replicate and become subjected to selective processes?
"Current thought focuses on the RNA World, and Meyer completely omitted any discussion of it."
But he did devote 30 or so pages to it in his book. In particular one thing worth emphasizing is that chemical constituents of RNA (carbon sugars, phosphate backbone, 4 nucleic acids) all form under completely different circumstances, so either they don't form at all, or they materialize too far away for them to consolidate into anything useful.
I hear different criticisms towards Meyer from people who do acknowledge that he covers the RNA world. They insist that there is an even MORE recent hypothesis that starts with simpler metabolic cycles. So that tells me there isn't even a consensus on what the latest hypothesis is for abiogenesis.
"The point is that you should be suspicious – very suspicious – of someone who tries to convince you that such theories and claims can be idly and effortlessly dismissed."
Steve, you are begging to have others accuse you of the same thing.
But nonetheless I'm glad to see that you've actually took some time to understand the side you are critiquing, especially with your posts on EoE. At least you put people in proper context, which is more than what many can say about people such as Ken Miller.
Jeff Snipes:
Are we supposed to stay the course with unintelligent mechanisms for the origin of life even after various hypotheses are tried and failed?
If what you're saying is true, then it doesn't sound like the explanations put forth by [actual scientists] are falsifiable.
Care to reconcile these two ideas? If you admit that "various Ool hypotheses have tried and failed" within the scientific community, then you also admit that it is baseless to accuse scientists of putting forth unfalsifiable ideas.
Besides, this is actually a flaw that ID suffers from. As philosopher of science Eliot Sober explains in this paper, to point at something and call it designed is a metaphysical claim that can't be tested in a scientifically meaningful way.
That doesn't necessarily mean a claim of design is necessarily untrue. Just that it can't ever be taken as a serious competitor to genuinely scientific theory.
"If you admit that "various Ool hypotheses have tried and failed" within the scientific community, then you also admit that it is baseless to accuse scientists of putting forth unfalsifiable ideas."
Frankly, I don't see anything to reconcile here. You're statement pretty much sums up a key point brought up in "The Mystery of Life's Origin" decades ago: You can never falsify an unintelligent cause to the origin of life because when one explanation fails, they will simply insist we need more time, different conditions, or a new approach altogether. And the constant resort to new crapshoot proposals means we cannot in principle falsify the claim that unintelligent causes played a role in the origin of life.
I still haven't gotten an answer to my main question: When do we know we've exhausted all potential possibilities for a strictly non-telic origin of life and can thus move on to explanations which invoke intelligent causes? If I'm right, there is no answer to this question.
"Besides, this is actually a flaw that ID suffers from."
Actually, that would be simple to do. Just simulate early earth conditions and show it's possible for life to form without humans intervening in the process itself. It's okay to use intelligence to recreate the setting for abiogenesis so long as we don't interfere with the process from that point on, otherwise we'd be introducing foresight to the situation.
Upon reading the paper you mention, it appears that the whole rationale the author has against rejecting this point is that in principle it is still possible for design to be in the picture, therefore it isn't falsifiable at all.
But saying something is possible is still different from saying it is the most plausible explanation. If we must reject a scientific theory from consideration because we can never prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that an it is false (as opposed to unlikely), then why stop there? It is always possible that we are brains in a vat because we really don't have much of anything to disprove that. Does this mean we cannot rule it out as a reliable explanation? I doubt it.
And the constant resort to new crapshoot proposals means we cannot in principle falsify the claim that unintelligent causes played a role in the origin of life.
You're half right. If scientists simply said "it happened by chance and necessity" and walked away, without arguing the actual mechanism by which life originated, that WOULD be totally unfalsifiable. But that is NOT what scientists do. Rather, they hypothesize what specific mechanism and methodology by which life may have originated, and specific mechanisms ARE falsifiable. And since ID doesn't even propose a mechanism (to quote Dembski: "ID is not a mechanistic theory"), it can't even in principle be meaningful, fruitful science.
Actually, that would be simple to do. Just simulate early earth conditions and show it's possible for life to form without humans intervening in the process itself.
How exactly would showing that life could form without intelligent intervention at a certain point in the past falsify the notion that intelligence was necessarily involved?
To use an example from the Sober article I linked to (which I highly recommend you actually read), if someone "proved" that a newspaper was produced sans intelligence because it was produced by a completely unintelligent printing press, would that "falsify" the ID hypothesis in this case? Or do you think you would be rational to insist that the intelligence acted at a causally prior time than the press?
Similarly, if I simulated early Earth conditions and out came a wiggling a molecule that metabolized and self replicated, would that really "falsify" the ID hypothesis? Or would it still be possible that intelligent designer simply employed these early Earth conditions to make life?
If you would hold onto the ID explanation in the former example but abandon it in the latter, what exactly is the meaningful distinction? As far as you know, (to use an SAT style analogy) "early Earth conditions" could be to "life" as "printing press" is to "newspaper."
In the newspaper example, there is literally no discovered facts that could prove ID wrong, only facts that could prove it right. The same goes for the abiogenesis example.
That's fine if you recognize that "it's designed" is a metaphysical explanation, not a meaningfully scientific one. But you'll run into some serious problems when you start confusing it with actual science.
Once again, thank you Steve for what you do. In your visit to Biola I thought about Jack Bauer in the recent episode of 24 in which he dons body armor to face the Secret Service. Bauer knows he's going in, and it's going to hurt. Same with you, my friend, commiserations on the bruises!
Logan, you are absolutely right about a hypothetical "early earth" experiment. It would prove nothing. Suppose a replicating chemical reaction took hold but not using the chemicals we use. Would that "disprove" our timeline of abiogenesis? No, it would not.
The task for ID is to provide a positive argument for an entity to have created life on early Earth and/or to have manipulated it over time.
ID has not done that. Not even close. ID is not a scientific enterprise. It's origins as documented by Barbara Forrest are through biblical creationists. That's where ID is rooted and that's where it remains.
Meyer fools nobody when he proclaims that ID neither characterizes nor defines the designer. Rubbish! It's in the title: INTELLIGENT design.
1. There is a designer.
2. It's intelligent.
How does Meyer know either of those facts? Well, obviously he doesn't. It's all made up.
No, design is not the default answer if Science can't answer a specific question.
Just last week if you asked the question, "Can a dead organism be brought back to life?" the answer would have been, "No."
This week Craig Venter's group announced that not only can a dead organism be brought back to life but it could be programmed to "turn itself" into another organism.
Therefore, what cannot be explained today does not lead to a supernatural explanation by default and, ergo, Stephen Meyer's entire thesis is null and void.
"Rather, they hypothesize what specific mechanism and methodology by which life may have originated, and specific mechanisms ARE falsifiable."
That would be the case if people did not resort to switching to a new proposal every time an old one is shown to fail.
You still haven't answered the question I posed earlier: When do we know for sure that we've exhausted all possibilities for the origin of live which involve no intelligence in the process whatsoever and can thus move on to new modes of explanation?
"And since ID doesn't even propose a mechanism (to quote Dembski: "ID is not a mechanistic theory"), it can't even in principle be meaningful, fruitful science."
Can you define for me what constitutes a "mechanism" in science? If this discussion turns out like any others I've had before then there either is no answer for this, or it turns out to be a term that does nothing more than define an explanation out of existence rather that proving it inferior.
"How exactly would showing that life could form without intelligent intervention at a certain point in the past falsify the notion that intelligence was necessarily involved?"
I think you've pretty much answered your own question there. If we show that life can form without intelligent intervention, then it falsifies the notion that Intelligence was necessarily involved. You're question pretty much speaks for itself, showing that intelligence is unnecessary falsifies the notion that it is necessary, plain and simple.
"To use an example from the Sober article I linked to (which I highly recommend you actually read)"
Don't worry, I've read it and the passage you highlight is similar to what "Wesley R. Elsberry" once argued here: http://www.talkreason.org/articles/wre_id_proxy.cfm
What you're referring to when agency sets up an initial set of conditions but does not intervene in the design of anything that results is known as front-loading. For instance, if Dean Kenyon's old hypothesis of chemical attraction between amino acids (Biochemical Predestination) were true, it would qualify as front-loading.
You argue (and rightly so) that this means that ID as a whole would not be falsified if it were shown that properties already exist within various elements that lead to the formation of life without repeated intelligent intervention.
My response is that this is no different than anything else in science we treat as an acceptable explanation of the facts at hand. For example, when it was found that there isn't a smooth transition between all fossil forms, Stephen Jay Gould proposed (as he had every right to do) that punctuated equilibrium can explain the gaps.
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC201_1.html
As the link above shows, there isn't anything wrong with tweaking a theory to fit existing facts instead of ditching it altogether. So I can't see why ID should be forbidden from the same practice.
"In the newspaper example, there is literally no discovered facts that could prove ID wrong, only facts that could prove it right.
Science isn't about showing something is wrong altogether; any theory can be falsified by showing that it is unnecessary. By your standard we cannot eliminate the existence of the flying spaghetti monster since it could still in principle exist no matter what tests we run (if any). But that doesn't mean we cannot falsify it from being the best explanation available. All one needs to do is show that it is unnecessary.
"The same goes for the abiogenesis example."
See the above point, you don't need absolute 100% indisputable proof against ID to falsify it; you need only show that it is not as sufficient as other theories in explaining a feature in question.
"The task for ID is to provide a positive argument for an entity to have created life on early Earth and/or to have manipulated it over time."
Would you care to explain to me what would constitute positive evidence?
"ID has not done that. Not even close. ID is not a scientific enterprise. It's origins as documented by Barbara Forrest are through biblical creationists. That's where ID is rooted and that's where it remains."
Was Fred Hoyle a biblical creationist? How about Michael Polanyi? Barbara Forrest will need to do more than sheer guilt by association if she wants to demonstrate ID is false. If ID in fact still remains a biblical enterprise then I would like to know why they reject starting with any sacred text to draw conclusions.
"1. There is a designer.
2. It's intelligent.
How does Meyer know either of those facts? Well, obviously he doesn't. It's all made up."
If it's capable of getting life started then I think that at least gives it the qualification of having some form of intelligence in it's abilities.
"Therefore, what cannot be explained today does not lead to a supernatural explanation by default and, ergo, Stephen Meyer's entire thesis is null and void."
I agree it doesn't lead to supernatural explanation. But once again, you seem to have highlighted the same problem I have yet to get an answer for: When do we know we've exhausted all possible explanations for the origin of life that don't invoke intelligence?
And you, Jeff, miss the point again. ANY scientific proposition rests on its own merits, not as the default of failed cases.
Provide the case for intelligence. Produce the intelligence, propose a mechanism and demonstrate, objectively and repeatably, how it works. If you can't do that ID is screwed. Simple.
Meyer says there's design. Fine, what's the objective definition of "design" and what's the metric of design? How can I detect design? Is my cat's whisker designed? Is my avocado tree designed? What measurement can I apply to determine that simple fact?
Then, what designed it and when and how? Why is "it" intelligent? Is my cat intelligent? Compared to what?
I'm not just jacking with you, Jeff, I'm asking you the kinds of questions that were asked of me when I earned my PhD. Why should intelligent design be held to a lesser standard? I couldn't say "Well, if all other analyses fail than my analysis is correct by default."
Lay it on me, man.
That would be the case if people did not resort to switching to a new proposal every time an old one is shown to fail.
That's a virtue of science, not a defect. Of course scientists switch to a new hypothesis once an old one has been shown to be untenable! What would you rather them do, stick to an explanation that is fatally flawed? The scientific communities willingness to abandon a hypothesis once it has been shown to be too problematic, no matter how much time or effort has been poured into it (as you apparently recognize) is a testament to how undogmatic they are.
When do we know for sure that we've exhausted all possibilities for the origin of live which involve no intelligence in the process whatsoever and can thus move on to new modes of explanation?
The question you are asking is essentially "When should scientists give up on the possibility that real science will provide meaningful answers to problems and step outside of science to do so."
The answers is: hopefully never. Instead, hopefully scientists will always do science.
Once upon a time, people had an ID theory of disease. That is they thought that intelligent demons designed illnesses within humans.
Physicians later abandoned the ID theory of disease for humorism, which while slightly more scientific, is still demonstrably wrong. Physicians generally held to this "non telic" theory of disease for centuries until the germ theory (another "non telic" theory) was confirmed in the 19th century.
What you are doing is essentially the same as the medieval doctor who says "The humor theory of disease has failed! And it has failed because it attributes natural cases to what must surely be the result of intelligent designers. At what point will you stop believing that natural causes cause natural events and simply give into the idea that design is the best explanation!"
Well, in the case of both that doctor and you, hopefully never. Had we listened to him, scientists would have never uncovered the germ theory. Similarly, should we listen to you, it is the end of science as we understand it in a post-Enlightement sense.
Can you define for me what constitutes a "mechanism" in science?
A step by step causal process. At Dembski admitted, ID can't even provide this in theory.
If we show that life can form without intelligent intervention, then it falsifies the notion that Intelligence was necessarily involved.
No, it doesn't. All it shows is that an intelligent designer wasn't involved AT THAT SPECIFIC POINT IN TIME. It still remains a possibility that an intelligent designer acted in a manner causally prior, or that he used the discovered "unintelligent" mechanisms to achieve it's goals.
What you're referring to when agency sets up an initial set of conditions but does not intervene in the design of anything that results is known as front-loading.
Right. And that kind of belief in "front loading" is wholly metaphysical and is not scientifically testable. In fact, theistic evolutionists would be happy to agree with the idea that an intelligent designer "set things up" so that we could be here, and while they doing it they would not conflict with any mainstream science.
You argue (and rightly so) that this means that ID as a whole would not be falsified if it were shown that properties already exist within various elements that lead to the formation of life without repeated intelligent intervention.
Then there is nothing left to discuss, and we can rightly agree that ID has no place at the scientific table and cannot be treated as a competitor to scientific hypotheses.
My response is that this is no different than anything else in science we treat as an acceptable explanation of the facts at hand.
Your response, besides being false and misguided, is a textbook tu quoque fallacy, and therefore doesn't erase your concession that ID isn't ultimately falsifiable.
As the link above shows, there isn't anything wrong with tweaking a theory to fit existing facts instead of ditching it altogether.
That's true, but you fail to make a distinction between "My theory is the best explanation of the facts, but must be changed given this new information that lends new insight into how the theory operates" and "My theory cannot be shown to be false, no matter what facts you throw at it."
To use an extreme example, if a half monkey half fish was discovered, that fact is CLEARLY incompatible with evolutionary theory, and it should be therefore abandoned.
However, no amount of discoveries into the naturalistic origins of life could disprove ID, as proponents could also back into the "front loading" explanation that you offered earlier.
"Provide the case for intelligence. Produce the intelligence, propose a mechanism and demonstrate, objectively and repeatably, how it works. If you can't do that ID is screwed. Simple."
So we have to SEE an agent or event in question to conclude that it exists or happened? Fine, in that case why stop there? We could just as easily rule out all sorts of other facts in science for the same reason. Do we need to observe or repeat the big bang in order for it to happen? Must we provide a mechanism for gravity (other than what it's effect is) or quantum mechanics for that matter?
"Meyer says there's design. Fine, what's the objective definition of "design" and what's the metric of design?"
Design as I understand it consist of multiple constituents in a system which produce an epiphenomenal function or effect greater than what the constituents by themselves cannot do. The function is predictable and can clearly serve a purpose outside of the context of the system itself. Design in bits is my preferred metric, but on the other hand, what would be a proper metric for evolution?
"How can I detect design?"
Same methodology as with anything else. Is this comment designed? How can you tell? I think you just might be capable of answering your own questions.
"Then, what designed it and when and how? Why is "it" intelligent?"
Design is not detected by reference to knowledge of the source or process of how it came to be. Those questions are for a different topic.
"Is my cat intelligent? Compared to what?"
Huh???
"I'm not just jacking with you, Jeff, I'm asking you the kinds of questions that were asked of me when I earned my PhD. Why should intelligent design be held to a lesser standard? I couldn't say "Well, if all other analyses fail than my analysis is correct by default."
Lay it on me, man."
I'm glad to see most fierce critics of ID who parade their PhD credentials (or at least claim to have something of that sort) are coming of age. Spending a few days of immersing myself in Kuhnian thought has convinced me that it's much easier to wait till the current consensus is six feet under instead of persuading them to see the light.
"The question you are asking is essentially "When should scientists give up on the possibility that real science will provide meaningful answers to problems and step outside of science to do so."
The answers is: hopefully never. Instead, hopefully scientists will always do science."
So you agree that you cannot falsify the claim that nature by itself was capable of getting life started without intelligent influence. I think we now share common ground on this one.
"Once upon a time, people had an ID theory of disease. That is they thought that intelligent demons designed illnesses within humans."
Wait a sec, I thought ID didn't start until after Edwards? Well, once again I can see progress on this issue. But speaking of ID and disease, here's some food for thought: http://www.researchid.org/wiki/Even_more_fast_facts_on_ID
Just skim down to where it says:
"Intelligent design helps fight diseases, and could help us fight terrorism at the same time."
"What you are doing is essentially the same as the medieval doctor who says "The humor theory of disease has failed!"
Straw man, why would I claim a demon-based origin to disease from the perspective of ID?
"Had we listened to him, scientists would have never uncovered the germ theory."
Don't get me started on Louis Pasteur's views on the subject...
"A step by step causal process. At Dembski admitted, ID can't even provide this in theory."
So how detailed does this step-by-step process have to be? Do we need this to conclude design for anything else in our daily lives?
"It still remains a possibility that an intelligent designer acted in a manner causally prior, or that he used the discovered "unintelligent" mechanisms to achieve it's goals."
Since ID's central claim is that design is both real and detectable, I think I can rest assured that showing the hypothesis is unnecessary is enough to rule it out of scientific explanation.
"Right. And that kind of belief in "front loading" is wholly metaphysical and is not scientifically testable."
Not at all, for example one could see if properties exist which make the formation of proteins (by physical attraction alone, but not repeated intervention) more probabilistic than a blind search. Front-loading is really not that different than a software application executing instructions it already has.
"Your response, besides being false and misguided, is a textbook tu quoque fallacy, and therefore doesn't erase your concession that ID isn't ultimately falsifiable."
So this leads me to think that your viewpoint is that neither theory is "scientific," am I correct to make that assumption?
"To use an extreme example, if a half monkey half fish was discovered, that fact is CLEARLY incompatible with evolutionary theory, and it should be therefore abandoned."
Nothing risky about that at all. Is there a set criterion for what sorts of living systems cannot exist?
"However, no amount of discoveries into the naturalistic origins of life could disprove ID, as proponents could also back into the "front loading" explanation that you offered earlier."
Front-loading is easily falsifiable by showing that the chemical traits that IDers claim were front-loaded operate no differently than a blind search, or that these chemical properties arise naturally without any need for intelligence in their materialization.
Forgot to mention:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque#Legitimate_use
Paul Nelson does seem a to be a likeable guy. I hope I get to meet him, someday.
So you agree that you cannot falsify the claim that nature by itself was capable of getting life started without intelligent influence
I think agreed to that earlier. "It was caused by nature" besides not being falsifiable, is a boring and miserably general theory that doesn't lend itself to scientific research in the slightest, whether you are talking about the origin of life or the origin of snot.
Fortunately, I'm glad that no real scientists simply say "it was caused by nature" and leave it at that. Rather, get into specifics of HOW life may have been caused, providing us with testable hypothesis that can lend itself to fruitful lines of research.
And that is a major distinction between what mainstream scientists do and what "ID theorists" do.
Straw man, why would I claim a demon-based origin to disease from the perspective of ID?
I never did. I'm simply illustrating how disastrous your line of thinking ("There are no unproblematic theories of OOL, therefore we should give up") would be if prior scientists used it ("There are no unproblematic theories of disease, therefore we should give up").
To quote Neil deGrasse Tyson:
"Science is a philosophy of discovery. Intelligent design is a philosophy of ignorance. You cannot build a program of discovery on the assumption that nobody is smart enough to figure out the answer to a problem."
So how detailed does this step-by-step process have to be?
Detailed enough to be testable.
Do we need this to conclude design for anything else in our daily lives?
Of course not. As a said earlier, the conclusion of design is wholly metaphysical, and therefore is not subject to the rigors of a scientific explanation.
Not at all, for example one could see if properties exist which make the formation of proteins (by physical attraction alone, but not repeated intervention) more probabilistic than a blind search.
Nope. Because IDers could simply claim that the the search isn't actually "blind" because the physical processes that do the "searching" were set by the intelligent designer.
You see, it's always possible the designer is operating one step back in the causal chain.
So this leads me to think that your viewpoint is that neither theory is "scientific," am I correct to make that assumption?
What do you mean, "neither theory"? "Chance" vs. "Design" or "Natural processes" vs. "design" aren't competing scientific theories, contrary to the way IDers have it set up in their head. They are metaphysical explanations, and by themselves can't be used as an "end point" as a scientific explanation for anything we see in nature.
Honestly, can you name one scientist who pointed at something and said "THAT HAPPENED BY NATURAL PROCESSES," then walked away, without getting any more specific than that? Is there any scientific theory that horribly vague?
Front-loading is easily falsifiable by showing that the chemical traits were front-loaded operate no differently than a blind search, or that these chemical properties arise naturally without any need for intelligence in their materialization.
Like I said earlier, the IDer could simply claim that the designer set up physics, which is causally prior to chemistry, with the complex specified information. And they could keep playing that game until T=0 in the casual chain.
Thanks for hanging in here, Jeff!
Here is where you fall into the bullshit trap. You wrote
Design as I understand it consist of multiple constituents in a system which produce an epiphenomenal function or effect greater than what the constituents by themselves cannot do. The function is predictable and can clearly serve a purpose outside of the context of the system itself. Design in bits is my preferred metric, but on the other hand, what would be a proper metric for evolution?
There is no objective metric for design. That's the problem with ID. There is no measurement of design. "Knowing design when I see it" isn't good enough.
Is a puddle designed to just precisely hold the amount of water it does?
The assertion of design (because there is no theory) says that SOME features of the universe and life are best explained by design.
Which features? Which features are not designed? Why do you prefer bits? Who made you king that your preference for bits is better than my preference for Rice Chex?
Work it out, Jeff, you're very close.
"I think agreed to that earlier. "It was caused by nature" besides not being falsifiable, is a boring and miserably general theory that doesn't lend itself to scientific research in the slightest..."
Okay, so if you did agree earlier that referencing unintelligent causes by themselves is unfalsifiable or "boring," then what isn't boring or unfalsifiable? Is there a way to formulate a theory that isn't falsifiable in your view?
"Rather, get into specifics of HOW life may have been caused, providing us with testable hypothesis that can lend itself to fruitful lines of research."
We've spent decades (or centuries depending on how you look at it) trying to answer this question. We still have a situation where the chemical constituents of life are impossible to synthesize together in proximity to even have a chance at forming a living cell. This is true regardless of what we start with, in particular it is a problem with RNA.
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/02/origin_of_life_researchers_int.html
So if the only response to this problem is to simply conclude that we must "stay the course for science's sake," how can we call this approach fruitful (or falsifiable, but I think we've agreed on that point)?
"I'm simply illustrating how disastrous your line of thinking ("There are no unproblematic theories of OOL, therefore we should give up") would be if prior scientists used it ("There are no unproblematic theories of disease, therefore we should give up")."
If the line of reasoning employed by ID did in fact lead to that conclusion, then we would indeed be in trouble. But comparing an inference to design to invoking demons for sickness is an unfair comparison. In the case of demons, there was no other independent evidence of demons acting anywhere else to use for experimental comparison, ID can be extrapolated in part by observing how we know intelligent agents act. With demon-based disease, there was no positive evidence to rule it out as being more plausible than anything else. And the only information to go on was symptoms, nothing else concerning the source of those symptoms. With ID we are now able to get right to the source of life's mechanisms and "symptoms" and discern what causal explanation best fits the evidence.
"To quote Neil deGrasse Tyson:
"Science is a philosophy of discovery. Intelligent design is a philosophy of ignorance. You cannot build a program of discovery on the assumption that nobody is smart enough to figure out the answer to a problem.""
Likewise you cannot build a program of discovery on using the same categorical explanations for the existence of a feature in the natural world if they keep failing. This would be the equivalent to struggling for eons to find an unintelligent explanation for the origin of the pyramids or the Rosetta stone. It doesn't help to stick with unintelligent causes simply because we feel a pressing need to.
And when it comes to quoting authority, here's a favorite of mine that probably won't be found on PBS anytime soon:
"The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them. ~William Lawrence Bragg"
"Detailed enough to be testable."
This still doesn't answer my question, looks like I need to be more specific: How detailed is testably detailed?
"Of course not. As a said earlier, the conclusion of design is wholly metaphysical, and therefore is not subject to the rigors of a scientific explanation.
I disagree, it is no more metaphysical than concluding the comments we write come from telic sources. If we can infer design in everyday life, than it is perfectly capable of being subjected to scientific rigor in science. And what exactly is "metaphysical" supposed to mean anyway?
"Nope. Because IDers could simply claim that the the search isn't actually "blind" because the physical processes that do the "searching" were set by the intelligent designer."
Nope. This inference can only be drawn when it can be demonstrated that the properties in question that supposedly constitute front-loading perform better than a blind search, otherwise intelligence becomes unnecessary leaving unintelligent causes as the plausible mode of explanation. Front-loading would thus be falsified and we can conclude that there is no detectable design.
"They are metaphysical explanations, and by themselves can't be used as an "end point" as a scientific explanation for anything we see in nature."
I will press this on you again in case you miss the first time I bring up this question above: What is a metaphysical explanation and how does ID fit in that explanation? A second question I would like to ask is what characteristic(s) of "metaphysical" (by whatever definition you give) disqualify it from scientific rigor?
"Honestly, can you name one scientist who pointed at something and said "THAT HAPPENED BY NATURAL PROCESSES," then walked away, without getting any more specific than that? Is there any scientific theory that horribly vague?"
Call it "evolution of the gaps" if you like. The description you gave up there seems to sum up all of origins science in biology as we know it. "It evolved..." Okay, now what? If someone were to accuse ID of being non-descriptive, then they should at least have the decency of holding themselves up to that same standard. What mutations led to that feature? How were they selectable? Or in the case of origins of life when someone insists that the first cells formed when chemical constituents "arranged" themselves over long periods of time to lead to a self-replicating cell. Anyone can point to something and say it "evolved." And last time I checked a theory that explains everything (regardless of the outcome) explains nothing.
"Like I said earlier, the IDer could simply claim that the designer set up physics, which is causally prior to chemistry, with the complex specified information. And they could keep playing that game until T=0 in the casual chain."
Looks like you've taken the time to read over Wesley's article. But I will reiterate a point I made earlier here: if front-loading is invoked in the causal chain of events then all one has to do to falsify that is to show that the features in question which are purported to exhibit self-organizational properties perform there tasks no more effectively than a blind search. Otherwise we would be doing the equivalent to claiming invisible gnomes are what pull matter together; it would be invoking an unnecessary agent and we would therefore rule it out as a plausible explanation.
Here is where you fall into the bullshit trap."
I'm not even half your age and yet I have already outgrown the need to curse my way through intellectual discussions. But that's beside the point, as we will see your own argument has a trap of it's own...
"There is no objective metric for design. That's the problem with ID. There is no measurement of design. "Knowing design when I see it" isn't good enough."
No, I would claim that superficial appearance alone is sufficient. But the standard you quoted and gave the above response to is. Can you find anything in the natural world that was produced by unintelligent mechanisms which fits this definition: Design as I understand it consists of multiple constituents in a system which produce an epiphenomenal function or effect greater than what the constituents by themselves cannot do. The function is predictable and can clearly serve a purpose outside of the context of the system itself.
This objection becomes a problem for yourself if your going to claim that evolution produces design at all.
"Is a puddle designed to just precisely hold the amount of water it does?"
Definitely not. At least not intelligently. There are no properties of any typical puddle which distinguish it from anything else in it's surroundings. A counter-example however would be a circular puddle in the middle of a yard on a hot summer day surrounded by synthetic materials that do not form via the non-telic forces of nature. Can you guess what kind of puddle that might be???
"The assertion of design (because there is no theory)[sic] says that SOME features of the universe and life are best explained by design."
While it doesn't assume that not every arrangement of matter out there is designed, it only sticks with that which is detectable. So false negatives are the only shortcoming in design detection. As for the claim that it isn't even a theory, I would challenge you to clearly define what a theory even is, and explain how you are so certain that ID is false when there supposedly isn't anything to critique.
"Which features? Which features are not designed?"
If we had an answer for everything science as we know it would be dead. But if your simply asking me to defend inferences to design in certain features of the natural world, then we can discuss that momentarily.
Why do you prefer bits?
Because this measure is applicable to common everyday measures of information. Like the HTML for this page for instance.
"Who made you king that your preference for bits is better than my preference for Rice Chex?"
Nobody, monarchy is dead (save for the folks across the pond if you know what I mean). I feel that bits is far more reliable do to the fact that it is applicable in every other information exchange in one form or another. Not to mention the fact that there doesn't seem to be any use of Chex in the programming world, or did you have a hand in programming Vista???
Jeff Snipes asked
When do we know we've exhausted all possible explanations for the origin of life that don't invoke intelligence?
The short answer is that we don't, but what we do have is 3+ centuries of success in the general approach taken by materialistic science, and zero by the ID "research program."
Jeff Snipes said
That would be the case if people did not resort to switching to a new proposal every time an old one is shown to fail.
That phenomenon occurs sufficiently often that there is a technical term for it: It's called "learning." We learn what's wrong or what's (closer to) correct, and change the former and keep the latter.
What ID has to do if it actually wants to be a scientific enterprise--a progressive research program in Imre Lakatos's terms--is to do actual research to fill in the placeholders in the summary here:
Sometime some intelligent agent(s) designed something, and then somehow manufactured that thing in matter and energy, all the while leaving no independent evidence of the design and manufacturing processes, and no independent evidence of the presence, or even the existence, of the designing and manufacturing agent(s).
That is, ID needs to provide and test an actual explanation--a theory that identifies relevant antecedent conditions, operative causal variables, and predicted outcomes, and then do the actual research necessary to establish that those antecedent conditions held, that the operative causal variables operated, and that the predicted outcomes occur (or not).
"Positive" evidence is a record of corroborated predictions; as they pile up, particularly coming from multiple disciplines and independent lines of research, we have more confidence in the explanation, though of course, it's always possible in principle that even a highly corroborated theory will require modification or even replacement some day. That's that "learning" thing I mentioned above.
The structure of the arguments made by IDists today are identical to those made by Paley in 1802. The examples differ, but the form of the argument is the same. But in the 2+ centuries since Paley's Natural Theology there is no sign of an ID research program. ID has a track record of vacuity.
Jeff Snipes said
Spending a few days of immersing myself in Kuhnian thought has convinced me that it's much easier to wait till the current consensus is six feet under instead of persuading them to see the light.
A few days? That's laughable. Best you spend a good deal more time on it. A place to start is Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge, though that's a start, not a finish.
"The short answer is that we don't..."
That's a good admission. So far it looks like there are now at least two other people besides my self who have commented here who agree that assuming abiogenesis had no intelligence involved in the process is not a falsifiable presumption. It is no different then trying to claim the dead sea scrolls materialized on their own without anyone to write them. If that's supposed to lead to progress, then I can't wait to see what happens when ID goes mainstream.
"That phenomenon occurs sufficiently often that there is a technical term for it: It's called "learning." We learn what's wrong or what's (closer to) correct, and change the former and keep the latter."
Then it sounds like ID has come in just the right time. We now know a wide variety of things that indicate a non-intelligent source to the first living cell is chemically impossible: http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/02/origin_of_life_researchers_int.html
...It would appear to me that since RNA/DNA constituents must be synthesized separately or else they don't form at all then it's time to move onto to intelligent explanations if you ask me.
"What ID has to do if it actually wants to be a scientific enterprise--a progressive research program in Imre Lakatos's terms--is to do actual research to fill in the placeholders in the summary here..."
How about discussing it's merits in a summary that fits the real world (I think my previous point alone shows that Imre's summary is false)?
"That is, ID needs to provide and test an actual explanation--a theory that identifies relevant antecedent conditions, operative causal variables, and predicted outcomes, and then do the actual research necessary to establish that those antecedent conditions held, that the operative causal variables operated, and that the predicted outcomes occur (or not)."
""Positive" evidence is a record of corroborated predictions; as they pile up, particularly coming from multiple disciplines and independent lines of research, we have more confidence in the explanation..."
(continues below since there is a character limit for comments)
As I was about to say...
Origins of life research has pretty much been heading in that direction for decades, and here's some food for thought: http://www.evolutionnews.org/2010/05/nature_reports_discovery_of_se.html
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2010/03/a_response_to_questions_from_a.html
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/10/how_the_junk_dna_hypothesis_ha.html
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/04/helping_students_answer_a_prof.html
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/04/helping_students_answer_a_prof_1.html
It would appear to me that the progress ID has been making over the past few years should lead anyone objective enough to conclude that in the context of predictions, research and hypotheses it has made headway.
"it's always possible in principle that even a highly corroborated theory will require modification or even replacement some day. That's that "learning" thing I mentioned above."
QED
"The structure of the arguments made by IDists today are identical to those made by Paley in 1802. The examples differ, but the form of the argument is the same."
Actually there are quite a few differences, ID does not attempt to extrapolate the supernatural, it does not assume an omniscient sky-daddy of sorts assembled everything we see today out of nothing in less than a week roughly 10,000 years ago, nor does it presuppose that we rely on the bible or other scriptural texts to draw conclusions.
"But in the 2+ centuries since Paley's Natural Theology there is no sign of an ID research program. ID has a track record of vacuity.
Perhaps you should look a bit deeper into the subject than you already have:
http://www.arn.org/report/2009.htm
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2010/05/biocomplexity_a_new_peerreview.html
http://www.researchid.org/wiki/Main_Page
http://www.biologicinstitute.org/
http://evoinfo.org/
"A few days? That's laughable. Best you spend a good deal more time on it. A place to start is Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge, though that's a start, not a finish."
Seems like it doesn't take away from my earlier point in which I stated that paradigm shifts tend to occur when the consensus of one generation finds itself six feet under.
Not one of those references is from a peer reviewed journal. Can you even point to origin of life letters and research articles in Nature or Science to support your contention that the research "is headed" towards the same direction the Discovery Institute's PR site is saying?
"Not one of those references is from a peer reviewed journal."
Actually one of those sites was entirely devoted to a peer-review ID journal. I think everyone in this debate is perfectly fine with the concept of peer-review; rather we tend to dispute who gets to sit at the editor's desk. ;D
Besides, if ID is so damningly dishonest as most (or possibly all) of it's critics insist, then why not just demonstrate that this is the case instead of excluding it out of discussion?
And if you want a good dialogue from people writing for a peer-review source, I would suggest checking the following debate out:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/blog/post/PLNKR0KKYIJL385H
From there simply click on the link to his full Amazon blog and scroll to part two and beyond. Both the "waiting longer for two mutations" and "The old enigma" posts detail what eventually led to authors in the journal "Genetics" conceding that Behe was right about evolutionary limitations.
http://www.discovery.org/scripts/mt/mt-tb.cgi/17201
Does this in fact mean that there is a debate over ID in the peer-review literature?
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/03/debate_over_behes_edge_of_evol.html
Apparently so, and it's no secret that editors at mainstream science journals would rather not let ID have a fair say:
http://www.discovery.org/scripts/mt/mt-tb.cgi/19521 (note: this is a trackback URL, I'll fix it if it doesn't work)
It isn't just Behe's work that is getting attention. A while back a paper appeared which lends support to the same probability bound methods used by Bill Dembski in design detection:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/12/new_peerreviewed_paper_demolis.html
In the end, facts aren't changed by what editors of any given journal approve of, they are determined by the evidence. Today's consensus views certainly didn't start that way.
Yeah, the TB URL's aren't working, here's the permalinks in the order the TB's appeared:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/03/michael_behes_edge_of_evolutio.html
And the one about his work being vindicated:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/05/behes_back_the_letters_science.html
So, the organization that Michael Behe gets paid by, links to his Amazon blog (where comments are not allowed) and this is considered 'evidence'?
Sorry, Jeff, but I expect nothing less than Nature or Science another peer reviewed SCIENCE journal to print something by a scientist who is not on the payroll of an ideological advocacy group before I take Behe seriously.
So, the organization that Michael Behe gets paid by, links to his Amazon blog (where comments are not allowed) and this is considered 'evidence'?"
No, the journals they are referring to (Genetics for instance) and the fact that Behe's thesis and Dembski's work was vindicated in them is considered to be proof that even peer-reviewed journals who are opposed to ID must admit credit where it is obviously due to avoid misleading their readers. And "peer-review" is difference from "evidence." Evidence is gathered through observational facts while peer-review declares them "acceptable" to academia at large.
Sorry, Jeff, but I expect nothing less than Nature or Science another peer reviewed SCIENCE journal..."
So the journal of "Genetics" doesn't count? I guess if the evidence was against me I would resort to declaring opposing views out of existence as well. But to stick with such an unsound argument even when it fails (yes, Genetics is a peer-review journal, and as I've previously mentioned, they conceded Behe was right) is pathetic. If the evidence was altogether against ID then I would've expected critics to not even have the need to insist that it's not worthy of discussion because editors of certain journals decide it's meaningless. The evidence would just speak for itself.
Oh, and here's more since it seems I must link DIRECTLY to the papers in question since you'll ignore news feeds that highlight them:
http://marksmannet.com/RobertMarks/REPRINTS/2010-EfficientPerQueryInformationExtraction.pdf
So Jeff, you have claimed that something "eventually led to authors in the journal Genetics conceding that Behe was right about evolutionary limitations."
Were you referring to the article "Waiting for Two Mutations" by Durrett and Schmidt in that journal? Or were you referring to the response of those authors to Behe's ludicrous letter to the editor?
Jeff, as long as you seek understanding of science from the Discovery Institute and Michael Behe's comment-free blog, you will be doomed to utter ignorance of the basic principles of evolutionary biology and genetics. And you will have only yourself to blame. Do not bother replying to this comment unless you aim to read and engage the ideas in Genetics to which you seem to be unwisely referring.
"Were you referring to the article "Waiting for Two Mutations" by Durrett and Schmidt in that journal? Or were you referring to the response of those authors to Behe's ludicrous letter to the editor?"
Both, not to mention the other papers cited. In particular I was referring to the fact that the authors eventually conceded that Behe was not at fault when he pointed out their models were inaccurate, partly because Behe relies on field data from P. Falciparum and not just models. There are some posts on the Panda's thumb, along with a comment made by Nick Matzke on PZ's blog which dispute the accuracy of the data if you want to discuss those instead.
The model use by Durret and Schmidt simply assumes that since the average point mutation rate of this strain of malaria is one in a hundred million (in terms of changing a base pair or condon), to find the rate of change for getting two point mutations you can square that value and rightly assume from that factor that the number of malaria cells needed to get a particular pair of mutations is ten to the sixteenth power cells. This is much less cells than what Behe insisted was needed in EoE; hence the reason the authors asserted he was wrong.
However, in some models the results seemed even more probabilistic; only a trillion cells seemed to be needed. As Behe points out in his book, that's roughly the amount of malaria cells in one infected person. So the authors conclude that getting a two amino-acid change to acquire a new biological novelty is nowhere near as unlikely as Behe asserted.
Behe's posts on his blog go on to show that when certain errors in their model are corrected, their model reaches a value much closer to the one Behe cited from Nick White. One such error includes the fact that they relied on a model which assumed the first change must in fact be neutral. But as Behe rightly pointed out, it was most likely deleterious. Since the amount of malaria cells needed to get one particular amino acid change is a hundred million, while something such as chloroquine resistance requires two amino acid changes in the PfCRT protein and requires a hundred million trillion (10 to the 20th) cells to acquire, we know something gets in the way of the "Genetics" paper's claim that the number needed is the probability of one mutation squared (since the result is 10,000 times less cells needed). That something suggests that the first change must in fact be harmful if the odds are greater than just one change squared, suggested by the difference on the order of ten thousand times more likely in one instance over the other.
Do you want me to highlight all the relevant points Behe was making or is this good enough to show that there is more than enough grounds for Behe disputing Durrett and Schmidt's paper?
"partly because Behe relies on field data from P. Falciparum and not just models.
"their model reaches a value much closer to the one Behe cited from Nick White. "
Um, the number Behe cited from White had almost nothing to do with the frequency of a double mutation in the PfCRT gene. I suggest that you read the whole section from White's paper that Behe misrepresented, as opposed to the misleading snippet in EoE.
OK, I'll provide it for you:
“Chloroquine resistance in P. falciparum may be multigenic and is initially conferred by mutations in a gene encoding a transporter (PfCRT) (13). In the presence of PfCRT mutations, mutations in a second transporter (PfMDR1) modulate the level of resistance in vitro, but the role of PfMDR1 mutations in determining the therapeutic response following chloroquine treatment remains unclear (13). At least one other as-yet unidentified gene is thought to be involved. Resistance to chloroquine in P. falciparum has arisen spontaneously less than ten times in the past fifty years (14). This suggests that the per-parasite probability of developing resistance de novo is on the order of 1 in 10^20 parasite multiplications. “
White was talking about changes in as many as three different genes (perhaps more). Quite different from what Behe discussed in his book.
Jeff, you completely avoided the question. Don't bother quoting Behe to me: I've read all his work and it's a disgrace. You can read my blog posts to find out why I consider him to have excused himself from science.
What I asked you to do was to explain why you think that the authors of the paper in question made the concession you claimed they did. Ominously, you have responded by citing Behe.
You have one more chance. Read and quote Durrett and Schmidt's paper and their response to Behe. Spare me the rest.
"White was talking about changes in as many as three different genes (perhaps more). Quite different from what Behe discussed in his book.
Really? Seems like he speculated the possibility of there being three genes where changes could be implicated if you ask me:
"At least one other as-yet unidentified gene is thought to be involved."
Steve,
Thanks for the write-up.
My own views of where Meyer tripped up in SigCell:
- He makes an early reference to the necessity of going beyond logic and doing experiment, then finds the logic chopping of Polanyi and Pattee utterly convincing.
- He is a serial player of the "I was going to include that, but couldn't get to it" game. His own chapter on the RNA World starts with a quote of him doing that in a newspaper op-ed. He did it at Biola, as you mentioned. And he did it in the book by avoiding discussion of work by Michael Yarus' lab on the stereochemical hypothesis and direct templating of RNA and proteins. The claims that Meyer surveyed all other theories and found them wanting before adopting ID are not supportable.
http://www.genetics.org/cgi/content/full/181/2/821
From there we can see: " Behe is right on this point. This divides our previously computed overestimate of 5 million by 30."
This is in reference to the fact that they assumed that any of ten nucleotides could be changed in a transcription-factor-binding site; which is far too optimistic for the protein. Thus, they conceded Behe was right on this point.
Jeff, Behe did not entertain the possibility of additional genes when he claimed that 10^20 is the probability of a double mutation in the PfCRT gene. He quoted White specifically to equate 10^20 with this frequency, even though the number White mentioned had almost nothing to do with a double mutation in the PfCRT gene. Behe wasn't concerned with additional genes when he pulled his magic number from out of thin air.
No amount of obfuscation and mis-direction can rescue Behe on this point. The number that is the foundation of his book is fiction, something that has no bearing on genetic and biochemical reality.
"Behe wasn't concerned with additional genes when he pulled his magic number from out of thin air."
Because as I showed earlier, White was only speculating the possibility of a third gene being changed in the process. White stated so as follows:
"At least one other as-yet unidentified gene is thought to be involved."
From what I can see this would mean that 10*20th refers to three amino acid changes or point mutations if another gene really was involved, right?
Jeff,
I commend you for your calm demeanor. I also hope that you are correct that ID will revolutionize our understanding of the world, though I don't believe that it will. I missed the (quantum physics) excitement at the turn of the last century, so it would be fun to live through another paradigm shift. I am not holding my breath, though.
In any case, I had some questions about one of the references you gave for the contributions of ID to the world:
But speaking of ID and disease, here's some food for thought: http://www.researchid.org/wiki/Even_more_fast_facts_on_ID
Just skim down to where it says:
"Intelligent design helps fight diseases, and could help us fight terrorism at the same time."
Can you explain what the ID hypothesis and experimental technique is that would allow one to design "drug combinations beyond the reach of mutation and selection"? How would this design process be different one used by someone who thought natural processes account for the unity and diversity of life on Earth? Also, what is the ID hypothesis and experimental technique that would help us stop bioterror attacks?
From what I can see this would mean that 10*20th refers to three amino acid changes or point mutations if another gene really was involved, right?
No, Behe meant, quite clearly, that 10^-20 was the frequency for a double point mutation. And he was speaking only about the PfCRT gene.
A more accurate statement that takes into account the entirety of White's summary would be something along the lines that 10^-20 is an estimate of the frequency of occurrence of the double point mutation in the PfCRT gene AND an indeterminate number of mutations in the PfMDR1 gene (a gene White clearly mentions but that Behe ignores when he pulls out the 10^20 number) AND an indeterminate number of mutations in one or more other genes.
That's the accurate statement. But it is utterly useless to the anti-evolution arguments of Behe.
Jeff writes:
"Actually, that would be simple to do. Just simulate early earth conditions and show it's possible for life to form without humans intervening in the process itself. It's okay to use intelligence to recreate the setting for abiogenesis so long as we don't interfere with the process from that point on, otherwise we'd be introducing foresight to the situation."
Sounds reasonable. Yet, I have seen with my own eyes creationists and IDists dismiss - pre-dismiss, really - the relevance of any such experiment. Why?
Why, because it took intelligence to design the experiment. It took intelligence to make the materials (glassware, etc.) used in the experiment. It took intelligence to make the building that the experiment took place in. Etc., etc., etc.
This all-purpose escape clause was firt laid out (as far as I know) in creationist veterinarian Randy Wysong's 1976 book "The Creation COntroversey", in which he claimed that life HAD been created in a lab (not sure where he got that information) but that it didn't support evolution because "KNOW HOW" (caps in original) was added in the form of what I indicated above.
Logan:
"What would you rather them do, stick to an explanation that is fatally flawed? "
Um, well....
Have you ever heard of this crazy outfit called the Institute for Creation Research?
:)
I find it very hard to take Meyer seriously when he writes articles such as this. He just doesn't have the expertise to make the statements he does and his credibility diminishes daily.
Jeff Snipes wrote: When do we know for sure that we've exhausted all possibilities for the origin of live [sic] which involve no intelligence in the process whatsoever and can thus move on to new modes of explanation?
Short answer: when the citation patterns of creationists (oh, excuse me, "intelligent design" advocates) indicate that they are engaging in actual knowledge creation (in peer-reviewed literature or in not), rather than quoting each other verbatim to achieve "corroboration" without really building a coherent argument, or quote-mining scientists.
As long as IDists behave as they do, one can rest assured that scientists are on the right track.
The scornful laughter that Steve refers to reminds me of that perplexing moment in Expelled when Ben Stein, after pontificating on the virtues of academic freedom and open inquiry, irrationally slammed "crystal piggy-back" abiogenesis by showing a swami with a crystal ball! (The audience laughed.) I don't know what a crystal ball has to do with crystalline structures, unless one is hopelessly confused.
ID "came at the right time"? ID is creationism and has been around for millenia. Another indication that we have not exhausted the possibility of naturalistic explanation is the fact that ID, like creation science before it, and like Biblical creationism before that, erupts into public consciousness, languishes, then goes extinct, resembling tulpenmanie, not sustained, progressive knowledge building through disciplined, formal research.
Kapako: “I commend you for your calm demeanor.”
Well, in return I would like to formally apologize for any cases in which you or anyone else on this blog has had to deal with people who have no understanding of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, or people who equate “theory” with a total “guess.” People of this background do not add anything of substance to discourse on this topic, and I can definitely say these people do not represent me.
“I missed the (quantum physics) excitement at the turn of the last century, so it would be fun to live through another paradigm shift.”
Most people won’t even notice it. If anything, it would be no more consequential than plate tectonics for most people. Assuming of course that “most people” a century down the road will spend days sitting in front of a square of moving images to kill time. It probably won’t mean a thing to them.
“How would this design process be different one used by someone who thought natural processes account for the unity and diversity of life on Earth?”
The kind of hypothesis set forth by the Design camp actually acknowledges the fact that there are limitations to what Darwinian processes can produce over time. Rather than assuming that such mechanisms are capable of surpassing the effects of a given drug, ID does give reason to believe that there are pretty significant limits to look for that can better tell us which drug combos will work for what amount of time. For instance, Behe states that if you can find something that requires twice as many genetic changes as what you would find in chloroquine-resistant malaria, it probably won’t lose effectiveness. Admitting the limits to Darwinian processes makes it that much easier to design drugs that will deter them.
In my view though I think it would take more than just a drug that takes a double C3 mutation in order have something that won’t lose effectiveness. The number of malaria cells you would need to acquire such a feature (ten to the 40th) would be the average number of cells needed to reach that mark. So I would put the threshold a little higher in order to create the “perfect drug.”
Arthur Hunt: “No, Behe meant, quite clearly, that 10^-20 was the frequency for a double point mutation. And he was speaking only about the PfCRT gene
And rightly so as we shall see. Indeed Behe was only referring to the estimate by Nick White of the number of the average number malaria cells required to acquire a double point mutation in the PfCRT gene. But that wasn’t all he mentioned…
“AND an indeterminate number of mutations in the PfMDR1 gene (a gene White clearly mentions but that Behe ignores when he pulls out the 10^20 number) AND an indeterminate number of mutations in one or more other genes.” [emphasis mine]
Maybe I’m overemphasizing the original significance of these “other” mutations you claim Behe ignored, but the phrase “indeterminate” really screams out at me. If I wanted to claim someone totally misstated what a given statistic represents, then I would try and find something far more conclusive than resting my case on the possibility of “indeterminate” factors being part of the picture.
But let’s take a moment to analyze two things, first we want to know what White was referring to when you say the ten to the 20th power value refers to more than just two point mutations. Next we want to know what Behe actually wrote in EoE to see if he did in fact ignore these “indeterminate” mutations, or if he mentions anything else relevant. I’ll start with the claim you make that the PfMDR1 is a confirmed necessity of chloroquine resistance in malaria.
http://www.pnas.org/content/93/18/9942.abstract
The very first sentence in that abstract indicates what you have already made clear; it isn't wise to insist that this was a necessary feature of chloroquine resistance because a consensus hasn't even been reached on what it does (more on what it probably accomplished for p. falciparum in a moment). On the other hand, White already makes clear in the quotes you highlight from his paper that these are speculative factors; no one really knows for sure that these are even necessary to acquire the resistance Behe refers to in the ten to the 20th power digit.
But what about your claim that Behe flat-out ignored this and other "indeterminate" factors? Let's take a look at what he wrote in EoE and see if you're correct on this point…
I'll place typeface emphasis in these quotes where I see necessary. From page 49:
"The mutant PfCRTs exhibit a range of changes, affecting as few as four amino acids, to as many as eight."
Sure sounds like he only mentions "two" amino acid changes doesn't it? And don't forget what Nick White said about other changes besides those in PfCRT:
"...but the role of PfMDR1 mutations in determining the therapeutic response following chloroquine treatment remains unclear."
I'm only bringing up a statement by Nick here to show that PfCRT is the only confirmed set of factors here.
And there's more with respect to what Behe wrote on page 49:
"Since two particular amino acid changes occur in almost all of these cases, they both seem to be required for the primary activity by which the protein confers resistance. The other mutations apparently "compensate" for side effects caused by these two primary mutations." [emphasis mine]
So there we have it. Behe doesn't mention the additional mutations as being necessary to chloroquine resistance because not all of them are found in every strain of p. falciparum; a pretty good sign that these are nothing more than compensatory mutations as that earlier PNAS paper I linked to suggests about the PfMDR1 gene. But what if I'm wrong...
Arthur: “That's the accurate statement. But it is utterly useless to the anti-evolution arguments of Behe.”
If you meant it’s useless against Behe’s argument, then you would have ground to stand on. Why so? Let’s imagine what you are saying is as true as you make it out to be and that there were in fact several REQUIRED mutations involved in malarial resistance to Chloroquine. Would this render Behe’s thesis completely false? Not at all as far as I’m concerned because what it would mean is that ten to the 20th power would refer not to a two-amino acid change, but perhaps a half-dozen or so at the most. The edge would still be there for sure even if the power of contingency in nature would have enough influence to climb a half-dozen step pathway instead of one only requiring two. Evolution as the dominant set of mechanisms leading to the complexity and diversity of live would still not hold water.
Anonymous: “Why, because it took intelligence to design the experiment.”
If that were necessary on early-earth conditions, then perhaps front-loading might get some leeway.
But if early earth conditions were accurately simulated, life made it’s way to the forefront, and it did not involve intelligence in the process itself, then I would have no complaints whatsoever. It’s when you interfere with the setting after you set it up (like artificially synthesizing RNA constituents separate from each other) that it becomes invalid from the ID viewpoint. But by all means, simulate primordial conditions and don’t mess with the scenario after the fact and there isn’t anything for us to complain about.
Gerry: “He just doesn't have the expertise to make the statements he does and his credibility diminishes daily.”
Do you regard the kolmogorov information example, or the claim that archeologists need to know who or what specifically made a pot as refuting Meyer? This is worth another discussion altogether if you’re interested. Epistemology seems to be a bigger topic of discussion than I was once told.
Kristine: “Short answer: when the citation patterns of creationists (oh, excuse me, "intelligent design" advocates) indicate that they are engaging in actual knowledge creation (in peer-reviewed literature or in not)…"
Kristine, why is it that the older posters here (Yes Bill, I’m referring to you too) feel the need to be immature when they drive their points home? Just make the point more professionally: You think ID is creationism, plain and simple. I’m not trying to make too big an issue out of this, but I would certainly prefer discussing these things with people who do not intend to create a flamewar in the process.
I can tell that a lot of your opposition to ID comes from a belief that it is more or less the same thing as creationism, right? Can I expect to see the Wedge or early drafts of Pandas and People show up in our dialogue anytime soon? Although my focus is more on the scientific merits (or lack thereof of ID), I hear the Pandas drafts are pretty noteworthy…
With respect to Peer-review, I don’t think anyone is really for or against such a procedure; depending on who sits at the editor’s desk that is. And when it comes to knowledge creation, I think some of the earlier comments I left should answer that for you. In particular the one from May 23, 2010 1:37 PM.
“rather than quoting each other verbatim to achieve "corroboration" without really building a coherent argument,”
Pretty sure that’s what the current consensus does… ‘:/
“or quote-mining scientists.”
I can see misrepresenting context in debate is in issue on both sides, so I can’t say I would depend on such a thing to rest my case. But when it comes to quotemining, I would like to know how the first paragraph of your comment is relevant to my quote about attempting to formulate non-telic origins to life.
“I don't know what a crystal ball has to do with crystalline structures, unless one is hopelessly confused.”
While I agree with the central thesis of Expelled (that scientists who promote ID face loss of tenure, or ostracizing in general), there are some parts of the movie where I feel that they embellish their case a little bit, so I can agree that their take on Ruse’s account of abiogenesis could’ve kept itself more relevant the entire time they covered it.
“ID "came at the right time"? ID is creationism and has been around for millennia”
Well, at least you don’t make the claim that it suddenly appeared after Edwards, so I guess that’s a start. As for the claim that ID and creationism are one in the same, I suggest you start with some of the topics I just mentioned earlier. Are they similar enough to fall under the same name or can I expect to see a case of the Woody Allen syllogism?
“Another indication that we have not exhausted the possibility of naturalistic explanation is the fact that ID, like creation science before it, and like Biblical creationism before that, erupts into public consciousness, languishes, then goes extinct, resembling tulpenmanie, not sustained, progressive knowledge building through disciplined, formal research.”
What does any of this have to do with determining when we can safely say non-telic OoL scenarios can no longer claim to have sufficient causal efficacy? And besides that, are you really trying to say that ID came after all these other viewpoints, only to go extinct? Didn’t you just say that ID has been around for millennia? If you’re going to critique it by claiming it’s religious, then you should at least be consistent.
The kind of hypothesis set forth by the Design camp actually acknowledges the fact that there are limitations to what Darwinian processes can produce over time. ... So I would put the threshold a little higher in order to create the “perfect drug.”
I still don't follow. Let's take 2 groups of drug designers (ID and non-ID). Either one is going to design a drug (combo) based on a specific metabolic pathway, surface protein, or whatever. After the drug is designed, they might look at what changes in the pathogen genome are needed for it to overcome the drug. The ID camp might say X number of mutations/transcription errors/etc. is needed (X >= threshold), so "you can't get there from here, let's go to market." The non-ID camp might say that X changes are needed, but "Hmm, random mutation + natural selection might allow the pathogen to overcome this drug, so let's go back to the drawing board."
I could see how the ID process would be better if the problem were that there weren't enough drugs being produced but they all completely prevented pathogens from developing resistance. Embracing ID would allow scientists to lower the bar and design more drugs which required fewer mutations/etc. and be secure in the fact that RM + NS (+ genetic drift + etc) would never allow the pathogen to develop resistance.
I have no idea how pharma companies actually decide whether to bring drugs to market, but my impression is that the problem isn't that we aren't getting new (e.g.) antibacterials because the bar is set so high, and that we'd be better of by having ID come along and lower the bar.
Jeff Snipes -
I want to respond to the very first thing that you said in your first post. The difference between ID and "unintelligent mechanisms" is that the latter actually has a mechanism that can be falsified. Molecules respond in ways that can be predicted. Any specific explanation, given enough rigor, can be falsified. ID, on the other hand, still does not have a mechanism. There is no way to test it. Given that explanations for the "specified" organization of the genome also do a very good job of obviating design means that all naturalistic "unintelligent mechanisms" can theoretically account for anything that IDers propose. Most ID arguments attempt to explicate just how big and unwieldy the mechanisms of life actually are, but that isn't a pro ID argument. That's an argument against naturalistic explanations.
In other words, the only definition for whether something is designed is that it was not undesigned. Scientifically it's a totally useless explanations. So this perceived problem with "unintelligent mechanisms" is actually a problem with ID. If ID could marshal evidence that was propitious to its cause, then it could win out as a better explanation for the evidence. But ID is trying to rest upon the premise that it automatically wins as an explanation if it outlasts the other theory. Yet we don't literally have to falsify every theory. It's up to ID to come up with a better explanation. It has failed so far.
Furthermore, there are still strong signs that we should move forward with "unintelligent mechanisms". One recent breakthrough wasn't reached until after a decade of persistence. That kind of positive confirmation might not be known until after it is reached. Who's to say how much persistence the next breakthrough might need?
And if we want to discuss intent, then we can rightfully ask why the designer itself didn't leave some sort of positive or negative confirmation. And if we are talking about a supernatural designer, then surely it should be able to create a world in which design can easily be defined and tested.
Kakapo, for the most part you seem to understand the gist of what I was arguing. To be totally honest, that second paragraph (about drugs being a possible ration) highlights a potential benefit of ID I wasn’t even aware of. But the main benefit I think ID would have in this area isn’t just designing more efficient drug combos to save existing resources; another possible benefit would be the fact that some drugs can become toxic at higher levels unless you can limit how much you use. To me, this is the main reason a design-theoretic approach can be of use since it can allow us to predict the lowest level of a given drug needed to stop a disease since there are many instances where too much of a drug can lead to harmful side effects.
Jeff, Glad you stopped back by.
I outlined a possible benefit of ID drug design; however, reality is such that the proposed benefit does not accrue. Even if the only examples were the well-known and very important cases of broad-spectrum anti-bacterials and HIV drugs, the problem is that drugs are "defeated" by mutation much more quickly than we'd like. ID drug design would only lower the bar further and make the drug (combos) even easier to overcome via mutation.
I am confused about your statement about the amount of drug required. The issue of dosage required is completely orthogonal to any considerations of how many mutations would be required for the pathogen to overcome the drug (combo). Remember, anyone designing a drug is going to design first for effectiveness and then (potentially) for resistance.
Sometimes, I think I sacrifice clarity for precision... Let me state succinctly, that I can find no benefit to ID-based drug design in the world that we live in.
I wish I could've gotten back sooner, but I think at some point in the near future this post will shut down comments or something.
If this is the case, then I will continue my response in the blog post that follows. Otherwise, I'll post back here if I have the chance.
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