Why I'm not a Behe fan, Part I

Michael Behe's name has come up around here a lot lately. During the lovefest over on Uncommon Descent, they mentioned him both as a scientist and as a Martyr, and here on QoD, a regular commenter named Bilbo has mentioned Behe a few times, noting that he finds Behe's argument in The Edge of Evolution compelling. Michael Behe is a Christian who accepts common ancestry and an ancient cosmos, so you'd think I would be excited about the work of a fellow "theistic evolutionist." But I'm not. There are two issues I'd like to address here, both raised in the UD discussion or by Bilbo or both. I'll tackle them in two separate posts.

1. Behe's fans say that he's a nice guy, and that the evolutionists are "crucifying" him. Both claims seem to be true, but they can't hide some serious problems with his conduct as a scientist. First, he showed contempt for his (former) colleagues when he avoided the process of peer review. Second, his comment-free blog is lamentably characterized by misleading and disingenuous "responses" to criticism that look to be calculated attempts to protect what is nothing more than folk science.

a. Behe exudes an arrogant contempt for the scientific community, exemplified by his neglect of peer review.

Michael Behe, I'm told, is quite a decent gentleman. I don't doubt this at all. He even seems to be a smart gentleman, and I gather that he's a gifted teacher based on his excellent writing. He doesn't tend to directly attack other people (though he can be pretty obnoxious), and he seems uninterested (in general) in Culture War. He doesn't deserve to be mocked, and I think he was treated somewhat unfairly by many critics of ID after the run-in with Abbie Smith at ERV. Mike Behe, it seems to me, is worthy of far more respect than are many of his fellow ID proponents.

But I have written before that Behe is properly an object of scorn in evolutionary biology. What I mean is that while I don't think he should be ridiculed or taunted, I do think he is mostly unworthy of professional scientific respect. Mike Behe has shown contempt for the scientific community in his writing on evolution, especially in The Edge of Evolution. This stance has quite appropriately alienated him from science and led scientists in relevant fields to view him, rightly, with suspicion and to dismiss him as ignorant and/or disingenuous. Behe has excused himself from the company of those who seriously study evolutionary science, and has done this by approaching the complex and fascinating analysis of evolutionary genetics with a malignant combination of arrogant condescension and pitiful ignorance. (Or, alternatively, his integrity has been somehow compromised.) You see, it actually doesn't matter how you couch your words when the message to an entire field of science (about which you know relatively little) is: "Hey, guys, give it up; I just figgered the whole thing out." In fact, in my opinion, there's something pretty creepy about a bland smile on the face of an undistinguished biochemist who claims to have overturned a century of work by some of the best minds in the history of biology.

There is only one new scientific idea in TEoE: Behe claims that random mutation rates are insufficient to generate the genetic diversity that is necessary for evolutionary change. That's it. That is an empirical claim, one that leads to some clear predictions. The claim is, at least in principle, testable. It's not theology, it's not metaphysics, and it doesn't have anything specific to do with "complexity" or any other doctrine of Intelligent Design. Behe's hypothesis, that random mutation cannot drive evolutionary change, is a scientific hypothesis of significant import that should have been carefully constructed and vetted by the professional scientific community. But as near as I can tell, the claim was never subjected to peer review. As far as I know, Behe has not completely formulated his hypothesis (by, for example, analyzing actual measurements of genetic variation in living organisms), and has not attempted to publish it in the professional literature or even to present it to a gathering of scientific experts. Instead, he wrote a popular book, aimed at a lay audience. His ideas are, in fact, almost completely without merit, but even if his radical hypothesis were worthy of scientific consideration, his choice to abandon the scientific community – and to eschew even the most basic review of his proposals by known experts – is an expression of arrogance and contempt that is difficult to overstate.

Richard Dawkins' New York Times review of The Edge of Evolution is pretty crappy; it's really not a review at all, and the hysterical Culture Warriors at the Discovery Intitute are right about that much. But one of Dawkins' final comments on the book summarizes why it is not a worthy contribution to science and why its author deserves to be dismissed as a critic of evolution:

If correct, Behe’s calculations would at a stroke confound generations of mathematical geneticists, who have repeatedly shown that evolutionary rates are not limited by mutation. Single-handedly, Behe is taking on Ronald Fisher, Sewall Wright, J. B. S. Haldane, Theodosius Dobzhansky, Richard Lewontin, John Maynard Smith and hundreds of their talented co-workers and intellectual descendants. Notwithstanding the inconvenient existence of dogs, cabbages and pouter pigeons, the entire corpus of mathematical genetics, from 1930 to today, is flat wrong. Michael Behe, the disowned biochemist of Lehigh University, is the only one who has done his sums right. You think?

If you don't find the preceding to be a devastatingly damning criticism of Behe's project, then you either don't understand what those scientists actually did (and you're in good company), or you actually do believe that Michael Behe is the architect of the most cataclysmic scientific paradigm shift since Copernicus. The point is that a person (like me) who knows some evolutionary genetics is left with a more difficult choice: whether to believe that Behe is really that ignorant and arrogant, or to believe that he lacks a full commitment to scientific integrity. While considering those options, one tends not to dwell so much on etiquette and gentility.

b. I find many of Behe's responses to his critics to be suspiciously misleading, and I believe this provides a clue as to why he does not allow comments on his blog or participate in professional discussion of his proposals.

• When challenged by Richard Dawkins on his failure to have his hypothesis subjected to peer review, he redirected the discussion to a consideration of his publication record in general, and compared it to Dawkins' nonexistent contributions.
• Confronted with the reality of superfast evolution of domesticated organisms, he redirected the discussion to an irrelevant (but technical-sounding) consideration of "developmental plasticity."
• He mocked Sean Carroll's accurate claim that Behe's ideas (and errors) involve technically-challenging concepts and theories, obnoxiously implying that it is Carroll who is hiding indefensible claims behind difficult math and biology.
• Confronted with evidence that, at least in bacteria, beneficial mutation rates are a thousand times more likely than previously thought, he redirected the discussion to the irrelevant consideration of whether many or most beneficial mutations "break things" or not, and concluded (based on no evidence at all) that the report in question most likely involves "degradatory mutations."

Behe's critics make many mistakes. But his responses are indicative of a defender of folk science, not of a serious scientist in a rigorous debate.

In part II, I'll deal with the second issue raised by Behe's admirers:

2. Some of Behe's defenders think that he has effectively answered his critics. He has not, nor has he understood or acknowledged the most important criticisms of his crude claims.

Of course there's a double standard!

Bilbo has become a regular commenter here, and he is a very welcome addition. He is a semi-regular contributor to the ID blog Telic Thoughts, and I've had the pleasure of meeting him in person. A layman who is willing to acknowledge his limited understanding of evolutionary science, he's thoughtful and direct.

I'll address his comments and questions regarding Michael Behe's The Edge of Evolution in a separate post. Here I'll tackle his peevish accusation that I employ a double standard when I lambaste the punk Dembski but (allegedly) give a pass to the Atheist Ayatollah PZ Myers. The reference is to Crackergate, the brouhaha surrounding Myers' effort to desecrate a Roman Catholic communion wafer. (Greg Laden put together some good links, and the good folks at the Boar's Head Tavern are discussing the saga and its recent conclusion.)

First, it's not true that I haven't been critical of Myers' behavior. Over at Clashing Culture, where I blog on science and belief with three others, Mike (who also blogs at Tangled Up in Blue Guy) started a discussion of the then-unfolding dustup, focusing on the juxtaposition of Myers' offense with the death threats he subsequently received (one of which cost someone her job). The ensuing conversation was quite interesting, I thought, and included three comments by me. I didn't re-post them here, for various reasons, and I don't think it's necessary to do that (in full) now, especially since some of the references to other comments will be confusing. Instead, I'll just summarize with some excerpts.

On why PZ's "desecration" is not mere "criticism" or even "ridicule":

If PZ’s behavior is notable at all, it isn’t notable for being critical or dismissive of the beliefs of others. In fact, I would be opposed to an ethos that discouraged the critical appraisal of “beliefs” or that considered any kind of “desecration” to be somehow anti-social or hate-inspired. Some of the things I believe are nothing short of outrageous in the eyes of certain other kinds of believers. No, there’s nothing notable about attacking religious belief.

What would make PZ’s statements disturbing would be if it was apparent that he wasn’t aiming to attack or criticize ideas – or at least not solely intending such – but was plainly hoping to hurt people. [...] I’m afraid that I found PZ’s words to look too much like hate, too much like the kind of thing that is specifically and solely intended to cause harm. That the harm is not physical in nature is only relevant when comparing it to, say, a death threat...

It’s a fact that PZ’s denunciations occasionally veer into territory that is reasonably construed as hate speech, and his lusty participation in the Culture War (TM) necessarily leads him into questionable conduct. Truth, after all, is the first casualty of war, and Crackergate is incomprehensible outside the framework of Total Culture War.

On why mere unbelief can't justify desecration:

What’s worse, a death threat or a desecration threat? The answer is obvious, but the question is a lot more interesting than it appears, because (in this crowd, so far) the combination of transubstantiation and sanctification of mass-produced wafers is considered to be ludicrous. [...]

But let’s change the sacred cow, and see what happens. Let’s try a picture of Dr. King, or an account of his legacy, or a transcript of the “I Have a Dream” speech, and let’s do our desecration on his birthday, on the spot where he was assassinated. Or let’s try a Holocaust memorial, or a Jewish graveyard in Poland. Don’t worry: we’ll use water-based spraypaint for the swastikas so the desecration will be temporary. And of course no one will be injured. Can you think of anything else? I sure can.

On why, specifically, I thought PZ's stunt was reprehensible:

...my problem is with the occasional lapse into something more plainly destructive. PZ’s proposed desecration was not designed to “ridicule” an idea. It was meant to enrage, to hurt, to do damage. It wasn’t merciless criticism. It was hate. It wasn’t aimed at an idea. It was aimed at Catholics. People.

Now, for the record, I’m a Christian and I think transubstantiation is codswallop. I think it’s incorrect, and I could even explain why I think it might be a non-innocuous incorrect belief. If I had the time or inclination, I could write a lot of things about the Catholic eucharist that would be scandalous at best in the eyes of a good Catholic. If I was in a bad mood, I might ridicule the idea - I certainly don’t give it high regard.

None of those things, in my view, is even comparable to the stunt that PZ was discussing.

Mike, the vast majority of PZ’s brutal criticisms of religion are legit. They’re the kind of bare-knuckled roughing-up of ideas that I think is not just tolerable, but welcome. But every now and then, he steps in it. It’s one of the hazards of Culture War. The only way to win…is not to play.

So yes, Bilbo, I did condemn PZ's actions, and I was quite specific about why. I should add that PZ's recent post in which he announces the "desecration" (and shows the results) is worth reading. The desecration, in my opinion, was unnecessary and ultimately contemptible. But Myers' commentary is illuminating. As I've said before, the critiques and attacks of the New Atheists are good for the church.

But much more importantly, I assert that it doesn't matter whether I ever said boo about Crackergate. Because Bilbo, there is indeed a double standard, and the moral distinction I see between Pharyngula and Uncommon Descent is hard to exaggerate. (Not to mention the scientific difference: Myers has recently posted superb summaries of snake segmental development and evolution, and of epigenetics; UD just put up a hilarious pseudonymous post in which the writer extrapolates from a misattributed abstract about fruit fly gene formation to a calculation about how "man" could have "evolved from the monkey." Just posting the link is savage mockery.) Briefly:

1. As DarwinCatholic has already noted, the bloggers at UD are largely (if not exclusively) Christian, and Dembski is a professor at a Baptist seminary. These folks aren't just Christians; they're public Christians and apologists. PZ Myers is an atheist. Does anyone need a list of proof texts for why I think Christians should be held to higher – much higher – moral standards than pagans?
2. The sickest crap at UD isn't the usual dishonesty and shoddy pseudoscholarship. It's the religious propaganda, a toxic mix of normal everyday bullshit (about "Darwinism") and the pearls of our lives as Christians: scripture, our confessions, even the name of Jesus, the chief cornerstone. What's worse, I ask: Myers' desecration of a piece of matter that he reckons a mere cracker, or Bill Dembski's malicious use of Christ as a lame polemical device? I'm sure you already know where I stand.

Uncommon Descent is a moral cesspool, a festering intellectual ghetto that intoxicates and degrades its inhabitants. Kudos to you, Bilbo, for denouncing Dembski's idiotic post, but let's have no more talk of "double standards" when it comes to criticism of the ID movement's pervasive pathology. I'll see you at Telic Thoughts.

Why one should wash thoroughly after visiting Uncommon Descent

My foray into the land of Intelligent Design partisans last month was both interesting and frustrating. I was able to explain a little of why I will never embrace the sad, sick movement, and I learned a little more about what's under the hood of that wrecked vehicle. My conversation with Thomas Cudworth and a few others went fine, I thought, despite the fact that many of my comments met nearly invincible incredulity regarding my flat axiomatic rejection of the claim that "random" or "natural" means "unguided" or "out of God's hands."

Some of the participants asked some of the usual questions, with some of the usual attitude, and I think I'll use the questions as the basis of a few posts in the next month or so. In the meantime, I've visited Uncommon Descent a few times in the past couple of weeks, which is a big change from my prior refusal to go anywhere near the place. (It's like visiting Pharyngula, but with far less wit and even less science.) (It's also like those gory movies they showed us in Drivers' Ed -- weirdly fascinating for a few minutes, then tediously nauseating after that.)

Well, today, I was reminded of why I can't stand the place, or most of the movement it represents.

Last week, Olivia Judson (writer of the evolution-themed blog The Wild Side at the New York Times) wrote a superb piece on the term "Darwinism," in a series on Charles Darwin and his influence/legacy. The series has been excellent, and the piece on "Darwinism" was superb. (Recommendation: If you can't stomach Bill Dembski, just go read Judson's post and don't bother reading the rest of mine.)

Here is Judson't simple point:

I’d like to abolish the insidious terms Darwinism, Darwinist and Darwinian. They suggest a false narrowness to the field of modern evolutionary biology, as though it was the brainchild of a single person 150 years ago, rather than a vast, complex and evolving subject to which many other great figures have contributed. (The science would be in a sorry state if one man 150 years ago had, in fact, discovered everything there was to say.) Obsessively focusing on Darwin, perpetually asking whether he was right about this or that, implies that the discovery of something he didn’t think of or know about somehow undermines or threatens the whole enterprise of evolutionary biology today.

Now, even if we didn't have anti-evolution propagandists employing the term "Darwinism" for the purpose of sowing confusion and fomenting religious opposition to science, the term would be "insidious" for the reasons Judson cites. Ditto for "Darwinist." In the case of "Darwinian," though, there is ample scientific precedent for using the term to indicate evolutionary changes (or mechanisms) specifically associated with selection, as opposed to other known forces (such as random genetic drift) that lead to evolutionary change, and "darwinian fitness," synonymous with reproductive fitness of a genotype, is a fairly standard term in genetics.

But Olivia Judson is right. After all, we don't call genetics "Mendelism," we don't call neuroscience "Cajalism," we don't call molecular biologists "WatsonCrickists," and no one accuses astronomers of being "Copernicans." The term is silly, and to a certain extent so is the overemphasis on Darwin and his birthday.

So, how is Olivia Judson's piece discussed at Uncommon Descent? With a barbaric comparison of Darwin, the "cornerstone" of evolutionary biology, with Christ, the cornerstone of Christian faith. Here's my response to Dembski's weird little rant:

Judson is right on in every way in her piece. We don't call genetics "Mendelism" or molecular biology "WatsonCrickism," and the abuse of the term "Darwinism," a specialty of this rancid blog, is just one reason to dispense with the term.

The sickest part of your post, Mr. Dembski, was where you mangled Judson's use of term "cornerstone" and then associated it with our Christian references to Christ himself. Judson's reference, of course, was not to Mr. Darwin but to "several of his ideas," which she and others note don't even originate exclusively or completely with him. Christ, on the other hand, IS the cornerstone of our faith. To link Darwin's place in evolutionary theory with Christ's place in the kingdom of God is really sick.

The quote from Jerry Coyne is pretty good, and funny thing: it doesn't mention Darwin at all. Coyne may be an a--, but if you think he worships Darwin, then you'll have to do some better quotemining than that.

Come on, guys. There's just no way this blog can be taken seriously as a place to defend and discuss design as long as it is characterized by twaddle like this.

The comment went up this evening, and lasted something less than an hour, probably closer to 30 minutes. It resulted in my immediate banning and much mirth on my deck (where I was relaxing with the laptop, enjoying the fireflies and feeding the mosquitoes). And there's already an obituary, which hilariously opines that I was "going out of my way to be negative." If that's negative, then what on earth does he call Dembski's swill? I call it sick. I think I already mentioned that.

Uncommon Descent is a cesspool. I'm eager to discuss design and evolution with Christians of diverse persuasions, and I know it can be done without the kind of desperate intellectual vandalism that characterizes Bill Dembski's writing at UD. But this much is clear: it can't be done at Uncommon Descent, as I repeatedly noted when I was there. It's hard to imagine a less apt forum for the serious consideration of Christian views of biological origins.

Uncommon Descent conversation, part 7: the question

Below is another installment of my comments from two weeks ago on a thread at Uncommon Descent, which I've been re-posting here.

As the conversation wound down, I patiently endured the silly suggestion that my expressions of frustration amounted to my "reverting to a culture war mode" (huh??), then asked a question that summarizes one of my main objections to the ID movement: the arguments, all too often, add up to a debasing of "natural" processes in God's world. "Random" or "naturalistic" mechanisms are too frequently assumed – or even asserted – to be separate from God's real work, such that explanations that provide "purely" or "merely" natural accounts of biological phenomena are thought to "exclude God." Exposing and attacking this blatant error is one of the main goals of my blog.

Well, unfortunately, I don't think I made my question very clear, and Thomas Cudworth clearly didn't understand what I was getting at. We'll come back to it sometime, but here it is for QoD readers, most of whom should be able to see where I'm going.

---

Thomas @89:

I’ll be glad to leave the discussions of culture-war casualties behind. If you read my response to StephenB again, you might find that you have been too harsh in your judgment of my words. (In fact, I think your comment that I “reverted to culture war mode” is patently unfair.) But either way, I’m still committed to our discussion, and I will let your comments stand as they are, if that means we’re done with that particular diversion.

I’ll add that while I think you’ve been unfair in your characterization of my comments, I don’t think you meant to be rude or disrespectful, and I’m still glad to be a part of the conversation. I’ll also add that we should all work on being patient with each other: we have substantive disagreements on emotionally-charged questions of real import. We should expect each other to behave civilly, but we oughtn’t be surprised to see some sharp disagreement. I’m okay with that (or I wouldn’t be here), and I think you need to be okay with that.

I propose that we wrap it up, for now anyway, perhaps by looking over the previous installments to see if there are any questions we’d still like to ask each other. I’ll start, if that’s okay.

Do you see design in the processes of human embryonic development? (I do.) If so, do you think that a Christian developmental biologist who embraces naturalistic explanations of these processes should be expected to affirm that s/he believes that Psalm 139 speaks the truth?

This is not a trick question; I’m very curious about how the whole natural vs. God thing works out for ID thinkers when considering biological phenomena other than evolution.

Uncommon Descent conversation, part 6

This is a continuation of the exchange from two weeks ago. (I've been re-posting my contributions here for the benefit of those who (like me) don't read Uncommon Descent. The discussion ended more than a week ago, but I neglected to re-post my last few responses.) There's not much in this installment other than my attempts to drive home the simple points I made at the beginning of the conversation (hence my evident frustration). I'm responding (mostly) to a post by StephenB.

---

To StephenB @80:

I don’t think we’re going to make much more progress, since I don’t think I’m making it clear enough to you that I see God and His world differently than you do. You seem unwilling or unable to reflect on what I have already said and to account for my words in your responses to them. Perhaps I haven’t been clear enough on my position with regard to “pure Darwinism,” but I think it’s more likely that you won’t accept the fact that I don’t see “design” the way you do, and that I reject your preferred assumptions regarding “randomness” and God’s work.

I will offer these final thoughts in response to your post, and then you can have the last word if you wish. This does not mean that I won’t discuss other topics with you, or that I’m leaving UD for good, but it does mean that you have exhausted my patience on this subject.

1. I don’t know what an “internal principle” is, and at this point I really don’t care, but if you want to know what I think of “pure Darwinism” you can re-read what I’ve already written here.

2. There are multiple reasons why “Pure Darwinists” and “Miller, Collins et al” are hostile to ID. If you think your movement is controversial solely because it “implies the INTENT behind the evolutionary process,” then you’re wholly deluded. I am opposed to your movement, and I’m not a pure Darwinist. Unsuccessfully it would seem, I have tried to explain why.

3. I’m a pretty good Calvinist, so I believe that our world belongs to God and was created by Him. And so I do think that all things were brought into existence by His hand. Because I’m only a pretty good Calvinist (i.e., not a perfect one), I wonder about the idea of freedom and how it works out in creation. I am undecided about how exactly to explain or account for creaturely freedom, and I’m content to consider it one of many mysteries. For now, I am unwilling to commit to a puppet-show universe with no freedom, and equally unwilling to commit to open theology (as I understand it). As I hope you can see, my thinking on this issue does not lend itself well to the simplistic dichotomies that you seem to favor. That’s not my problem.

4. I didn’t come here to argue about what Francis Collins and Ken Miller believe or say. I came here to explain why I, a fellow Christian and practicing biologist, do not support your movement. Because our conversation went well, without any of the ugliness that characterizes the broader cultural confrontation, I now consider myself a fully-minted “friendly critic.” That’s a pretty big step, I think, but it doesn’t mean I have a whole lot more patience with the generally obnoxious tenor of this blog, or of the Discovery Institute, and it sure doesn’t mean that I will waste my time listening to a lot of whining about culture-war body counts. Count me as a friendly critic, perhaps even occasional defender, but not as a friendly audience for melodramatic portrayals of ID persecution, and certainly not as a scapegoat for the sins of whoever it is you can’t stand.

ID = Independence Day

Where I've been for a week and a half. Where we're going tomorrow, back next week. Happy ID!

Uncommon Descent conversation, part 5

Below is my fifth contribution to the discussion at Uncommon Descent, in the thread called "Theistic Evolutionists...we can help you." My previous post, addressed to "jerry," has not gone up on UD, for reasons unknown. Perhaps readers can spot the problem (e.g., a dirty word hidden in some scientific jargon) and UD visitors can pass that information to the UD magistrates.

Interestingly, yesterday I discovered that my comments were posted immediately, without moderation. But the contribution below is now reporting that it "awaits moderation," so I'm back in purgatory for some reason, probably related to the unexplained rejection of the response to "jerry." Anyway, here it is, and we'll see if it also appears (with the previous post) on UD.

---

Thomas @70:

First a note to all: I attempted to post a response to jerry here last night, but it hasn't gone up and I don't know why. You can read it at my blog, but I hope we'll get it up here soon.

I think I will let this be my last word on the topic of randomness and how various TEs handle it, and I'll try to keep it brief. But if there's something specific you'd like me to address, by all means point it out.

You have made it quite clear, I think, what you want "TEs" to do. But you have failed to convince me that this is anything but completely trivial, and I have judged your complaint to be unimportant. To summarize my own position: Darwin's "mechanism" was natural selection acting on random variation. Darwin, without any scientific or metaphysical support, added non-teleology to his mechanism, and the result is something that you and I seem to agree to call "Darwinism." Christians, we seem to agree, can't embrace that thing we're calling "Darwinism." (Non-Christians, even non-theists, might choose to reject "Darwinism" for the same reasons, namely that it incorporates unjustified metaphysical pronouncements that don't add explanatory force.) But since Darwin added his metaphysical proviso without justification, and since the proviso does no explanatory work, it can (and should) be removed as unceremoniously as it was added. The consequences of this move are of course not trivial, but the move itself is completely trivial.

Again, I don't speak for any of those other folks, but I surmise that one reason they don't provide the disclaimers you desire is that they, like me, are concerned that they will be misunderstood. The term "Darwinism" is, in my opinion, very often deliberately meant to confuse. In our conversation here, it's gone well, but only because I made it very clear, right from the beginning, what I meant by "Darwinism." This distinction is rarely made clear, but it's hugely important. Without it, a person reading your post, referring to our agreement "that the Darwinian mechanism is at least partly wrong," might reasonably conclude that I am unconvinced of the explanatory power of natural selection acting on random variation. Perhaps because I'm a scientist, I can barely imagine interpreting "the Darwinian mechanism" in any other way. But that's what you and I have done here. The potential for misunderstanding is significant, and I haven't even factored in the ID movement's fondness for martial rhetoric and propaganda.

And Thomas, I do not take seriously your comments about people like Francis Collins "poisoning the public discourse in the country." It's not that I think Ken Miller is right about everything (hardly), or that I think Collins hasn't missed some pitches. No, the basic problem is that your movement has no moral credibility with me. You are speaking from within a blog that represents everything I loathe about the movement. You are whining about "hostility" in a blog that revels in the belligerent taunting of my colleagues and that breezily describes people like me as "spineless appeasers," "Neville Chamberlains," or "dhimmis" while asserting that we have entered a "pact with the Devil." Your movement's contempt for evolutionary creation has been communicated all too clearly, and if I were you I'd be much more focused on building and maintaining scholarly relationships with those who are willing to be responsible critics, or even on forcefully disclaiming your movement’s many abuses of science and scientists, than I would be on feigning victimhood.

I am committed to working hard at maintaining collegiality in discussions with folks like you and StephenB and jerry, in my role as "friendly critic." But if you want me to be a friend, you'll have to change your approach significantly. At the very least, you should re-examine my original post, regarding some very important problems I have with your movement, and consider whether the conversation is going in the right direction.

But lest you think I'm not listening: yes, you can count on me to criticize bogus or unfair arguments by TEs, and yes, I think there are times when interesting discussions of design and God's action are lost in the fog of culture war.

Uncommon Descent conversation, part 4

A few interesting responses on the Theistic Evolutionists...We Can Help You thread at Uncommon Descent, one from a poster named jerry who asked a few straightforward questions. My response is below as usual.

---

To Jerry @68:

Thanks for the words of welcome. I need to be relatively brief now, especially on Behe's work, but I'm happy to discuss biology and evolution with anyone anytime, and I welcome questions, the more specific the better. I hope you and the others here will be patient with me: I work full time in the lab, run a blog of my own, and juggle several additional writing projects among my time with my wife and four kids. When/if there's a question you really want me to address, make it clear.

First, re banning on this site, I've heard from too many decent people on this topic to believe that the policy here is a good one. And the claim that people are banned due to "ad hominems" is laughable, as anyone who reads this blog knows all too well. I've been warmly welcomed, and that's all that matters in this conversation, but please don't ask me to defend your venue. It is what it is, and I happen to think it's a mess -- let's leave it at that.

"I think design is the question, and you think it's the answer." Here, basically, is what I mean. In your first paragraph, you note that you and others here "do not believe there is any naturalistic mechanism that can explain macro evolution or the origin of life," and so you "opt for design events as the only answer." Design, for you, is the answer, and the question was how did these biological systems come about? In between, we find your conclusion that the phenomena in question cannot be explained naturalistically.

I start with the same question: how did these biological systems come about? At the same time, I notice design, "purposeful arrangement of parts," even "prodigies of nature." As I already mentioned in my first post here, I'm quite happy discussing design, and completely reject the suggestion that design has no place in science. Baloney! Design is what we're trying to understand. Design is the question. Here is this biosphere, filled with mind-blowing nanomachines and indescribably intricate processes. Do we need a mathematically-inclined philosopher to coax the specter of "design" out of modern probabilistic theories? Do we need an underinformed biochemist to locate "design" through analysis of mutation rates in Plasmodium falciparum? Good heavens, no. It's right there; it's everywhere. Detecting design, for me, is almost effortless, natural, automatic. (Consider the vocabulary of cell biology, which we can further discuss later.) And so I identify "design" as the very thing I'm trying to understand. My question becomes how did all of this design come about?

I think, then, that we can identify at least two crucial ways in which our thinking diverges. First, design for you is the stuff you use to fill explanatory gaps -- it's the answer. For me, it's the thing we seek to understand -- it's the question. Second, you are convinced that "naturalistic" explanation of natural history is not possible. I'm not at all convinced of this, and in fact I expect God's world to be largely amenable to natural explanation. In other words, I expect that naturalistic mechanisms can account for biological evolution, just as I expect that they can account for embryonic development and for, say, autism. Did that answer your question?

And what about Behe's The Edge of Evolution? Writing carefully about his errors is not easy; evolutionary genetics is challenging under the best of conditions, and laypersons are understandably poorly-equipped to grasp the necessary details. I have been planning a series on my blog, and this conversation might get that project moved up on the to-do list. I've explained some of the most dramatic errors on my blog, and I'll add three further comments here.

1. In TEoE and elsewhere, Behe presents a highly simplified vision of adaptation and microevolution, in which only beneficial mutations are maintained in populations. He gives the impression that a population would only harbor a given mutation or polymorphism if that change had been specifically favored by selection. This is a substantial mischaracterization of evolutionary genetics, overlooking some very important aspects of eukaryotic genetics. There are several mechanisms, well-known to geneticists but almost universally neglected in popular discussions of evolution and inheritance, that can lead to the maintenance of a non-adaptive or "non-beneficial" allele in a population, especially in a sexually-reproducing diploid population (like, say, Plasmodium falciparum). Moreover, during evolutionary and/or environmental change, the beneficial-ness of a particular allele can change completely. Beware of simple evolutionary stories in which adaptation can only proceed in happy little steps from good to better to best. Genetics is more complicated (and interesting) than that.

2. The book's central argument is based fundamentally on population genetics, but ignores the work of the world's most prominent and accomplished geneticists. Allen Orr, for example, is precisely the kind of expert whose work should be the focus of Behe's analysis, but Behe's references to Orr's work are minimal. He leaves untouched the entire field of evolutionary genetics, merely cherry-picking two of Orr's papers. The point is this: a serious consideration of evolutionary genetics -- never mind a complete rewriting of the entire field -- should show marks of serious engagement with existing ideas. TEoE doesn't even try to do this. And most tellingly, Behe hasn't been able to get population geneticists to endorse his book, or to follow up on his assertions. Did he even ask Allen Orr to read the manuscript before going to press? Has he asked Allen Orr to critically review the book, the way any real scientist would seek critical feedback before (or after) advancing a big new idea?

3. If Behe's claims in TEoE are correct, he will soon be the most celebrated biologist since Watson and Crick, and perhaps of all time, for he will have shown conclusively that essentially everything in the biosphere has arisen through mechanisms unknown to science. It is impossible to exaggerate the magnitude of the impact of such discoveries, and I assure you that if I thought there was anything there at all, I would hasten to follow up on Behe's skeletal introduction, devising bioinformatic analyses to bolster his hypothesis and working hard to establish myself as a part of this historic sea change in science. I would achieve scientific "immortality" for myself, worldwide acclaim for Calvin College, and maybe enough of a raise to retire my student loan debt while paying for Christian school education for my kids. Guys, if Allen Orr or Michael Lynch or Sean Carroll or Francis Collins or Craig Venter thought there was anything even remotely plausible about Behe's analysis, they would marshal resources of every kind to pursue the question, and some of them would gather investors and start an institute, bearing the name of some benefactor eager to have his/her name associated with the most momentous discovery of the 20th century and with the Nobel Laureate who made it happen.

Wake up, people. There's nothing there.

Survivor:UD -- when will they vote Matheson off?

Okay, that'll probably be the last UD moderation joke, because my irresistible charm has had its predictable (non-random) effect. I have a nice discussion going with two regulars at Uncommon Descent, StephenB and the original poster, Thomas Cudworth. I'll post my contribution below as usual, and you can read the rest of the conversation in the growing thread at Uncommon Descent.

Before you go there, have a look at this nice (older) post on randomness in the Bible, at Martin LaBar's blog, Sun and Shield. Martin is a regular commenter here, and his blog is a joy to read.

Please jump in here if you wish; I don't moderate comments and will welcome any and all.

---

I'll respond to both Thomas and StephenB here. First, to the moderator: thanks for posting my comments. The discussion has been profitable, and I take it that Thomas and StephenB would agree. Please note that I am mirroring my own contributions on my blog, Quintessence of Dust, and will continue to do that, at least so that others can participate in the conversation. (I don't moderate comments.) In answering both Thomas and StephenB, this post got pretty long, and I would understand if you asked us to move it elsewhere. Just let me know.

To Thomas @61:

I do think that your statements appear to bracket God's power, but you didn't mean to say that, and I think I see why we're struggling to understand each other here. You discuss "pure Darwinism" and "strict Darwinism" and "the naked Darwinian mechanism." Here you are referring, I gather, to random mutation and natural selection with a further stipulation: that no divine guidance of any kind is involved. (We could substitute 'design' or 'teleology' here and my point would be the same.) And you are, I think, correct in identifying that -ism with Mr. Darwin, as Prof. Hodge so ably demonstrated. Hodge was right: "Darwinism," so defined, is atheism. This may mean that I'm not a Darwinist, but a Grayist. (I would be most pleased to bear that name if I thought anyone else would get the allusion.) The point, though, is this: your criticism of Christians who embrace "Darwinism" only makes sense if those Christians embraced the Darwinism that Hodge railed against, which he correctly identified as atheism. And that means your criticism reduces to this: Christians shouldn't be atheists. I'm struggling to understand why you think so many Christians are that stupid, which we'd have to be in order to embrace the "Darwinism" that you condemn. With all due respect, you should reconsider a line of argument that can only imply abject stupidity (or perhaps evil) on the part of the Christians that you name. For my part as a Christian evolutionist, I'll gladly make the statement you call for: Darwin was indeed "partly wrong" about the "mechanism of evolution," because he insisted on ateleology, with neither scientific nor metaphysical justification. Trivial.

So, Thomas, I'm not at all sure who these Christian TEs are who embrace atheistic Darwinism. I'm pretty sure they don't exist. In any case, I'm not one of them, and my intention here at UD is to speak only for myself.

With the understanding that I do not seek to speak for others, I will say that I reject your accusation against three of the four Christian scholars you singled out. Francis Collins contradicts you on page 205 of The Language of God; Ken Miller in chapter 8 of Finding Darwin's God, and especially on pp. 238-9; Denis Lamoureux refers explicitly to evolution as a "teleological natural process ordained by God." I don't know Ayala's work on this subject well enough to know where he stands, but I very much doubt that you have gotten him right. Perhaps I have misunderstood you again, but whether you retract your accusations or not, I can't currently take them seriously.

My point about atheists was meant only to note that the viciousness of the rhetoric on UD constitutes a major deterrent to me with regard to your movement. I would not count myself among Christians who engage in such practices. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't have lunch with you. I'll even buy.

Finally, thanks for making me feel welcome as a "friendly critic." I don't buy your martyr case, and I'm mostly amused by the apocalyptic martial prose, but I also don't doubt that people have been treated unfairly. More importantly, I won't call you a bad scientist or a bad theologian for thinking about design. I may, on the other hand, point to bad science or bad theology (mostly bad science) done in the name of ID, and you and your friends are going to have to do a better job of distinguishing criticism of your ideas (some of which are spectacularly bad) from diabolical attempts to destroy you and anyone who looks like you. (Bill Dembski botched this badly in his fatwa-like rant from two weeks ago; read it carefully and see if you can understand my disgust.)

To StephenB @62:

I'm not sure what to do with most of your comments, except to thank your for taking the time to lay out your thoughts and to do it with a measure of respect. Just a few responses, then I'll answer your question at the end.

1. I do not belong to any particular school regarding God's work in the world. Kenosis is interesting -- that's all I said. Your thoughts parallel mine for the most part. I wouldn't go as far as to say that Psalm 19 and Romans 1 imply that "design in nature is detectable," but that might be because I'm suspicious of the word "design" here. I suspect that your claim regarding those scriptural passages is indicative of some very significant differences in outlook between you and I.

2. Your rebuttals of Stephen Barr are interesting and informed, but my purpose in citing his piece was to highlight Aquinas' very clear pronouncements regarding "chance" and providence. That was all.

3. You write: "God CAN use random events. The problem is, however, TEs insist that God does EVERYTHING that way." Well, StephenB, obviously I'm not a TE. I'm not sure there's any such thing as a Christian TE, by your reckoning, and I'm not sure there's anything more for us to discuss on this particular topic.

4. You asked about the various phenomena I listed as examples of scientific explanations that invoke randomness. Here's a brief overview.

a. Axonal pruning is widespread during vertebrate brain development, and is preceded by the overgrowth of axonal projections into a target field. These projections are guided by various mechanisms into that target field, but once there they find themselves in competition with an excess of other axons. These so-called exuberant axonal projections are postulated to fill the target field randomly, meaning that they display no discernible pattern. Pruning (also termed selection for obvious reasons) occurs following competition, which usually involves electrical activity of the axons. Analagous processes are involved in the elimination of excess synapses, and even excess neurons.

b. Mammalian females have 2 X chromosomes, while males have only one. Since gene dosage seems to be adjusted such that one X chromosome is enough for any given cell (which makes sense given that male cells have only one to start with), one of the two X chromosomes in every cell in a female's body is inactivated. (This occurs during early development, and results in the organism becoming a chimera of areas that express the maternal X chromosome and areas that express the paternal version.) Because the exact chromosome that will be chosen in any given cell cannot be predicted, the process is referred to as "random." Evidence in favor of this view comes from the examination of coat color in cats and mice.

c. Erosion...the Grand Canyon...think fractals. And meteorites...if I say that meteorites are falling "randomly" onto the earth's surface, would you think I was making an atheistic metaphysical claim? Or would you understand me to be saying that there seems to be no discernible pattern?

d. Random (meaning unbiased) fertilization is the basis of Mendelian genetic analysis. If I ask you about the probability of your getting cystic fibrosis based on your parents' known status as carriers, I'm assuming random fertilization. And when geneticists see non-Mendelian inheritance patterns, they don't think "design."

e. The genes that encode antibodies (in mammals, at least) are generated by a frenzy of genetic shuffling during embryonic development. The shuffling involves some non-random processes combined with an error-prone process that randomly generates vast combinations of antibody structures.

Apparently random processes are ubiquitous in biological systems, especially during development, and I'm a developmental biologist. Is it clear why I'm completely turned off by all the nonsense about random vs. God's work?

Day 2 on Uncommon Descent: waiting for the axe to fall

My comment on Uncommon Descent yielded a single response, from one StephenB, who had two things to say. He was curious about my side note regarding "some pretty clear statements about chance and God's providence in Scripture" and then he reiterated what we all know very well: that he and other ID proponents see "Darwinian evolution" as a "an unintended, unconscious, chance process with no plan."

He left without comment my reasons for avoiding contact with his movement. I guess I was not misunderstood, which is good.

Here's my comment in response. Feel free to lay odds on its inclusion at UD.

---

To StephenB @57:
Thanks for the response. It seems there are just two issues to tackle here.

1. You asked about my view of chance in Scripture. I note that God's people commonly used the casting of lots to make decisions (choosing the scapegoat, selecting Judas' replacement, choosing Saul as king) and Proverbs 16:33 seems pretty clear to me: "The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord." My claim is not that "design by chance is a Scriptural concept." My claim is much more basic: the notion that "random" processes, including Darwinian evolution, are "out of God's control" is indefensible. Thomas Aquinas, I gather, would agree.

StephenB, I can't even imagine why a Christian would want to make that assertion about God's action in the world, even if that person had never read about the deliberate use of random devices in the Bible and God's claim to control those devices. A Christian who talks like that is one who views God and the world very differently than I do.

2. The rest of your response, it seems to me, can be summarized in this phrase: "The problem is that some want to impose on God a Darwinian process, which is, by definition, a non-control process, and then try to make it fit in with a picture of God under control." As I noted in my first comment, this claim (that Darwinian evolution is necessarily a "non-control" process) is nonsense. The best you can do is label it true "by definition" and then haul out quote-mined proof texts from confused atheists. (I'm not saying that you've quote-mined; I'm only saying that the only support such an assertion can possibly muster is the existence of those who agree.) What you most certainly cannot (honestly) do is demonstrate that God does not (or cannot) work through events or processes that we label "random."

Now again, let me point to the common ground here. Neither of us believes that the marvels of creation came about by "accident" or through a process that God "can't control." I'm pretty flexible on questions of what God knows and when, and I'm interested in kenosis and other models of God's interaction with creation that make room for creaturely freedom. But like you, I reject the notion that creation unfolds outside of God's control. And that means that some of what your movement claims to value is also valuable to me.

But one last thing. Do you feel compelled to reject and/or oppose scientific models of axonal pruning or synapse elimination or X chromosome inactivation or erosion or fertilization or meteorite impacts or generation of antibodies that invoke the concept of randomness? Can you see why I (as a developmental biologist) would hesitate to follow you down this road?