FR Debate: Intelligent Design vs. Birth Defects, Can They Be Reconciled?

Discovery Health & Multiple Medical Sites ^ | 11/11/05

[Wolfstar]

Each year in the United States, about 150,000 babies are born with birth defects ranging from mild to life threatening. While progress has been made in the detection and treatment of birth defects, they remain the leading cause of death in the first year of life. Birth defects are often the result of genetic and environmental factors, but the causes of well over half of all birth defects are currently unknown.

Following is a partial list of birth defects:

Achondroplasia/Dwarfism	Hemochromatosis
Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency	Huntington's Disease
Anencephaly	Hydrocephalus
Arnold-Chiari Malformation	Klinefelter's Syndrome
Ataxia Telangiectasia	Leukodystrophies
Blood coagulation disorders/Hemophilia	Marfan Syndrome
Brain malformations/genetic brain disorders	Metabolic disorders
Canavan Disease	Muscular Dystrophy
Cancer: Neonatal, newborn, infant and childhood	Neural tube defects/Spina Bifida
Cerebral Palsy	Neurofibromatosis
Cleft lip and palate	Niemann-Pick Disease
Club foot/club hand	Osteogenesis Imperfecta (brittle bone disease)
Congenital heart disease	Phenylketonuria
Conjoined twins	Prader-Willi Syndrome
Cystic Fibrosis	Progeria (advanced aging in children)
Down Syndrome	Sickle Cell Anemia
Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome	Spinal Muscular Atrophy
Eye, ear and speech defects	Tay-Sachs Disease
Fragile X Syndrome	Tuberous Sclerosis
Gaucher's Disease	Turner's Syndrome
Genital and urinary tract defects	Wilson's Disease

Some birth/genetic defects, such as near-sightedness, are mild and do not affect the person's ability to lead a normal life. Others are so severe that the person has no chance to even live. Efficiency and economy are part of intelligently designed systems. If the "design" of human systems is so intelligent, why do tragic inefficiencies such as the following occur at all? Warning, the linked photos are graphic medical images, and are very, very sad.

Conjoined twins, i.e., monozygous twinning in which there is fusion of the twins. The popular term is "Siamese" twins. This happens when identical twin embryos become fused together during the very early stages of development. Conjoined twins occur in an estimated one in 200,000 births, with approximately half being stillborn. Here are links to three photos of severely conjoined twins:

Photo 1: one head, two bodies

Photo 2: essentially one torso between two babies

Photo 3: profound fusion

Neural tube defects are are one of the more common congenital anomalies. Such defects result from improper embryonic neural tube closure. The most minimal defect is called spina bifida, with failure of the vertebral body to completely form, but the defect is not open. Open neural tube defects with lack of a skin covering, can include a meningocele, in which meninges protrude through the defect. Here is a link to a severe neural tube defect.

Photo 4

Defects of the head/brain: In the linked photo a large encephalocele that merges with the scalp above is protruding from the back of the head. The encephalocele extends down to partially cover a rachischisis on the back. This baby also has a retroflexed head from iniencephaly.

Photo 5

The form of neural tube defect in the next linked photo is known as exencephaly. The cranial vault is not completely present, but a brain is present because it was not completely exposed to amniotic fluid. Such an event is very rare. It may be part of craniofacial clefts associated with the limb-body wall complex, which results from early amnion disruption.

Photo 6

Congenital and pediatric neoplasms: One type that can occur is a teratoma. The next linked photo shows a large nasopharyngeal teratoma that is protruding from the oral cavity.

Photo 7

Tumors: In the next linked photo there is a large mass involving the left upper arm and left chest of the baby. This congenital neoplasm turned out to be a lymphangioma. This baby and the one in Photo 9 were essentially riddled with cancer before birth and shortly afterwards.

Photo 8

Next is a gross neuroblastoma arising in the right adrenal gland. It is the most common pediatric malignancy in infancy, and 75% of cases are diagnosed in children less than 4 years old. These tumors most often present as an abdominal or mediastinal mass.

Photo 9

[From many - one.]

A man might...if he were also around to provide for those children and protect them.

Short term advantage: more offspring
Long term disadvantage: fewer offspring reproduce

Add in the fact that having a male unerelated to children in the home leads to mistreatment or death of unrelated offspring (sort of like lions)

Looking at the world-as-it-is I'm guessing that monogamy is on the rise for good sound biological reasons.

[Tribune7]

My point is that the Theory of Evolution is no more aligned with Judeo-Christian morality than any other scientific theory.

A claim was made that good morals is good evolution. Xzins was responding to it. He didn't make it.

[hosepipe]

[ hosepipe: Whose misbehavior?, What has the Bible got to do with it? What has truth being a hard taskmsaster got to do with it? ]

You seem to be quite "thick"..
Incest and inbreeding cause geneological damage to A gene pool..
Its the misdeeds of someones ancestors(incest/inbreeding as an example) thats effects the gene pool.. Biblical guidelines caution against inbreeding and incest.. You're not to smart are you.?...

HELLO!.. this is not rocket science.. Most "developed" countrys make inbreeding illegal for just that reason.. it has nothing at all to do with religion..

[xzins]

Based on your current analysis, we have evolution on the both sides of the issue.

I guess that way they're right as much as they're wrong. :>)

[xzins]

Tribune is correct. Thanks, T7.

[Gumlegs]

Thanks, T7, but I think I got xzins's point. Perhaps I've failed to make mine adequately.

Trying to make a case that good morals = good evolution is to misunderstand the point of a scientific theory, evolution or gravity -- it doesn't matter. So I disagree with the poster that xzins disagreed with.

I also disagree that a scientific theory can or should be judged whether it contributes to any set of morals, Judeo-Christian or otherwise. That's not what a scientific theory is for.

[trashcanbred]

ID would not preclude evolution as many of its proponents agree. The designer would be the guiding hand culling out "errors" and wrong pathways.

I am not sure I follow. A designer culling out errors would mean that the designer, not evolution, is the force behind genetic changes. The changes in the environment would have nothing (or little) to do with the alterations of a species. If so... then the changes the designer makes to a species would be what we have been mistaking for all along to be evolution. The fact that changes we see today in a species (antibiotic resistance, wild wheat adaptations in different soils, etc...) isn't from different environments but from the designer making the changes him/herself. If so... you are indirectly accusing the designer of purposely trying to kill us. You are saying it isn't evolution that is causing half a million people in the US to get staph infections from hospitals, it is the designer. You would be saying that resistant tuberculosis strains that have appeared and are lethal did not happen because of any evolutionary reasoning but because the "guiding hand" of the designer is at work.

Not a very pleasant thought...

It could be perfectly scientific if we just change the scale and re-evaluate the goal of the designer. We could even devise experiments designed to reveal traces of a designer.

I am hard pressed to think of a scientific way to prove there is a designer. And by the way, did this designer create the known universe of just life? If the designer created the known universe, maybe there is something to find in mathematics of physics that would be proof. Sort of like in the book "Contact" by Carl Sagan. They had a super computer figure out PI(π) to the umpteenth decimal place and discovered that there were a group of 1's and 0's that when put together properly formed a circle. Even that might not quite be proof for me but it would at least be some sort of odd evidence.

One could argue that Euler's identity could be proof. The most basic important numbers in mathematics(and physics and EE) are 0,1,e,π and i (imaginary number of square root of -1). Good ol' Euler proved that these numbers all can be combined to create a simple formula:

1 + e to the power of i*π = 0

As for how to scientifically prove there is a designer I would like to hear that.

[From many - one.]

Permit me to clarify:

Inbreeding simply permits the expression of recessive genes already in the gene pool.

It does not cause damage to the gene pool.

The overwhelming majority of birth defects are not caused by inbreeding at the incest level.

[xzins]

That wasn't the point of the discussion ... it really wasn't about scientific theory at all.

It was about atheistic materialism.

My premise was: There can be no real morality if there is no God.

[xzins]

That wasn't the point of the discussion ... it really wasn't about scientific theory at all.

It was about atheistic materialism.

My premise was: There can be no real morality if there is no God.

[Gumlegs]

My premise was: There can be no real morality if there is no God.

Just as No Real Scottsman puts sugar on his oatmeal ... ? ;>)

[xzins]

Brown sugar is allowed.

[From many - one.]

Ok, I'll start with the two easiest ones: murder and stealing.

Virtually every human society disapproves of both. Unlimited murder would destroy the population in no time so any human group that permits murder will die out and be supplanted by one which disapproves.

Note also that the definition of murder varies a bit among societies... some have human sacrifice, some have suttee, some have death penalty for various crimes. Each, however, says that there are only a limited number of humans that you can kill with impunity.

Similar with stealing. Only a very limited population could be supported if the acquirers of goods could not be assured that they could keeps them. Again, each human society has some modifications related to sharing... taxes, socially obligatory food sharing etc.

[From many - one.]

:-> You've just discovered one of the major features of evolution: natural variation.

Suppose a disease killed off most men. Guess who'd be favored then?

[hosepipe]

[ Inbreeding simply permits the expression of recessive genes already in the gene pool. It does not cause damage to the gene pool. The overwhelming majority of birth defects are not caused by inbreeding at the incest level. ]

Suggest taking up dominos.. many lessons to be learned..

[From many - one.]

caveat 1. I do not advocate this argument, I simply present it as possibly.

caveat 2. At geezer age, being sleep deprived definitely impedes clarity.
Apologies in advance.

Step one: the designer wants to harvest selenium on the earth without bothering to dig and process. The designer lives uxty billion light years away and lives 20gazillion years.

Step 2 it shoots a life-starter missle earthwards and checks back every whumpty years. The contents of the missle will start earth-compatible self-replicating molecules with a tendency to variance at 1^720

Step 3 if the direction of growth of life forms is not desirable it heaves an asteroid or a climate-change bomb as kind of a reset button

step 4 a designer-engineer gets the idea to make sure the developing life includes a secondary form that will harvest the selenium mining form in order to further concentrate the harvested crop. The engineer doesn't get as much funding as the established crowd but does the best he can by making itelligence favoring bottlenecks here and there.

step 5 we don't know, but we may get a visitor soon saying harvest loco weed or die.

I've written in a frivolous style, but my point is serious (series?). A designer need not be God, nor might we be the primary goal of the designer.

[From many - one.]

Suggest away. They pay me to teach this stuff.

[From many - one.]

re: finding traces of a designer:

right now I can only think of one anda bad one at that: if major evolutionary events were to be somehow discovered to align with some collection of events which didn't square with known science: say if 3 major diffentiating events were associated with a non-solar system comet, and none were associated with a solar system comet.


This is sticking with a non-supernatural designer and not including God.

[trashcanbred]

Ahhh... now I will be sleep deprived tonight if I think of this. :-)

I do not know exactly how to answer your question except... most conjecture should have some sort of basis of evidence to even go further on it. How do we know it wasn't some pan-dimension can of soda that created us for no other reason than entertainment value. Or we were put here to answer the question "What is the meaning of Life, Universe, and Everything?".

Oh and I do not advocate any of my arguments either... I just like to argue. Maybe no one is right at all on this matter... I dunno... hope I can sleep tonight though...

[From many - one.]

Considering your pan-dimensional can of soda invading my brain, my sympathy for your potential sleep deprivation is minimal. :)

However, bad as my notion was, I did try to keep it within the bounds of semi-reasonable so that if you pick it apart, a viable notion might emerge somewhat in keeping with Wolfstar's original request.

If, though, it was just too horrificly ridiculous, I won't be insulted by a LOL return post.