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". . . At any rate, the recent peer-reviewed article by an Intelligent Design theorist concentrates on two points: the rise of information and geometry in biological systems. . . ."

I took a look at the article and I found some of its points to be highly questionable, so I googled a search on it and I found that the Council of the Biological Society of Washington has issued a statement of repudiation of the article, stating that its publication was a mistake and explaining that one of the reasons it happened was that the article did not go through the normal peer review process. I'll post their statement here:

"The paper by Stephen C. Meyer, "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories," in vol. 117, no. 2, pp. 213-239 of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, was published at the discretion of the former editor, Richard v. Sternberg. Contrary to typical editorial practices, the paper was published without review by any associate editor; Sternberg handled the entire review process. The Council, which includes officers, elected councilors, and past presidents, and the associate editors would have deemed the paper inappropriate for the pages of the Proceedings because the subject matter represents such a significant departure from the nearly purely systematic content for which this journal has been known throughout its 122-year history. For the same reason, the journal will not publish a rebuttal to the thesis of the paper, the superiority of intelligent design (ID) over evolution as an explanation of the emergence of Cambrian body-plan diversity. The Council endorses a resolution on ID published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml), which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis to explain the origin of organic diversity. Accordingly, the Meyer paper does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings.

We have reviewed and revised editorial policies to ensure that the goals of the Society, as reflected in its journal, are clearly understood by all. Through a web presence (http://www.biolsocwash.org) and improvements in the journal, the Society hopes not only to continue but to increase its service to the world community of systematic biologists.

That paper does not meet peer review standards, as even the society which published it regrets its error.

Thanks for posting that.

Thank you so much for your replies! I’ve decided to respond to them in reverse order in order to get the simplest responses out-of-the-way first (LOL!)

It has been a pleasure discussing all of this with you primarily because you have refrained from posting third party rebuttals and have instead been asserting your own exhaustive reasoning with source information for background and context. Therefore, I found your last post at 324 disappointing.

It is the nature of peer review to sanction theory which is not “politically correct”. This has lead to a number of tragic results which Lurkers can read about here: Refereed Journals: Do they ensure quality or enforce orthodoxy?

In sum, Nobel prize winners whose papers were rejected include Rosalyn Yalow, Gunter Blobel, Mitchell Feigenbaum. Stephen Hawking’s paper on black holes was also rejected. And, by the way, none of Einstein’s ground breaking papers went through a “peer review” process. Personally, I think it is doubtful any university professor in his day would have accepted Einstein’s theories for publication.

Darwin was not subjected to peer review – neither was Newton or Galileo. Ergo, the quality of the science is not determined by whether it not it survived a peer-review.

In Einstein’s case, the editor was the one who decided whether to publish. That is what happened with this article from the Intelligent Design theorist - the publisher’s remorse for breach of orthodox notwithstanding (emphasis mine):

The Council endorses a resolution on ID published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml), which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis to explain the origin of organic diversity. Accordingly, the Meyer paper does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings.

For all these reasons, I dismiss both their official response and your quoting it as authority.

But the fact of the matter is that exobiologists are working to provide the materialistic explanation of which you speak. They have made some progress in explaining the chemical synthesis of RNA as has been pointed out in other posts earlier in this thread. Until exobiologists disprove all materialistic explanations, they remain a possibility, especially in light of the progress they have made up until this point.

Exobiology deals with extraterrestrial life. Cosmic ancestry, or panspermia, in arguing against the “theory of evolution” uses rationale which is often indistinguishable from the Intelligent Design arguments. Lurkers might wish to compare the arguments: panspermia to intelligent design. Francis Crick in his book Life Itself - and elsewhere - sounded like any other Intelligent Design theorist in his panspermia speculations.

Notwithstanding all of the above, my original statement would not require a plausible theory for the rise of information in biological systems to have an extraterrestrial materialistic causation. In the realm of terrestrial theory, models which suggest a mechanism like a finite state machine (e.g. Rocha) are being considered for the RNA world scenario. Even so, this would only broach biological autonomy and symbolization – the question of “successful communication” remains unanswered.

All of that brings me to your first post! Whew…

Somehow we have managed to get into a side bar discussion of biosemiosis. The issue that I raised originally focused on self-organizing complexity – which in application to evolution would be biological and autonomous and of course, requires biosemiosis - hence all the emphasis on symbolization.

I raised self-organizing complexity as a separate issue from “natural selection” – though one of the strongest proponents of cellular automata, Stephen Wolfram, goes a step further and suggests that it answers the entire evolution model. In his book, A New Kind of Science, Wolfram says:

[I]n the end, therefore, what I conclude is that many of the most obvious features of complexity in biological organisms arise in a sense not because of natural selection, but rather in spite of it.

But I do not go as far as Wolfram. IMHO, natural selection still plays a part because not all body plans and variations are created equal – some will survive in the environment, others will not. But the true “engine” of biological innovation is not in random mutations but rather in “autonomous biological self-organizing complexity.”

Now, let us turn to the "randomness pillar" of the Theory of Evolution. I believe this is a misnomer, unless you insist that the Theory of Evolution can only be viewed as the entirety of Darwin's original formulation. The problem stems from the definition of the “theory of evolution”. As long as people construe the theory as Darwin proposed it – random mutation + natural selection – it is in error based on what we know today about regulatory control genes (eyeness, etc.) The theory needs to be reformulated and hopefully, renamed. Euclid’s geometry became “dated” as did Newtonian gravity. The same has happened to Darwin.

IMHO, the far majority of contention over evolution would subside if only the randomness pillar were disavowed. After all, the primary difference between Intelligent Design and Evolution is that one is directed and the other happenstance.

Though you have attacked the Theory of Evolution for its inclusion of the "randomness pillar" you have persisted randomness in using natural selection as the engine of evolutionary change in your alternative model. This was why I suggested an alternative formulation using Rocha's paper in which he differentiated biological agents by the distinction of "syntactic autonomy":

". . . I propose that until a private syntax (syntactic autonomy) is discovered by self-organizing agents, these agents exist in dynamically coherence or situation with their environments that include other agents. At this stage there are no significant or interesting types of closure or autonomy. When syntactic autonomy is enabled, then, because of description-based selected self-organization, open-ended evolution is established. . . ."

Natural selection is not the engine of evolutionary change in my alternative model, rather “autonomous biological self-organizing complexity” is the engine. In Rocha’s work I do not see where syntactical autonomy speaks against natural selection at all. Autonomy is necessary to formulate the symbolization for semiosis. At the end of his paper, for an RNA world, he speculates on something like a “finite state machine” changing states between autonomous and non-autonomous to bootstrap a self-organizing mechanism. Without autonomy, there can be no self to organize.

Now; to deal with communication and behavioralist evolutionary models. You initially objected to the difference between "that which is physically alive from that which is physically not alive . . . being described by behavior" and you argued that communication was the key. But behavioralist or semiotic models exist because they enable communication, as Rocha pointed out in part 4 of his paper:

". . . The introduction of a syntactic code allows the kind of recombination of dynamic descriptions used for construction of organisms which leads to open-ended evolution when included in a self-replication scheme as specified by Von Neumann. It furthermore allows the communication of these descriptions to systems which possess the same semiotic code. . . ."

Your statement that “behavioralist or semiotic models exist because they enable communications” is not clear. Semiosis is the process whereby connections are made between symbols. It can be compared to a circuitboard or software. As Rocha says, it “allows the communications”. But it is not the communication itself. A circuitboard or software is dead as a doornail without electricity – and DNA, semiosis capability, chemicals are dead as a doornail without communication.

By examining the semiosis, the symbolization, the autonomy, the changing of states – Rocha and other researchers are proposing the mechanism (or software if you will) for self-organizing complexity in biological systems.

Perhaps we can clear the air a bit by agreeing at least to this: that DNA and biosemiosis is evidence that communication has successfully occurred in biological life.

Or in the computer metaphor - the database and software stored on your hard drive is evidence that the electricity to your computer has been successfully turned on.

FYI regarding the Meyer paper:

Excerpts from here.

Dear Visitor,

Controversy and confusion surround the recent publication of the paper "The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories" by Dr. Stephen C. Meyer in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. I was the managing editor of the Proceedings at the time of publication of the paper and I handled the review and editing process. The material on this website will clarify and resolve many of the disputes about the paper.

In the case of the Meyer paper I followed all the standard procedures for publication in the Proceedings. As managing editor it was my prerogative to choose the editor who would work directly on the paper, and as I was best qualified among the editors I chose myself, something I had done before in other appropriate cases. In order to avoid making a unilateral decision on a potentially controversial paper, however, I discussed the paper on at least three occasions with another member of the Council of the Biological Society of Washington (BSW), a scientist at the National Museum of Natural History. Each time, this colleague encouraged me to publish the paper despite possible controversy.

Sincerely, Rick v. Sternberg, September 16, 2004

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Here's a recent thread that discusses Meyer's paper:

Intelligent Design advocate Stephen Meyer published in peer-reviewed journal