Posted on 01/28/2005 4:28:41 PM PST by metacognative
Panicked Evolutionists: The Stephen Meyer Controversy
The theory of evolution is a tottering house of ideological cards that is more about cherished mythology than honest intellectual endeavor. Evolutionists treat their cherished theory like a fragile object of veneration and worship--and so it is. Panic is a sure sign of intellectual insecurity, and evolutionists have every reason to be insecure, for their theory is falling apart.
The latest evidence of this panic comes in a controversy that followed a highly specialized article published in an even more specialized scientific journal. Stephen C. Meyer, Director of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, wrote an article accepted for publication in Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. The article, entitled "The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories," was published after three independent judges deemed it worthy and ready for publication. The use of such judges is standard operating procedure among "peer-reviewed" academic journals, and is considered the gold standard for academic publication.
The readership for such a journal is incredibly small, and the Biological Society of Washington does not commonly come to the attention of the nation's journalists and the general public. Nevertheless, soon after Dr. Meyer's article appeared, the self-appointed protectors of Darwinism went into full apoplexy. Internet websites and scientific newsletters came alive with outrage and embarrassment, for Dr. Meyer's article suggested that evolution just might not be the best explanation for the development of life forms. The ensuing controversy was greater than might be expected if Dr. Meyer had argued that the world is flat or that hot is cold.
Eugenie C. Scott, Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education, told The Scientist that Dr. Meyer's article came to her attention when members of the Biological Society of Washington contacted her office. "Many members of the society were stunned about the article," she told The Scientist, and she described the article as "recycled material quite common in the intelligent design community." Dr. Scott, a well known and ardent defender of evolutionary theory, called Dr. Meyer's article "substandard science" and argued that the article should never have been published in any scientific journal.
Within days, the Biological Society of Washington, intimidated by the response of the evolutionary defenders, released a statement apologizing for the publication of the article. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the society's governing council claimed that the article "was published without the prior knowledge of the council." The statement went on to declare: "We have met and determined that all of us would have deemed this paper inappropriate for the pages of the Proceedings." The society's president, Roy W. McDiarmid, a scientist at the U.S. Geological Survey, blamed the article's publication on the journal's previous editor, Richard Sternberg, who now serves as a fellow at the National Center for Biotechnology Information at the National Institute of Health. "My conclusion on this," McDiarmid said, "was that it was a really bad judgment call on the editor's part."
What is it about Dr. Stephen Meyer's paper that has caused such an uproar? Meyer, who holds a Ph.D. from Cambridge University, argued in his paper that the contemporary form of evolutionary theory now dominant in the academy, known as "Neo-Darwinism," fails to account for the development of higher life forms and the complexity of living organisms. Pointing to what evolutionists identify as the "Cambrian explosion," Meyer argued that "the geologically sudden appearance of many new animal body plans" cannot be accounted for by Darwinian theory, "neo" or otherwise.
Accepting the scientific claim that the Cambrian explosion took place "about 530 million years ago," Meyer went on to explain that the "remarkable jump in the specified complexity or 'complex specified information' [CSI] of the biological world" cannot be explained by evolutionary theory.
The heart of Dr. Meyer's argument is found in this scientifically-loaded passage: "Neo-Darwinism seeks to explain the origin of new information, form, and structure as a result of selection acting on randomly arising variation at a very low level within the biological hierarchy, mainly, within the genetic text. Yet the major morphological innovations depend on a specificity of arrangement at a much higher level of the organizational hierarchy, a level that DNA alone does not determine. Yet if DNA is not wholly responsible for body plan morphogenesis, then DNA sequences can mutate indefinitely, without regard to realistic probabilistic limits, and still not produce a new body plan. Thus, the mechanism of natural selection acting on random mutations in DNA cannot in principle generate novel body plans, including those that first arose in the Cambrian explosion."
In simpler terms, the mechanism of natural selection, central to evolutionary theory, cannot possibly account for the development of so many varied and complex life forms simply by mutations in DNA. Rather, some conscious design--thus requiring a Designer--is necessary to explain the emergence of these life forms.
In the remainder of his paper, Meyer attacks the intellectual inadequacies of evolutionary theory and argues for what is now known as the "design Hypothesis." As he argued, "Conscious and rational agents have, as a part of their powers of purposive intelligence, the capacity to design information-rich parts and to organize those parts into functional information-rich systems and hierarchies." As he went on to assert, "We know of no other causal entity or process that has this capacity." In other words, the development of the multitude of higher life forms found on the planet can be explained only by the guidance of a rational agent--a Designer--whose plan is evident in the design.
Meyer's article was enough to cause hysteria in the evolutionists' camp. Knowing that their theory lacks intellectual credibility, the evolutionists respond by raising the volume, offering the equivalent of scientific shrieks and screams whenever their cherished theory is criticized--much less in one of their own cherished journals. As Dr. John West, Associate Director of the Discovery Institute explained, "Instead of addressing the paper's argument or inviting counterarguments or rebuttal, the society has resorted to affirming what amounts to a doctrinal statement in an effort to stifle scientific debate. They're trying to stop scientific discussion before it even starts."
When the Biological Society of Washington issued its embarrassing apology for publishing the paper, the organization pledged that arguments for Intelligent Design "will not be addressed in future issues of the Proceedings," regardless of whether the paper passes peer review.
From the perspective of panicked evolutionists, the Intelligent Design movement represents a formidable adversary and a constant irritant. The defenders of Intelligent Design are undermining evolutionary theory at multiple levels, and they refuse to go away. The panicked evolutionists respond with name-calling, labeling Intelligent Design proponents as "creationists," thereby hoping to prevent any scientific debate before it starts.
Intelligent Design is not tantamount to the biblical doctrine of creation. Theologically, Intelligent Design falls far short of requiring any affirmation of the doctrine of creation as revealed in the Bible. Nevertheless, it is a useful and important intellectual tool, and a scientific movement with great promise. The real significance of Intelligent Design theory and its related movement is the success with which it undermines the materialistic and naturalistic worldview central to the theory of evolution.
For the Christian believer, the Bible presents the compelling and authoritative case for God's creation of the cosmos. Specifically, the Bible provides us with the ultimate truth concerning human origins and the special creation of human beings as the creatures made in God's own image. Thus, though we believe in more than Intelligent Design, we certainly do not believe in less. We should celebrate the confusion and consternation now so evident among the evolutionists. Dr. Stephen Meyer's article--and the controversy it has spawned--has caught evolutionary scientists with their intellectual pants down.
_______________________________________
R. Albert Mohler, Jr
Available online?
FYI, try:
http://www.genomesonline.org/
1340 current Genome Projects
251 complete
It would be funny if not for all the false science presented by the YEC's and the fact that people actually believe that nonsense.
I mean saying that we have muscles attached to our tailbone disproves evolution. Like, uh, how does the dog wag its tail if it has not muscles attached to his tailbone.
Hmm, since he eats caterpillars maybe he saw all the 'peppered' moths on the trees and got frustrated that the seasoning (pepper) was added too late, i.e. after cocooning and metamorphosis :-)
No wonder there are so many flame wars on these threads, straw men burn easily!
The origins of quantum mechanics lies with Bohr's hydrogen model. Now, we all know that electrons do not travel in 2-D circles. Evolutionary theory is still incomplete but so were a lot of other "hard" theories such as Newton's law of gravitation.
Crap. We all know no such thing. Whoever wrote this idiocy - and I suspect it wasn't you; you probably cribbed it from some basher web-site - can't even transcribe a formula correctly, let alone understand it.
The equation is dS=dqrev/T. q (lower case) is the reversible heat, not the energy. Unless you specify it's the reversible heat, it's not correct to write it as a differential at all. Heat itself is a path variable.
While you're staying at home, Mom, pick up a chemistry text.
Which one?
No. Mostly I am replying to all the posts made to me since I was last signed on. Just being courteous.
Agreed.
Evolution and the Bible are incompatible.
Says MAN. MAN also said that a sun-centered solar system was incompatible with the Bible.
God tells us things via the brains he gave us which we use to interpret His word and the world He created for us. As someone here pointed out earlier, it would be a perverse God who would leave false evidence to fool us. You can pretend that there is no actual fossil record, but you are only pretending. Or perhaps you think God is perverse? Again, I think you are confusing what MEN say God says in the Bible, with what God actually says in the Bible. Nothing in evolution negates the moral teachings of the Bible. Evolution doesn't challenge the existence of God or the veracity of the Bible; it challenges men.
A wise man's heart inclines him toward the right, but a fool's heart toward the left. -- Eccles. 10:2
God is telling us never to make a left-hand turn? Well ... certainly not on a red light!! ;^)
Read "Darwin's Dangerous Idea", it's in there. Creationist parents should be fenced off. Tell me which of Icons you want to defend. Haeckel? Horse evolution? You are reluctant to relate your prize icon of evidence.
Thanks. I knew I had it about right.
Jonathan Wells was personally commissioned by Rev. Moon to bring down evolution in the schools.
http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience//Coyne-IconsReview.htm
http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience//Coyne-IconsReview.htm
http://www.tparents.org/Library/Unification/Talks/Wells/0-Toc.htm
If there are no problems with your belief system, why are you guys so defensive? Physicists have debates without relying on liberal judges to protect preposterous 'facts' like DNA mutations can make a reptile lung into a bird lung.
Let's have page number and exact quote. Oh, and let me anticipate your failure to do so by calling you a liar right now.
Call me names. I just consider the source. I don't have the book at hand. Did you read it?
We're more angry than defensive. When someone tells blatant lies in the name of their religion, as you do, it annoys us.
As a graduate student at Yale, I studied the whole of Christian theology but focused my attention on the Darwinian controversies. I wanted to get to the root of the conflict between Darwinian evolution and Christian doctrine. In the course of my research I learned (to my surprise) that biblical chronology played almost no role in the 19th- century controversies, since most theologians had already accepted geological evidence for the age of the earth and re-interpreted the days in Genesis as long periods of time. Instead, the central issue was design. God created the cosmos with a plan in mind. This affirmation is among the most basic in all of Christianity (and other theistic religions as well, including Unificationism). And that plan included human beings as the final outcome of the creative process: we are created in the image of God.
I'm glad your mad. Maybe you'll try to figure out why someone else's belief sytem upsets your world.
You accused a man of calling for concentration camps, and when challenged, you won't even attempt to stand behind your words. How contemptible!
Your equation is for reversible processes where the net entropy is ZERO. Let me quote from a reputable science text for that situation:
"The interpretation of entropy as a measure of the capacity of a system for doing work is consistent with the result that the change in entropy is zero for a reversible cycle, for a system carried through such a cycle loses no capacity for work"
BTW, which YEC website did you get that "T the absolute temperature" quote from?
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