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.
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R. Albert Mohler, Jr
My thoughts exactly. Doesn't the erudition leave one speechless.
You didn't address two points: 1) Sun-centered solar system incompatible with the Bible; and 2) 10:2 Ecclesiastes that in any "clear and rational" reading says that people shouldn't opt to veer to the left, but should always veer to the right. (Of course, I take it to mean that God says liberals are fools! ;^)
At bottom, RobRoy, what I suspect is happening is a kind of broad cultural backlash. The progressive Left (i.e., "post-modernism" -- which includes folks in science and the arts and letters who, while maybe not professing to be members of that category, still have imbibed a large number of ideas from post-modernist thinkers [more or less unconsciously] about the nature of God, man, and society) -- is slipping into the irrelevance it so richly deserves. The Internet has facilitated this process; for it makes it far more difficult to control information. And of course, the control of information is an indispensable bulwark of the power of the "status quo."
Repression of thought, curbs on speech, the kind of "diversity" that makes one walk in lock-step to the approved nostrums of elites, authoritarianism/totalitarianism of all stripes, all seem to be on the losing side of history right now. President Bush's "liberty initiatives" aren't so much as cutting against the grain, but riding the tide of changing global circumstances, which are driven by intellectual, cultural, political, and ideological change.
It's as if folks had finally started taking C.S. Lewis' The Abolition of Man quite seriously, and are fighting back. In the process, culturally it seems we are going back to, and reappraising our "roots" -- which derive from the traditions of Jerusalem, Athens, and Rome.
This is what makes for the conflict and general loss of civility of debate these days. Careers are on the line, reputations are at stake -- and also the ability to wield power.
Well, them be just some miscellaneous thoughts of my own, FWTW. Thanks for your post!
Another thread opened on the Mr. Meyer's controversy (same as this one). Here we go again!
All of the ordering issues are addressed in that "Origins and Scriptures" article (it goes day by day and then into the patriarchs) - most of them are also addressed in the "Age of the Universe" article.
200? Bah. Things just start heating up around post 500.
Beautiful prose and thanks for the ping. May I delicately add, 'a potential loss of the moral high ground'.
For though the fame motive plays a big role, at root, the morals debate is driving much of this too. The high elite know the party is coming to a close, and they don't like it one bit. They have been the mill owners of moral fibre for awhile now, but the mills are subject competition. Viva la internet!
"If you insist on teaching your children that Man is not the product of evolution...Zoos are now seen as havens for endangered species
[like you church people]"
Daniel Dennett, page 519, 1995
also:
"If you want to teach your children...God. We will stand firmly opposed to you."
The 'we' here is the ten percent [or less] of the population like Dennett, Dawkins, the ACLU and assorted darwinuts like George Soros
I don't care to debate this "zoos for christians' meme.
It shows how dangerous this idea really is....
You left out all the lies and the false-science promoted by the anti-evolutionists.
Dr. Walt Brown explains it all in how light was created by deaccelerating electrons similar to what happens with radio antenna.
Uh, DAY ONE. God created light! Plants use light! Right! They don't need sunlight. We have lots of dopers growing their marijuana under grow lights and their plants never see the sun.
She's trying to help.
Our "warmth" is received via infra-red, visible and ultra-violet light. Dr. Walt Brown explains how these multiple frequencies are generated by the deaccelerating electrons.
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