Posted on 08/26/2005 8:57:58 AM PDT by wallcrawlr
My mother says she is a Darwinist. I’m not sure of all the things that could or should imply. I take it to mean the she does not believe that the Cosmos and all that it contains is the result of the will of a Supreme Being. Nature just exists and that is all there is to it. Asking what is the purpose of human existence is a nonsense question. It has no meaning. As we have no conscious origin, we have no conscious destination. Hence no purpose.
This idea is quite troubling to many humans as we are quite reluctant to attach no meaning to the thoughts and desires coursing through the synapses of our brains. And so, for most of human existence, the idea that there was no God was a heresy to be condemned, punished, reviled, tortured and even burned at the stake.
When our social institutions evolved to the point where asking such a question wasn’t as quite as painful or harmful to one’s health, science, in the sense that we use today, began to blossom. And it bloomed because of its explanatory power, its predictive power. If you combine A, B, and C – bingo! – you get D. And no one had ever seen, heard or thought of D before!
One of the best and most widely known examples of this is Einstein’s famous equation, E = mc^2. Exactly what this means is not, for the purposes of this discussion, important. What is important is that this conclusion results from a very simple postulate. Namely, that the speed of light is constant relative to an observer – hence the term “relativity” theory. The other postulate is that we are only dealing with non-accelerated frames of reference. That means constant velocities and no gravitational fields. Hence the term “special” relativity. General relativity, dealing with accelerated frames of reference, is, both conceptually and mathematically, a great deal more abstract and difficult. And, unfortunately, I’m not one of those privy to its secrets.
We still believe, given compliance with the postulates, that the mass-energy equivalence equation is an accurate description of physical reality. For someone with an undergraduate’s knowledge of physics and fair skill with the calculus, it isn’t even very difficult to derive. But that is not the reason for its endurance. Our “faith” in this equation is borne out by innumerable observations, experiments and even a couple of unfortunate events in Japan that took place just about sixty years ago. Though the details of specific processes may, to some extent, still elude us, we have an explanation for the enormous energy levels and extreme duration of the power generated by stars. It was this question that stumped some of the greatest scientific minds of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Einstein’s answer still has no competing theory and it does not leave unanswered questions as to its validity lying about unaddressed.
The same cannot be said of evolutionary theory. There are unanswered questions. Evidence that does not fit. “Facts” that have proven illusive or false. Fabricated evidence. Explanations that are logically incomplete. Jerry-rigged computer models – oops! – sorry, that’s global warming. Result? A competing theory, Intelligent Design or ID, has been proposed as an alternative to Darwin’s rumination. Is this “unscientific” as many wail and gnash in their haste to keep “God” out of science? No. It’s an alternative hypothesis. A competing theory. Not religion. Not superstition. Not a conspiracy by those pesky right-wing, Christian fundamentalist – fundamentalist Christians, if you prefer. A proposed theory. This is how science advances. If one never questions, there are no answers to be had.
If you would like to bone-up on the fundamentals of ID, I suggest that you read Dan Peterson’s piece in the American Spectator, “The Little Engine That Could...Undo Darwinism.” He gives a rundown of the main players in the ID debate along with their academic backgrounds and achievements as well as the main arguments supporting their positions. For an opposing view by a man of science in the field of evolutionary theory, read Jerry Coyne’s offering in the New Republic Online, “The Case Against Intelligent Design.” This was at one time linkable without a subscription as I have a copy saved. But alas, one now seems mandatory.
Based on my brief acquaintance with the subject, there seems to be two fundamental lines of argument used by ID theorists. The first is that which asserts the probability of the complex molecules that form our DNA occurring by chance is infinitesimally small and therefore unlikely to have ever happened by chance. This is the argument put forth by the mathematician and physicist William Dembski.
Michael Behe, who popularized the flagellar motor found in e. coli and other bacterium as an example of intelligent design, is a professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. His arguments are based on the concept of irreducibly complex processes or structures as opposed to those that are cumulatively complex. Those that are irreducibly complex do not lend themselves without great difficulty to explanation by a theory of evolution. For Darwin himself stated that if one could show that a blind, incremental process could not explain a natural phenomenon, his theory would fall apart.
Darwin’s theories are being questioned, but here we are not talking about religious zealots making the inquiry. We’re talking about real, live, grown-up scientists, who, because of our advancing knowledge of the molecular basis of life, and not just bible stories, are asking legitimate and profound questions that are undermining the basis of Darwinism. And they’re not doing so with the desire nor intention of substituting scripture for textbooks. God, as the Jews or Christians or even Muslims perceive Him, is not being offered in place of Darwin.
What is? Good question. I’ll ask my mom. She always had the answers.
You are obviously a critical thinker. Is it impossible that the universe was created?
Who said anything about science? Here's what I said.
The bottom line is it doesn't really matter what "Darwinism" is. As long as it leads one away from God, that's all that truly matters.
And Darwin's scientific theory of evolution through natural selection cannot possibly lead one away from God; but only show how the universe that God created works.
There is nothing scientific about Darwinism. It's pure speculation.
You don't call naziism and communism being led away from God?
Darwin postulated that there was differences between members of the same species and that these differences could be selected for or against by the environment leading to them being more or less prevalent within the population depending upon if they were selected for or against. This has been demonstrated repeatably in the lab.
My ass.
Logically discourse this -- in the following statement you say: Darwin postulated that there was differences between members of the same species and that these differences could be selected for or against by the environment leading to them being more or less prevalent within the population depending upon if they were selected for or against. This has been demonstrated repeatably in the lab.
Question: In the lab demonstrations, who or what did the selecting?
Dr. David R. Liu, a professor of chemistry and chemical biology at Harvard seems to think that the purpose of science is to create stories/theories in regard to the origin of life that – well, as he says, ‘’my expectation is that we will be able to reduce this to a very simple series of logical events that could have taken place with no divine intervention.”
Myth 1: The theory of intelligent design is a modern version of Creationism.
Fact: The theory of intelligent design goes back at least as far as classical Greece and it has been debated in nearly every century since then.
…"as a blind man has no idea of colors," Newton wrote, "so we have no idea of the manner by which the all-wise God perceives and understands all things." But the structure of the universe provides a clue, enabling us to "know (God) . . . by his most wise and excellent contrivances of things, and final causes." As for the idea that science could lead to atheism, Newton dismissed it brusquely: "Blind metaphysical necessity, which is certainly the same always and everywhere, could [not] produce [the] variety of things" found on our diverse and ever-surprising world…
My faith, and the worldly evidence that God has given me only help to strenghten it beaxause it shows that He created the world, and how he did it, but I am also wise enough to know that we humans were not there for creation so all we beside theory is revelation.
I am curious what you would call serious problems?
Your post is rather redundant, because we on the evo side have been saying for years the there is nothing new in Behe.
Behe's book, almost word for word, was published in 1802. The argument was old then, as you have pointed out.
This would explain why Darwin's Origin is written explicitely to answer this line of thought. Origin takes each and everry argument posed by William Paley in 1802, and counters it.
The rebuttal has yet to be published. Current ID theory is just a paraphrase of Paley.
Evolving the Bacterial Flagellum Through Mutation and Cooption
Evolving the Bacterial Flagellum Through Mutation and Cooption: Part II
Evolving the Bacterial Flagellum Through Mutation and Cooption: Part III
Evolving the Bacterial Flagellum Through Mutation and Cooption: Part IV
I suppose that if you are willing to lie about what biologist say about the evolution of the flagellum, you can make a pretty good case against your invented scenerio.
The easiest way to lie is to take a layman's explanation, which is necessarily vague, and poke holes in it for vagueness.
If you want to argue against actual biology, instead of aganst straw man biology, I suggest you start with a description that is not vague.
Did you read the data? Have you become as dogmatic as the people you criticize?
Is the Design Theory, in your opinion, a theory that has been disproved?
God created naziism (sic) and communism.
Thank you senator Durban…
It is natures intention that the exact genetic information from both parents will be seen in the offspring's DNA in the the critical stages of fertilisation. However, it is possible for this genetic information to mutate, which in most cases, can result in fatal or negative consequencies in the outcome of the new ogranism.
Non-Disjunction and Down's Syndrome
One well known example of mutation is non-disjunction. Non-disjunction is when the spindle fibres fail to seperate during meiosis, resulting in gametes with one extra chromosome and other gametes lacking a chromosome.
If this non-disjunction occurs in chromosome 21 of a human egg cell, a condition called Down's syndrome occurs. This is because their cells possess 47 chromosomes as opposed to the normal chromosome compliment in humans of 46.
Chromosome Mutations
The fundamental structure of a chromosome is subject to mutation, which will most likely occur during crossing over at meiosis. There are a number of ways in which the chromosome structure can change, as indicated below, which will detrimentally change the genotype and phenotype of the organism. However, if the chromosome mutation effects an essential part of DNA, it is possible that the mutation will abort the offspring before it has the chance of being born.
The following indicates types of chromosome mutation where whole genes are moved:
Deletion of a Gene
As the name implies, genes of a chromosome are permanently lost as they become unattached to the centromere and are lost forever
Normal chromosome before mutation
Genes not attached to centromere become loose and lost forever
New chromosome lacks certain genes which may prove fatal depending on how important these genes are
Duplication of Genes
In this mutation, the mutants genes are displayed twice on the same chromosome due to duplication of these genes. This can prove to be an advantageous mutation as no genetic information is lost or altered and new genes are gained
Normal chromosome before mutation
Genes from the homologous chromosome are copied and inserted into the genetic sequence
New chromosome possesses all its initial genes plus a duplicated one, which is usually harmless
The next page continues looking at these chromosome mutations and mutations that happen within genes that can prove to be more harmful to the organism at hand. The following pages also investigates polyploidy in species.
biology-online.org
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