ID: What’s it all about, Darwin?

The American Thinker ^ | August 26th, 2005 | Dennis Sevakis

[Heartlander]

Thus, 21 genes are shared by these four distantly related bacteria. Aquifex aeolicus are the most thermophilic bacteria, growing just below the boiling point of water. They are also thought to represent the earliest lineages to branch off the eubacterial tree. Bacillus subtilis is a gram-positive soil bacterium that can use a wide variety of carbon sources. Very similar bacteria (Clostridium) used to be thought most primitive. Escherichia coli represent the gram-negative proteobacteria and live in the digestive tracts of many organisms. Their flagella are among the most studied. Treponema pallidum is a spirochete whose flagellum is part of a rather specialized motility organelle known as the axial filament. As I mentioned, these four species are very distantly related, as seen by the phylogenetic tree constructed from 16s rRNA sequence (Fig 3). Furthermore, all four bacteria have experienced very different environmental pressures over the last several billions years. This strongly implies that these 21 genes were present in the last common ancestor of all eubacteria, thus comprising the Ur-IC flagellum. To further test this notion, I surveyed the flagellar genes of Thermotoga maritima since it is also a very deeply branching bacterium. According to the TIGR list of flagellar genes, everything in the Ur-IC list is represented, thus confirming what IC would predict.[7] Furthermore, this Ur-IC state has persisted for billions of years since it appeared. That billions of years of microbial evolution, in each lineage, have not imposed significant permutations on this IC core speaks to its true IC state.

Figure 3. Eubacterial phylogenetic tree. Adapted from [8]

 

Since the last detectable flagellum most likely contained these 21 genes (22, if we split FliG; 23 if we separate FliM and FliN), we can finally turn to the hypothesis of gradual CCAF to understand why it is so unconvincing.

[Heartlander]

It was intelligently designed and that’s the point --- ID does not ‘need’ to be ‘supernatural’.

[WildTurkey]

Unsourced. I take it that is an excerpt from some creatinists' website and not a peer-reviewed article.

[WildTurkey]

It was intelligently designed and that’s the point --- ID does not ‘need’ to be ‘supernatural’.

Space aliens?

[Heartlander]

S.E.T.I.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"It was intelligently designed and that’s the point --- ID does not ‘need’ to be ‘supernatural’."

This is essentially the argument that because we ourselves can intelligently design things, therefore intelligent design is true for the origin of life and for the evolution of life through time. The fact we can design something says NOTHING about whether life has been intelligently designed.

ID cannot help but be supernatural. It is the assumption that natural means could not possibly produce the complexity we see. It is an argument from incredulity; "I can't imagine it so it must not be possible for nature to do it with no outside help". People used to imagine that God had to move the stars and planets in their orbits; it was inconceivable that natural processes could produce the order we see in orbital motion. We now know that to be not true; ID looks for areas where we may not have complete knowledge and assumes we never will. It is a defeatist philosophical position, unworthy of Galileo and Newton and Darwin.

[js1138]

Behe, Dembski and Denton have all accepted the historical fact of evolution and have now retreated to what is essentially fine tuning or anthropic principle.

[Heartlander]

Why? The Multiverse Theory states that billions of universes spit out into existence and we were just lucky. It states that there are junk universes “all the way down” allowing our existence. It states that billions of universes have been popping up from the alpha and omega.

Why can’t the founder of DNA be correct in his assumption that we were seeded here especially since we are currently looking for intelligent life?

Do you have proof that our material consciousness ultimately comes from mindlessness?

[Heartlander]

What have you retreated to? Materialism?

[js1138]

I think it is a sin to hide your mind, like the buried talent, rather than invest it in understanding the Word of God. Creation is the Word and Breath of God, and those who dishonor creation by believing it is flawed or fallen, dishonor God.

If that makes me a materialist, then so be it.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Why can’t the founder of DNA be correct in his assumption that we were seeded here especially since we are currently looking for intelligent life?"

Nobody pushing the ID hypothesis believes it was anything but their own version of God (Most believe it was the Christian God, though there are of course Islamic ID adherents too

Crick is not the founder of DNA, he was the one (with Watson) who discovered its shape. He promoted the panspermia idea more as a way to shake up existing ideas than anything else. Even if it were correct, it only pushed the creation of life to somewhere else.

" Do you have proof that our material consciousness ultimately comes from mindlessness?"

No, because scientific theories never deal in proof, only in evidence. There is not evidence that consciousness came from anything but matter.

[Heartlander]

You have invoked scripture in a scientific discussion. Are you a believer in God?

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Why can’t the founder of DNA be correct in his assumption that we were seeded here especially since we are currently looking for intelligent life?

You missed the thread where a poster said that Mendel invented DNA and that he was an ID'er.

Sorry to interrupt. I just thought your question was ironic.

[Heartlander]

There is not evidence that consciousness came from anything but matter.

Why? Where is this evidence… IA comes from intelligence. Your intelligence comes from mindlessness and you have evidence? Do tell…

[js1138]

I do not accept scripture as a final authority, if that's what you are asking. Creation itself is untranslated and equally available for all to study.

[Heartlander]

Well, I’ll ask again..You have invoked scripture in a scientific discussion. Are you a believer in God? ?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Why? Where is this evidence… IA comes from intelligence. Your intelligence comes from mindlessness and you have evidence? Do tell…"

I said there was no evidence of anything but matter causing consciousness. That is a fact. The evidence for the mind coming from matter is the brain and the nervous system. The evidence for mind coming from something else that is non-material is.... nonexistent. Does that mean we have a complete understanding of the mind? Hardly. Resorting to non-material causes that cannot be falsified is just folly though. It doesn't work in any other scientific endeavor and there is no reason to believe it will in this case.

And Iowa (IA) does not come from intelligent design.

[Heartlander]

FYI…

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"you have invoked scripture in a scientific discussion. Are you a believer in God?"

Where did he bring scripture into this?

js1138 said,

"I think it is a sin to hide your mind, like the buried talent, rather than invest it in understanding the Word of God. Creation is the Word and Breath of God, and those who dishonor creation by believing it is flawed or fallen, dishonor God.

If that makes me a materialist, then so be it."

Is that now scripture? Which chapter and verse was that?

[Heartlander]

I hope you knew that I meant A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) … But I am curious about how your theory allows material intelligence to become a subset of mindlessness…