Charles Darwin Knew: Science and Freedom

BreakPoint with Charles Colson | 1 Mar 04 | Charles Colson

[js1138]

What part of The origin of life remains very much a mystery...

do you not understand. There is, oddly enough, no law of physics or rationality to prevent one from speculation, providing you start with a disclaimer such as "The origin of life remains very much a mystery".

[Mr. Silverback]

What part of The origin of life remains very much a mystery... do you not understand.

I was not saying that evolution is invalid because evolutionists don't know what the exact origin of life was; Holding them to be in intellectual error because they don't claim to know it all is silly. I am saying that evolutionists like Mr. Rennie tend to gas on for whole pages at a time about how life could have arisen from non-living matter, but then claim that evolution has nothing to do with the origin of life, especially not the origin of life from non-living matter. That's like saying that creationism has nothing to do with belief in God, or that Intelligent Design theory has nothing to do with the concept of irreducible complexity.

[Mr. Silverback]

I just read the excerpt again. He does not say that evolution covers the origins of life.

Suuuuuuuuuuure he doesn't.

Tell you what, how about I write you a paragraph about how you dig and lay a foundation. Then I'll claim that my paragraph had nothing to do with building houses. Then, I'll claim that the housing contractor community has nothing to do with laying foundations, and that anyone who says we do is mischaracterizing our industry. All of this in answer to a strawman "nonsense" assertion that house builders don't know how to lay foundations. Oh, and then for added points I'll impugn your integrity and call you a dunderhead that can't drive a nail into a wall.

Hey, what do you know, I'm John Rennie with a hard hat and a tape measure!

[Virginia-American]

... but the way you can tell that it isn't science is that ID researchers haven't published in those same journals.

what observations would show that ID is wrong?

Is the hypothesized designer capable of making things that are forbidden by standard biology (eg, a transitional form between a bird and a mammal, a centaur, a whale with gills, etc etc).

If it can, where are they?

IF it can't, the designer hypothesis adds nothing to the theory, and should be rejected by Occam's Razor. Further, the theory would have to acccount for this limitation.

[Virginia-American]

...You formulate a theory, and you make predictions based on that theory, as the theory of evolution does with respect to fossils. Then, you go out, you gather data...

Specifically, Darwin predicted that the intermediate forms between people and apes would be African. In fact several have been: Homo erectus; H. habilis; Australopithecus africanus; A. Afarensis. et al.

He also predicted intermediates between four-footed animals and cetaceans. Guess what? multiple confirmations of this: Pakicetus, Ambulocetus, etc.

BTW, what were the predictions made by the creationists? That such things would never be found, because they never existed? EG, Behe said:

[I]f random evolution is true, there must have been a large number of transitional forms between the Mesonychid and the ancient whale. Where are they? It seems like quite a coincidence that of all the intermediate species that must have existed between the Mesonychidand whale, only species that are very similar to the end species have been found.

source

Not really a prediction, but he seems to think it was unlikely. A few months later, intermediates were in fact found.

[Virginia-American]

LAWYER, n. One skilled in circumvention of the law.

LAWYER, n. One with professional training in lying under oath.

[BiffWondercat]

I might have said something like Sinä olet paskapää or Kusikalle in my reply to him....

[balrog666]

LAWYER, n. One with professional training in lying under oath.

I didn't use that one in deference to CobaltBlue.

[Virginia-American]

Well, the lawyer who told it to me wan't under oath, he was in a bar. Think he might have been lying? maybe drunk

Seriously, there have been contributions made to science by lawyers: Lyell and Fermat are the only ones I can think of.

[Heartlander]

Can you describe to me the theory of intelligent design, and show me experiments subject to the scientific method that determine the predictive power of ID as well as or better than the ToE.

First, understand that ID and ToE is not an ‘either / or’ situation. ID, ToE, and OOL disagree with the actual mechanisms. At the root of this debate; it’s natural mechanisms i.e. mindless, void of purpose and intent (neo-darwinism) - or mechanisms which display intelligence, purpose, and intent (ID). Furthermore, Design Theory encompasses the Anthropic Principle while ToE and OOL stand alone in what they theorize (at least sometimes – see Dawkins). And if ToE or OOL do not state the creator of life and consciousness to be mindless than ID should not be scorned. IOW, design in biology is an illusion or real. Now, to your question…

We have always underestimated cells. . . . The entire cell can be viewed as a factory that contains an elaborate network of interlocking assembly lines, each of which is composed of a set of large protein machines. . . . Why do we call the large protein assemblies that underlie cell function protein machines? Precisely because, like machines invented by humans to deal efficiently with the macroscopic world, these protein assemblies contain highly coordinated moving parts.
Bruce Alberts, "The Cell as a Collection of Protein Machines: Preparing the Next Generation of Molecular Biologists," Cell 92 (February 8, 1998): 291.

Biology currently uses design, engineering, and the Information Theory with genetic research. Robust design and intelligently designed analogies, engineered DNA and reverse engineered DNA, and language information and programming information is associated with DNA. ID is not detrimental to current research as it is actually employed and utilized. Moreover we use our very conscious in these constructs, which we see as intelligent.

So what does ID bring to the table and what predictions does it offer science?
· Transposable LINE-1 (junk) actually serves a purpose.
· Functional parts will be reused in unrelated species.
· Intelligent and purposeful information will be found in DNA (encoded information).
· Mindlessness cannot create consciousness.
· Absolutes exist beyond mankind.

[Right Wing Professor]

Finnish?

[general_re]

You're wasting my time and clogging up my comments page with your useless nonsense. Repeatedly posting the dictionary definition of "experiment" does nothing to support your case that what I have described is anything other than same. By your apparent standard of "support", I can simply state that LVD is, in fact, Mary Queen of Scots, and then "support" it by posting a picture of Mary Queen of Scots next to your name. Unless you can explain which part of the definition is not in accord with what I have posted, you're simply parroting garbage without betraying any sort of understanding.

It's a shame, too - I've seen you on other threads, and you are capable of making a coherent argument, probably because on those other topics you are actually attempting to make a case, rather that simply arguing for the sake of arguing as you appear to be doing here. When you can come up with something more substantive than silly semantic arguments, drop me a line and we'll have a real chat.

[general_re]

The entire first paragraph of the Rennie excerpt I provided describes how non-living materials could have laid "the foundation for cellular biochemistry." He does this in response to the "nonsense" that evolution can't explain origins, then he goes on to explain how the basic building blocks of the cell could have arisen from non-living matter.

You've managed to read quite a bit into that. I suggest you stick to parsing the words themselves, rather than trying to invent hidden meanings between the nouns.

Rennie says, quite clearly, that there are several hypotheses for how life "could have" arisen from nonliving sources - this is speculative, as indicated by the use of the words "could have". He then continues on to say that, even if some non-material, non-natural force was responsible for the origins of life, it does not invalidate the theory of evolution, which has already been confirmed by experimentation. Therefore, whether one of the speculative hypotheses is correct or not, or whether some other agency was responsible, the theory of evolution is not affected. Why? Because the origins of life are irrelevant to the theory.

Read for content. It'll do you a world of good.

[BiffWondercat]

You get around to know so many of them. I don't know if I spelled it correctly, but it translates as 'full of it'.
A bit rough to remember much of it.

[C.J.W.]

"I've got my popcorn. Let's see all the scientific criticism of evolution."

Systematic thought and observation should lead you to question a hypothesis which can be summarized: "Once upon a time, a group of avian ancestors jumped out of trees and killed themselves enough times that they eventually grew wings and flew away." Aka "The Tree Down Theory." Or another little narrative: "Once upon a time, a group of mammalian ancestors killed themselves on land enough times that eventually they grew legs and walked away." (Not only did they evolve one leg by naturalistic processes but the other leg evolved in a pair just the same way, maybe this "proves" the legs are ancestral to each other??) One has to question the intelligence of anyone who believe this type of mythological narrative. If you're going to believe a mythological narrative this has got to be one of the dumbest. One has to question their knowledge as well, Nature shows a patter of vast typology, not sequence. A bird has a whole different *type* of heart, lungs, etc. than other mammals. There are vast differences of anatomy between animal kingdoms that cannot be overcome by "Nature did it." storytelling ability, i.e. naturalistic mythological narrative.

[Doctor Stochastic]

James Hutton worked as a law clerk before going to medical school (but he didn't practice medicine, either.)

[general_re]

Systematic thought and observation should lead you to question a hypothesis which can be summarized: "Once upon a time, a group of avian ancestors jumped out of trees and killed themselves enough times that they eventually grew wings and flew away."...Or another little narrative: "Once upon a time, a group of mammalian ancestors killed themselves on land enough times that eventually they grew legs and walked away."

If those were reasonable summaries, one would be quite right in questioning them. But they aren't, which pretty much invalidates the whole exercise.

BTW, welcome aboard. Who were you before?

[C.J.W.]

"There is nothing currently scientific about intelligent design."

The notion that everything must be made to fit a naturalistic explanation is false. There are many (pseudo)scientists whose version of science is to make all observations fit a naturalistic explanation, no matter what systematic thought applied to observations actually show.

True scientists believe that science is the pursuit of the truth, not just the pursuit of naturalistic explanation. Failing to admit this leads some to a pseudo-science like evolutionism. It is especially ironic when those who believe that science is the pursuit of naturalistic explanations rather than pursuit of the truth make the argument: "Science shows us that everything has a naturalistic explanation!" And they act as if it surprising that they have found all that they are willing to look for or see. There are none so blind as those who will not see, as they say. They had already defined science to show what they wanted to see a priori to actually practicing science.

Note:

Fascist scholarship's "weakness is
due not to inferior training but to
the mendacity inherent in any
scholarship that overlooks or openly
repudiated all moral and spiritual values."
(Max Weinreich, Hitler's Proffessors: The
Part of Scholarship in Germany's Crimes
against the Jewish People. (New York:
The Yiddish Scientific Institute, 1946) :7)

The Founders on philosophic naturalism:
"And what was their Phylosophy? Atheism; pure unadulterated
Atheism . . . . The Univer[s]e was Matter only and eternal;
Spirit was a Word Without a meaning; Liberty was a Word
Without a Meaning. There was no Liberty in the Universe; Liberty was a Word void of Sense. Every thought Word Passion Sentiment Feeling, all Motion and Action was necessary. All Beings and Attributes were of eternal Necessity. Conscience, Morality, were all nothing but Fate."
(John Adams on the French revolution
Letter from John Adams to Thomas Jefferson (Mar. 2, 1816),
in The Adams-Jefferson Letters)

The pseudo-science of evolutionism (which did not really begin with Darwin) acts as a solvent to civilization. Instead it promotes a sort of "animalization." There is nothing very scientific about it because real science is systematic thought and observation applied in the pursuit of the truth. It is not gathering together every observation which can vaguely be made to fit or making every observation fit with an ideology like evolutionism. That is pseudo-science.

[Virginia-American]

A bird has a whole different *type* of heart, lungs, etc. than other mammals.

You might want to rephrase this.

[RightWingNilla]

Instead it promotes a sort of "animalization."

Oh yeah! Stephen Gould and Niles Eldredge really knew how to party!