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
Meyer, hmmm. Isn't he that history teacher? Yeah, we really want to go to a history teacher for our science classes, DUH ...
and my posts and those of others make clear that the sun can NOT be a sufficient source of entropy decrease.
Your posts have shown you to be totally ignorant on science and just a regurgitator of the false propaganda of the creationists' websites.
Meyer, hmmm. Isn't he that history teacher? Yeah, we really want to go to a history teacher for our science classes, DUH ...
and my posts and those of others make clear that the sun can NOT be a sufficient source of entropy decrease.
Your posts have shown you to be totally ignorant on science and just a regurgitator of the false propaganda of the creationists' websites.
They sound like whining liberals.
Their tool of choice? Ad-Hominem attack. Thinking people are never persuaded by such nonsense. It actually makes their claims look more suspect.
'Course, they can always try to throw a few billion more monkeys at typewriters at the equation. Maybe they can find another trillion years or so to boot.
I gotta admit, it is mildly amusing to watch them squirm. They think they are still relevant.
From his DVD?
No. A pickiness to correct your incorrect formulas.
Genesis says the Sun was created on the 1sh day. do you believe it?
Genesis says land animals were created after Adam. do you believe it?
.schuelers.com/ChaosPsyche/part_1_9.htm
Lord Eddington stated;
If your theory contradicts the Second Law
I can offer you no hope."
]I'll take Eddington over Asimov]
Your link makes one passing reference to Eddington. For you to imply that Eddington is on your side of false science is totally false.
The evidence for the existence of space aliens is about the same as that for evolution.
No problem. Evolution does not contradict the Second Law.
Since you switch topics, I assume you have no response to my statement and thus agree with it.
I didn't say Eddington was on that site.
Quit the hysterical panic!
You don't believe in ID?
Have you always been this stupid; or did you work at it?
"The general equation for an open system is: dS > dQ/T + dmisi - dmoso
I guess you do believe in ID, after all.
I suspect the Freeper whose screen name is "JS" is a bit surprised at being pinged to this thread.
Abiogenesis is in the hypothesis stage. Whether it happened or not is irrelevant to whether evolution happens.
Science does not speak to miracles because it is impossible to prove that a miracle did not occur.
Suppose people in Washington D.C. wake up one morning to find a 300 foot redwood tree firmly planted in the Mall. A miracle, right? Now suppose you take a core sample of the tree and find it has rings indicating an age of 2000 years. What would this prove or disprove?
My point is that the earth has tree rings, and life has tree rings. Science deals with how things on this earth work; it deals only with the regularities we label natural laws. The evidence that is visible to us indicates an age of the earth in billions of years. The evidence of DNA indicates all life is related by common descent.
The actual history -- whether this history is "real" or whether the miracles are real -- is unimportant to science. But the interpretation of the tree rings is important because it is derived from theories about how things work in the present and how they will work in the future. These theories have consequence in engineering and medicine.
It is irrelevant which interpretation of history is "real", but it is important in our everyday lives to decide which interpretation is based on how ongoing, regular, "natural" processes work.
No Santa Claus, no Tooth Fairy -- those are both beliefs.
Do you "believe" in that keyboard in front of you? What the heck difference would it make if you did or did not.
The keyboard would still be there. You of course, could ignore it.
Or do you "believe" in good whiskey? The bottle at right hand is still there, "belief" or not.
Now ... if you "believe" the whiskey is a fine lively taste to the palate and warms the gut you will, I'd say and most physiologists too, I'd guesss -- you will actually taste your "belief". Perhaps it is that such "belief" pre-conditions the palate, the gut, the body chemical. Maybe. But this is to say that "belief" can be a great thing in the right context -- to improve the taste of things, to improve the comfort, the enjoyement.
Or reveresed -- a negative "belief" will also color taste and take on things.
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