Posted on 03/09/2005 12:36:05 PM PST by Heartlander
Darwinian Doubts
By: David Berlinski
March 9, 2005
Original Article
NOTE: The article below is the full version by Dr. Berlinski. The Wichita Eagle opted to shorten the piece to only 400 words.
The defense of Darwin’s theory of evolution has now fallen into the hands of biologists who believe in suppressing criticism when possible and ignoring it when not. It is not a strategy calculated in induce confidence in the scientific method. A paper published recently in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington concluded that the events taking place during the Cambrian era could best be understood in terms of an intelligent design – hardly a position unknown in the history of western science. The paper was, of course, peer-reviewed by three prominent evolutionary biologists. Wise men attend to the publication of every one of the Proceeding’s papers, but in the case of Steven Meyer’s "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories," the Board of Editors was at once given to understand that they had done a bad thing. Their indecent capitulation followed at once.
Publication of the paper, they confessed, was a mistake. It would never happen again. It had barely happened at all. And peer review?
The hell with it.
“If scientists do not oppose antievolutionism,” Eugenie Scott, the Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education, remarked, “it will reach more people with the mistaken idea that evolution is scientifically weak.” Scott’s understanding of ‘opposition’ had nothing to do with reasoned discussion. It had nothing to do with reason at all. Discussing the issue was out of the question. Her advice to her colleagues was considerably more to the point: "Avoid debates."
Everyone else had better shut up.
In this country, at least, no one is ever going to shut up, the more so since the case against Darwin’s theory retains an almost lunatic vitality.
Look – The suggestion that Darwin’s theory of evolution is like theories in the serious sciences – quantum electrodynamics, say – is grotesque. Quantum electrodynamics is accurate to thirteen unyielding decimal places. Darwin’s theory makes no tight quantitative predictions at all.
Look – Field studies attempting to measure natural selection inevitably report weak to non-existent selection effects.
Look – Darwin’s theory is open at one end since there are no plausible account for the origins of life.
Look – The astonishing and irreducible complexity of various cellular structures has not yet successfully been described, let alone explained.
Look – A great many species enter the fossil record trailing no obvious ancestors and depart for Valhalla leaving no obvious descendents.
Look – Where attempts to replicate Darwinian evolution on the computer have been successful, they have not used classical Darwinian principles, and where they have used such principles, they have not been successful.
Look – Tens of thousands of fruit flies have come and gone in laboratory experiments, and every last one of them has remained a fruit fly to the end, all efforts to see the miracle of speciation unavailing.
Look – The remarkable similarity in the genome of a great many organisms suggests that there is at bottom only one living system; but how then to account for the astonishing differences between human beings and their near relatives – differences that remain obvious to anyone who has visited a zoo?
But look again – If the differences between organisms are scientifically more interesting than their genomic similarities, of what use is Darwin’s theory since it’s otherwise mysterious operations take place by genetic variations?
These are hardly trivial questions. Each suggests a dozen others. These are hardly circumstances that do much to support the view that there are “no valid criticisms of Darwin’s theory,” as so many recent editorials have suggested.
Serious biologists quite understand all this. They rather regard Darwin’s theory as an elderly uncle invited to a family dinner. The old boy has no hair, he has no teeth, he is hard of hearing, and he often drools. Addressing even senior members at table as Sonny, he is inordinately eager to tell the same story over and over again.
But he’s family. What can you do?
David Berlinski holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University. He is the author of On Systems Analysis, A Tour of the Calculus, The Advent of the Algorithm, Newton’s Gift, The Secrets of the Vaulted Sky, and, most recently, Infinite Ascent: A Short History of Mathematics. He is a senior fellow with Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.
Maybe I had him confused with Dembski, that other -ski ID info-theory writer, who has his own problems. But Dembski is better than this. This is awful.
QED ‘is’ one of the most accurate theories – it agrees with experiment more than 13 decimal places. Look up Richard Feynman…
Now; I do believe intelligent design allows for monkeys to have produced human like offspring...That's where Democrats come from......
Perhaps the Discovery Institute would like to let us know who these three "prominent evolutionary biologists" are--associated with the Discovery Institute or other creationist organs?
Wise men attend to the publication of every one of the Proceeding’s papers, but in the case of Steven Meyer’s "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories," the Board of Editors was at once given to understand that they had done a bad thing. Their indecent capitulation followed at once.
STATEMENT FROM THE COUNCIL OF THE BIOLOGICAL
SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON
The paper by Stephen C. Meyer, "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories," in vol. 117, no. 2, pp. 213-239 of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, was published at the discretion of the former editor, Richard v. Sternberg. Contrary to typical editorial practices, the paper was published without review by any associate editor; Sternberg handled the entire review process. The Council, which includes officers, elected councilors, and past presidents, and the associate editors would have deemed the paper inappropriate for the pages of the Proceedings because the subject matter represents such a significant departure from the nearly purely systematic content for which this journal has been known throughout its 122-year history. For the same reason, the journal will not publish a rebuttal to the thesis of the paper, the superiority of intelligent design (ID) over evolution as an explanation of the emergence of Cambrian body-plan diversity. The Council endorses a resolution on ID published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml), which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis to explain the origin of organic diversity. Accordingly, the Meyer paper does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings.
We have reviewed and revised editorial policies to ensure that the goals of the Society, as reflected in its journal, are clearly understood by all. Through a web presence (http://www.biolsocwash.org) and improvements in the journal, the Society hopes not only to continue but to increase its service to the world community of systematic biologists.
In other words, Discovery Institute creationist Meyer gives a paper to creationist editor Sternberg (who admits in his own blog that he, Sternberg, is associated with a YEC group, which fact was not generally known until the controversy), who short-cutted the editorial process in the in the last edition of the PBSW for which he would be editor, and did not choose an associate editor who might get in the way or choose unfriendly reviewers; of an article that was unsuitable for this specialized publication.
I'm not a biologist, but this is my understanding of it:
First off, species are groups of organisms (this is really basic, but I don't want to leave anything out).
For species that are not gendered: (like bacteria, and lots of other stuff)
Every asexually-reproducing organism with DNA distinct from another organism could theoretically be put in a different group. For bacteria, "species" seem to be categories of convenience. It has much more meaning for organisms that are male or female.
For species that contain male and female genders: (animals, maybe plants... like I said, I'm not a biologist)
If two fertile members of a species f---, the resulting offspring should be another fertile member of that species. Obviously, some animals are not fertile (birth defects, etc. can prevent a woman from bearing children or a man from producing proper sperm). But in general, Fertile Male + Fertile Female --> One or More Fertile Offspring of the Same Species.
This is why common dogs are considered to be a single species, even though there are many "pure" breeds (because two dogs can almost always produce a mutt, even if they are from different "breeds")
Likewise, horses and donkeys are considered different species, because the offspring of a horse and donkey is a mule, which is infertile. If mules could make mule babies, then horses and donkeys would be considered to be in the same species--in fact, instead of horses on one side and donkeys on the other, we would have a continuum between the two. Some animals would be 80% horse, 20% donkey, some would be 50/50, etc. They would not be considered separate species.
This is an objective test for whether or not two animals are in the same species (and hence an objective definition for what a species is). In fact, if Intelligent Design theorists are correct, and God designed all animals, then of course there would be such a thing as species. If animals cannot evolve between species, then God would have had to create all species. Species would be put here by God. So it makes no sense for an ID person to attack evolutionists on the grounds that species are not distinct! If species are not in fact distinct, that is not evidence for intelligent design! In fact, if you look at the Hebrew Bible, Jews are specifically commanded not to mix species. Mules are an abomination--even clothing made from multiple fibers is banned (cotton + rayon --> DEMONIC). So from a creationist viewpoint, attacking the idea that species follow solid boundaries, is absurd.
The idea behind speciation is that through evolution, one species (one group of animals capable of mating with each other) would break into two separate groups. Separated somehow, the two groups would evolve separately until they became unable to produce fertile children from f---ing each other. It doesn't always require separation, as far as I know, but that is the simplest way to get there. (but it does usually take many, many years to happen, so it's not something that can generally be observed in the lab under a normal time-frame)
Species can be more complex, though. For instance, there are a bunch of arctic birds that are considered to be within the same species, even though not all members of the species can mate and produce fertile offspring with all others. There are multiple sub-species, and while all subspecies are sexually compatible with at least one other sub-species, not all sub-species are compatible with all other sub-species. Classifying animals as belonging to a species can indeed be somewhat messy, but that is evidence for evolution, not evidence for design! If God designed everything and nothing evolved, species would be easy to tell apart and would be absolute!
Bump for that. Creationists must be so proud to finally get something peer-reviewed, even under such murky circumstances lol.
The 3 scientists who peer-reviewed the article were chosen by the Biological Society of Washington. If you want a clear view of what happened, see:
http://www.rsternberg.net/
Another peer-reviewed paper to follow the same lines by Behe:
http://www.proteinscience.org/cgi/content/abstract/ps.04802904v1
I was unable to find the link to young-earth creationism and Sternberg. If you have it please post it.
ad hominem anyone?
Yeah terrible writing, forget the issue...too uncomfortable.
http://www.rsternberg.net/BSG.htm
"Berlinsky's books on calculus and algorithms were rather poor. I read both. Neither was competently written."
Did he get the math right?
Re Sternberg and YEC: In the Sternberg blog is this:
When the story about the Meyer paper broke web searchers noticed for the first time my three-year-old public association with the Baraminology Study Group. Knowing all too well the extraordinary antipathy shown by many scientists towards anything relating to "young earth creationism," my primary contact Dr. Todd Wood immediately sent for my use the letter reproduced below.
See page 10 of the Palaeotology Newsletter for more on the Baraminology Study Group.
"It was Sternberg and not the BSW who assigned the peer reviewers."
And Sternberg was the BSW's managing editor. Thus, the BSW. That's what a managing editor does.
Berlinski suggests there was a board of editors involved, and the BSW's statement states that an associate editor would normally be involved in the editorial process; but Sternberg took an editorial short-cut and worked alone. Obviously Sternberg involved no one else from the BSW in the process because he knew that the article would be as unfavorably received as it was in the BSW's post-publication statement. Sternberg clearly abused the trust of the BSW; and it is misleading to say that the BSW appointed the reviewers, it was creationist-affliliated Sternberg. Sternberg does argue on his blog that he had the authority to make any editorial decisions, but the BSW said in its statement that this authority was used inappropriately.
>>Berlinski is supposed to be better than this.<<
You miss the point. It looks like he matured and "got better."
Anything can go extinct according to intelligent design, because it is about design, not death by accident or intent.
And yet, they are still fruit flies, right?
So, since in only 3 generations of human experiments with modern medicine, we now live 10% longer, are you going to call that evolution?
Already done. A species is a population whose members will will not breed with individuals of another population.
A different species similar to a fruit fly. Is it a fruit fly? I don't know, that's a rather vague term. Is a fly that looks like a fruit fly, but can't breed a fruit fly, that has two sets of wings instead of one still a fruit fly?
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