Tuesday 16 January 2024
Monday 15 January 2024
Common design not common serendipity?
In Bats and Other Animals, Evidence of Common Design in a Magnetic Compass
recent article in Biology Letters, published by the Royal Society, provides some of the first evidence that mammals can navigate using a magnetic compass. The finding is significant because there has been little data previously to confirm that mammals navigate long distances using the earth’s geomagnetic field. Some bats migrate hundreds of miles. Being nocturnal, migratory bats must navigate without reliance on visual cues, which is why it has been a mystery how that is accomplished.
The Soprano Pipistrelle
One bat species, the soprano pipistrelle (Pipistrellus pygmaeus), migrates between northeast and southwest Europe. In this study researchers determined that the species calibrates their magnetic compass with the position of the sun at sunset.1 A compass based on the earth’s magnetic field is susceptible to various errors, including global drift over time and local anomalies. Therefore, a calibration mechanism improves its accuracy for traveling long distances.
The bats do not just detect the direction of the magnetic field, but also the vertical inclination. Detecting the sun’s position is also not a simple mechanism. Research has found that bats can determine its location through the polarization pattern of sunlight.2 That enables the animal to determine the sun’s position even on cloudy days. This mechanism also involves a complex algorithm because the polarization pattern vectors change as the sun moves through the sky during the day.
Similarity to Migratory Songbirds
The magnetic compass calibration demonstrated in bats is very similar to the behavior observed in some migratory songbirds, who have long been known to navigate using a magnetic compass. This was the case in an experiment with Savannah sparrows.3 The birds calibrate their magnetic compass by detecting the sun’s position using polarized light. What is different about the mechanism in the sparrows is that they calibrate their compass based on information decoded at both sunrise and sunset. This more complex method enables a more accurate calibration as the two measurements are averaged. A more accurate navigation path reduces the distance travelled, saving both time and energy for the animals.
Complex Programmed Behaviors
This navigation behavior falls into the category of complex programmed behaviors as described in my book Animal Algorithms.4 Such behaviors, as in this case, involve both physical organs and behavior algorithms. Birds and bats are not conscious of these behaviors. Instead, they are programmed and involve neural networks and memory. There are physical organs that include mechanisms for detecting and encoding the magnetic field, and detection of the solar polarization pattern. An algorithm must perform the translation of the polarization pattern to the sun’s position, and an algorithm must compare the sensor data and calculate the required calibration. Finally, another algorithm must compute the corrected flight path based on the calibrated magnetic compass.
The typical Darwinian explanation for common traits in species lacking a common ancestor is “convergent evolution.” Usually the specific mechanism invoked is developmental constraint. Paleontologist George McGhee explains, “The same forms have been produced by the repeated channeling of evolution along the same developmental trajectory…Natural selection has a limited repertoire of potential forms from which to choose, and convergent evolution is the result.”5
The Best Explanation
That explanation is inadequate for a number of reasons. The most obvious is that these behaviors do not involve forms that have developmental constraints. But the most significant problem in this instance is that these behaviors involve a number of complex physical and neural mechanisms and large numbers of genes. There is nothing deterministic that constrains all of these elements. A recent article here by Emily Reeves, “Convergent Evolution: An Argument that Comes at a Price,” explains other difficulties with the convergence explanation. The better explanation is common intelligent design. An intelligent agent, it seems, has chosen to design and optimize these complex mechanisms and applied them in unrelated animal species for purposes specific to those animals.
Notes
Schneider, et al., “Migratory bats are sensitive to magnetic inclination changes during the compass calibration period,” Biology Letters, 2023, 19: 20230181.
Lindecke, et al., “Experienced Migratory Bats Integrate the Sun’s Position at Dusk for Navigation at Night,” Current Biology, 29, 1369-1373, April 22, 2019.
Rachel Muheim, John B. Phillips, Susanne Akesson, “Polarized Light Cues Underlie Compass Calibration in Migratory Songbirds,” Science, Vol. 313, 11 August 2006, 837-839.
Eric Cassell, Animal Algorithms (Discovery Institute Press, Seattle, 2021).
George McGhee, Convergent Evolution: Limited Forms Most Beautiful (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011), 7.
Darwinian snake oil?
Fooled by Darwinism: A Scholar’s Cautionary Tale
On a classic episode of ID the Future, Taking Leave of Darwin author Neil Thomas and host Jonathan Witt conclude their conversation about Thomas’s journey from Darwinian materialism to theistic humanism and a thorough skepticism of Darwinian theory.
In Part 2, Thomas links the heroic posturing of modern atheists Richard Dawkins and Bertrand Russell with the heroic fatalism of poetry stretching back to the early Middle Ages, and further still, to the ancient Greeks. Thomas also draws a link between the animistic thinking of much ancient pagan thought and the magical powers attributed to the Darwinian mechanism. Thomas explains why he now views the latter as essentially “crypto-animism.”
In their wide-ranging conversation, Thomas and Witt also touch on contradictions in Darwin’s treatment of natural selection, the tug-of-war between the paleontologists and the geneticists in the evolutionist community (and how their battle points to a conclusion neither side appears willing to consider), and insights offered up by figures as diverse as British philosopher Antony Flew and celebrated American novelist John Updike.
Download the podcast or listen to it here
Epicurus is finally victorious?
Is Epicurus Smiling?
SciTechDaily reports on “The Amyloid Hypothesis: Rewriting Life’s Origin Story.” The original research paper mentioned in the news story is open access at the Journal of the American Chemical Society: “An Analysis of Nucleotide–Amyloid Interactions Reveals Selective Binding to Codon-Sized RNA.”
Here are the opening sentences of the research article, with my emphases:
Questions concerning the origin of life are often couched in terms of what sort of molecule arose first. The linear thinking in this approach to prebiotic chemistry, perhaps guided by a need to solve the chicken–egg paradox embedded firmly in the central dogma of molecular biology, is predestined to fall short of its goal. That is, the elaborate chemical networks that support life could not have originated from a few exceedingly complex molecules, but rather it is more likely that systems of simpler, more abundant molecules were involved.
Says Who?
Not Eugene Koonin. In 2007, he pointed out that any abiogenesis scenario requires a cosmological background theory against which any local event probabilities (e.g., the origin of life on Earth) must be evaluated. If we make the universe big enough and old enough, or avail ourselves of an infinite multiverse — i.e., purchase all the lottery tickets — then “a few exceedingly complex molecules” are ours for the asking. We win the lottery of the origin of life via a natural pathway. And Epicurus smiles in his Athenian tomb.
Here is how Koonin put it :
The plausibility of different models for the origin of life on earth directly depends on the adopted cosmological scenario. In an infinite universe (multiverse), emergence of highly complex systems by chance is inevitable. Therefore, under this cosmology, an entity as complex as a coupled translation-replication system should be considered a viable breakthrough stage for the onset of biological evolution.
Why Bother?
Of course, Saroj K. Rout and his co-authors want to raise the probabilities of the many undirected chemical pathways to the living state as high as they can. Hence, this paper on the possible interactions between amyloid and proto-nucleic acids.
But it’s unclear, if Koonin is correct, why they should bother. Who cares if a natural pathway from chemistry to “a few exceedingly complex molecules” can be elucidated?
Remember, the emergence of highly complex systems by chance is inevitable. So just relax.
Sunday 14 January 2024
On the argument from charm.
Tour-Cronin Debate: Does Charisma Carry the Day?
Yesterday I began a discussion of the Harvard roundtable debate on the origin of life between James Tour and Lee Cronin. Before going further, I should disclose a couple of facts: I consider Jim Tour a friend, and I’m certainly partial to his arguments. But I know that Jim is very passionate. He wears his feelings on his sleeve, and with Jim, what you see is what you get. I don’t think Jim would deny any of this — in fact, I like that about him: he’s a very transparent individual. But sometimes his personality type means that if he feels that he’s on the right side of an important issue, some passion is going to come out. In a world paralyzed by apathy, fuzziness, and fog, I find this refreshing. But his approach brings a rhetorical risk: Jim’s opponents know that our apathetic and fuzzy world fears conflict, so sometimes people try to capitalize on Jim’s passion and misrepresent it as aggression in order to appeal to the “peace, peace…can’t we just have peace?” crowd.
This dynamic was on full display during the Tour-Cronin roundtable. Sometimes Jim’s critics might have a point that he could reach more people if he toned things down a little. But there’s also a time when people need to be awakened to the fact that something is seriously wrong. If Tour is right, then the OOL community has been dramatically overstating their successes to the public, misleading them into thinking that answers are close at hand. If Tour is right then this point needs to be stated clearly, even if some of the offenders’ feathers get ruffled.
So was Tour overly aggressive at the roundtable? Having watched and then re-watched the event, I don’t think that was at all the case. Professor Tour kept his cool, never shouted, never raised his voice to inappropriate levels, and, most importantly, was highly focused on the science. Tour was in fact very mild throughout the event and maintained a very cool disposition.
Cronin’s Charisma Doesn’t Equate to Science
As for Lee Cronin, he has a likeable personality and a cool haircut, and this plays well before an audience of academics — especially those who are allergic to controversy and/or want peace with the establishment. I suspect a lot of Harvard folks fit into that category. Cronin was quick to attempt to address some of the seemingly devastating quotes that Tour had cited from him.
For example, Cronin jovially compared his 2011 prediction that we’d create life in the lab “within the next two years” to other misguided prophecies that we should already have self-driving cars, and affably admitted that his prediction might have been “a little bit too quick.” Cronin directly addressed Tour’s quotation of a tweet where Cronin had called OOL research “a scam.” Cronin clarified what he meant: “I don’t think origin of life is a scam. That was a joke.”
Fine. So Cronin admits he overstated how soon we’d recreate the origin of life, and we’re supposed to take his tweet as a joke. We should give people space and grace to clarify their positions and retract statements that they later realized were inaccurate. But don’t miss the hidden assumption in Cronin’s explanation of his inaccurate prediction: most everyone believes that someday we will have self-driving vehicles. So if predicting that we’ll someday “make life in the lab” is like predicting that someday we’ll “build self-driving cars,” then the two predictions falls into the same category of “reasonable things that will likely someday be accomplished.” The hidden assumptions in Cronin’s argument imply that someday we’ll solve the origin of life.
But remember, Tour offered many reasonable and potent scientific challenges, so we have to ask: Did Cronin adequately address them? The answer is important, and it is this: No, he didn’t. Cronin did not even attempt to address Tour’s challenges. Instead, Cronin adopted a dual rhetorical angle — attack Tour and make the OOL sound reasonable.
Cronin seemed intent upon using the roundtable not to provide a scientific explanation for the origin of life, but rather to convince people to believe that one day we’ll solve this problem. Amazingly, Cronin sought to inspire this confidence without ever coming remotely close to explaining the science of how it is going to happen.
It was quite an impressive and bold rhetorical move. Simply put, Cronin didn’t come to explain how the OOL took place; he just came to convince you to believe that someday that problem can be solved. And Cronin’s good-humored personality certainly made the task much easier for him. But if you look past the charisma, it’s clear that Cronin presented virtually no science that suggests the origin of life is actually a solvable problem.
Jim Tour as Foil
Cronin did not come to talk about the chemistry of how life originated. He came to sound reasonable, and even admitted up front that “I’m not coming here to today to say we’ve solved the problem.” Instead, he hoped that as an OOL theorist appearing in the flesh, he might be able to make the natural chemical origin of life sound reasonable. And he gave it a good try, repeatedly reassuring the audience — without any specifics — that we’re “making progress,” even “fantastic progress.”
But when you want to look like the good guy, it helps to make someone else into the bad guy. That way, you look all the more reasonable and believable. Thus, Cronin forced Tour into the role of foil, the pessimistic, angry, aggressive, and unfair critic. As the self-identified scientific optimist, Cronin sought to make himself look like the reasonable party.
There was a problem, however. When he scripted out his opening statement, he was obviously banking on the plan that Tour would raise his voice, shout, get angry, and act in a generally aggressive and distasteful manner. Thus, in a very odd move, Cronin repeatedly referenced Tour’s “shouting,” or “rattling” people’s “eardrums,” saying Tour would “shout at me until … hoarse” or “shout at [people] relentlessly to say ‘everyone’s an idiot.’” But none of that happened — Tour may have been passionate but didn’t shout, didn’t rattle anyone’s eardrums, and he certainly didn’t call anyone an idiot.
Another example: Cronin claimed that Tour called him a “bad chemist.” But this never happened either. Later during the roundtable Cronin claimed Tour was being “overcritical” — like something you might say to your spouse who keeps nagging you about something. I felt this was entirely unfair: Tour is raising reasonable questions and for this he is accused of being too critical? If so, then surely his challenges should be easy to answer. But Cronin had no answers. Instead, Tour focused on the science, and Cronin focused on Tour. Sound familiar?
Déjà Vu: Repeating the Tour-Farina Debate Dynamic
Lee Cronin is far more pleasant than “Professor Dave,” and this roundtable was far mellower and more civil than the Tour-Farina-debate. Yet key aspects of the rhetorical dynamics were virtually identical:
In the May 2023 OOL debate between Tour and Dave Farina, Tour focused on the science, posing a series of scientific challenges to OOL. Farina explicitly refused to answer those challenges and questions, and instead spent a great deal of time talking about Tour personally — with a vicious series of ad hominem attacks.
In this November 2023 OOL roundtable between Tour and Cronin, Tour focused on the science, posing a series of serious scientific challenges to OOL. Then, his opponent Cronin explicitly refused to answer Tour’s reasonable challenges and questions, and instead spent a great deal of time talking about Tour personally — not getting nasty but nonetheless attacking Tour by repeatedly trying to paint him as “shouting,” “angry,” “aggressive,” etc.
Moreover, the outcome of this “roundtable” is almost identical to that of the Tour-Farina debate:
At the close of the Tour-Farina debate, Tour’s reasonable challenges were left completely unanswered, yet Tour’s character had been unfairly slandered.
At the close Tour-Cronin roundtable, Tour’s reasonable challenges were left completely unanswered, and once again Tour’s character had been unfairly slandered, even if in a friendlier manner.
Lee Cronin is a very personable individual. No doubt about that. But the critic of the origin of life, Jim Tour, had arguments and challenges that his opponent did not address and therefore apparently could not address. Once again, James Tour carried the day. No doubt about that, either.
Saturday 13 January 2024
Friday 12 January 2024
Yet more echoes of the Cambrian explosion?
Fossil Friday: Update on Cambrian Bryozoans
A few weeks ago, I commented (Bechly 2023) on the abrupt origin of Bryozoa either during the Cambrian Explosion or in the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event, both of which have been called big bangs of life by mainstream evolutionary biologists. I especially emphasized the back and forth concerning the interpretation of putative bryozoan fossil from the Cambrian period. I mentioned that a new study by Yang et al. (2023a) had recently challenged the bryozoan status of the genus Protomelission from Cambrian limestone in Australia, and instead identified it as a dasyclad green algae.
Now, a new study (Yang et al. 2023b) has been uploaded to the preprint archive bioRxiv. (The lead author only coincidentally shares the same name as that of the lead author of the earlier study.) This new study strongly rejects the determination as dasyclad green algae in favor of an identification as archaeocyath-like sponges, based on the analysis of multiple specimens that show the typical skeletal structures, aquiferous system, and ontogeny. Archaeocyaths, which are “broadly accepted as an extinct class of the phylum Porifera, were the earliest reef-building metazoans in the Phanerozoic” and “reached a biodiversity of over 300 genera and ca. 1500 species before the end of the Cambrian Age 4” (Yang et al. 2023b).
The authors emphasize that “the origin of the bryozoans remains a mystery” but explicitly confirm the reality of the Cambrian Explosion as “the most significant evolutionary event in Earth history in terms of setting up stem- and even crown-groups of almost all major metazoan phyla.” That’s bad news for the science deniers among the hardcore Darwinists and anti-ID activists, who recently have tended more and more simply to deny the Cambrian Explosion as a real event, and instead claim it to be just an artifact of an incomplete fossil record or even a straw man set up by evil creationists. The real experts disagree and fully corroborate the thrust of Stephen Meyer’s point in his book Darwin’s Doubt.
References
Bechly G 2023. Fossil Friday: Cambrian Bryozoa Come and Go. Evolution News November 24, 2023. https://evolutionnews.org/2023/11/fossil-friday-cambrian-bryozoa-come-and-go/
Meyer SC 2013. Darwin’s Doubt. HarperOne, New York (NY), viii+498 pp.
Yang J, Lan T, Zhang X-G & Smith MR 2023a. Protomelission is an early dasyclad alga and not a Cambrian bryozoan. Nature 615(7952), 468–471. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-05775-5
Yang A, Luo C, Han J, Zhuravlev AY, Reitner J, Sun H, Zeng H, Zhao F & Hu S 2023b. Not dasycladalean alga, but an Odyssey of the earliest Phanerozoic animal reef-builders. BioRxiv December 8, 2023. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.12.07.570709
Thursday 11 January 2024
Psalms Chapter 96 American Standard Version.
1.Oh sing unto JEHOVAH a new song: Sing unto JEHOVAH, all the earth.
2Sing unto JEHOVAH, bless his name; Show forth his salvation from day to day.
3Declare his glory among the nations, His marvellous works among all the peoples.
4For great is JEHOVAH, and greatly to be praised: He is to be feared above all gods.
5For all the gods of the peoples are idols; But JEHOVAH made the heavens.
6Honor and majesty are before him: Strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.
7Ascribe unto JEHOVAH, ye kindreds of the peoples, Ascribe unto JEHOVAH glory and strength.
8Ascribe unto JEHOVAH the glory due unto his name: Bring an offering, and come into his courts.
9Oh worship JEHOVAH in holy array: Tremble before him, all the earth.
10Say among the nations, JEHOVAH reigneth: The world also is established that it cannot be moved: He will judge the peoples with equity.
11Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof;
12Let the field exult, and all that is therein; Then shall all the trees of the wood sing for joy
13Before JEHOVAH ; for he cometh, For he cometh to judge the earth: He will judge the world with righteousness, And the peoples with his truth.
Reductionism bumping up against its limits?
Biochemist Begins to Sense Limits of Materialism
Irish biochemist William Reville has been the first Officer for the Public Awareness and Understanding of Science at University College, Cork — the sort of post Richard Dawkins had at Oxford. Reville, author of Understanding the Natural World: Science Today (Irish Times Books 1999), informed us last week that “There is every reason to believe that consciousness will eventually yield to scientific analysis just as the general nature of life yielded”.
I was somewhat taken aback. What does he mean by the “general nature of life” yielded to scientific analysis? True, we now know vastly more than we used to about life in all its forms. But, as James Tour’s ongoing debates with fellow scientists attest, no one has any idea how life began.
“Deep Ongoing Mysteries”
It is the same with physics. Just yesterday at IAI.TV, Oxford theoretical physicist Tim Palmer acknowledged that “we are in dire need of some new paradigms in physics, and seemingly unable to arrive at them. We are yet to solve the deep ongoing mysteries of the dark universe and still haven’t convincingly synthesised quantum and gravitational physics.”
The “general nature,” both in physics and in life sciences, is precisely what hasn’t yielded. Thus the current state of affairs in science is hardly a very strong basis for optimism that something ethereal like consciousness is going to “yield” to a physicalist or other naturalist explanation.
Reville hopefully tosses up emergence theory:
Most scientists and philosophers think that consciousness is an emergent phenomenon. Emergent phenomena arise in complex systems, such as the human brain. The “wetness” of water is a simple example of an emergent property. Water is composed of water molecules (H2O). There is nothing about the fundamental properties of hydrogen or oxygen that predicts wetness but when countless H2O molecules congregate together, wetness emerges.
Similarly, the human brain contains 86 billion neurons. Individual neurons are not conscious but the emergent phenomenon hypothesis predicts that the collective properties of these 86 billion neurons and their interactions produce consciousness.
WILLIAM REVILLE, “WILL SCIENCE BE ABLE TO EXPLAIN CONSCIOUSNESS?” IRISH TIMES, JANUARY 4, 2024
But why should 86 billion non-conscious material neurons working together produce consciousness? Dr. Reville can believe in such an origin of consciousness if he wants but calling it science is arbitrary when no mechanism is proposed.
Considering Panpsychism
He then considers panpsychism. Panpsychism, unlike eliminative materialism, concedes the existence of immaterial consciousness, provided it is shared with all life forms or the universe in general:
Philosophers who support panpsychism believe there is an open explanatory gap between the physical and the mental. As Norwegian philosopher Hedda Hassel Mørch notes: “If you knew every last physical detail about my brain processes, you still wouldn’t know what it’s like to be me.” And philosopher Yanssel Garcia, University of Nebraska Omaha, declares “physical science is incapable, in principle, of telling us the whole story”.
REVILLE, “EXPLAIN CONSCIOUSNESS?”
All true. But in the real world, the Hard Problem of Consciousness is unique to humans. If electrons or sea cucumbers are in some sense conscious, it’s just not the same kind of thing and raises no similar issues.
Reville senses something may be afoot:
But, the apparent difficulty of the task facing science of elucidating how inanimate matter forms conscious minds must not deter scientists from patiently and systematically pursuing the matter in the traditional manner. Of course, if consciousness eventually turns out to be completely resistant to explanation by science, then we are into, as they say, “a whole new ballgame“. Either way, exciting times lie ahead.
REVILLE, “EXPLAIN CONSCIOUSNESS?”
In Pursuit of “Traditional Methods”
He somehow senses a duty to continue to pursue the “traditional methods” (materialist research) indefinitely. But he is at least willing to consider the possibility that they will continue to fail. And, it is true, as he says, that exciting times lie ahead.
Materialist science has got about as far as it can go and progress will only be made if we are willing to contemplate non-materialist approaches. It won’t be easy; for one thing, progress won’t even necessarily look like the same thing. A better understanding of consciousness, for example, may mean a clearer picture of how it relates to the environment but will not mean showing that it doesn’t really exist or is somehow a physical thing.
Not just intelligent design but ingenious design. II
Arts and Sciences Reveal the Genius of Nature
Is the universe meaningful or meaningless? Purposeful or pointless? On a new episode of ID the Future, enjoy the second half of an interview with Dr. Jonathan Witt about the evidence of purpose and meaning built into the universe. Dr. Witt is co-author of the book A Meaningful World, which argues that the more we learn about the universe, the more it seems laden with meaning. He unpacks this argument in a discussion with host Dr. Mark Turman.
Here in Part 2, Witt describes four characteristics common in all works of human genius and provides examples, from Shakespeare’s Hamlet to Euclid’s geometry. He then explains that we find the same hallmarks in the natural world, from the “unreasonable effectiveness” of mathematics and the elegant structure of the DNA helix to the efficiency of protein machines and the intricate interconnected systems that keep organisms alive. It turns out, Witt argues, that the deeply original thinking and high levels of intelligence we so admire in human genius has a long-standing precedent in nature.
Download the podcast or listen to it here.
Wednesday 10 January 2024
Technology is more predictive re:biology than physics? II
Systems Biology Cracks Life’s Engineered Intricacies — A Report from CELS
Most academic biologists would sooner parasail into Mordor than admit intelligent design beats blind evolution. Modern Darwinism is very much the reigning paradigm in historical biology. Curiously, however, the hottest branch of experimental biology nowadays actually adopts as a working heuristic the view that biological systems are optimally engineered. This hot new approach — systems biology — has proven so fruitful that there is a growing demand for engineers to join biological research groups to help those groups think like engineers.
Recently I had the privilege of attending a scientific conference that took this systems biology approach — the Conference on Engineering in Living Systems (CELS) in Denton, Texas. What makes this gathering stand out is that the biologists and engineers in attendance don’t adopt the design paradigm as merely a working heuristic. They are convinced that the biological systems under review exhibit clever engineering solutions because they really were cleverly engineered. Every CELS talk I attended spotlighted a different ingenious design in biology, or upended some cherished Darwinian assumption, or both.
Smarter than Knitting Machines
In one lecture, internationally distinguished Brazilian chemist Marcos Eberlin discussed the engineering marvels of proteins, ribosomes, and their underlying amino-acid architecture. Ribosomes contain proteins and RNA. They are waterproof, mechanically resistant, flexible, and elastic, with long-lived, connecting units. They work like knitting machines but are much smarter than knitting machines, Eberlin explained.
Proteins, likewise, are extraordinarily strong, flexible, and elastic — much better than man-made nylons and able to self-fold into the precise four-dimensional structures needed for life. They do so in a myriad of shapes that fulfill a host of challenging tasks. These protein machines, moreover, don’t just work individually; they work together symphonically.
Eberlin said that many of his fellow scientists disbelieve in God but plagiarize him all the time in a research field known as biomimetics. The kicker is that when they manage the copying feat, they usually do so in a way inferior to the original.
A Chicken-and-Egg Problem
Eberlin also pointed out problems with the idea that RNA, proteins, and ribosomes evolved gradually through a mindless process. To get ribosomes and any kind of protein, you need various kinds of amino acids, all left-handed. (No, amino acids don’t have hands. They do, however, have amine groups either on the right-hand or left-hand side.) How did mindless nature sort through the righties and lefties and choose exclusively left-handed amino acids? There is no purely mindless natural process for generating or selecting only left-handed amino acids.
Eberlin warned against slipping into a view of physical laws as having foresight or intentions. The laws of nature were never striving to produce purely left-handed amino acids. Nature’s laws don’t care about nursing life. If anything, the mindless forces of nature want to tear life apart.
To overcome these buffeting forces, Eberlin says, you need molecular biological machines. One is the ribosome. It’s essential for making proteins, but ribosomes are themselves partially made up of proteins. So, which came first in the evolutionary story?
You also need very large RNA molecules to make ribosomes. Some origin-of-life researchers say life began as an RNA World, with DNA and proteins arriving later. Others say, no, proteins came first. Others, that no, ribosomes were first to the party. But really you need all three, Eberlin says. None of them can survive without the others.
It’s a classic chicken-and-egg problem, and Eberlin said that overcoming it requires foresight and planning, activities reserved for intelligent agents. Three chemists won a Nobel Prize for mapping the ribosome, and Eberlin said the prize was well deserved. So, what prize, he asked, is due the one who designed the ribosome in the first place?
The Problem of Orphans
In another CELS talk, philosopher of biology Paul Nelson discussed a rising challenge to modern evolutionary theory — the exponential growth in the catalogue of orphan genes.
Orphan genes are functional DNA sequences without known homologues outside a given species or lineage. A commitment to universal common descent led biologists to expect such genes to be rare. After all, if all species evolved from ancestor species in a gradually branching tree of life, starting with the Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA), with genetic changes accumulating only very gradually through small genetic mutations, then novel genes — seemingly without ancestry — should be quite unusual. But as it turns out, they’re not.
Nelson related an experience from years ago when he was called out in a lecture at Dartmouth. He was speaking on the challenge orphan genes pose for evolutionary theory, and his critic complained that we didn’t have enough of a sample — just 122 bacterial species — to conclude that there was any real problem for evolutionary theory. Surely this signal would dissipate, said the critic, once the genomes of more bacterial types were sequenced.
So, what has occurred in the intervening years? A Polish research team has now surveyed the genomes of more than 60,000 bacterial species and close to 200 million bacterial proteins. In the process they have uncovered 8.5 million orphan proteins. The signal, far from fading, is now loud enough to rattle teeth. Nelson noted that it isn’t just bacteria either. Whenever the DNA of a previously unsequenced plant or animal form is sequenced, many new orphan genes are uncovered.
The pattern clashes with what universal common descent anticipates but meshes well with an intelligent design paradigm. If a feature is closely shared with another species, then we might expect the designer to repurpose a module already in use. If the feature is unique to the species or lineage, then we could expect the designer to write new DNA code for the new feature, much as a software engineer would proceed, with the result being more orphan code. And that is the pattern that is emerging.
The Point of the Pentadactyl
Another CELS speaker was engineering superstar Stuart Burgess, Professor of Engineering Design at Bristol University in England. Burgess is the editor of two bioengineering journals, and a lead designer for the British Olympic Cycling Team. His work there helped the British track cyclists win the top medal haul in both the Rio and Tokyo Olympics. Burgess also has had two research fellowships at Cambridge University and was the lead designer for the European Space Agency’s Metop satellites.
In his CELS talk, Burgess made the case that an understanding of engineering principles well explains the repeated appearance of the pentadactyl (five digit) limb design throughout the animal kingdom.
Evolutionists have long argued that this pattern is due to evolutionary common descent — that is, that a series of mutations constructed the five-digit design in a common ancestral lineage and that the blueprint was passed down to various descendants on the branching limb of animal life, leaving everything from human hands to whale flippers sporting the pentadactyl design. But even a fully paid-up evolutionist such as Harvard paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould conceded that this tidy story breaks down. In his book Eight Little Piggies, he noted various exceptions to the pentadactyl rule before he gamely tried to fit the much messier picture into a Darwinian frame.
Burgess offered what he sees as a more elegant solution. Namely, an engineering analysis shows that five digits (as opposed to, say, one or three or seventeen) provides an optimal tradeoff between strength and flexibility/dexterity. A single digit would be strongest, and a dozen digits more flexible or dexterous. But if you want an optimal combination of these two virtues, and you graph them with strength decreasing with each additional digit, and flexibility/dexterity increasing with each digit, you find that the two virtues cross at the five-digit point. Five digits thus represent what engineers describe as a constrained optimization of competing attributes.
The five-digit design appears so often in the animal world, in other words, because the designer was a good engineer and selected it as the best trade-off between competing virtues. Take the five-digit whale flipper. The flipper must be strong but also flexible enough to twist in various subtle ways in the service of making the creature a master swimmer. An engineering analysis found that five digits best achieves that compromise, Burgess said.
Whale Bones of Contention
At this point in the talk Burgess anticipated an objection: Yes, but whales have vestigial pelvic bones, left over from their land-dwelling ancestors, pelvic bones largely useless to the whales. Surely that screams blind evolution, not design. Burgess noted that this oft-recycled argument for evolution is badly outdated, since research has long revealed important functions for these bones.
The point was conceded in a 2014 paper in the journal Evolution. “Due to their highly reduced state, cetacean pelvic bones are sometimes thought of as ‘useless vestiges’ of their land-dwelling ancestry,” but, the authors continued, these whale bones in fact serve “important roles in male reproductive function.”1 In support of the claim, the article cited more than a dozen corroborating scientific papers stretching from 1881 to 2009.
As one would expect from an article in the journal Evolution, the authors scrambled to provide an alternative evolutionary explanation for the pelvic bones, but the cherished evolutionary story of “vestigial” pelvic bones joins the growing pile of discredited icons of evolution detailed by biologist Jonathan Wells, first in Icons of Evolution and then further in Zombie Science: More Icons of Evolution.
In the case of the pelvic bones of the whale, the Darwinian framework led many scientists astray, whereas the view that these bones are the product of rational and skillful engineering pointed in the right direction.
This pattern of discovery harkens back to the scientific revolution itself. The founders of modern science were theists, tutored in the Judeo-Christian understanding of reality. Their early breakthroughs were fueled by seeing the book of nature as the work of a master author, a great craftsman whose deep designs called for careful study to illuminate their hidden intricacies. So, we shouldn’t be surprised that in recovering this approach to the living world, today’s systems biologists find themselves in the midst of a fresh revolution of discovery.
How the stones bore witness to the bible's account re:Belshazzar.
How does archaeology confirm the role of Belshazzar of Babylon?
FOR many years, Bible critics claimed that King Belshazzar, who is mentioned in the book of Daniel, never existed. (Dan. 5:1) They held that view because archaeologists could find no evidence that he had actually lived. However, that changed in 1854. Why?
In that year, a British consul named J. G. Taylor explored some ruins in the ancient city of Ur, in what is now southern Iraq. There, located in a large tower, the explorer found several clay cylinders. The cylinders, each about four inches (10 cm) long, are engraved with cuneiform writing. The writing on one of the cylinders includes a prayer for the long life of Babylonian King Nabonidus and his oldest son, Belshazzar. Even critics had to agree: This finding proves that Belshazzar did exist.
However, the Bible states not only that Belshazzar existed but also that he was a king. Again, critics were skeptical. For example, the 19th-century English scientist William Talbot wrote that some state that “Bel-sar-ussur [Belshazzar] was co-regent with Nabonidus his father. But of this there is not the slightest evidence.”
That controversy was settled, however, when the writings on other clay cylinders revealed that Belshazzar’s father, King Nabonidus, was away from the capital city for years at a time. What happened during his absence? “When Nabonidus went into exile,” states the Encyclopaedia Britannica, “he entrusted Belshazzar with the throne and the major part of his army.” So Belshazzar served, in effect, as a coruler in Babylon during that time. Thus, archaeologist and language scholar Alan Millard stated that it was appropriate for “the Book of Daniel to call Belshazzar ‘king.’”
Of course, for God’s servants, the principal evidence that the book of Daniel is trustworthy and inspired by God is found within the Bible itself.—2 Tim. 3:16.
In pursuit of JEHOVAH'S Favor.
Leviticus Ch.8:16NIV"Moses also took all the fat around the internal organs, the long lobe of the liver, and both kidneys and their fat, and burned it on the altar."
1Samuel Ch.2:15-17ASV"Yea, before they burnt the fat, the priest's servant came, and said to the man that sacrificed, Give flesh to roast for the priest; for he will not have boiled flesh of thee, but raw. 16And if the man said unto him, They will surely burn the fat first, and then take as much as thy soul desireth; then he would say, Nay, but thou shalt give it me now: and if not, I will take it by force. 17And the sin of the young men was very great before JEHOVAH; for the men despised the offering of JEHOVAH.
18But Samuel ministered before JEHOVAH, being a child, girded with a linen ephod."
Leviticus Ch.7:25ASV"For whosoever eateth the fat of the beast, of which men offer an offering made by fire unto JEHOVAH, even the soul that eateth it shall be cut off from his people. "
The sacrices and freewill offerings made at JEHOVAH'S sanctuary under the law covenant were foreshadows of the even better sacrifices Christ's High Priesthood facilitates. Yet a careful study of these illuminates key principles as to what JEHOVAH'S Standards are re:acceptable offerings.
The Fat mentioned in these passages was considered the most valuable part of the meat. Note that JEHOVAH insisted that the most valuable part of the sacrifice be offered first and that not even the priests were to convert any of it to personal use on pain of death.
Roman's Ch.12:1NKJV"I beseech[a] you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your [b]reasonable service."
So mere ritual will not do ,the Lord JEHOVAH is entitled to the most desirable/valuable part of our inner life. If we are not leading with an offering of our inner self to JEHOVAH exclusively our overall offering will be displeasing to JEHOVAH. Certainly it would be idolatrous to make material/hedonistic pursuits the centre of our affections and concerns. None of this is because JEHOVAH is a joyless fuddy duddy who begrudges his servants ever having any fun. Rather having created us for a particular purpose he understands that there can be no deep and abiding Joy found outside of that purpose. But joy is an elusive quarry. The trick is to turn Joy in to our pursuer rather than our quarry . JEHOVAH Alone can help us with that. He is worthy of our best,after all we got it from him.
Tuesday 9 January 2024
Not merely intelligent but ingenious design II.
Nature Reveals Not Just Design but Genius
Almost 50 years ago, physicist Steven Weinberg wrote that “[t]he more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless.” But is our universe really just a meaningless accident? Or can we detect true genius by studying its workings? On a new episode of ID the Future, we are pleased to share the first half of an interview with Dr. Jonathan Witt on the Denison Forum podcast about a cosmos charged with meaning and purpose. In their book A Meaningful World, Dr. Witt and co-author Benjamin Wiker develop a philosophical argument that the more we learn about the universe, the more it seems laden with meaning. Dr. Witt discusses this argument with host Mark Turman.
In Part 1, Witt shares his personal journey of faith and notes why he became skeptical of Darwinism. He discusses why he and Wiker wrote their book, describing the volume as an antidote to the materialist thinking that has dominated academic and scientific circles for the last 150 years. Witt explains that after studying the hallmarks of genius in humans, they looked for the same characteristics in nature, finding bountiful examples of the same challenges, surprises, mystery, and elegance one expects from a work of genius.
Download the podcast or listen to it here
On the price of convergent serendipity.
Convergent Evolution: An Argument That Comes at a Price
Can the laws of nature explain the biological information in human beings and other creatures? In his recent book The Compatibility of Evolution and Design, theologian Rope Kojonen argues that they can. My colleagues and I reviewed the book in the journal Religions and have been critiquing it here.
I turn now to convergent evolution, which is Kojonen’s strongest positive argument for the laws of form, or what he calls the “library of forms.” This argument is significant because these laws of form play a crucial role in Kojonen’s positive case for design. In his view, the laws of form arise from designed laws of nature and, in turn, they vitally shape the “fine-tuned” preconditions that help make evolution possible. So, Kojonen’s convergence argument is a crucial part of his case for design. It also plays a key role in his account of how design supplements evolutionary processes in just the right way.
To understand why this is problematic, it helps to know more about convergence. Kojonen says that convergence means “the independent evolution of the same biological outcome in two or more different lineages, beginning from different starting points” (Kojonen 2021, p. 125). He notes, for example, that “dolphins and sharks have similar streamlined bodies and dorsal fins, even though dolphins are mammals and sharks are fish.” He also says that “paddle-shaped limbs for swimming have evolved independently seven times, and a structure as complex as the eye has evolved independently 49 times…” (p. 125). The word “convergent” is used to describe these examples because, in general, multiple lines of evidence — usually from genetics, paleontology, biochemistry, systematics, and similar fields — indicate that it is hard to make a coherent phylogenetic account of how they came to be from a given common ancestor. Under the idea of common ancestry, these facts are considered odd. Thus, evolutionists say that they are the result of convergent evolution.
A Stacked Deck
Kojonen sees this convergence as evidence that laws of form “play a significant role” in helping evolutionary processes cluster around similar solutions (p. 125). He comes to the conclusion that convergence shows “functional constraints have a big effect on the evolution of life like that on Earth” (p. 127). The general idea, expressed as a rhetorical question, seems to be: If the same solutions came up independently over and over again, doesn’t that suggest that the deck was probably stacked to help evolution succeed?
The first problem is that convergence needs not only to evolve certain complex proteins, traits, and systems but also to evolve these things on their own more than once. If proteins are rare and isolated (as our review establishes) and the chances of even a single short protein evolving once in the whole history of the earth are too low, then, all other things being equal, the chances of similar proteins evolving more than once are even lower. This is amplified when scaled up to protein complexes, cell types, tissues, and organs, again demonstrating why the strength of the scientific evidence is crucial. If unguided evolution was not the cause of convergence, Kojonen’s argument that convergence supports the reconciliation of evolution and design would also fall apart.
A Dilemma
Second, and more importantly, Kojonen’s model is stuck in a paradox. This problem is a version of “Sober’s Paradox,” which is a term used by philosopher of biology Paul Nelson (Nelson 2022). Kojonen’s ideas about common ancestry and his ideas about convergence are at odds with each other. His attempt to agree with both sides breaks up the model internally.
Accept Convergence, Lose Common Ancestry
For instance, if convergence of forms is the result of being constrained by the laws of physics and chemistry, then Kojonen’s co-option response to Behe’s argument about irreducible complexity loses some of its power. This is because co-option only makes sense if there are similar protein parts in other systems that could be changed into the specialized parts needed for the bacterial flagellum. Kojonen says this about the flagellum: “The fact that similar parts exist in other systems, for example, does show that evolution is possible” (p. 118). But with “convergent evolution,” parts or systems that are even more complicated than the flagellum of a bacterium can develop without any similarity or common ancestry. If that’s true, what real power does co-option have?
Let’s also think about how true evolutionary convergence hurts Kojonen’s case that proteins evolved over time. As the story goes, mutation and natural selection can transform one functional protein into another. But if convergence is happening, wouldn’t it be easier for evolution to just make a new protein? Otherwise, if it is just as likely that evolution can lead to big changes as it is to lead to small ones, why talk about gradual changes moving one functional protein to another? Again, the argument has lost its power.
As we’ve seen, Kojonen’s belief in evolutionary convergence hurts the case for common ancestry in standard evolutionary theory. Evolutionary biologists usually think that similar structures can best be explained by having a common ancestor with a similar structure, i.e., it is far more likely that a complex trait evolved once instead of twice. If complex features are just as likely to appear on their own, then it is very hard to prove that two organisms share a common ancestor (Luskin 2017).
Accept Common Ancestry, Lose Convergence
What about the other side of the dilemma? If Kojonen accepts common ancestry, then what follows for his case for convergence and, by extension, his case for the “laws of form”? It seems like two results follow. First, he can no longer explain a lot of biological phenomena. This is because he says that convergence is “ubiquitous.”
Second, in Kojonen’s model, convergence is part of his case for the laws of form. And these laws play a crucial role in the “fine-tuned” preconditions that help make evolution possible. Given that these preconditions arise from designed laws of nature, they play a vital part of Kojonen’s overall account of design. But if Kojonen accepts common ancestry (and its standard justification), then he loses a crucial element of his particular account of design. This greatly harms the heart of his model, which is to defend a certain view of design and its compatibility with evolutionary theory.
So Kojonen’s model has internal inconsistencies. He is basically stuck between a rock and a hard place. Kojonen’s understanding of (and justification for) “design” conflicts with both his own reasoning (about co-option and protein evolution) and the justification of common ancestry, which is a mainstay of evolution. So while Kojonen’s study of the laws of form is one of the most interesting ways he looks at design, this argument comes at a very high price.
References
Branscomb, Elbert, and Michael J. Russell. 2018. “Frankenstein or a Submarine Alkaline Vent: Who Is Responsible for Abiogenesis?: Part 1: What Is Life-That It Might Create Itself?” BioEssays: News and Reviews in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology 40 (7): e1700179.
Djamgoz, Mustafa B. A., and Michael Levin. 2022. “Bioelectricity: An Update.” Bioelectricity 4 (3): 135–135.
Dobson, Christopher M. 2004. “Chemical Space and Biology.” Nature 432 (7019): 824–28.
Ellis, George. 2023. “Quantum Physics and Biology: The Local Wavefunction Approach.” arXiv [quant-Ph]. arXiv. http://arxiv.org/abs/2301.06516v10
Monday 8 January 2024
The first humans are just as human as present day humans?
Childhood in the Ice Age — What Was It Like?
In Aeon late last winter, University of Victoria archaeologist April Nowell offered insights into the lives of children in the Paleolithic era, roughly 40,000 to 10,000 years ago. The surprising thing is how much we actually know about that.
Nowell, author of Growing Up in the Ice Age (Oxbow Books 2021) points out, in addition to Caves of Lascaux-level archeological finds that make world news, a wealth of additional information, put together, tells us more than we might have expected about Stone Age life.
For example, footprints embedded in soft earth or mud in and near a cave tell us that a family, burning bundles of pine sticks to light their way, crawled through a cave called Grotta della BÃ ̀sura 14,000 years ago. The footprints belonged to two adults, an 8-to-11-year-old, a 6-year-old, and a 3-year-old.
Having reached a point now known as the “Sala dei Misteri,” they left signatures of their time there: “While the adults make charcoal handprints on the ceiling, the youngsters dig clay from the floor and smear it on a stalagmite, tracing their fingers in the soft sediment. Each tracing corresponds to the age and height of the child who made it: the tiniest markings, made with a toddler’s fingers, are found closest to the ground.”
Then They Left
Their pine torches left charcoal traces on the walls. What were they doing? We will never know for sure but it seems like a ritual of some sort.
We know other things about the lives of children back then as well. One is that they had to learn the art of making stone tools (knapping). Examining the masses of struck-off fragments, archeologists can tell which ones were produced by novices who had not yet perfected the art.
But, says Nowell, we have evidence of children at play too:
Other studies of footprints, this time from 13,000-year-old sites in Italy and France, document children and teens running around playing tag, making ‘perfect’ footprints the way kids do today at the beach, and throwing clay balls at each other and at stalagmites — some of the pellets missed their targets and remain on the cave floor. Skills were honed through play in other ways: at Palaeolithic sites in Russia, researchers found 29 clay objects that, by analysing traces of fingerprints, were determined to be made by children between the ages of six and 10, and adolescents between 10 and 15. Ethnographically, we know that children often begin to learn ceramics by first playing with clay, making toy animals and serving bowls.
APRIL NOWELL, “CHILDREN OF THE ICE AGE,” AEON, 13 FEBRUARY 2023
And Sadder Evidence as Well
One young child from 10,000 years ago was buried in clothing with hundreds of beads lovingly sewn in.
When telling us of our ancestors, researchers often hold out the hope that the information they painstakingly accumulate will shed light on human development. From the fragments gathered so far, it seems we have no evidence for a history of the human mind, only the history of human technology.
Sunday 7 January 2024
On separating real from apparent design in nature
Stephen Meyer: Evidence of Mind in the Natural World
Can we scientifically detect the activity of a mind behind the universe? On a new episode of ID the Future, philosopher of science Dr. Stephen Meyer answers this question and more in the concluding hour of a new two-hour interview on various topics related to his work and books. The interview was recorded in the fall of 2023 by Praxis Circle, a worldview-building organization that promotes open dialogue around life’s biggest questions. The word praxis harkens back to Latin and Greek as a word for practice, action, or doing. So praxis refers to the process of interaction between our worldview — our conception of reality, our view of the world — and our practice of living and acting in it. It’s an interesting mental space to begin a dialogue.
A word on the format of the interview. The interview host is Doug Monroe, and you’ll hear him at various intervals. However, the discussion was recorded specifically to be broken up into 39 short videos, so most of the time you won’t hear the question being asked — just Dr. Meyer’s response. The questions he answers are often connected and follow a logical progression exploring Dr. Meyer’s books and arguments. Plus, Dr. Meyer usually begins his answer by paraphrasing the question, so you’ll have a good idea what he’s talking about as he begins each new answer.
In case it’s helpful, here’s an outline of the topics covered by Dr. Meyer in this second hour of the interview:
How Christianity Sparked the Scientific Revolution
How Human Fallibility Led to Development of a Scientific Method
Scientific Materialism and Philosophical Skepticism
Where Intelligent Design Stands in the Scientific Community Today
The Argument of Signature in the Cell
The Universe’s Origin and Quantum Physics
Every Philosophical System Posits a Prime Reality
Cosmological Data that Points to God?
Our Fine-tuned Universe
Fine-tuning vs. the Multiverse
Applying Occam’s Razor
The Low Creative Power of Darwinian Mutations
The Problem with Theories of Everything
Theistic Evolution: an Oxymoron
Do Miracles Violate the Laws of Nature?
A Good Theology of Nature
Society’s Ultimate Problem
Download the podcast or listen to it here.
Saturday 6 January 2024
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