The gentleman thief talks cognitive bias.

When scientists attack?

Why Scientific Polarization? A Case Study
David Klinghoffer | @d_klinghoffer

Here’s a scientific war that’s rending the fabric of polite disagreement. Scientists are divided against themselves, choosing sides in a highly polarized environment, charging each other’s “lobby” with denying or distorting evidence.

As the European Journal for Philosophy of Science summarizes, “The two sides of the controversy have never seen eye to eye, but over the past decade, the accusations and counter accusations have become increasingly belligerent and entrenched.” It’s not merely a scientific but a “legal and political battleground.”

Yes, it’s the bitter scientific dispute over…evolution? Nope. Climate change? No, silly, over Lyme disease! 

Debate and Death Threats

The specific issue is the existence and treatment of “chronic Lyme disease.” Our friend Alex Berezow at the American Council on Science and Health notes, “The man who discovered Lyme disease, Allen Steere, was skeptical of the chronic Lyme diagnosis as well as long-term antibiotic therapy. So, he started receiving death threats from patients who were convinced he was wrong.” The aforementioned journal article takes this debate, previously unknown to me, as a model of how disagreement arises even among scientists — you know, those models of cool, rational deliberation — and tends increasingly toward irrational polarization. Berezow writes:

The authors employ a mathematical model to show that, even when scientists are acting in good faith over the correct interpretation of evidence, polarization is still a likely outcome. How so?

Suppose a scientist believes that Hypothesis X is more likely to be correct than Hypothesis Y. He may perhaps come to believe that other scientists who also accept Hypothesis X are slightly more reliable than scientists who accept Hypothesis Y. Over time, this slight initial bias against data provided by scientists who believe Hypothesis Y can morph into outright distrust. Once that happens, a stable state of polarization develops, in which neither side can “win” the debate, even if the facts clearly support one hypothesis over the other.

The authors reach a rather disturbing conclusion:

“We do not need to suppose that anyone is a bad researcher (in our models all agents are identical), or that they are bought by industry, or even that they engage in something like confirmation bias or other forms of motivated reasoning to see communities with stable scientific polarization emerge. All it takes is some mistrust in the data of those who hold different beliefs to get scientific polarization.”

In other words, everybody acting in good faith can result in a society in which we cannot agree on a common set of facts.

Berezow cites the parallel of our contemporary political scene where Left and Right often appear not just to hold different opinions but to live in alternative universes. You can compare these, dizzyingly, by switching rapidly back and forth between Fox News and CNN.

Strengths and Weaknesses

I would add that the evolution debate presents another illustration, equally stark. Berezow again: “Over time, this slight initial bias against data provided by scientists who believe Hypothesis Y can morph into outright distrust. Once that happens, a stable state of polarization develops, in which neither side can ‘win’ the debate, even if the facts clearly support one hypothesis over the other.”

I honestly don’t think that most advocates of intelligent design are unable to recognize merits in the other side’s case. If we were unable, we wouldn’t speak of the alternative neo-Darwinian theory’s “strengths and weaknesses.” Yes, it has strengths. In explaining the emergence of biological novelties, the choice between Darwin and design is not a no-brainer.

This most sound unfair if you know little about the evolution debate. However, from long experience, I do believe that many evolution proponents are so committed to their view with its unacknowledged philosophical underpinnings, so mistrustful of other interpretations, that arguing with them is likely a waste of time. 

A friend explained recently that this appears to be so, not least, with theistic evolutionists of a certain profile. See “No Escape from Theistic Evolution?” When we do argue with these people, the purpose is not to convince them, which is probably hopeless, but to persuade the unpersuaded who, we know, are listening or reading.

Denis Noble says time to rebuild rather than repair Darwinism.

Denis Noble: Why talk about replacement of Darwinian evolution theory, not extension?
Posted by News under Darwinism, Evolution, Intelligent Design

In  new book on the Royal Society’s  Public Evolution Summit,, Oxford’s Denis Noble explains,

The reasons I think we are talking about replacement rather than extension are several. The first is that the exclusion of any form of acquired characteristics being inherited was a central feature of the modern synthesis. In other words, to exclude any form of inheritance that was non-Mendelian, that was Lamarckian-like, was an essential part of the modern synthesis. What we are now discovering is that there are mechanisms by which some acquired characteristics can be inherited, and inherited robustly. So it’s a bit odd to describe adding something like to the synthesis ( i.e., extending the synthesis). A more honest statement is that the synthesis needs to be replaced.

By “replacement” I don’t mean to say that the mechanism of random change followed by selection does not exist as a possible mechanism. But it becomes one mechanism amongst many others, and those mechanisms must interact. So my argument for saying this is a matter of replacement rather than extension is simply that it was adirect intention of those who formulated the modern synthesis to exclude the inheritance of acquired characteristics. (p. 25)

That’s why the fat’s in the fire and smoking hot. Darwinism (or whatever the term du jour is) has been a totalistic system, enforced as such. But the evidence today simply doesn’t support it.

Reading Mazur’s book, I was struck by two things:

The genuinely interesting nature of alternative evolution proposals contrasts sharply with the science media release where fairly dull researchers have come up with a casuistical explanation of how Darwinism can account for various phenomena. And one realizes that for those individuals, that is evolution. That is science. Science is about reaffirming and finding evidence for the teachings of the Great One. And deploring or attacking anyone who doubts his teachings, irrespective of the state of the evidence.

The new approach is not exclusive or totalistic. It does not behave, as Darwinism does, as a metaphysic. Among many assemblies of evidence, some will naturally prevail, as more persuasive than others. But for once, evidence exists to understand living things better rather than to understand Darwin better.

Ladies and gentlemen, place your bets. This’ll be fun.

Russia's tattered reputation re: religious liberty regresses to full blown dumpster blaze

Mass Arrests and Detentions Continue in Russia

During the month of October 2018, local and federal police raided more than 30 homes throughout western Russia. Six brothers and two sisters were arrested and sentenced to pretrial detention for so-called extremist activity. Consequently, there are now 25 brothers and sisters unjustly imprisoned, and 18 others are under house arrest.

October 7, Sychyovka, Smolensk Region—Local police and masked special forces searched four homes and arrested two sisters, 43-year-old Nataliya Sorokina and 41-year-old Mariya Troshina. Two days after their arrest, the Leninsky District Court sentenced our sisters to pretrial detention through November 19, 2018. Then, on November 16, 2018, the Leninsky District Court extended the sisters’ pretrial detention for an additional three months, that is, until February 19, 2019.

October 9, Kirov, Kirov Region—At least 19 homes were raided. Five congregation elders were arrested and later sentenced to pretrial detention. Four of the brothers (Maksim Khalturin, Vladimir Korobeynikov, Andrey Suvorkov, and Evgeniy Suvorkov) are Russian nationals, and one, Andrzej Oniszczuk, is a Polish citizen. Brother Oniszczuk is the second foreigner, after Dennis Christensen from Denmark, to be unjustly detained in Russia for his Christian beliefs.

October 18, Dyurtyuli, Republic of Bashkortostan—Police raided at least 11 homes and seized money, bank cards, photographs, personal letters, computers, SIM cards, and cell phones. Anton Lemeshev, an elder, was arrested and then sentenced to pretrial detention for two months. On October 31, 2018, he was released from prison and transferred to house arrest, where he remains at present.

Despite the ongoing threat of raids and unlawful seizure of their belongings, local brothers and sisters continue to pray for those imprisoned and to provide them and their families with practical help when possible. Until the situation is resolved, our international brotherhood will supplicate Jehovah in behalf of all his faithful servants in Russia, even mentioning some by name.—Ephesians 6:18.

Darwinism's glass jaw and the Cambrian explosion's challenge.

In Cambrian Explosion Debate, ID Wins by Default
Evolution News | @DiscoveryCSC

Sometimes you win a game by default. The loser might not acknowledge losing, but fails to show up. 

Picture a world champion prize fighter who has command of the media. He hears a challenger who claims to have a knockout punch, but refuses to get into the ring with him. Instead, he runs to the media and tells them there is indeed a big challenge, and it “might” be winnable. That’s it. Reporters run with the story and report, “The Fight Might Be Winnable.” Nothing is said about the challenger or his knockout punch. Question: under these circumstances, who wins the fight?

This is the impression you get reading the mainstream media regarding the debate about the Cambrian explosion. Stephen Meyer offered a big challenge in Darwin’s Doubt, claiming that Darwinian evolution is not only incapable of explaining the Cambrian event, but that the hierarchical information required to explain almost 20 new body plans that appeared suddenly in Cambrian layers gives positive evidence of intelligent design. His challenge was not lost on Darwin proponents. The book created a strong backlash by evolutionists in blogs, but only one Darwinian got into the ring with Meyer, so to speak, but at least by taking on his challenge. That was “heavyweight” paleontologist Charles Marshall, and a gentlemanly interchange resulted. Meyer answered the response by demonstrating that it did not explain the main point: the origin of the information required to create hierarchical body plans (see Debating Darwin’s Doubt, Section III). The challenge stood.

Still Waiting Engagement

The rest of Debating Darwin’s Doubt responded to various critics who had taken potshots outside the ring. None of them defeated Meyer’s challenge. Paul Nelson wrote in Chapter 34, “Still Waiting Engagement”: 

Thus, at the end of the day, it really doesn’t matter whether the contemporary evolutionary theorists that Meyer discusses in Darwin’s Doubt are attempting to supplement neo-Darwinian theory, replace it with something fundamentally new, or replace some, but not all, parts of the theory. What matters is whether any of these theories can explain what needs to be explained: the origin of novel animal body plans and the biological information necessary to produce them. 

That was in 2015. In the four years since, evolutionists have had plenty of opportunity to “engage” and offer their explanation, yet every paper reported here at Evolution News has simply dodged the issue. They pretend the challenge doesn’t exist. Instead, they mutter among themselves that “the fight might be winnable,” and give the media the impression that Darwin remains the world champion in the heavyweight category of scientific explanation.

The latest is an essay by Michael S. Y. Lee and James B. Dorey in Current Biology, “Evolution: Dampening the Cambrian Explosion.” Lee and Dorey practice all the same old moves that failed before. They rely on two recent papers, one already addressed by Evolution News: the one by Deline et al: and another by Graham Budd, who has been cited several times in these pages, most recently here.

A List of Moves

Here’s a list of the moves in the new Current Biology paper. This is the latest response by Darwinians about the Cambrian explosion. Keep your eye on the right hook (the origin of biological information) and see if they are ready for it.

The Small Explosion move: “Cambrian diversity was not greater than living diversity — at least for arthropods, the most diverse group of animals then and now.”

The Soft Touch: Sure, arthropods and vertebrates developed hard parts that accelerated their diversification, but “most phyla have either soft bodies (e.g. annelids, nematodes) or simple and relatively inert skeletons (mollusks, brachiopods), and remain largely confined to aqueous environments.”

The Distraction: The Burgess Shale Cambrian animals failed to fit into living phyla, but “when viewed from the perspective of the Cambrian explosion, modern birds and beetles would appear even more bizarre.”

The “Got All Day” feint: “Animal disparity is still increasing, and the extent of post-Cambrian innovation rivals the Cambrian explosion, though admittedly occurring over a longer timeframe.”

The Promise-to-Fight Later tactic: “more complex phyla indeed have larger genomes” —a result from analysis that “should therefore provide fertile ground for further testing.”

The Churchill Strategy: “History is written by the victors,” Churchill said. Twisting this principle in support of Darwin, they allege that “focusing only on living taxa can give a very distorted view of the dynamics of evolutionary radiations.” What we see as an explosion might just be an artifact of having only survivors in the record. Darwin was as busy at the beginning as he is now!

Punch at random: “Budd and Mann further speculate that if speciation rates are correlated with rates of morphological and molecular change — an association which has been much debated  — then surviving clades would also exhibit elevated rates of phenotypic evolution and genetic change, again due to chance alone.”

That’s it. Did you see any response to the origin of biological information for new body plans? There’s a lot of punching at the air, and hitting at the soft gloves of the sparring partner. Basically, they reaffirm Darwin as the undisputed champion, even without a fair fight. Here’s the ending paragraph. They acknowledge a big challenge is afoot, but they tell the media not to overestimate it, promising them that “the fight might be winnable.”

While there is little doubt that the Cambrian explosion represented a massive and rapid proliferation of animal forms and lineages, the two studies caution against overestimating its magnitude [i.e., Meyer “might” be a pushover.] The empirical work of Deline and colleagues demonstrates that the Cambrian did not represent the zenith of animal diversity, and that major innovation continues to this day, while the theoretical study of Budd and Mann suggests that elevated rates in speciation at the base of such radiations might be at least partly attributable to stochastic upswings rather than unusual evolutionary mechanisms.

“Innovation” or Chance Miracles?

You can always trust Darwin to be the world champion eventually, they promise. In Darwinspeak, “innovation” refers to chance miracles, like new body plans appearing suddenly. Those miracles evidently happen more quickly in periods of “stochastic upswings” within the “usual evolutionary mechanisms” (you know: sheer dumb luck). Sometimes, by chance, sheer dumb luck runs faster!

Most amusing in this paper is a suggestion that actually handicaps Darwin more. It’s the idea that there might have been even more body plans at the Cambrian that we don’t see! This makes perfect sense — if you believe that blind chance has infinite creative power. Since Darwin is always on the move, they speculate, and since history is written by the victors, the explosive evidence in the fossil record might just be an artifact of what survived. Logical, right? Commenting on the Deline paper, they say:

In a major challenge to the view of unsurpassed Cambrian diversity, all Cambrian fossils fall near (between or within) living phyla: for instance, the famously bizarre Anomalocaris helps link modern velvet worms and arthropods. Thus, at least some gaps between the different body plans of modern phyla are artefacts of extinction of ‘intermediate’ taxa, rather than fundamental evolutionary discontinuities. 

How this will help Darwin in the “major challenge” he admittedly faces (Darwin called the Cambrian explosion “the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory”) is anyone’s guess.

Furthermore, the morphospace occupied by Cambrian forms is much smaller than the morphospace occupied by living forms, even after accounting for non-preservation of soft features in most fossils.

But again, that is not the challenge Meyer makes. It’s about disparity, not diversity. They can call it small, but the morphospace includes at least 20, and up to 30, new body plans, each distinctive, bearing complex systems like muscles, nerves, digestive systems, sensory systems, locomotion, and reproductive systems with no precursors in the Precambrian. They all appear suddenly. Where are the “intermediate taxa”? They are nowhere in the rock record, 158 years after Darwin had hoped they would be found.

So that’s the situation going on six years after Meyer’s challenge. Marshall tried a few practice punches after the book came out, but then left. Bloggers have hooted and hollered from the stands, nothing more. Meyer still stands alone in the ring. He wins by default.