Wednesday 8 March 2017
Monday 6 March 2017
The case for design remains undeniable.
The Envelope, Please? Doug Axe and Undeniable Are World Magazine 2016 Science Book of the Year! -
David Klinghoffer
Update: I see that Doug Axe’s book is in its rightful place at the top of Amazon’s bestseller list under Organic Evolution. In fact, of the top ten books on that list, four are by authors affiliated with Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture — Axe, Meyer, Behe, and Johnson. Nice
Unlike the Oscars, World Magazine and its editor Marvin Olasky don’t employ the accounting firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers to tell them who won Book of the Year. So we trust there’s been no mix-up with the envelopes. In the category of “Science, math, and worldview,” the Book of the Year for 2016 is Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. by Douglas Axe!
Congratulations to Dr. Axe of Biologic Institute — and to our biologist colleague Michael Denton too, who not only figures prominently in Axe’s book, but also tops World‘s shortlist in the same category with his book from Discovery Institute Press, Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis. Dr. Denton is followed on the Short List by Tom Wolfe’s The Kingdom of Speech, which tweaks Darwin on the mystery of human language and its evolution.
Mr. Olasky is one journalist who has carefully studied the debate about biological origins. His write-up accompanying the announcement is characteristically well informed. It all starts with Denton:
In 1985 biologist Michael Denton noted — in Evolution: A Theory in Crisis — that Darwinism was cruising for a bruising. Now he’s back with Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis, which shows — with three decades of new research — that Darwin’s theory needs hip replacements, for “there is now a growing chorus of dissent within mainstream evolutionary biology.”
He’s right. Darwin himself wrote, “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous successive slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” It has broken down, as advances in paleontology, genomics, and developmental biology show.
For example, mainstream researchers Douglas Erwin and Eric Davidson have noted that “classic evolutionary theory, based on selection of small incremental changes,” is clearly inadequate. Günter Wagner in Homology, Genes, and Evolutionary Innovation writes, “Adaptive modifications often involve only the modification of existing cis-regulatory elements,” but truly new developments “require large-scale reorganizations of the gene regulatory network.”
Moving on to Doug Axe and his achievement:
Axe’s subtitle offers a shocking suggestion: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. Axe has an elite science education and record of journal publication, but he commits treason to the scientism guild when he writes that “people who will never earn PhDs [can] become full participants in the scientific debates that matter to them.” Undeniable is our science book of the year because it’s a largely nontechnical argument showing the incredible improbability that life has evolved as Darwin theorized. Axe offers example after example to show that “functional coherence makes accidental invention fantastically improbable and therefore physically impossible. Invention can’t happen by accident.” He shows how “the claim that evolution did invent proteins, cell types, organs, and life forms is scientifically legitimate only if we know evolution can invent these things.” He then shows how we have learned that evolution can’t.
On Denton:
When Denton in 1985 wrote Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, he was a lonely PhD holder in biochemistry crying out in the wilderness. Now, just about everyone who doesn’t have a monetary or professional stake in defending Darwinism is seeing the theory’s ability to explain small changes but its incompetence in explaining macroevolution — and the adaptive transitional forms Darwin predicted we’d find are still absent without leave. Denton shows how advances in our knowledge of genetics, paleontology, and developmental biology have threatened the faith that macromutations by chance put together complex structures like a diaphragm, a bat’s wing, a branched bipinnate feather, etc.
The point about “monetary or professional stakes” is spot on. Social prestige, self-esteem, vanity — these figure into it as well, as Tom Wolfe repeatedly underlines in his excellent book.
Undeniably, Darwin’s theory is guarded at the highest level by scientists whose careers and the income and esteem that go with them are inextricably tied up with the defense of orthodox evolutionary theory. Scientists like Doug Axe and Michael Denton are a threat to all that, which is why they earn such venom from the establishment — and admiration from open-minded thinkers like Olasky and his colleagues at World.
David Klinghoffer
Update: I see that Doug Axe’s book is in its rightful place at the top of Amazon’s bestseller list under Organic Evolution. In fact, of the top ten books on that list, four are by authors affiliated with Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture — Axe, Meyer, Behe, and Johnson. Nice
Unlike the Oscars, World Magazine and its editor Marvin Olasky don’t employ the accounting firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers to tell them who won Book of the Year. So we trust there’s been no mix-up with the envelopes. In the category of “Science, math, and worldview,” the Book of the Year for 2016 is Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. by Douglas Axe!
Congratulations to Dr. Axe of Biologic Institute — and to our biologist colleague Michael Denton too, who not only figures prominently in Axe’s book, but also tops World‘s shortlist in the same category with his book from Discovery Institute Press, Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis. Dr. Denton is followed on the Short List by Tom Wolfe’s The Kingdom of Speech, which tweaks Darwin on the mystery of human language and its evolution.
Mr. Olasky is one journalist who has carefully studied the debate about biological origins. His write-up accompanying the announcement is characteristically well informed. It all starts with Denton:
In 1985 biologist Michael Denton noted — in Evolution: A Theory in Crisis — that Darwinism was cruising for a bruising. Now he’s back with Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis, which shows — with three decades of new research — that Darwin’s theory needs hip replacements, for “there is now a growing chorus of dissent within mainstream evolutionary biology.”
He’s right. Darwin himself wrote, “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous successive slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” It has broken down, as advances in paleontology, genomics, and developmental biology show.
For example, mainstream researchers Douglas Erwin and Eric Davidson have noted that “classic evolutionary theory, based on selection of small incremental changes,” is clearly inadequate. Günter Wagner in Homology, Genes, and Evolutionary Innovation writes, “Adaptive modifications often involve only the modification of existing cis-regulatory elements,” but truly new developments “require large-scale reorganizations of the gene regulatory network.”
Moving on to Doug Axe and his achievement:
Axe’s subtitle offers a shocking suggestion: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. Axe has an elite science education and record of journal publication, but he commits treason to the scientism guild when he writes that “people who will never earn PhDs [can] become full participants in the scientific debates that matter to them.” Undeniable is our science book of the year because it’s a largely nontechnical argument showing the incredible improbability that life has evolved as Darwin theorized. Axe offers example after example to show that “functional coherence makes accidental invention fantastically improbable and therefore physically impossible. Invention can’t happen by accident.” He shows how “the claim that evolution did invent proteins, cell types, organs, and life forms is scientifically legitimate only if we know evolution can invent these things.” He then shows how we have learned that evolution can’t.
On Denton:
When Denton in 1985 wrote Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, he was a lonely PhD holder in biochemistry crying out in the wilderness. Now, just about everyone who doesn’t have a monetary or professional stake in defending Darwinism is seeing the theory’s ability to explain small changes but its incompetence in explaining macroevolution — and the adaptive transitional forms Darwin predicted we’d find are still absent without leave. Denton shows how advances in our knowledge of genetics, paleontology, and developmental biology have threatened the faith that macromutations by chance put together complex structures like a diaphragm, a bat’s wing, a branched bipinnate feather, etc.
The point about “monetary or professional stakes” is spot on. Social prestige, self-esteem, vanity — these figure into it as well, as Tom Wolfe repeatedly underlines in his excellent book.
Undeniably, Darwin’s theory is guarded at the highest level by scientists whose careers and the income and esteem that go with them are inextricably tied up with the defense of orthodox evolutionary theory. Scientists like Doug Axe and Michael Denton are a threat to all that, which is why they earn such venom from the establishment — and admiration from open-minded thinkers like Olasky and his colleagues at World.
Saturday 4 March 2017
The revolution rolls on
Michael Behe's Challenge -- Past, Present, and Future
Evolution News & Views
Twenty years after Darwin's Black Box, the irreducibly complex outboard motors showcased by Michael Behe still confound Darwinism. That's one theme of our upcoming documentary Revolutionary: Revolutionary: Michael Behe & The Mystery of Molecular Machines, which heads to Texas next month for previews. Behe's challenge is the past, the present, and the future.
Look at this quote from a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences:
The bacterial flagellar system has been an object of intense study for many years. It has helped to elucidate issues of assembly, motility, and chemotaxis at a molecular level in a relatively simple system, typically containing ∼40 different proteins. It has also been the icon for creationists in the United States who deny evolution. [Emphasis added.]
Ah, the bacterial flagellar system. The paper by scientists from Germany, the Netherlands, Israel, and the U.S. (University of Virginia) purports to show how a simpler flagellum in a species of archaea provides evidence for evolution of the more complex flagellum in bacteria. It's satisfying to reflect that the authors remain irritated by the "creationist" icon. They can't let it rest.
As expected, they refuse to cite Behe directly (or any other ID source), so their only references supporting the "creationist" charge are to 6-to-12-year-old writings by Kenneth Miller, Barbara Forrest, and E.H. Egelmann. Have it your way. What matters is the substance of Behe's argument and evidence, which attracted the attention of researchers in four nations.
Meanwhile, farther east -- particularly in Japan -- scientists don't seem quite so motivated to defend Darwin. Two new papers dealing with molecular motors show their openness to design thinking.
Cilium Mimicry
The first deals with designing a mimic of cilia, another one of Behe's examples of irreducibly complex (IC) systems. Five biomedical engineers from Tokyo, writing in Science Advances, succeeded in making "Artificial cilia as autonomous nanoactuators." They call this "Design of a gradient self-oscillating polymer brush with controlled unidirectional motion."
Here, we have prepared a polymer brush surface similar to a living cilium, exhibiting self-oscillating and unidirectional wave motion of the grafted polymer at the nanometer scale.... This study provides a new concept to design autonomous polymer brush surfaces effective in the nanometer scale as bioinspired dynamic soft materials.
They pay tribute to the design in cilia and other cellular machines that inspired their own work:
Spatiotemporally well-ordered mechanical actuation of biomacromolecules in the nanometer-order scale driven by chemical reactions, such as enzymatic reactions, plays an important role in living organisms. For example, motor proteins bind to a polarized cytoskeletal filaments and use the energy derived from repeated cycles of adenosine 5′-triphosphate hydrolysis to move steadily along them. In addition, many motor proteins carry membrane-enclosed organelles to their appropriate locations in the cell. Cytoskeletal motor proteins move unidirectionally along an oriented polymer track. In this process, they use chemical energy to propel themselves along a linear path, and the direction of sliding is dependent on the structural polarity of the track. Recently, the construction and design of these biomolecular motor systems with well-controlled unidirectional motion have become an area of great focus in advanced sciences.
The word "design" appears ten times in the paper. References to evolution are completely absent.
Another team worked on imitating the cilia in hair cells of the inner ear. Publishing in Nature's journal Scientific Reports, they proudly announce, "Here we present a novel, completely biomimetic flow sensor which attempts to replicate the intricate morphological organization and function of the hair bundles of the hair cells" found in zebrafish. Neither of the cheap imitations, however, contain anything like intraflagellar transport in biological cilia (see our report). As for the origin of these intricate structures, the team treated evolution as magic: "Nature's evolutionary path led to sensors of high functionality and robustness, in terms of material properties, anatomical architecture and energy expenditure." That's all the press Darwin got. They used the word design, though, 15 times.
Flagellum Focus
Back in the 1990s, Behe relied on relatively crude electron micrographs of flagella. Imagine twenty years ago if he had been able to see in detail one protein in the stator of the flagellum. That's what Japanese scientists from Nagoya University revealed with advanced imaging techniques. So has the case for design grown stronger or weaker since Darwin's Black Box was published? A paper in Nature's open-access journal Scientific Reports reveals the answer. You can see their composite image of the stator protein MotA here:
It looks more like a well-designed outboard motor than ever!
Many bacterial species use spiral propellers (flagella) attached to motors to move through a liquid environment. An interaction between the rotor and stator components of the motor generates the rotational force required for movement. The stator converts electrochemical energy into mechanical force after undergoing a structural change caused by a movement of charged particles (ions) through an internal channel. Previous studies investigated the stator and its interaction with the rotor by constructing mutant proteins and analyzing their functions. However, little was known about stator structure.
A team of Japanese researchers led by Homma's laboratory of Nagoya University have now purified the stator protein MotA from a bacterium found in hot springs (Aquifex aeolicus) and analyzed its three-dimensional structure using electron microscopy mainly in cooperation with Namba's laboratory of Osaka University.
The stator protein MotA shows an elegantly crafted channel for ions. These are arranged in groups of four at the base of the stator on the cytoplasmic side. Two slender molecules of MotB extend into the periplasm. Identifying the structure is an important step on the way to figuring out how the flagellum works.
The stator is one of the most important parts for the proper functioning of the bacterial flagellar motor, and is believed to work as an energy-converting unit that transduces electrochemical potential gradient across the cytoplasmic membrane into mechanical force. The interaction surfaces of the stator and the rotor have been well studied by mutational analyses. However, the mechanism governing energy conversion remains unknown because of the lack of structural information on the stator.
How is chemical energy converted into rotational energy (torque)? "It is believed that the ion influx through the channel induces a conformational change in the stator, allowing its interaction with the rotor to generate torque," they say.
A little reflection suggests that the components must be well matched. Imagine for a moment a flow of ping-pong balls trying to turn a large metal turbine. It wouldn't work. Somehow, in ways still to be determined two decades after Behe's book was published, tiny hydrogen ions or sodium ions are able to make particular parts of the stator undergo conformational changes that can get the rotor to turn. How that works is bound to be interesting. We know from the discussion in Unlocking the Mystery of Life that not only must the parts be well matched, they must be assembled in the right order, in the right amounts, at the right place and time -- all directed by instructions in the genetic code.
While these Japanese researchers do not mention Behe or his conclusions, their work underscores the case for irreducible complex molecular machines as prima facie evidence for intelligent design. Nowhere do they credit evolution for the motors of the cell:
Various motor proteins are essential for different biological activities such as cell locomotion, cell morphogenesis, metabolism, and material transport. Motor proteins convert various types of energy, such as ATP hydrolysis or electrochemical potential, into mechanical force for directional motion. Motor proteins are divided into two types: linear motors, such as myosin-actin and kinesin/dynein microtubule motors; and rotary motors, such as ATP synthase and bacterial flagellar motor.
Behe's intuitive first impression of the flagellum, "That's an outboard motor!" has stood the test of time. That's what the Japanese teams still call the cilium and the flagellum in 2016.
Scratching the Itch
Now back to the PNAS paper. Did the Western nations solve Michael Behe's challenge? If so, they have a strange way of claiming success:
The proteins that form the bacterial flagellar system have no known homologs in eukaryotic cells. The eukaryotic flagellar [sic], based on a microtubule-containing axoneme, is vastly more complicated. In fact, the current estimate for the number of different proteins in the axoneme is ∼425. In contrast, the archaeal flagellar system appears simpler than the bacterial one and can contain as few as 13 different proteins. As with the eukaryotic flagellar system, the archaeal one does not have homology with the bacterial one and must have arisen by means of convergent evolution.
Ah yes, convergent evolution again. But think about what they say here. The "vastly more complicated" eukaryotic flagellum has no known commonalities with the bacterial flagellum, and the bacterial flagellum has no homolog in the archaeal flagellum: "In archaeal flagellins, however, no homology has yet been found outside of the N-terminal domain with any bacterial or eukaryotic proteins." Do they show any common ancestry between these motors? None. Are we to believe, then, that blind processes happened upon three naturalistic miracles independently?
Notice that the archaeal flagellar system that "appears simpler" contains as few as 13 different proteins. How many different parts were required for the mousetrap? Behe's pithy illustration of an IC system had only five parts. How much more is an IC system with 13 parts, or with 40 parts, each unrelated to machines with similar functions in other types of cells?
If the best that evolutionists can come up with in response to Behe is "convergent evolution," then his 1996 statement can be seen as prescient: "An irreducibly complex biological system, if there is such a thing, would be a powerful challenge to Darwinian evolution" (p. 39). Only he could reword it now with much more confidence: Irreducibly complex biological systems continue to pose a powerful challenge to Darwinian evolution and are best explained by intelligent design.
Evolution News & Views
Twenty years after Darwin's Black Box, the irreducibly complex outboard motors showcased by Michael Behe still confound Darwinism. That's one theme of our upcoming documentary Revolutionary: Revolutionary: Michael Behe & The Mystery of Molecular Machines, which heads to Texas next month for previews. Behe's challenge is the past, the present, and the future.
Look at this quote from a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences:
The bacterial flagellar system has been an object of intense study for many years. It has helped to elucidate issues of assembly, motility, and chemotaxis at a molecular level in a relatively simple system, typically containing ∼40 different proteins. It has also been the icon for creationists in the United States who deny evolution. [Emphasis added.]
Ah, the bacterial flagellar system. The paper by scientists from Germany, the Netherlands, Israel, and the U.S. (University of Virginia) purports to show how a simpler flagellum in a species of archaea provides evidence for evolution of the more complex flagellum in bacteria. It's satisfying to reflect that the authors remain irritated by the "creationist" icon. They can't let it rest.
As expected, they refuse to cite Behe directly (or any other ID source), so their only references supporting the "creationist" charge are to 6-to-12-year-old writings by Kenneth Miller, Barbara Forrest, and E.H. Egelmann. Have it your way. What matters is the substance of Behe's argument and evidence, which attracted the attention of researchers in four nations.
Meanwhile, farther east -- particularly in Japan -- scientists don't seem quite so motivated to defend Darwin. Two new papers dealing with molecular motors show their openness to design thinking.
Cilium Mimicry
The first deals with designing a mimic of cilia, another one of Behe's examples of irreducibly complex (IC) systems. Five biomedical engineers from Tokyo, writing in Science Advances, succeeded in making "Artificial cilia as autonomous nanoactuators." They call this "Design of a gradient self-oscillating polymer brush with controlled unidirectional motion."
Here, we have prepared a polymer brush surface similar to a living cilium, exhibiting self-oscillating and unidirectional wave motion of the grafted polymer at the nanometer scale.... This study provides a new concept to design autonomous polymer brush surfaces effective in the nanometer scale as bioinspired dynamic soft materials.
They pay tribute to the design in cilia and other cellular machines that inspired their own work:
Spatiotemporally well-ordered mechanical actuation of biomacromolecules in the nanometer-order scale driven by chemical reactions, such as enzymatic reactions, plays an important role in living organisms. For example, motor proteins bind to a polarized cytoskeletal filaments and use the energy derived from repeated cycles of adenosine 5′-triphosphate hydrolysis to move steadily along them. In addition, many motor proteins carry membrane-enclosed organelles to their appropriate locations in the cell. Cytoskeletal motor proteins move unidirectionally along an oriented polymer track. In this process, they use chemical energy to propel themselves along a linear path, and the direction of sliding is dependent on the structural polarity of the track. Recently, the construction and design of these biomolecular motor systems with well-controlled unidirectional motion have become an area of great focus in advanced sciences.
The word "design" appears ten times in the paper. References to evolution are completely absent.
Another team worked on imitating the cilia in hair cells of the inner ear. Publishing in Nature's journal Scientific Reports, they proudly announce, "Here we present a novel, completely biomimetic flow sensor which attempts to replicate the intricate morphological organization and function of the hair bundles of the hair cells" found in zebrafish. Neither of the cheap imitations, however, contain anything like intraflagellar transport in biological cilia (see our report). As for the origin of these intricate structures, the team treated evolution as magic: "Nature's evolutionary path led to sensors of high functionality and robustness, in terms of material properties, anatomical architecture and energy expenditure." That's all the press Darwin got. They used the word design, though, 15 times.
Flagellum Focus
Back in the 1990s, Behe relied on relatively crude electron micrographs of flagella. Imagine twenty years ago if he had been able to see in detail one protein in the stator of the flagellum. That's what Japanese scientists from Nagoya University revealed with advanced imaging techniques. So has the case for design grown stronger or weaker since Darwin's Black Box was published? A paper in Nature's open-access journal Scientific Reports reveals the answer. You can see their composite image of the stator protein MotA here:
It looks more like a well-designed outboard motor than ever!
Many bacterial species use spiral propellers (flagella) attached to motors to move through a liquid environment. An interaction between the rotor and stator components of the motor generates the rotational force required for movement. The stator converts electrochemical energy into mechanical force after undergoing a structural change caused by a movement of charged particles (ions) through an internal channel. Previous studies investigated the stator and its interaction with the rotor by constructing mutant proteins and analyzing their functions. However, little was known about stator structure.
A team of Japanese researchers led by Homma's laboratory of Nagoya University have now purified the stator protein MotA from a bacterium found in hot springs (Aquifex aeolicus) and analyzed its three-dimensional structure using electron microscopy mainly in cooperation with Namba's laboratory of Osaka University.
The stator protein MotA shows an elegantly crafted channel for ions. These are arranged in groups of four at the base of the stator on the cytoplasmic side. Two slender molecules of MotB extend into the periplasm. Identifying the structure is an important step on the way to figuring out how the flagellum works.
The stator is one of the most important parts for the proper functioning of the bacterial flagellar motor, and is believed to work as an energy-converting unit that transduces electrochemical potential gradient across the cytoplasmic membrane into mechanical force. The interaction surfaces of the stator and the rotor have been well studied by mutational analyses. However, the mechanism governing energy conversion remains unknown because of the lack of structural information on the stator.
How is chemical energy converted into rotational energy (torque)? "It is believed that the ion influx through the channel induces a conformational change in the stator, allowing its interaction with the rotor to generate torque," they say.
A little reflection suggests that the components must be well matched. Imagine for a moment a flow of ping-pong balls trying to turn a large metal turbine. It wouldn't work. Somehow, in ways still to be determined two decades after Behe's book was published, tiny hydrogen ions or sodium ions are able to make particular parts of the stator undergo conformational changes that can get the rotor to turn. How that works is bound to be interesting. We know from the discussion in Unlocking the Mystery of Life that not only must the parts be well matched, they must be assembled in the right order, in the right amounts, at the right place and time -- all directed by instructions in the genetic code.
While these Japanese researchers do not mention Behe or his conclusions, their work underscores the case for irreducible complex molecular machines as prima facie evidence for intelligent design. Nowhere do they credit evolution for the motors of the cell:
Various motor proteins are essential for different biological activities such as cell locomotion, cell morphogenesis, metabolism, and material transport. Motor proteins convert various types of energy, such as ATP hydrolysis or electrochemical potential, into mechanical force for directional motion. Motor proteins are divided into two types: linear motors, such as myosin-actin and kinesin/dynein microtubule motors; and rotary motors, such as ATP synthase and bacterial flagellar motor.
Behe's intuitive first impression of the flagellum, "That's an outboard motor!" has stood the test of time. That's what the Japanese teams still call the cilium and the flagellum in 2016.
Scratching the Itch
Now back to the PNAS paper. Did the Western nations solve Michael Behe's challenge? If so, they have a strange way of claiming success:
The proteins that form the bacterial flagellar system have no known homologs in eukaryotic cells. The eukaryotic flagellar [sic], based on a microtubule-containing axoneme, is vastly more complicated. In fact, the current estimate for the number of different proteins in the axoneme is ∼425. In contrast, the archaeal flagellar system appears simpler than the bacterial one and can contain as few as 13 different proteins. As with the eukaryotic flagellar system, the archaeal one does not have homology with the bacterial one and must have arisen by means of convergent evolution.
Ah yes, convergent evolution again. But think about what they say here. The "vastly more complicated" eukaryotic flagellum has no known commonalities with the bacterial flagellum, and the bacterial flagellum has no homolog in the archaeal flagellum: "In archaeal flagellins, however, no homology has yet been found outside of the N-terminal domain with any bacterial or eukaryotic proteins." Do they show any common ancestry between these motors? None. Are we to believe, then, that blind processes happened upon three naturalistic miracles independently?
Notice that the archaeal flagellar system that "appears simpler" contains as few as 13 different proteins. How many different parts were required for the mousetrap? Behe's pithy illustration of an IC system had only five parts. How much more is an IC system with 13 parts, or with 40 parts, each unrelated to machines with similar functions in other types of cells?
If the best that evolutionists can come up with in response to Behe is "convergent evolution," then his 1996 statement can be seen as prescient: "An irreducibly complex biological system, if there is such a thing, would be a powerful challenge to Darwinian evolution" (p. 39). Only he could reword it now with much more confidence: Irreducibly complex biological systems continue to pose a powerful challenge to Darwinian evolution and are best explained by intelligent design.
Friday 3 March 2017
Will the real macroevolution please stand up
“Macroevolution” and Its Discontents
Evolution News
The term “macroevolution” has problems. Why? Among other things, because it’s a term that means different things to different people. Case in point: an email correspondent points out a random usage on a BioLogos Forum thread, “Is evolution continuing? Is God still creating?” It’s a comment from a Forum participant, Socratic.Fanatic, about rabbits:
Northern and southern populations of a common species of North American rabbit is quickly becoming TWO distinct species and populations which can no longer cross-reproduce. It is a great example of macroevolution directly observable right in front of our eyes.
Without wishing to jump down Fanatic’s throat, we took a moment to Google that one and could not find anything that resembles it — nothing about speciation in a North American rabbits. It’s possible we didn’t look hard enough. In any case, the phrase “quickly becoming” suggests the populations have achieved reproductive isolation, which implies they aren’t truly distinct species.
We asked for a reference, and no doubt Fanatic will supply one in good time. It’s possible that he’s thinking of two squirrel populations on opposite sides of the Grand Canyon, which are almost identical.
In any event, let’s review two different classes of definitions of “macroevolution” found in a couple of college biology textbooks that we just grabbed off the shelf. They give two different definitions of the word.
(1) One, represented by Douglas Futuyma textbook Evolutionary Biology (1998),defines “macroevolution” in terms of the taxonomic hierarchy: “the origin and diversification of higher taxa.”
And what are “higher taxa”? Higher taxa are generally considered any taxa above “species.” That would include genera and above. That point will become important in just a moment.
(2) Others, represented by Campbell’s Biology (1999), define “macroevolution” in terms of the origin of biological novelty: “Evolutionary change on a grand scale, encompassing the origin of novel designs, evolutionary trends, adaptive radiation, and mass extinction.”
Regarding Definition (1), Michael Behe takes a similar approach in The Edge of Evolution where he says evolution at the species level is feasible.
He allows that evolution at the genera, family, or order level could be possible. But as he argues in the book, evolution at the class level or above is “beyond the edge of evolution.” So if macroevolution includes evolution at the genera, family, or order level, Behe concludes that what some consider “macroevolution” might be possible.
As for Definition (2), the theory of intelligent design has no problems with macroevolution when defined as “mass extinction.” However, many ID proponents are skeptical that material mechanisms can produce novel traits. So here it might be fair to say ID poses its biggest challenge to “macroevolution.”
But the formation of a new species isn’t necessarily a big deal for ID. In fact, pending clarification on the rabbit issue, we’re skeptical that this rabbit example entails the evolution of any kind of biological novelty. At best it’s probably just two species that are partially reproductively separated.
In short, what’s at stake are somewhat semantic questions about how we define “macroevolution.” The key point is that we know there are limits to what Darwinian evolution can accomplish. We see these limits in experiments on features that require multiple mutations before giving any advantage. Darwinian evolution gets stuck.
For example, Douglas Axe has found that in prokaryotes the limit is more than six mutations to get an advantage. Behe suggests that in multicellular organisms, any feature that requires more than two mutations to give an advantage is beyond the limit of what unguided evolution can do.
Anything below these limits is microevolution. Anything above it cannot happen by Darwinian mechanisms, mathematically speaking. Perhaps one could say that is “macroevolution.”
- See more at: http://evolutionnews.org/2017/03/macroevolution-and-its-complaints/#sthash.tofHv6XE.dpuf
Evolution News
The term “macroevolution” has problems. Why? Among other things, because it’s a term that means different things to different people. Case in point: an email correspondent points out a random usage on a BioLogos Forum thread, “Is evolution continuing? Is God still creating?” It’s a comment from a Forum participant, Socratic.Fanatic, about rabbits:
Northern and southern populations of a common species of North American rabbit is quickly becoming TWO distinct species and populations which can no longer cross-reproduce. It is a great example of macroevolution directly observable right in front of our eyes.
Without wishing to jump down Fanatic’s throat, we took a moment to Google that one and could not find anything that resembles it — nothing about speciation in a North American rabbits. It’s possible we didn’t look hard enough. In any case, the phrase “quickly becoming” suggests the populations have achieved reproductive isolation, which implies they aren’t truly distinct species.
We asked for a reference, and no doubt Fanatic will supply one in good time. It’s possible that he’s thinking of two squirrel populations on opposite sides of the Grand Canyon, which are almost identical.
In any event, let’s review two different classes of definitions of “macroevolution” found in a couple of college biology textbooks that we just grabbed off the shelf. They give two different definitions of the word.
(1) One, represented by Douglas Futuyma textbook Evolutionary Biology (1998),defines “macroevolution” in terms of the taxonomic hierarchy: “the origin and diversification of higher taxa.”
And what are “higher taxa”? Higher taxa are generally considered any taxa above “species.” That would include genera and above. That point will become important in just a moment.
(2) Others, represented by Campbell’s Biology (1999), define “macroevolution” in terms of the origin of biological novelty: “Evolutionary change on a grand scale, encompassing the origin of novel designs, evolutionary trends, adaptive radiation, and mass extinction.”
Regarding Definition (1), Michael Behe takes a similar approach in The Edge of Evolution where he says evolution at the species level is feasible.
He allows that evolution at the genera, family, or order level could be possible. But as he argues in the book, evolution at the class level or above is “beyond the edge of evolution.” So if macroevolution includes evolution at the genera, family, or order level, Behe concludes that what some consider “macroevolution” might be possible.
As for Definition (2), the theory of intelligent design has no problems with macroevolution when defined as “mass extinction.” However, many ID proponents are skeptical that material mechanisms can produce novel traits. So here it might be fair to say ID poses its biggest challenge to “macroevolution.”
But the formation of a new species isn’t necessarily a big deal for ID. In fact, pending clarification on the rabbit issue, we’re skeptical that this rabbit example entails the evolution of any kind of biological novelty. At best it’s probably just two species that are partially reproductively separated.
In short, what’s at stake are somewhat semantic questions about how we define “macroevolution.” The key point is that we know there are limits to what Darwinian evolution can accomplish. We see these limits in experiments on features that require multiple mutations before giving any advantage. Darwinian evolution gets stuck.
For example, Douglas Axe has found that in prokaryotes the limit is more than six mutations to get an advantage. Behe suggests that in multicellular organisms, any feature that requires more than two mutations to give an advantage is beyond the limit of what unguided evolution can do.
Anything below these limits is microevolution. Anything above it cannot happen by Darwinian mechanisms, mathematically speaking. Perhaps one could say that is “macroevolution.”
- See more at: http://evolutionnews.org/2017/03/macroevolution-and-its-complaints/#sthash.tofHv6XE.dpuf
For a change,something we can all agree on.
The science of intelligent design typically focuses on details, “steel-hard facts,” as as Douglas Axe puts it.Sometimes, if carried to an extreme, that can be a fault. Now and again, therefore, it’s good to take a step back and ponder the biggest picture of life and its wonder, beauty, and charm.
In this from BBC One, David Attenborough offers the voiceover — a reading of the lyrics of Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World.” Perfect. All this from dumb natural forces and blind shuffling? Also nice to report that we came across on this over at Why Evolution Is True,where there would more typically be cause for clash than concord. Cheers, Dr. Coyne!
Thursday 2 March 2017
A discovery is turning OOL Science's circus into a full fledged carnival
Life in the Fast Lane — Microfossils, 3.77 Billion Years Old, Pose Challenge to Materialist Presuppositions -
Evolution News
A paper in Nature reports the discovery of fossil microbes possibly older, even much older, than any found previously. The lead author is biogeochemist Matthew Dodd, a PhD student at University College London. If the paper is right, these Canadian fossils could be 3.77 billion years old, or even as old as — hold onto your hat, in case you’re wearing one — 4.28 billion years.
From the Abstract:
Although it is not known when or where life on Earth began, some of the earliest habitable environments may have been submarine-hydrothermal vents. Here we describe putative fossilized microorganisms that are at least 3,770 million and possibly 4,280 million years old in ferruginous sedimentary rocks, interpreted as seafloor-hydrothermal vent-related precipitates, from the Nuvvuagittuq belt in Quebec, Canada. These structures occur as micrometre-scale haematite tubes and filaments with morphologies and mineral assemblages similar to those of filamentous microorganisms from modern hydrothermal vent precipitates and analogous microfossils in younger rocks. The Nuvvuagittuq rocks contain isotopically light carbon in carbonate and carbonaceous material, which occurs as graphitic inclusions in diagenetic carbonate rosettes, apatite blades intergrown among carbonate rosettes and magnetite–haematite granules, and is associated with carbonate in direct contact with the putative microfossils.
This new paper is interesting to compare with a paper from last year, Nutman et al.,“Rapid emergence of life shown by discovery of 3,700-million-year-old microbial structures,” - also in Nature, which found microbial structures that are a bit younger.
But the “microbial structures” from Nutman et al. 2016 are different from these new “microfossils” presented by Dodd et al. 2017. In Nutman et al., they only found stromatolite-type structures rather than actual microfossils. Some stromatolite experts were a bit skeptical that what they found were really stromatolites.
But the new paper by Dodd and his colleagues, “Evidence for early life in Earth’s oldest hydrothermal vent precipitates,” seems to offer potential bacteria-like microfossils. They are tiny black carbonaceous spheres and “hematite tubes” which the authors think are biogenically created. We’ve seen more convincing ancient microfossils, but these aren’t bad.
According to Dodd et al., these new finds would be the oldest known microfossils, if that is in fact what they are. Very interesting. If so, that just keeps pushing unquestionable evidence of life’s existence on Earth further and further back, which leaves less and less time for the origin of life to have occurred by unguided chemical evolution after Earth became habitable.
If they are in fact 4.28 billion years old, then that would mean there was life very, very early in Earth’s history — as Cyril Ponnamperuma said, it’s like “instant life.”
In zeroing in on this point, theWashington Post quotes Dodd:
If their results are confirmed, they will boost a belief that organisms arose very early in the history of Earth — and may find it just as easy to evolve on worlds beyond our own.
“The process to kick-start life may not need a significant length of time or special chemistry, but could actually be a relatively simple process to get started,” said Matthew Dodd, , a biogeochemist at University College London and the lead author of the paper. “It has big implications for whether life is abundant or not in the universe.”
A “relatively simple process”? He’s right about the discovery having “big implications,” but maybe not in the way he intends.
It seems there are three observations to make: 1) The more we know, the more it seems that life arose rapidly on the early Earth, even more quickly that we previously realized. 2) How even the simplest life could arise, given materialist presuppositions, remains a profound mystery. This is the subject of Stephen Meyer’s book Signature in the Cell. 3) If life arises so easily, as Coyne’s friend Dr. Dodd suggests, then it’s strange we’ve seen no signs of it, at least not in an intelligent form, across the cosmos.
Taken together, these call into question materialist presuppositions, in the light of which 1, 2, and 3 present a tangle of contradictions. On the other hand, as a source of purposeful agency able to bring life into existence 1) quickly, 2) despite obstacles in the path of purely material processes, 3) uniquely, as it appears for now, on one planet, intelligent design fits the bill.
-
Evolution News
A paper in Nature reports the discovery of fossil microbes possibly older, even much older, than any found previously. The lead author is biogeochemist Matthew Dodd, a PhD student at University College London. If the paper is right, these Canadian fossils could be 3.77 billion years old, or even as old as — hold onto your hat, in case you’re wearing one — 4.28 billion years.
From the Abstract:
Although it is not known when or where life on Earth began, some of the earliest habitable environments may have been submarine-hydrothermal vents. Here we describe putative fossilized microorganisms that are at least 3,770 million and possibly 4,280 million years old in ferruginous sedimentary rocks, interpreted as seafloor-hydrothermal vent-related precipitates, from the Nuvvuagittuq belt in Quebec, Canada. These structures occur as micrometre-scale haematite tubes and filaments with morphologies and mineral assemblages similar to those of filamentous microorganisms from modern hydrothermal vent precipitates and analogous microfossils in younger rocks. The Nuvvuagittuq rocks contain isotopically light carbon in carbonate and carbonaceous material, which occurs as graphitic inclusions in diagenetic carbonate rosettes, apatite blades intergrown among carbonate rosettes and magnetite–haematite granules, and is associated with carbonate in direct contact with the putative microfossils.
This new paper is interesting to compare with a paper from last year, Nutman et al.,“Rapid emergence of life shown by discovery of 3,700-million-year-old microbial structures,” - also in Nature, which found microbial structures that are a bit younger.
But the “microbial structures” from Nutman et al. 2016 are different from these new “microfossils” presented by Dodd et al. 2017. In Nutman et al., they only found stromatolite-type structures rather than actual microfossils. Some stromatolite experts were a bit skeptical that what they found were really stromatolites.
But the new paper by Dodd and his colleagues, “Evidence for early life in Earth’s oldest hydrothermal vent precipitates,” seems to offer potential bacteria-like microfossils. They are tiny black carbonaceous spheres and “hematite tubes” which the authors think are biogenically created. We’ve seen more convincing ancient microfossils, but these aren’t bad.
According to Dodd et al., these new finds would be the oldest known microfossils, if that is in fact what they are. Very interesting. If so, that just keeps pushing unquestionable evidence of life’s existence on Earth further and further back, which leaves less and less time for the origin of life to have occurred by unguided chemical evolution after Earth became habitable.
If they are in fact 4.28 billion years old, then that would mean there was life very, very early in Earth’s history — as Cyril Ponnamperuma said, it’s like “instant life.”
In zeroing in on this point, theWashington Post quotes Dodd:
If their results are confirmed, they will boost a belief that organisms arose very early in the history of Earth — and may find it just as easy to evolve on worlds beyond our own.
“The process to kick-start life may not need a significant length of time or special chemistry, but could actually be a relatively simple process to get started,” said Matthew Dodd, , a biogeochemist at University College London and the lead author of the paper. “It has big implications for whether life is abundant or not in the universe.”
A “relatively simple process”? He’s right about the discovery having “big implications,” but maybe not in the way he intends.
It seems there are three observations to make: 1) The more we know, the more it seems that life arose rapidly on the early Earth, even more quickly that we previously realized. 2) How even the simplest life could arise, given materialist presuppositions, remains a profound mystery. This is the subject of Stephen Meyer’s book Signature in the Cell. 3) If life arises so easily, as Coyne’s friend Dr. Dodd suggests, then it’s strange we’ve seen no signs of it, at least not in an intelligent form, across the cosmos.
Taken together, these call into question materialist presuppositions, in the light of which 1, 2, and 3 present a tangle of contradictions. On the other hand, as a source of purposeful agency able to bring life into existence 1) quickly, 2) despite obstacles in the path of purely material processes, 3) uniquely, as it appears for now, on one planet, intelligent design fits the bill.
-
Wednesday 1 March 2017
A victory for academic freedom?
In Indiana, State Senate Affirms Teaching Evidence For and Against Evolution
Sarah Chaffee
This week, the Indiana State Senate passed, by a 40-9 vote, a resolution recognizing the need for academic freedom for teachers when approaching controversial scientific issues.
The resolution, SR 17, notes in part:
Whereas, The Indiana General Assembly understands that an important purpose of science education is to inform students about scientific evidence and to help students develop the critical thinking skills they need in order to become intelligent, productive, and scientifically informed citizens;
Whereas, The Indiana General Assembly further understands the recommendation by the U.S. Congress, as stated in the report language of the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act, namely, "Where topics are taught that may generate controversy (such as biological evolution), that the curriculum should help students to understand the full range of scientific views that exist, why such topics can generate controversy, and how scientific discoveries can profoundly affect society";
...
Whereas, The Indiana General Assembly understands that neither recommendations, nor endorsements, nor implications by the courts have the force of law, but to avoid legal or other conflicts, teachers should not be intimidated, fired, or restricted from following the recommendation named herein or students penalized for holding differing positions based on the evidence objectively presented, as long as they meet specified curriculum requirements otherwise;
...
Be it resolved by the Senate of the General Assembly of the State of Indiana:
SECTION 1. That the Indiana Senate urges the Department of Education to reinforce support of teachers who choose to teach a diverse curriculum.
"I am encouraged by the strong stand the Senate has taken in favor of open discussion and examination of evidence in science education," said Senator Jeff Raatz, a sponsor of the resolution. He continued:
To be clear, this resolution only concerns subjects already allowed in the curriculum. It does not introduce new or additional topics. Indiana students benefit from practicing scientific inquiry skills in the classroom; SR 17 sends a signal to teachers that the Senate supports them in fostering an environment of critical thinking on scientific issues.
Indeed, so that there is no misunderstanding, let's remind ourselves of what kind of teaching this legislation encourages . On evolution, that could include discussing, for example, whether the Galápagos finches provide evidence of macroevolution, or just microevolution. It could mean understanding the strengths and weaknesses of theories of universal common ancestry, by considering the fossil record and studying the Cambrian explosion.
Acknowledging the importance of examining the evidence for and against scientific ideas such as evolution is a step forward. Teachers face pressure to teach evolution and other subjects dogmatically. In this resolution, the Indiana Senate calls for freedom for teachers to present evidence objectively. Students will benefit from learning more about evolution and similar subjects, from practicing critical thinking, and engaging in scientific inquiry.
The alternative would be to insist that teachers be vulnerable to retribution for sharing this evidence with students. SR 17 is thus not "antiscience" nor does it "target evolution," as the National Center for Science Education claims. Treating a theory as worthy of fair questioning based on mainstream scientific sources, just like any other scientific theory, is pro-science and demonstrates concern for scientific objectivity and academic freedom.
We commend the Indiana Senate for this action.
Sarah Chaffee
This week, the Indiana State Senate passed, by a 40-9 vote, a resolution recognizing the need for academic freedom for teachers when approaching controversial scientific issues.
The resolution, SR 17, notes in part:
Whereas, The Indiana General Assembly understands that an important purpose of science education is to inform students about scientific evidence and to help students develop the critical thinking skills they need in order to become intelligent, productive, and scientifically informed citizens;
Whereas, The Indiana General Assembly further understands the recommendation by the U.S. Congress, as stated in the report language of the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act, namely, "Where topics are taught that may generate controversy (such as biological evolution), that the curriculum should help students to understand the full range of scientific views that exist, why such topics can generate controversy, and how scientific discoveries can profoundly affect society";
...
Whereas, The Indiana General Assembly understands that neither recommendations, nor endorsements, nor implications by the courts have the force of law, but to avoid legal or other conflicts, teachers should not be intimidated, fired, or restricted from following the recommendation named herein or students penalized for holding differing positions based on the evidence objectively presented, as long as they meet specified curriculum requirements otherwise;
...
Be it resolved by the Senate of the General Assembly of the State of Indiana:
SECTION 1. That the Indiana Senate urges the Department of Education to reinforce support of teachers who choose to teach a diverse curriculum.
"I am encouraged by the strong stand the Senate has taken in favor of open discussion and examination of evidence in science education," said Senator Jeff Raatz, a sponsor of the resolution. He continued:
To be clear, this resolution only concerns subjects already allowed in the curriculum. It does not introduce new or additional topics. Indiana students benefit from practicing scientific inquiry skills in the classroom; SR 17 sends a signal to teachers that the Senate supports them in fostering an environment of critical thinking on scientific issues.
Indeed, so that there is no misunderstanding, let's remind ourselves of what kind of teaching this legislation encourages . On evolution, that could include discussing, for example, whether the Galápagos finches provide evidence of macroevolution, or just microevolution. It could mean understanding the strengths and weaknesses of theories of universal common ancestry, by considering the fossil record and studying the Cambrian explosion.
Acknowledging the importance of examining the evidence for and against scientific ideas such as evolution is a step forward. Teachers face pressure to teach evolution and other subjects dogmatically. In this resolution, the Indiana Senate calls for freedom for teachers to present evidence objectively. Students will benefit from learning more about evolution and similar subjects, from practicing critical thinking, and engaging in scientific inquiry.
The alternative would be to insist that teachers be vulnerable to retribution for sharing this evidence with students. SR 17 is thus not "antiscience" nor does it "target evolution," as the National Center for Science Education claims. Treating a theory as worthy of fair questioning based on mainstream scientific sources, just like any other scientific theory, is pro-science and demonstrates concern for scientific objectivity and academic freedom.
We commend the Indiana Senate for this action.
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