Thursday, February 16, 2006
Knowing Little . . . And Proud of It
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There is a good article in the Chicago Tribune (free registration may be necessary) about how basic research into bacterial and sperm flagella and the blood clotting system is countering the claims of Intelligent Design advocates that "irreducible complexity" demonstrates design. Scientifically, there is nothing much new here but some of the statements of Michael Behe recounted in the article are most enlightening. For example, there is the following:
No one yet has a complete theory of how the cell's most complex systems evolved -- a fact seized upon by Michael Behe, a biochemistry professor at Lehigh University who first outlined intelligent design in 1996.
Behe was a central witness in last year's federal suit over whether the school board in Dover could require ID to be taught in biology classes. U.S. District Judge John Jones III ruled against the school board, concluding after a review of the testimony that "ID is not science." Behe said the ruling did not faze him.
"It probably gave a black eye to [ID] in the newspapers and so on," Behe said. "But in my mind ID is an explanation for the biology we see."
Of course, this is an admission that what he is doing is not science, which admits no personal explanations for phenomena absent evidence. And Behe’s claims are lacking evidence:
Critics of ID say its proponents have ignored the scientific method, offering no testable ideas about how the sperm flagellum or anything else came to be. Instead they simply leap to the conclusion that a designer made complex biochemistry.."They've admitted, under oath, that they have no direct evidence for design at all," [Kenneth] Miller said.
That's true, Behe said; his focus has been on arguing that some systems could not have evolved naturally. He said he has no idea how complex biochemistry actually came about, no suggestions for testing how intelligent design occurred, and he knows of no scientists who are planning such tests.."Trying to figure out how something was designed -- where or when, or by whom -- are different questions and much more difficult to address," Behe said.
Of course, difficult questions are always the most interesting ones in science and are eagerly sought out by people who are really trying to understand the universe. The utter lack of interest on the part of Behe and the rest of the "ID Movement" to try to understand biology is most telling.
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After quoting from Judge Jones’ decision in the Dover case to the effect that Behe, when faced with numerous works concerning the evolution of supposedly irreducibly complex systems, simply insisted that they weren’t ‘good enough,’ the article turns to Ken Miller to sum up:
Behe's dismissal of the immune system research "tells you right away, ain't nothing gonna convince this guy," he said.
Charles Darwin knew those kind of people too:
[I]gnorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.
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Comments:
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Chicago Tribune Reporter Puts False Words in My Mouth, Leaves Out Those That Didn't Fit His Script
by Michael Behe
...Manier appears to think that sperm flagella are the same as bacterial flagella. More, he says that the blood clotting system is not irreducibly complex because of proteins found in "the sea squirt, which cannot clot blood". But if its blood doesn't clot, then how does that show the clotting cascade is not irreducibly complex? More, he repeats the ACLU attorney's words about work on the immune system not being "good enough" which the judge in his decision put in my mouth. They make me seem petulant using the other attorney's words. I point out the misattribution of those words in
my response to the Dover decision, published by Discovery.
Manier writes, "Yet biologists have made major strides on each of those phenomena since the first ID books were published in the mid-1990s." That's ludicrous. The interesting story is that essentially no progress whatsoever has been made in a Darwinian framework on the systems I discussed in Darwin's Black Box since it was published ten years ago. The Free Press will soon release a tenth anniversary edition of DBB in which I review exactly that lack of progress in a new chapter-length Afterword.
by Michael Behe
...Manier appears to think that sperm flagella are the same as bacterial flagella. More, he says that the blood clotting system is not irreducibly complex because of proteins found in "the sea squirt, which cannot clot blood". But if its blood doesn't clot, then how does that show the clotting cascade is not irreducibly complex? More, he repeats the ACLU attorney's words about work on the immune system not being "good enough" which the judge in his decision put in my mouth. They make me seem petulant using the other attorney's words. I point out the misattribution of those words in
my response to the Dover decision, published by Discovery.
Manier writes, "Yet biologists have made major strides on each of those phenomena since the first ID books were published in the mid-1990s." That's ludicrous. The interesting story is that essentially no progress whatsoever has been made in a Darwinian framework on the systems I discussed in Darwin's Black Box since it was published ten years ago. The Free Press will soon release a tenth anniversary edition of DBB in which I review exactly that lack of progress in a new chapter-length Afterword.
Behe is a liar and a fake, and his own words in Dover prove it. More imporantly, he left science long ago, along with any professional ethics that he had. Now he's a conman that pretends he's a scientist.
Thanks for the pointer to Behe's response to the Tribune article. I'll have some comments later when I have a chance.
I linked to this: let's spread the sensible word!
http://monado2.blogspot.com/2006/02/argument-for-irreducible-complexity.html
http://monado2.blogspot.com/2006/02/argument-for-irreducible-complexity.html
Behe's testimony that there was no solid research on molecular evolution moved me to do a Web search and post some of the links I found about that research and to peer-reviewed journals that publish research on it.
http://monado2.blogspot.com/2005/11/is-there-good-research-on-molecular.html
http://monado2.blogspot.com/2005/11/is-there-good-research-on-molecular.html
Dear Lord,
Behe is so full of shite that if you slapped him, he would splatter.
And, I am not a scientist, I am a lowly underwriting analyst. In the business world (as apparently in the world of science), if you get called on it, be prepared to answer for it.
Unless of course, if your brand of shite originated from the CEO. In this case, Behe’s brand of shite that he endorses comes from the geniuses at the Discovery Institute. This is Behe’s version of a CEO, or CFO.
Give me a break, ID is the next Enron, but it has the stupidity of the American public to keep it going, until it finally meets it’s demise in the boardroom of the courts.
Public policy in many cases is supported by the stupidity of the people who vote.
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Behe is so full of shite that if you slapped him, he would splatter.
And, I am not a scientist, I am a lowly underwriting analyst. In the business world (as apparently in the world of science), if you get called on it, be prepared to answer for it.
Unless of course, if your brand of shite originated from the CEO. In this case, Behe’s brand of shite that he endorses comes from the geniuses at the Discovery Institute. This is Behe’s version of a CEO, or CFO.
Give me a break, ID is the next Enron, but it has the stupidity of the American public to keep it going, until it finally meets it’s demise in the boardroom of the courts.
Public policy in many cases is supported by the stupidity of the people who vote.
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: 11:49 PM
: 11:49 PM << Home
