From: Josh Bembenek (jbembe@hotmail.com)
Date: Sun Aug 17 2003 - 11:05:27 EDT
Sarah wrote:
"Your original claim, albeit phrased as a question, was
that it is more difficult to claim a lack of intelligent
intervention in a biological process (in this case, the
patterns of sea shells) if the resulting traits lack an identifiable
relationship to survival. Later you have
qualified the claim to relate only to "random mutation and
natural selection". (However you do not reiterate your
claim, and I can't think of any way to do that that makes
sense.) At this point it is entirely unclear to me what
you mean, although you appeared to be setting "RM &
NS" against "intelligent intervention" and to be making
the claim naturalistic mechanisms cannot explain
complexity that arises without apparent function"
-Actually David's original unproven assertion was that there was no
intelligent intervention involved ("despite being formed without intelligent
intervention ") with respect to origins of clamshells and their patterns. I
took this as meaning that one must understand that a RFEP type of
explanation is the correct one for clamshell and pattern origins. Since the
way ID people disagree with this is to postulate that IC cannot be explained
by evolutionary mechanisms, David's statement disregards the veracity of an
IC claim altogether (despite us not knowing what processes are involved in
clamshell & pattern formation or how they evolved and whether they display
apparent or actual IC). I felt his statement was irresponsible in light of
the fact that everything else he stated was a statement of scientific fact
(quotation of journals) and he offered his faith statement with no
qualification. Founder effects etc. have not been shown to derive clam
shell structures, so these are only possible mechanisms. See below for more
on RM&NS.
"ie " If we find extremely complex phenomena appearing all
over creation that has no other purpose than to produce
complex patterns and beautiful organization of shells, etc.
it is much harder to suspect that naturalistic mechanisms
continue to produce these in the absence of functional
meaning."
This is teleological thinking, and teleology has not been
incorporated into science for many years."
-The tradition of teleology in science lends no support as to whether or not
it is correct to approach science in this way.
"This is a historical development in science that is discussed in the
preface of Futuyama's Evolutionary Biology textbook (which P. Johnson quoted
grossly out of context in
_Reason in the Balance_). When teleology was involved
in science, appeals to metaphysical entities were common
(eg, _Natural Theology_). The shift from looking at
things in terms of secondary causes, or mechanisms, or
whatever you want to call it, instead of in terms of
function or purpose has simultaneously reduced the
scope of science as a discipline and increased its
productivity in terms of results (useful models that
predict how things may behave and intersubjectively
verifiable results.) You appear to be asking why science
fails to solve a problem that it doesn't work on, and are
dissatisfied that there is no answer."
-I think science is absolutely working on this, I would place a reasonable
bet that we'll see a clam species genome soon enough (if one isn't already
available) and I'm sure many talented scientists such as David are
interested in the problem. I also don't really think it has "failed" to
solve the problem, simply hasn't gotten enough information on it yet.
However, to bolster David's statement of faith, it would be more facile to
use clearer examples.
"My view is that it is more productive to raise public awareness of the
*limits* of modern science, not to go back and increase science's scope."
-Certainly an interesting approach, when you say public do you also mean
"pop scientists"? It appears the Brights need as much education as the
literal 7 day creationist.
"What these limits mean is exactly what you finally say. No, naturalistic
mechanisms and ultimate intelligent causation are not
mutually exclusive. What's the argument, then? Why
spend all this time criticizing the inadequacy of "RM &
NS" to explain a phenomenum when that has not been
offered as the explanation, and when the existence
of naturalistic explanations doesn't preclude belief in
design and a designer? David's original phrasing was
I guess provocative, but not if you take the meaning
that "intelligent intervention" means "only a miracle
would get you from here to there" or as I think Van
Till has described it, "God's hand-like action" was
required. This is not a scientific answer. The scientific
answer is "I don't know. Let's develop some tests to
try to figure it out. Failing that, we just don't have
an answer to this question right now".
-Sarah I guess we disagree as to openness for allowing the type of
intervention that ultimately cannot be described by secondary causes to be
used actively by God during the creative process. With our ignorance I
believe that "God's hand-like action" is a viable possibility, as viable as
new laws that can explain the phenomena or an unforeseen evolutionary
pathway. My focus on RM&NS is due to previous discussion about ID with
David and others on the list. CSI and irreducible complex structures are
supposedly examples of nature that cannot be explained by evolutionary
mechanisms, and members of this listserve have previously argued at length
that RM&NS is sufficient to explain their derivation. Thus, David's
statement in support of RFEP is equivalent to stating that evolutionary
mechanisms are sufficient to produce all features of clam shell origin and
patterning. I have no recollection of anyone arguing how gene frequencies
within a population explain their origin or assembly into IC structures, so
your approach is unfamiliar to me. Perhaps you can expound how founder
effect etc. can solve IC?
"You further claim that
"if RM&NS is the overall basis for understanding the
origin of biological systems, "
As regards evolutionary biology, this is so incomplete as
to be grossly inaccurate!
See, for example, http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/modern-synthesis.html
and
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/genetic-drift.html "
-Again, I cannot see how population genetics solves IC. David's statement
in support of RFEP is equivalent to denying the fact that clams or
fibonacchi series ever require IC structures and/or those structures are
easily solved by evolutionary mechanisms. Perhaps you can elaborate on how
these additional mechanisms can solve IC, thus weakening the ability of any
IDer to claim that God's Hand Like Action is necessary.
"I just plain don't understand implication of this
statement, and how it relates to whether and when
it is appropriate to posit supernatural action as
an explanation for natural processes. My "suggestions"
are areas of standard evolutionary biology! They
are well-known alternative mechanisms to NS! I have
not even mentioned more speculative areas, such as self-
organizing systems. I would not have responded at
all except I read your comments as equating evolutionary
biology with RM & NS, and that is quite simply
inaccurate."
-NS is never absent, a gene cannot be fixed or spread within a population if
it causes its owner to die or become sterile. Neither will a gene continue
to increase in a population if it causes a distinct disadvantage and no
advantage whatsoever wrt NS. Once you elaborate how population genetics
solves IC, things will be more clear.
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