On Wed, 09 Sep 1998 21:00:23 -0400, Tim Ikeda wrote:
[...]
TI>Speaking of finding things in Behe's book, did anyone happen to see
>mentioned how some of the flagellar components bear similarities to some
>membrane pores and protein transport components? Did anyone read how
>the blood clotting cascade is configured in anything but mammals? Or what
>components of the human immune system is found in reptiles, amphibians
>and sharks? No? Hmmm..
Behe does not AFAIK dispute that there are similar components in other
systems. He disputes that these components got put together stepwise by
fully natural processes.
[...]
TI>The track record is not promising. Not too long ago Mike and Phil J.
>wondered where the fossil intermediate forms for the whales were
>to be found. As it turned out, they had been buried but now some
>have been unearthed. Haven't heard much about this from either of
>them since then
Johnson's argument is not that the whale did came from a land mammal but
that Darwinian `blind watchmaker' natural processes are inadequate to do
it.
Mike Behe (who accepts common ancestry) doubted that the Mesonychid
was the ancestor of the whale. He was right! I posted recently an article
from SCIENCE (Dennis Normile, "New Views of the Origins of
Mammals," Science, August 7, 1998, p775).which reported that
Thewissen, the discoverer of "the fossil intermediate forms for the whales"
you refer to, has now ruled out Mesonychids as whale ancestors
TI>Well, Michael at least seems to have finally
>accepted the more rational position of common descent.
Behe has AFAIK *always* accepted common descent. He says so in
Darwin's Black Box:
"For the record, I have no reason to doubt that the universe is the billions
of years old that physicists say it is. Further, I find the idea of common
descent (that all organisms share a common ancestor) fairly convincing,
and have no particular reason to doubt it." (Behe M.J., "Darwin's Black
Box," 1996, pp5-6)
TI>It's still progressive creationism but at least that's a step in the right
>direction for establishing any sort of reasonable dialog on the subject.
Not really. Darwinists rule out "progressive creationism" (and even theistic
evolution for that matter). Julian Huxley, a co-founder of Neo-Darwinism,
said that any "idea of God as the creator of organisms" was not even in
"the sphere of rational discussion":
"Darwinism removed the whole idea of God as the creator of organisms
from the sphere of rational discussion." (Tax S. & Callender C., eds,
"Evolution After Darwin," 1960, Vol. III, p45, in Hitching F., "The Neck
of the Giraffe," 1982, p254)
Dawkins regards progressive creation as "just a watered-down form of
[special] creationism" and as defeating "the whole point of the theory of
evolution by natural selection" which was to provide "a non-miraculous
account of the existence of complex adaptations":
"The Duke of Argyll, for instance, accepted the evidence that evolution had
happened, but he wanted to smuggle divine creation in by the back door.
He wasn't alone. Instead of a single, once and for all creation in the Garden
of Eden, many Victorians thought that the deity had intervened repeatedly,
at crucial points in evolution....[this was] just a watered-down form of
creationism....Darwin perceived this too. He wrote...: `If I were convinced
that I required such additions to the theory of natural selection, I would
reject it as rubbish...I would give nothing for the theory of Natural
selection, if it requires miraculous additions at any one stage of descent.'
This is no petty matter. In Darwin's view, the whole point of the theory of
evolution by natural selection was that it provided a non-miraculous
account of the existence of complex adaptations. For what it is worth, it is
also the whole point of this book. For Darwin, any evolution that had to be
helped over the jumps by God was not evolution at all." (Dawkins R., "The
Blind Watchmaker", 1991, pp248-249)
Steve
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Stephen E (Steve) Jones ,--_|\ sejones@ibm.net
3 Hawker Avenue / Oz \ senojes@hotmail.com
Warwick 6024 ->*_,--\_/ Phone +61 8 9448 7439
Perth, West Australia v "Test everything." (1Thess 5:21)
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