Stephen E. Jones wrote:
>It is interesting how Cliff slides away from answering the question:
>"if design was real, how would Cliff ever know it?"
The designer would have to reveal herself and explain her nature,
her methods, and her objectives.
>The fact is that I, and some other IDers (like Mike B. Gene), are as
>much interested in working out the "puzzle" as Cliff is. In fact,
>Cliff is a rarity among evolutionists on this List. Most of them
>are not interested in puzzling out the details, because they have
>"one big all-inclusive answer", namely "evolution"!
How about puzzling out the design process? How would that differ
from evolutionary biology? Would anything that was difficult for
evolutionary biology be declared an intervention?
>No. "symbiosis theory" also needs "the `blind watchmaker' to build complex
>designs". All that "symbiosis theory" does is merge already produced
>designs together.
That is doing a lot; that is an evolutionary mechanism that can generate
new morphological complexity instantly, a mechanisms not envisioned by
Darwin.
>Cliff can verbally espouse a `symbiosis all the way
>down' but it is just `hand-waving' unless Cliff explains *in detail* how
>symbiosis could build complex designs in the first place.
There's no observing these processes; they don't seem to be operative
now among the present highly evolved fauna. So we have to theorize,
based upon some general notions. The possibility of organisms joining
is such a general idea. The origin of the primitive fauna that began the
process is pretty obscure, but the general idea is that complexity was
built up through cells mutating to form aggregations and specializations.
>CL>As I suggested recently, symbiosis could work at every level.
>
>So "could" the `blind watchmaker' "work at every level". So could ID or
>creation for that matter. If Cliff is espousing a fully naturalistic theory
>which is superior to the fully naturalistic theory (i.e. Neo-Darwinism)
>taught in all the textbooks, then he needs to show it is better than it.
I don't see how you can subscribe to irreducible-complexity arguments
against gradualism while maintaining that a theory that goes beyond
gradualism with new explanations for the evolution of complexity is inferior
to existing theory.
>>SJ>Besides, no SET advocate AFAIK claims it happened in "a leap".
>
>CL>I don't see how genomic integration could be gradual. It wouldn't
>>work if the genetic material were divided.
>
>Well, the fact is that even now in eukaryotes, "the genetic material" *is*
>"divided". Mitochondria have their own DNA (i.e. mtDNA) and as well
>the cells nuclear DNA controls the mitochondria.
It doesn't matter where the DNA is kept, it's all part of the genome of
the organism. The point is that the DNA of a symbiont joins the genome
suddenly, not gradually.
>And, apart from making Darwinism a mere bystander to this, arguably the
>greatest `evolutionary' change in the history of life, SET does not explain
>other major structures of the cell, such as the "nucleolus, the Golgi
>apparatus, or the microtubules":
Why should all these things have to be explained at once?
>If the former, why does Cliff need his pan-symbiosis theory?
>Macromutations (especially an "astronomical number" of them) could do it
>all. If the latter, why does Cliff need his pan-symbiosis theory? An
>"astronomical number of' *micro*-"mutations" coupled with Margulis'
>SET theory, is what even Dawkins believes:
The joining of symbionts *is* a macromutation.
>CL>Again, the point is that here is a mechanism, a wrinkle not envisioned
>>by Darwin, one which could function at various levels.
>
>Cliff hasn't shown that it *is* "a mechanism". To everyone else
>on this List except Cliff, it looks just like `hand-waving'.
You accept the mechanism in Margulis's model, what's so bad about
stretching the concept's application a bit?
>CL>Right, how can you envision this complex arising step-by-step?
>
>I don't have to "envision this complex arising step-by-step". Under
>my progressive creationist paradigm I could quite consistently
>postulate the entire cell arose de novo in one fell swoop!
What *can't* you consistently postulate under ID?
>Now maybe Cliff can explain how he, under his *fully naturalistic*
>paradigm, envisions "this complex arising" either "step-by-step" or
>otherwise?
>
>>SJ>Big symbionts invited little symbionts
>>> into their cytoplasm to bite 'em,
>>>and little symbionts invited littler symbionts,
>>> and so ad infinitum! :-)
>
>CL>Big symbionts would be complexes built up from smaller ones.
>
>It is easy to *say* this, but Cliff needs to show how
Why? It's a general concept. People have believed in Darwinian evolution
for a long time without showing how.
>But before Cliff starts throwing the "personal incredulity" stone, let him
>consider his own glass house. Cliff's whole symbiosis alternative theory is
>based on the fact that Cliff personally cannot see how Darwinist
>gradualism could work, e.g.:
Bringing in additional mechanisms is not the same thing as invoking
the supernatural.
>Indeed, the major difference between Cliff (and all other
>atheists/agnostics) and theists like me is in fact a *giant* "personal
>incredulity" issue.
I don't call myself any of those things, but it's inevitable that you
would lump me in there. Anyway, it seems that ID is a rival to
macroevolutionary theory. They are competing explanations for
the same thing, organic complexity that can't be explained through
gradualism.
--Cliff Lundberg ~ San Francisco ~ 415-648-0208 ~ cliff@cab.com
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