Re: Behe

Either Carol or John Burgeson wrote:

>Michael J. Behe, an intelligent design proponent and fellow at the
>Discovery Institute, attempts to justify the teaching of alternatives to
>evolution in public schools.
>
>http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/07/opinion/07behe.html
>
>
The following was a letter from the NAS President in response to the
Op-Ed piece.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/12/opinion/l12science.html

To the Editor:

In “Design for Living” (Op-Ed, Feb. 7), Michael J. Behe quoted me,
recalling how I discovered that “the chemistry that makes life possible
is much more elaborate and sophisticated than anything we students had
ever considered” some 40 years ago. Dr. Behe then paraphrases my 1998
remarks that “the entire cell can be viewed as a factory with an
elaborate network of interlocking assembly lines, each of which is
composed of a set of large protein machines.”

That I was unaware of the complexity of living things as a student
should not be surprising. In fact, the majestic chemistry of life should
be astounding to everyone. But these facts should not be misrepresented
as support for the idea that life’s molecular complexity is a result of
“intelligent design.” To the contrary, modern scientific views of the
molecular organization of life are entirely consistent with spontaneous
variation and natural selection driving a powerful evolutionary process.

In evolution, as in all areas of science, our knowledge is incomplete.
But the entire success of the scientific enterprise has depended on an
insistence that these gaps be filled by natural explanations, logically
derived from confirmable evidence. Because “intelligent design” theories
are based on supernatural explanations, they can have nothing to do with
science.

BRUCE ALBERTS
President
National Academy of Sciences
Washington, Feb. 9, 2005
Received on Sat Feb 12 16:09:50 2005