Does Michael Denton understand current evolutionary theory?

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You asked for my definition of “creationist”. Here, read your own words:

But since you insist: I define evolution as the scientific theory that explains how the diversity of life on earth has arisen from common ancestry. “Intelligent design” is not part of that theory, so ID is not evoution, but creationism. Just as a “theory” that says invisible fairies pull objects towards each other is not the theory of gravity.

To address the more general point: I reject your use of a dictionary approach to defining a scientific theory. The elements of a theory are determined by the empirical evidence that support them, not by some arbitrary criteria created by people typing on their computer keyboards. ID is creationism, IMHO, because evolution is a sound scientific theory, and creationism is pseudoscience concocted by religious zealots. ID falls squarely and unambiguously into the latter camp.

So your attempts at derailment having been dealt with, it’s now up to you to deal with the fact that your beloved creationist hero, Michael Denton, has been exposed as having feet of clay.

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Well, that’s a start. Let’s analyze it.

  1. You are defining evolution as a theory, rather than as a process. Note that I define evolution as a process: “descent with modification” (Darwin’s term, and used by many biologists up to the present, and also the almost universal meaning of the term among laymen). So, unlike me, and many if not most scientists, and the general public, you appear to have no word for the process that the theory called “evolution” explains. Or if you do, what is that word? Or is the word the same, for both the theory and the process? If the latter, then the situation is that “Evolution explains evolution,” which is not very helpful.

  2. You are speaking of it as “the” theory, rather than as a number of theories. Yet Lamarck is said to have a theory of evolution, as was Darwin, as was Bergson, as was Dobzhansky, as was Kimura, as is Futuyma, as is Stuart Newman, etc. Each of these persons explains “how the diversity of life has arisen from common ancestry” differently. Are all these explanations part of one theory called “evolution”? Or are there several “evolutions”, one corresponding to the ideas of each theorist? If you adopt the first option, then “evolution” contains internal contradictions, and if you take the second option, then you admit that the specific contents of “evolution” vary over time, and it no longer is a single definable thing.

  3. You add the word “scientific.” Yet when the theories of gravity, electromagnetism, etc. are defined, the reference books never put the word “scientific” in there. Why do you put it in, for this one theory alone?

This does not follow. What follows from your logic is, “so ID is not evolution.” The additional words “but creationism” aren’t justified by the logical connective you supply; they would have to be established on some other basis.

Of course not, but having spoken to a few people who work on gravitational theory and cosmology, I have been made aware of differing interpretations of gravity. Understanding the material is beyond my pay grade, but it’s clear that advanced theorists specializing in gravity don’t agree on everything. That is, their theories of gravity are not identical. There are of course common elements, but there is not uniformity. The fact that none of them include fairies does not mean that there is one singular, monolithic view of the nature of gravity. And of course, Denton’s understanding of design makes no appeal to fairies.

The dictionary, if a good one, will capture the existing use of a word as used by competent speakers and writers in a language. If a dictionary gives a definition of a scientific term, it should get that definition from the actual usage of scientists. So how do scientists use the term “evolution?” Are you saying that scientists don’t use the term “evolution” to mean what virtually every dictionary from 1900 to the present says it means, i.e., a process of descent with modification from simpler forms?

The first part doesn’t follow from your “because.” Evolution might be a sound scientific theory and ID might be Swiss cheese. There is no logical relationship between the assertions in your two clauses.

As far as I can make out your very unclear argument, with its flawed use of logical connectives, you are saying: “I define evolution as a theory explaining origins that does not include intelligent causes. Since Michael Denton thinks there are intelligent causes, therefore he is not an evolutionist.” Well, given your definition, the conclusion is obvious. But if one defines evolution not as a particular theoretical account of mechanisms but as a process of descent with modification, then it does not, at least not by definition, preclude intelligent causes. Such causes might be excluded by current theory, but not by the definition.

You might try employing a definition of “evolution” that is not rigged in advance to yield the conclusion you want to arrive at, i.e., that Michael Denton cannot possibly believe in evolution. But I don’t think you’re even aware that you are rigging the definition. I, on the other hand, instead of employing a rigged definition, simply employ the common meaning of the term, a meaning that appears in scientific and popular literature alike. So I say that Denton accepts evolution – the process – as real, but differs from many other scientists regarding how – the mechanisms – evolution works. This still allows you to say that Denton’s theory of evolution is wrong, is false, etc., but it doesn’t allow you maintain that Denton rejects evolution.

You can use words willfully, with an agenda, or you can use them as you find them in the language. I prefer to use them as I find them in the language; that leaves me free to debate about ideas, theories, data, etc., rather than wrangle over words. It’s because you want to subjugate the use of words to your particular ideological slant on things that we are having this endless dispute. If you were less elitist and more democratic at heart, you would defer to long-established usage regarding the meaning of the word “evolution” and would talk instead about how Denton’s theory of evolutionary mechanism differs from that of some others. Then we could agree on much more, because I’d be the first to say that he differs from many. It’s because you’re absurdly insisting that if Denton doesn’t toe the line regarding evolutionary mechanism, he doesn’t believe in evolution, that we aren’t getting anywhere.

I think we’ve gone around in circles enough times on this. If you haven’t by now got the message that you should be saying, “Denton accepts evolution, but makes many errors regarding how evolution works,” instead of “Denton rejects evolution,” and that this simple change would turn a pointless argument over mere words into a useful discussion about causes of evolutionary change, you are never going to get it.

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Boring.

To reiterate: In discussing the terms “evolution” and “creationism”, in this context, my point of demarcation is science vs pseudoscience. That is not a distinction that can be made on the basis of philological, lexicological or etymological analysis of the words themselves. The distinction, rather, is made on the basis of the nature of the claims made by, and the behaviour and motivations of, those supporting the ideas.

In centuries past, someone could speak of the four humors, phlogiston, or the luminiforous ether whlie engaging in legitimate scientific discourse. Today, someone proposing these ideas is engaging in pseudoscience. The ideas themselves have not changed. Rather, it is the body of scientific knowledge pertaining to these ideas that has.

And, again, this is just a sideshow of your creation. You are free to call Michael Denton an evolutionist, or a creationist, or a dentist, or a phlebotomist or a deuteragonist or whatever other “ist” your little heart desires. It does not change the fact that his “structuralism” is pseudoscience, and Denton a pseudoscientist.

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Really, the only definition that matters here is that Denton writes books full of speculation, while never thinking of an actual testable hypothesis or thinking of an actual experiment for himself or someone else to do.

The all rhetoric–no testing of hypotheses is what makes it obvious pseudoscience.

Of course, Denton’s understanding of design somehow fails to lead him to advance a single testable hypothesis, so his understanding must be that design is pseudoscience.

There is, but you can’t acknowledge it because you can’t acknowledge that ID is pseudoscience. Let me unpack it for you: because evolution is a sound scientific theory, there’s nowhere for ID to go but pseudoscience.

If evolution weren’t sound OR ID proponents didn’t realize on some level that it is sound, there’d be some science in ID, not all this pseudoscientific fakery and handwaving, your own being a fine example.

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And if all you use is words and not the scientific method, you are promoting pseudoscience.

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Yet Behe did do exactly that in print, in a book that was issued in 2006, after he admitted under oath in 2005 that he hadn’t read the work he was commenting on. Did he revise the new edition?

And yet you support him relentlessly. Can you explain why that is not hypocritical, Eddie?

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The equally serious problem, as has been demonstrated here, is that his speculation is based on an understanding of evoution that is, at best, incomplete.

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Even if that were true, it would not make him a creationist. You can dodge, wriggle, and squirm, but your claim is without foundation in anything that Denton has written. That you can’t admit that you simply made an error in calling him a creationist says a great deal about you.

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I am glad that you are not denying that he is a pseudoscientist. That is good progress.

I made no error. He clearly meets the definition of “creationist” that I am using. You do not like that definition. That’s fine, I don’t really care.

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Structuralism isn’t a pseudoscience. It’s a respectable position. Some modern biologists flirt with it and Stephen Jay Gould said it’s a respectable postiton. It could be wrong but it’s not pseudoscience. I thinks it’s true to an extent. If you don’t want to read Denton i suggest reading Gould’s chapter on it in “The Stucture of Evolutionary Theory”.

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Sorry, I was not clear enough in saying that Denton’s structuralism is pseudoscience. As I understand it, structuralism in general is a respectable, but probably incorrect, position.

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I concur with T.j_Runyon here. I’ve not claimed that structuralism is correct, but only that it has a place in evolutionary theory, if only as a minority voice over the past century. Denton is not outside of evolutionary theory merely by virtue of advocating structuralism.

Glad you finally grant that structuralism exists within evolutionary theory. And I find it interesting that the first time I ever heard of structuralism within evolutionary theory was not on either an atheist or TE website, but from sites sympathetic to ID, which led me to Denton, which led me to Gould. I can’t think of a single evolutionary champion with a population genetics focus who has shown any interest in structuralism in these online debates, or who has even mentioned it. And I don’t trust one-sided pictures of evolutionary theory – or of any other theory in science.

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That is not the reason he is a pseudoscientist.

I never said it didn’t. You have a strange habit of imagining people have written things which they have not.

Interesting that you should mention Gould, given that he was one of the chief proponents of the idea of historical contingency, the denial of which is one of the main reasons to consider Denton a pseudoscientist.

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I mentioned Gould because he gives an articulate account of structuralism, one which T.j_Runyon and I have read, and which I recommend as educational.

Denton doesn’t deny a role for contingency in evolution, as his 2016 book makes clear.

But back to your original post:

Ummm… if they were initially “unicellular organisms,” then they weren’t bats, cats, whales and humans.

Ummm – how do you think the homologous forms are passed on from generation to generation, over sometimes hundreds of millions of years, if not through common descent?

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I guess you don’t actually understand structuralism. Add it to the list.

It’s pretty presumptuous of you to expect me to continue to engage in a dialogue with you, when you refuse to address the main subjects of my discussion. But, again, not surprising from a creationist.

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I think that @Faizal_Ali was more than clear. He’s a pseudoscientist simply because he doesn’t do science.

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Non sequitur. This sentence of yours does not follow from any of the points I made in my previous post.

How so, when I directly quoted your opinion piece above, and responded to parts of it?

I repeat, how do you think that you possess pentadactyly, if that was not passed down to you through common descent from an original pentadactyl ancestor? Does Denton say anything, anywhere, to suggest that he thinks that pentadactyly and other long-enduring structural forms are passed on by means other than common descent? The paragraph from your OP that I am commenting on just does not make any sense.

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Re-read my post, and try come up with some questions that actually pertain to what I wrote. Obviously, I think that common descent explains this. But we’re not talking about my understanding and acceptance of evolution.

Or, even better, respond to the actual scientific information presented here that contradicts Denton’s claims.

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Then, in the paragraph I commented on, you wrote unclearly.

There is always data to contradict any theoretical explanation. The jury is still out regarding structuralism. I’ve never claimed that everything Denton says is right, or even that all of what he says is entirely self-consistent. But I’m deeply grateful to him for introducing me to structuralist thinking – something I wouldn’t have heard about at all if I had relied on the contributions of Francis Collins, Dennis Venema, Nick Matzke, Eugenie Scott, Robert Pennock, Jerry Coyne, P. Z. Myers, etc. to the public discussion of evolution and design. I never would have been made aware by any of these people that such a current of thought existed or had ever existed within evolutionary theory. None of them present well-rounded discussions of evolutionary theory from an informed historical perspective. For that, one has to go to someone like Gould.

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There are two ways to flunk a discussion of X.

One is to say Denton appears to ignore X without having read his book.

The other is to claim to have read the book, but to have no ability to articulate whether Denton ignored X or not.

Best,
Chris

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