Part 2 of Behe's response to his Lehigh colleagues

Is someone going to support this claim?

Wow. The hypocrisy.

Here ya go, Bill. Knock yourself out:

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So why donā€™t you summarize why you think their argument is convincing? It appears to me that you have not looked at it or thought about it.

Here is the crux of Lenskiā€™s argument.

Yes, natural selection sometimes increases the frequency of broken and degraded genes in populations. But when it comes to the power of natural selection, what is most frequent versus most important can be very different things.

Yet when he tries to show how natural selection provides the most important improvements he cites:

In the same vein, even if many more mutations destroy functions than produce new functions, the latter category has been far more consequential in the history of life. That is because a new function may enable a lineage to colonize a new habitat or realm, setting off what evolutionary biologists call an ā€œadaptive radiationā€ that massively increases not only the numbers of organisms but, over time, the diversity of species and even higher taxa. As one example, consider Tiktaalik or some relative thereof, in any case a transitional kind of fish whose descendants colonized land and eventually gave rise to all of the terrestrial vertebratesā€”amphibian, reptiles, birds, and mammals. That lineage left far more eventual descendants (including ourselves), and was far more consequential for the history of life on Earth, than 100 other lineages that might have gained a transient advantage by degrading some gene and its function before eventually petering out.

Cases where he has not established random mutation and natural selection as the mechanism. He is using circular reasoning by assuming it was the cause.

Brazen hypocrisy.

Please show that Tiktaalik was magically poofed into being by God.

They are using the same assumption Behe is using. Behe assumes that the differences between polar bears and brown bears are due to random mutation and natural selection/neutral drift.

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In every last case where we have identified the mechanisms itā€™s been naturally occurring evolution so itā€™s a reasonable assumption. Itā€™s Behe who is assuming POOF the MAGIC DESIGNER DIDDIT without a shred of positive evidence. Thatā€™s not science Bill.

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I thought Behe was more into ā€œdivine pool shotā€ rather than "poof"ing. I havenā€™t read his latest book yet so I could be wrong.

He is really not into either. His goal is to surface evidence for design which is sometimes evidence against the proposed alternative. He is not really interested in historical speculation. He offers the pool shot as a logical possibility.

Behe has sequence data to support his hypothesis.

Sure, if he cherry picks tiny snippets and ignores the other 95% of the genetic data which directly refutes him.

Maybe we should talk about the genetic table Behe posted where he deliberately cut out all the line items which contradicted his claims. Was that what an honest scientist does Bill?

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You seem to be king of the non-sequiturs. What does that have to do with what I wrote?

Does Behe assume that the differences between polar bears and brown bears is due to natural processes like mutation, selection, and drift? Yes/No?

Then how can ID be falsified, if in fact it is scientific.

He has evidence here. He may be wrong as the mutations may not be random but a couple of SNP differences is evidence of non directed mutation.

On the other hand Lenskiā€™s assumption was pure speculation. You made a false equivalence and I really donā€™t understand why you would do this. There are obvious differences between looking at current data and a speculation about a historic event in the remote past.

How is evidence against current evolutionary theory positive evidence for Design? Thatā€™s a rather glaring false dichotomy.

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So does Behe assume these differences are due to naturally occurring processes of mutation or not? Could you give a clear answer?

If the proposed mechanism could not make a complex sequence it would be falsified. It also could be falsified is another in the cell other than a mind could generate complex sequences. There is a 5 million dollar prize for the person that can solve this.

If we saw complex sequences evolving right before our eyes in the lab, would that falsify ID?

In that case IDC is already falsified because we know natural evolutionary processes can generate complex sequences.

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What is IDCā€™s proposed mechanism for producing complex sequences? Merely saying ā€œit was designed!ā€ isnā€™t a mechanism.

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