Stepwise evolutionary pathways to highly specific protein binding partners. That seems imposs--

[Faizal_Ali]

@BenKissling

But I thought Darwinism was dead, and intelligent design people were using it as a straw man.

Yes, that’s essentially what I am saying.

@misterme987

What is this in response to? I did a search for “Darwinism” and no one has talked about it in this thread.

Try searching for “Darwinian”.

[Rumraket (Mikkel R.)]

@BenKissling

But I thought Darwinism was dead, and intelligent design people were using it as a straw man.

They are, yes. Typically by quoting biologists criticizing Darwinism (by which these biologists invariably mean evolution on smooth or unchanging fitness landscapes, or evolution entirely by positive selection), pretending this means biogists are abandoning the theory of evolution, or even that the concept of natural selection itself has been rejected.

That’s most often how ID proponents use the term “Darwinism” as a strawman.

[Giltil (Gilbert Thill)]

It takes the bug responsible for malaria 10^20 multiplication events to acquire the CQR phenotype, a rather modest adaptation. And we are asked to believe that by a blind, undirected mechanism, in less than 10^11 births, a pig-like creature was able to give rise to a fully marine dolphin-like pelagicete whale like Basilosauridae, an adaptation tremendously more demanding than CQR in malaria, requiring a profound anatomical re-engineering of the whole animal. I’m sorry but I don’t have enough faith to believe a thing so extraordinary.

[Rumraket (Mikkel R.)]

@Giltil

an adaptation tremendously more demanding than CQR in malaria

Is it? How so? Explain. Show your math and your assumptions.

[Faizal_Ali]

@Giltil

And we are asked to believe that by a blind, undirected mechanism, in less than 10^11 births, a pig-like creature was able to give rise to a fully marine dolphin-like pelagicete whale like Basilosauridae, an adaptation tremendously more demanding than CQR in malaria, requiring a profound anatomical re-engineering of the whole animal.

I thank you for providing such an explicit example of the sort of thinking Behe intended his book to inspire in his intended audience. That audience being people ideologically committed to the belief that complex life forms could not exist without the direct intervention of God.

The error you make is in assuming, in the complete absence of any evidence whatsoever, that the mutations that allowed the evolution of whales could not have occurred over the allotted time period.

Here’s a hint for you: When malaria were evolving to develop CQR, were there absolutely no other mutations occurring? Did their phenotype remain completely unchanged, other than the resistance to CQ?