There is an extensive scientific literature that demonstrates you are wrong. That will not affect you, since you do not allow your beliefs to be influenced by scientific evidence.
But they do. As does most everyone else in their field. And most everyone else outside of their field, too. Everyone with a general science education of any description could name mechanisms by which new genes are generated, and by “general science education” I’m talking about something like ninth grade biology class. Apparently, somehow, you managed to evade all of that. That is surely regrettable, but it is hardly a valid criticism of the paper’s style or language. You have some homework left to do before you can meaninfully partake in this discussion. That’s not somebody else spinning anything.
1 Like
Faizal with all due respect you do not understand the evidence. Just because something is mentioned in papers does not make it true. Almost all papers infer common descent and this paper is no exception. This assertion is based on the inference of common descent and then a “best guess” for what they are observing.
I am sorry, but you are not giving me anything close to the respect I am due.
I suggest you take this subject up with your good friend “Mike” Behe. Please explain to him that, in your opinion, he does not understand the evidence and mistakenly accepts common descent as a fact that is trivially true.
2 Likes
If you are willing to consider that all of the evidence at our avail might unanimously and unambiguously point all the time to something that is ultimately untrue, that’s fine. That is a philosophical possibility. We might be living in a universe that’s out to deceive us about everything, or perhaps at the mercy of a god who wants nothing but us thinking untrue things. If past experience is anything to go by, this is not an effective strategy to understand and correctly predict events in nature, and as such it is scientifically uninteresting. Still, philosophically, you are absolutely welcome to insist that evidence and truth have nothing in common. I, for one, would neither know of a way nor particularly care to argue against a position like that, not because I find it respectable or easy to defend, but because I find it boring and unworthy of the time either of us could waste on it.
Mike understands the evidence very well. He also understands that common descent is an inference. He also understands as well as anyone that gene duplication as an explanation for new genes is very limited.
As you do not.
He probably does, but I expect he also understands, as you do not, that every conclusion in science is an inference from data. “Inference” is not a pejorative term or a synonym for “wild guess”. Some inferences, as common descent, are strong enough that the failure to accept them is perverse. I suspect Mike realizes that too, as you do not.
Not sure what you mean by that. But if a new gene shares significant sequence with a pre-existing one, the argument for duplication is strong. “God just wanted it that way” is not a credible alternative.
2 Likes
You mis represent what Mike thinks as he only sees common descent as an inference based on the similarities.
This statement you have made here is spin. Common descent among humans and Apes has little mechanistic support at this point. By mechanistic support I mean a mechanism as part of reproduction that can account for the genetic differences including genes.
This is right but that is limited to a few changes in very large populations of bacteria. Primates with much slower reproductive rates may not support the mechanism at all.
This is why the paper is spinning the information implying the different genes among primates are due to duplication.
Here is Behe explaining, as it were, his position on common descent in his own words. IMHO, he quite clearly understands and accepts that the scientific evidence supports common descent. He also clearly understands the importance of spinning his comments so as to avoid upsetting the majority of his followers who are creationists and don’t accept CD.
It’s as if you don’t even read what I write.
You know nothing. All the genetic differences can be accounted for by ordinary mutations of the sort we see happening al the time. And you still have no comprehension of the evidence for common descent or even of its nature. Once more: it’s not just similarity; it’s nested hierarchy.
Again, no idea what you mean by that, and I doubt you know yourself.
I agree that what you posted is Mikes position which has not changed. As I said to John his inference is based on similarities and this is what he articulates in the video.
Common descent maybe true but ultimately it requires a mechanism which is part of reproduction that can account for the differences. Maybe this mechanism exists but is out of the reach of science as Behe points out with his pool shot idea.
I apologize to Bill. I gave Behe way to much credit for understanding, and his reasoning ability has deteiorated since I last encountered his words. He has no clue what the evidence for common descent is, and he appears not to agree that the evidence is strong, unsurprising if he misunderstands it so badly. Behe seems only slightly less ignorant than Bill is, and I will not recommend his views on the subject for Bill’s consideration any longer.
But note this, Bill: in that whole video, there’s not a single reference to nested hierarchy.
3 Likes
I accept. Let’s let the temperature cool down.
This is true.
This horse has been beat so far beyond death(
) you’re all basically smearing the microscopic particles of dried horse residue over a surface that’s lost even the colored outline of what might once upon a time in some long-gone geological epoch have been the pool of blood the animal laid in shortly after it died.
2 Likes
Which did not really surprise me, as he has no interest in helping his followers understand the evidence in favour of common descent so that they will accept it. He would much rather they deny common descent so long as that means they also deny what he calls “Darwinian evolution.”
However, I was surprised that I was unable to find a source in which he does demonstrate an understanding of the nested hierarchy. I somehow thought he had. This is about the closest I could find:
I have no solutions to the difficult problems pointed to by scientists who are skeptical of universal common descent: ORFan genes, nonstandard genetic codes, different routes of embryogenesis by similar organisms, and so on. Nonetheless, as I see it, if, rather than Darwinian evolution, one is talking about “intelligently designed” descent, then those problems, while still there, seem much less insuperable. I certainly agree that random, unintelligent processes could not account for them, but an intelligent agent may have ways around apparent difficulties. So in judging the likelihood of common descent, I discount problems that could be classified as “how did that get here?” Instead, I give much more weight to the “mistakes” or “useless features” arguments. If some peculiar feature is shared between two species which, as far as we can tell, has no particular function, and which in other contexts we would likely call a genetic accident, then I count that as rather strong evidence for common descent. So, if one looks at the data in the way that I do, then one can say simultaneously that: 1) CD is very well supported; 2) grand Darwinian claims are falsified; 3) ID is confirmed; 4) design extends very deeply into biology.
Which really isn’t very close at all. So, I think it might actually be the case that his (lukewarm) endorsement of common descent, rather than being the result of a detailed understanding of the topic, is more of a rhetorical ploy used to argue that one need not be a dyed-in-wool Biblical creationist to reject evolution. That’s disappointing.
@swamidass has suggested in another discussion that Behe no longer holds to the “pool shot idea”, but I don’t know what that is based on. In the video below, at 51:20, they both agree that there is no biochemical evidence of intelligent design in the evolution of humans from a common ancestor with other apes (in contradiction to what you claim). Instead, they both contend that the qualities that (they believe) make humans exceptional may not be based in biology.
I suppose they are referring to an immaterial soul or something like that. In that case, it would provide Behe with a means of reconciling his belief that God ordained the existence of humans with the fact, which not even he can deny, that nothing more than unguided evolutionary mechanisms is needed to explain the existence of human beings (at least in terms of our physical bodies). Presumably, God was sitting around watching evolution proceed for about 4 billion years before deciding that these hairless apes with the grotesquely huge crania would be a suitable receptacle for the soul.
It’s still not clear why God so badly needed bacteria to have flagella.
If Mike is making the claim that evolutionary mechanisms are all that is needed to explain the genetic differences between human and apes I would conclude he has not looked at the evidence carefully. Different genes, alternative splicing, and chromosomes need to be explained and RMNS does not easily explain these differences.
RM = random mutations.
If a random mutation occurs in a gene, that makes it different.
If there were no random mutation, the splicing would not be alternate.
If there were no random mutation, the chromosomes would be the same.
Are you denying that mutations happen? That they somehow happen but genetic material should remain the same? If you have mutations, you will have differences.
1 Like
Yes, I guess that must be the obvious conclusion, just as when any other scientist disagrees with you. It simply cannot conceivably be the case that you are just mistaken. Right?
1 Like
If Mike believes this it would contradict the evidence that he generated in this 2004 paper given the genetic differences between chimps and humans that are known today.
That’s right but the question is if the differences are due to random mutations or not. Mutations can be neutral, advantageous or deleterious. The more deleterious the less a large genetic change can be explained by random mutation.
That’s the point, yes. You consider yourself better qualified to assess if and how well a position is consistent with evidence than pretty much anybody else. And you reckon the healthiest way of making that assessment is just making up what ever conclusion you please, much like someone would who does not at all care about the evidence in the first place.
And yet, literally all mutations are changes to the sequence. Indeed, all changes to a DNA sequence are mutations, too. Things that are identical can come to be different, if one or both of them change. This is somehow a point of contention here.
Wrong. The more deleterioius a mutation is, the less likely it is to spread through a population in subsequent generations. This has no bearing whatsoever on whether or not mutations that do end up spreading, i.e. ones that are not grossly deleterious enough to eliminate themselves out of the gene pool so swiftly, are also random mutations. They are. The ones that survive are, and the ones that go extinct are.
1 Like