The Current Status of Ewert's Dependency Graph of Life

I’ll wait a bit and see what develops out of Winston Ewert’s work, et al., when it is expanded, and I expect more developments in information and the time required, since biocomplexity and biodiversity are not shrinking, nor are the numbers of the discoveries in molecular and cellular biology.

I’ll make a prediction: noting will develop.

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I’ll make a note of that. :slightly_smiling_face: I just proved you right.

I’ll make a prediction, too. Science will be discovered to not have all the answers. Oh wait. We already know that. :slightly_smiling_face:

Well of course science doesn’t have all the answers. However, it’s the only good way we know of to get answers, and it does produce more answers as time passes. What else would you propose that is also capable of getting answers? (And there must be a way of assessing whether the answers are good ones too.)

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The problem with Ewert’s work is that it ignores the sequence data. He simply looked at the distribution of proteins with a given function, but he wasn’t able to explain why the sequences of those genes produced a nested hierarchy. On top of that, Ewert’s claims relied heavily on the accuracy and thoroughness of gene annotation which really can’t be relied on.

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That is entirely correct. @DaleCutler, this is exactly what @Winston_Ewert agreed with when he was here. Did you read our exchange on this? (Winston Ewert: The Dependency Graph of Life). We are still waiting for him to do the next set of analysis and get back to us. I think it will take him some time.

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That’s a strength, not a weakness.

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@DaleCutler, we already know that Science does not have all the answers. Who thinks differently on this?

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Let me suggest another weakness of Ewert’s scheme: his “modules” are not functional units but are purely ad hoc sets of genes that have the same taxonomic distribution, and even that depends on his tiny taxonomic sample.

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That came up already. Though we don’t know for sure. I suggested that he could build support by showing they were functional modules. He had not yet looked into this.

Those that think they know that there is no God? …and base it on science.

I was a longtime atheist and I never thought science had all the answers. None of the top atheist scholars adhere to scientism

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Not if they are scientists. Most scientists are acutely aware of the limits of science.

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Right now, this is a parallel conversation to Why Christianity is the Worldview that Best Supports Science, in many ways.

There you go again…

Well, yes, in that it also involves your attempts to falsely attribute beliefs and positions to others.

Wrong and a false accusation and a pretence at omniscience. I’ve been in coversations with antitheist scientists that demand exactly that, because “nature is all there is.”

That sounds like a less than peaceful insult to me.

Not all scientists are top atheist scholars, though, thus leaving a lot that do.

There are a lot of excellent evolutionary scientists doing great work who are Christians. Francis Collins comes to mind as does Dr. Swamidass. Why bash them?

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This seems very unlikely on its face. The fact that he talks about them as if they were, prior to any investigation, is a count against him.