Michael Behe as a propagandist: Robbie's Week 9 New and Hot (and review)

I just read Michael Behe's Darwin's Black Box, in which he tries to use the argument of irreducible complexity as evidence of design. I wrote a pretty scathing review of the book on Amazon; I think the Behe was wrong or actually unfounded in making a lot of his claims.

I decided to do a little research on Behe, who's listed as a senior fellow on the Discovery Institute Website. It says that "Behe's current research involves delineation of design and natural selection in protein structures," which basically means that Behe has been doing whatever he can to show that proteins could not have evolved.

One of the peer reviewed articles in favor of design on the DI website was wirten by Behe in the journal Protein Science in 2004. It was called "Simulating evolution by gene duplication of protein features that require multiple amino acid residues," with the conclusion that the mutations required for evolution to produce functioning proteins are so improbable that proteins could have not evolved. This was an irreducible complexity argument without the use of the word irreducible complexity.

This article was pretty controversial; in an editorial in Protein Science, the editor concludes:

"Prof. Lynch’s approach of testing the problem raised by Drs. Behe and Snoke within the modern framework of evolutionary biology represents the desirable scientific approach (Lynch 2005, this issue; Behe and Snoke 2005, this issue). As Bruce Alberts wrote in a Letter to the Editor of the New York Times (Feb. 12, 2005): "In evolution, as in all areas of science, our knowledge is incomplete. But the entire success of the scientific enterprise has depended on an insistence that these gaps be filled by natural explanations, logically derived from confirmable evidence."

I guess this is true; this may be part of the desirable scientific approach because other scientists pretty much killed Behe's claim. Still, I think Dawkins has a better point in "The God Delusion:" Behe has devoted his career to developing confusing propaganda rather than finding truth.

Josh's New and Hot

The (unnecessary) controversy between "intelligent design" and "darwinism" continues!

Even though this article comes to us courtesy of the The Gospel Herald, it gives a rather straightforward account of the recent uproar at Southern Methodist University over an intelligent design conference. Click here for the article.

In brief, a very conservative Christian group called the "Discovery Institute" is hosting an intelligent design conference this weekend at Southern Methodist University (SMU). In late march the anthropology, biology, and geology departments sent similar letters signed by the faculty objecting to the event. The letter from the Anthropology department read, "These are conferences of and for believers and their sympathetic recruits. They have no place on an academic campus." In response to this critism, the event's organizers invited the professors to speak which they just recently declined.

The fact that this conference is occuring at all is, of course, troubling in itself. But occurring, it is. The question then is whether it is appropriate to be held at an institution of higher learning.

It is understandable that the science professors were so incensed the presence of such a conference that clearly undermines some very basic principles upon which their entire fields rest. Clearly research has been conducted and scholarship advanced all under the basic principle that evolution is a fact. To have to defend this position would be as if the math department, after publishing for years on incredibly complex theories, was asked to host a conference asserting that 2+2 was not equal to 4. Why should these professors be asked to denigrate themselves by joining a pseudo-scientific "debate" that really is only a debate to a select group of religious fanatics?

Also, check out my Amazon Book Review of Darwin's Autobiography here.

One last "Also", Here are some cool Youtube videos that I found.

Richard Dawkins interviews the Bishop of Oxford

A BBC Newsnight Report from December 4, 2006 about the debate between Evolution and Intelligent Design

Dani's New & Hot (Week 2)

Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus (2006)

"Flock of Dodos is the first feature documentary (84 mins.) to present both sides of the Intelligent Design/Evolution clash that appeared on the covers of Time and Newsweek in 2005. Filmmaker and former Evolutionary Ecologist Dr. Randy Olson tries to make sense of the issue by visiting his home state of Kansas. At first it seems the problem lies with intelligent design -- a movement labeled recently as "breathtaking inanity" by a federal judge -- but when a group of evolutionists convene for a night of poker and discussion they end up sounding themselves like...a flock of dodos." - Official Website

Go to the official website (http://www.flockofdodos.com/) and there's a funny trailer. I think it would be interesting to watch this movie. Reviews say that it presents a well-balanced argument for both sides of the debate even though the filmmaker is an evolutionist.

The "Flock of Dodos" title serves as a metaphor. Originally, when Portuguese sailors arrived at the island of Mauritius, they found that the dodo bird was a great prey because it was not afraid of humans and could not fly. And since the bird could not evolve in order to avoid predation, it became extinct by the 17th century. The movie attempts to find the contemporary dodos in the evolution vs. intelligent design debate; which belief will survive in today's society?

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As a brief background, in 2005 both Time and Newsweek published articles discussing the intelligent design vs. evolution debate. Also in 2005, in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case, a US federal court ruled against the Dover (Pennsylvania) school district's decision to teach intelligent design (that some higher intelligence created the universe) in science classes as an alternative to the subject of evolution. The main argument was that because intelligent design had no supporting scientific evidence, it is "essentially religious in nature." (Wikipedia.org)

Here's a link for more information about intelligent design: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design

Here's a link for more information about dodo birds:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodo

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Amazon.com review is up at http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Charles-Darwin-1809-1882/dp/0393310698/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-5828627-0155228?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1176241364&sr=8-1