Alleged "Insufficient Evidence at Hand for Darwinism"

[dann]

In another thread Baby Nemesis links to the article “Insufficient Evidence at Hand for Darwinism” by this apparent advocate of ID, Stephen A. Batzer, Ph.D., P.E., who does not seem to know an awful lot about evolution and biology.
Since he might be on his way to creationist fame – other websites already publish copies of the article - it might be a good idea for somebody more knowledgeable than me and with time on his/her hands to repudiate the article.
Threads from this forum often appear when I google something, but I came up empty-handed when I googled "Stephen A. Baxter" + jref.

 

[UnrepentantSinner]

Did you spell it "baxter" in your search?

I did a Google for just his name and the only evolution related hit in the first 30 was his article on reasons.org (which is Hugh Ross' website). The rest are all engineering related stuff. Sounds to me like another example of someone without actual training in biology weighing in just because s/he has a PhD.

 

[Dancing David]

Pretty silly stuff on his part,

1.Which species did the blue whale evolve from? How do you know? Can you work back three generations from any present-day whale species?
2.Have these three species progressed in near infinitely fine gradations, as Darwin postulated, or do they demonstrate “saltational” (single-step) jumps?
If the individual species designs did “jump,” what was the mechanism, exactly of the jump?
3.Why did the saltational jump occur when it occurred? Did all species modify at that time due to the same “pressure” or not?
4.Let’s assume that the Darwinian model, which shows a directionless process, is correct. Thus, progress to the sea is as likely as progress toward the land, isn’t it? How many land-dwelling species emerged, either from whales, or the transitional species that you listed? Did any of them branch back toward land dwelling? Did any branch toward air-faring creatures and become bats? How do you know?
5.Can you relate the changes in the genome that you hypothesize to a change in climate? Shouldn’t the change in environment correlate to the change in phenotype (that is, the shape and anatomy)?
6.Have you sequenced the genomes of your postulated progression of species? What does your analysis show?
7.If you simply looked at the phenotype of the previous species, are you concerned at all that DNA (genotype) and phenotype are not nearly as well correlated as was believed? What is the probability of your phenotype analysis being confirmed by an independent DNA analysis?
8.Suppose that another researcher were to indicate that your analysis was incorrect. What test would you offer to confirm your analysis?
9.Would you agree that if your analysis isn’t subject to testing that it is not scientific by definition?

So well he has already ignored the answers he could have found.

No- we do not know exactly what species blue whales came from.
Yes and no-species change can occur gradually or rapidily.
If species make a very rapid shift it is still not going to be saltation,m the geologic record does not contain every generation of every species.
You can sort of reverse engineer a good guess as to why a species arose, but no not all species will change at the same time.
Evolution is not directionless. Duhh. It is based upon reproductive success.
Some species will change in response to climat eothers won't. Arctic foxes are still foxes , as well. A fossil would look the same.
Oh Yeah, i will hop on my time machine and do that.
Duh, we can measure the difference in DNA amongst the survivors but I still haven't got my time machine.
I would like to know the actual reason they say evolution is incorrect.
No.

 

[Dr Adequate]

Pretty silly stuff on his part ...

Yeah, this is just gibberish. It's on the level of claiming that there is insufficient evidence for the Roman Empire by asking: "What did Julius Caesar eat for breakfast on the Ides of March? Was that what he usually ate for breakfast? What route did he take to the Forum that day? What was the weather like? Can you correlate his route with the weather? What color was his paternal grandfather's hair? ..."

This does not, of course, remove the mountain of evidence that the Roman Empire did in fact exist.

 

[Bikewer]

Any use of the term "Darwinism" indicates a biased viewpoint.

 

[MG1962]

Any use of the term "Darwinism" indicates a biased viewpoint.

I know it is hot and sticky in Darwin...but is the city that bad?

 

[dann]

Did you spell it "baxter" in your search?

No, I only misspelled his name in the post!

 

[Baby Nemesis]

I wonder why physicist Hugh Ross has posted something so silly on his website by that man. I'm going to contact him and notify him of this thread, and perhaps he'll take your criticisms on board and take the article down.

Whether his entire website Reasons to Believe is full of junk science or not, I wouldn't have a clue. If you'd like to criticise his own articles, perhaps he'll take the rest of what you say on board as well.

 

[Robster FCD]

Any use of the term "Darwinism" indicates a biased viewpoint.

Seems to depend on where you live and work. In the UK, it doesn't seem to have the same associations.

 

[Bikewer]

In the US, it seems to be used almost entirely by creationists, who like to separate evolution from the rest of biology somehow....

 

[sphenisc]

Yeah, this is just gibberish. It's on the level of claiming that there is insufficient evidence for the Roman Empire by asking: "What did Julius Caesar eat for breakfast on the Ides of March?

Don't know, but Caesar adsum iam forte.

Was that what he usually ate for breakfast?

Not sure, but Pompeii adarat.

What route did he take to the Forum that day?

Again can't be positive, but Caesar sic in omnibus.

What was the weather like?

It pluviaed down, that's why Pompeii ad an at.

Can you correlate his route with the weather?

All viae lead to Rome, so correlation equal 1.

What color was his paternal grandfather's hair? ..."

Like all ancient Romans, his hair (and the rest of him) was marble-coloured, and he had spooky looking eyeballs too.