Why is ID so successful?

Mercutio said:
It's interesting. The argument over species is, in one way, a neat example of how science changes ...

In this view, what a "species" is is more or less an irrelevant question. It is the functional equivalent of asking "where, in a rainbow, does it switch from orange to yellow?" Of course, it switches from yellowish-orange to orangeish-yellow, and there is no one meaningful line of demarkation.
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Now if macro-ev would just work like that in the fossil record (or in the lab), I'd be a Darwinist too.

Er, a horse is a horse?? ;)
 
CplFerro said:
I doubt microevolution is the sole cause of species, because I don't see it able to overcome entropy.
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Exactly where on the spectrum from micro- to macro-evolution does entropy kick in and ruin things?

Hammegk said:
Now if macro-ev would just work like that in the fossil record (or in the lab), I'd be a Darwinist too.
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Check out the evolution of the whale.

~~ Paul
 
paul said:
Check out the evolution of the whale.
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Yeah, those darn cetaceans can't decide whether they prefer land & legs or water & flippers.

Convinces you, does it?
 
You like the cetacean on land to the cetacean that's a good swimmer better than Eohippus to Percheron?

What's your comment on wolf to chihuahua and great dane in a few thousand years? Obviously micro, huh?
 
Hammegk said:
You like the cetacean on land to the cetacean that's a good swimmer better than Eohippus to Percheron?
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Yes, I'm a big fan of the shoreline.

What's your comment on wolf to chihuahua and great dane in a few thousand years? Obviously micro, huh?
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Depends where on the spectrum you bogusly draw the line between micro and macro. Gotta have the line, don't we? Otherwise how would evolution complainers argue that micro is okay but macro is not? Can't argue micro vs. macro unless we makes the distinction, after all.

~~ Paul
 
hammegk said:
Yeah, right back to the little problem "What the heck is a species?". :)
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Which, you will recall, is a "little problem" of the previous view, not the current. What we label something is not terribly important, is it? To creationists, perhaps, because they have a limited number of "kinds" to fit their view.

hammy, could you please elaborate a bit on the horse question? Assume a better-than-average understanding of the fossil record, but a worse-than-average understanding of what point you are trying to make.
 
A little bit on the original question. I read recently Darwin's Black Box by Micheal Behe because a friend of mine wanted to know what I thought about it. I thought I would say why I thought his book might seem logical.
He misleads the reader into thinking various lies about what science knows or doesn't know about evolution and cellular level biochemistry. Is there a major problem with the theory of evolution? Not unless you listen to him. Do we know every little detail of the biochemical processes in the cells of most animals? No unless you listen to him. He misleads the reader by saying he is a scientist when in the end of the book he clearly abandons any hint of science and chastises science for not studying god. He unfairly criticizes people who are doing research to answer the questions that he supposedly wants to know. He puts down well done research without any discussion of the obvious problem it presents to his theory. He just mentions it says a little degrading comment and that's it. He ignores large volumes of of information such as variations in the structure and function of eyes among different species. All of this helps to hide the fact that what he is saying is truly loony balooney and not something a scientist would say.
He presents a series of poor analogies. Like his famous mousetrap. Which is a poor analogy for a living system (and not irreducibly complex to boot.) If he wanted to use a mouse trap to talk about evolution then he could have said that the information that was used to make a mousetrap evolved and accumulated over time just like DNA mutations accumulate over time. But to compare a mousetrap with a complex biological system is totally inaccurate. These poor analogies are easy to understand while the science behind the biochemical processes are not so easy to understand. This leaves a person unfamiliar with biology nothing to do but agree with the poor analogy.
He demands biochemical level of explanation for evolution yet somehow does not even mention the biochemical level explanation for intelligent design. So the most important point he wanted to make was that we could not explain evolution on a biochemical level to his approval yet he did not even try to explain intelligent design because at this point he totally abandoned science for faith.
Anyway I am sure most of you had heard this kind of stuff before but I thought I would put in my 2 bits all be it a little bit of repetition for you.
 
Mercutio said:
To creationists, perhaps, because they have a limited number of "kinds" to fit their view.
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Hmm. Do you have an unlimited number of "kinds" (Or for you, "species") you recognize?

I suppose at the individual homo sap level, each of us is indeed unique. Simpler life-forms? I don't know if that would hold, but I suspect; "yes".


hammy, could you please elaborate a bit on the horse question? Assume a better-than-average understanding of the fossil record, but a worse-than-average understanding of what point you are trying to make.
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Basic evolution-in-the-classroom no longer uses the miraculous demo of speciation based on the horse lineage from Eocene to now?
 
Dogdoctor said:
Anyway I am sure most of you had heard this kind of stuff before but I thought I would put in my 2 bits all be it a little bit of repetition for you.
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No, it is quite useful since I haven't read Behe's book - only a couple of his articles.

The first time he compared Darwin to a naive child playing make believe with a cardboard box he lost me completely. I couldn't see anybody with a serious point resorting to such childish ad hominem.

When I heard the mousetrap analogy and the statement that a mousetrap without the catch would just not work, the first thought I had was - "yes it would - as a clipboard for receipts". So straight away I was not convinced that the irreducible complexity argument was as straightforward as the ID boys said it was.

In one way I would not be too worried about this stuff being presented to school kids, I can imagine a class full of bright high schoolers tearing the mousetrap analogy to pieces in front of the hapless teacher suggesting humorous evolutionary pathways for it.

And I can imagine what we would have made of Dembski's stuff in my old high school - especially the part where he appears to suggest that if some unspecified mathematical function involving a bacterial flagellum and an outboard motor returned a value of more than 500 bits then the flagellum must have been designed. It sounds like something the Monty Python writers rejected as too far fetched.

The ultimate result of teaching ID in the classroom will not be more believers but more atheists. Those people that are bright enough to be potential scientists will not be fooled by this stuff, those who buy it were probably never destined for a science career in the first place.

But it might engender an unhealthy cynicism among the brightest students. Imagine having to pretend you don't understand what a genetic algorithm is in order to pass an exam because the material on GA's is taken from Dembski. Imagine an intelligent teacher having to present such nonsensical material to a classroom in the first place.

And in the end it just wastes precious time that could be spent learning something useful.
 
Robin,

When peopel are offered a simple and comfortable view of life they usually embrace it. And they will feel threatened if someone arguments against that view.

So I wouldn't be surpriced if peer pressure forces the other kids to stray low or join.
 
hammegk said:
Hmm. Do you have an unlimited number of "kinds" (Or for you, "species") you recognize?
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Again, "species" (and "genus", "order", and all the other neat little demarcations) is part of the Linnaean system of classification. "Genus species", as in Homo sapiens, Ocimum basilicum, or Drosophila melongaster, was based on grouping together things which looked similar. It is now a matter of convenience--we can call something "Felis concolor" instead of "that thing over there with the teeth and the tail". But as I understand it (and I would defer to any evolutionary biologists on this one), the Linnaean system, based as it is on observable morphology and behavior, may group organisms together which DNA analysis shows are not closely related. Bottom line is, the "number of species" argument is based on an outdated (if still sometimes useful, if sometimes misleading) system of classification. It is still practical to demarcate by behavior (thus, we say that populations which will not breed with other populations are distinct from them, even if morphologically similar), and "species" is as good a word as any for these groupings, but your question (to my ear, at least) makes it sound like you still treat "species" as Linnaeus did. Just as the members of a population vary (and we do not term this "error" any longer), so do the characteristics defining a "species". (I have heard some argue that different "breeds" of dogs might just as well be called different species--again, in the current view, the label used is not terribly important.)

I suppose at the individual homo sap level, each of us is indeed unique. Simpler life-forms? I don't know if that would hold, but I suspect; "yes".
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I suspect yes, as well. Populations vary. Animal observers, from scientists to backyard birdwatchers, will report individual differences in behavior and morphology. Again, the labeling thing is a matter of convenience. We can recognise huge differences among cats, from Maine Coon cats to Egyptian Hairless icky nasty things, but after the age of 3 we rarely confuse them with dogs. The color spectrum analogy fits again--the folks at Crayola may agonize over whether a color is yellow-green or green-yellow, and what percentage of which is present, but it is unlikely that greenish-yellowish will ever be confused with purple.

Basic evolution-in-the-classroom no longer uses the miraculous demo of speciation based on the horse lineage from Eocene to now?
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Is this a question? My answer is, I don't know, it has been decades since I have been in the appropriate classroom. Please, hammegk, could you give one more try to elaboration? Perhaps an entire paragraph, so I don't have to attempt to read your mind? What is the example? What is the problem with it? Is it a problem recognised within the evolutionary biology community, or a strawman from the ID side? Please flesh out your bones here. I would much rather agree or disagree with you once I actually know what you are saying.
 
Originally posted by Mercutio
It is now a matter of convenience--we can call something "Felis concolor" instead of "that thing over there with the teeth and the tail".
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That's true, but some theorists (Gould/Eldredge in particular) have placed considerable importance on the role played by speciation as a mechanism. Small changes which would tend to get washed out in a large, stable population may accrue in an isolated sub-population; if such a sub-population remains isolated long enough, variations in (say) chromosomal arrangements may prevent its members from producing fertile offspring with members of the ancestral population even if barriers to such interbreedings (by, say, the reconnecting of an island to the mainland) are removed. At this point, the 'biological species' definition will have been met -- but applying the color spectrum analogy offers plenty of opportunity to agonize over identifying the individual best representing the first bona fide member of the new species.
 
Dymanic said:
That's true, but some theorists (Gould/Eldredge in particular) have placed considerable importance on the role played by speciation as a mechanism. Small changes which would tend to get washed out in a large, stable population may accrue in an isolated sub-population; if such a sub-population remains isolated long enough, variations in (say) chromosomal arrangements may prevent its members from producing fertile offspring with members of the ancestral population even if barriers to such interbreedings (by, say, the reconnecting of an island to the mainland) are removed. At this point, the 'biological species' definition will have been met -- but applying the color spectrum analogy offers plenty of opportunity to agonize over identifying the individual best representing the first bona fide member of the new species.
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(underlining mine)

The need for an individual to represent a species is a function of the Linnaean system. Your example is spot-on in demonstrating that the real action is in population variability, and behavioral, morphological, and genetic differences resulting in the separation of two populations into what we may call separate species.

I don't know if there is any movement toward a new classification system that does not depend on a prototype. Perhaps Bug_Girl might know this.
 
Robin said:
No, it is quite useful since I haven't read Behe's book - only a couple of his articles.

When I heard the mousetrap analogy and the statement that a mousetrap without the catch would just not work, the first thought I had was - "yes it would - as a clipboard for receipts". So straight away I was not convinced that the irreducible complexity argument was as straightforward as the ID boys said it was.
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I thought about the TV show 'Connections' with James Burke. A caveman did not sit down and make a mouse trap. Metallurgy needed to be developed and wood working and tinkering tools needed to be developed and the various parts were likely all preexisting prior to the development of the mousetrap.


In one way I would not be too worried about this stuff being presented to school kids, I can imagine a class full of bright high schoolers tearing the mousetrap analogy to pieces in front of the hapless teacher suggesting humorous evolutionary pathways for it.
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It's not bright kids that we need to worry about although look at what Andrew Flew is saying. Also my friend who asked me to read this book is a pretty smart although a religious person and seemed pretty convinced of it's veracity. She however did not have an extensive background in biology.
 
Mercutio said:
The examples PCA has given you are rather remarkable in terms of how much change has occurred in such a short span of time.

I keep getting this image of a critic trying to review, say "Citizen Kane", based on 2 or 3 frames of film near the end, and saying "no, I am convinced that this cannot be the movie you say it is." For us to replicate natural selection in the laboratory, "from fins to proper legs", is quite literally asking us to condense millions of years into some convenient time-frame for human observation.

Fortunately, we have the ability to look at our particular "Citizen Kane" through the fossil record--still only a frame or two at a time, of course, so if you demand to see motion in a human time-frame you will not see it here. And we can look through the DNA record, but that is a bit more like reading the script--it is also not absolute proof that this thing was ever a motion picture.

The evidence is there, for those who do not choose to wear blinders.
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It's more like someone screening _Citizen Kane_ without the sound, and having his friend try to justify everything that is going on in the movie, through the scenery and physical actions of the actors alone. That's what Darwinian evolution is. I'm saying that there is something equivalent to "the sound" - some principle of nature equivalent to magnetism or gravity or optics or what-have-you - that is being overlooked, and that's why evolution can't be given such a devastatingly clinching argument for its existence as to bury the creationists.
 
CplFerro said:
It's more like someone screening _Citizen Kane_ without the sound, and having his friend try to justify everything that is going on in the movie, through the scenery and physical actions of the actors alone. That's what Darwinian evolution is. I'm saying that there is something equivalent to "the sound" - some principle of nature equivalent to magnetism or gravity or optics or what-have-you - that is being overlooked, and that's why evolution can't be given such a devastatingly clinching argument for its existence as to bury the creationists.
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Remarkable, then, that in the publish-or-perish world of science, that the evolutionary biologists who stand to make major names for themselves for finding this "overlooked something" aren't even looking for it.

Reminds me of all those physicists and biologists who are failing to look for that "life essence" or whatever Iacchus called it.

Doesn't it bother you that the people who know the most about natural selection, and for whom such a ground-breaking discovery would benefit them the most, are the ones who are satisfied that there is no such gaping hole in their accumulated knowledge? (See Project Steve for a more detailed explanation of why I would suggest such a blatant appeal to authority.)
 
Mercutio said:
Remarkable, then, that in the publish-or-perish world of science, that the evolutionary biologists who stand to make major names for themselves for finding this "overlooked something" aren't even looking for it.

Reminds me of all those physicists and biologists who are failing to look for that "life essence" or whatever Iacchus called it.

Doesn't it bother you that the people who know the most about natural selection, and for whom such a ground-breaking discovery would benefit them the most, are the ones who are satisfied that there is no such gaping hole in their accumulated knowledge? (See Project Steve for a more detailed explanation of why I would suggest such a blatant appeal to authority.)
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It's only remarkable in the sense that virtually all scientists today operate within a certain Enlightenment-era materialism. Someone like Gauss, Fresnel, or Alexander Gurwitsch (discoverer of biophotonic radiation) are more in the Renaissance tradition that tends to deny materialism in favour of a kind of geometric approach. Thus, Darwinians can swim around in their fishbowl forever and never find the answer.
 
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