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Originally posted by

Reed Hanson

Thank you to Dr Wise and Dr Vogel for their interesting article on ID and Darwinian theory...

There is no such thing as "Darwinian theory," nor does this article mention such a thing. Maybe you are replying to some other article, or replying to something you imagined.

First, it is my understanding that the authors had the intent of giving brief, simply stated examples to a broad audience (for the most part, not scientists), not spending a few hours writing a long, boring-to-many article about a flagellum's parts becoming whole over the course of millions of years.

Second, there is no explanation of how things began. You can't simply say, there was an Intelligent Designer and he always was and always will be. There is no evidence to that except an imagination and a good fairy tale. I guess SMU's scientists are more reputable in that they don't make up stories about things they don't understand. They pursue answers to the things we don't understand, and they believe in physical, real, evidence.

Third, everyone ought to read the Wedge Document. You'll note that the DI is simply hungry for power, and like many in the world today, will do whatever it takes to get to where they want to be, regardless. I have faith that we have more sense, however, and will not be brain-washed by a few people with an agenda.

Originally posted by

Reed Hanson

Thank you to Dr Wise and Dr Vogel for their interesting article on ID and Darwinian theory...

However, I must ask a few questions:

First, if the flagellum can still function with only 10 of its 50 parts, this still does not disprove irreducible complexity. For natural selection to work, it has to work at each point in the natural selection process. So it has to perform a function with 1 part, 2 parts, 3 parts, etc. If it fails at any point in this chain of events before it becomes a full-fledged flagellum, it has dealt a serious blow to natural selection. Just because its true in a couple instances in a long, necessary chain of events does not make it true of the whole. The authors of this article are guilty of a fallacy of composition.

Secondly, even if you assume that Darwinian evolution by natural selection etc is TRUE, what do you offer as the explanation for how such undirected processes came into existence? Did the laws of physics and biology and chemistry just always exist? In my experience, it has never occurred to me (and I've never heard a scientist claim) that the laws simply invented themselves. So where did they come from? This is the fundamental problem with all naturalistic philosophies and theories. They can explain each process or law with a more fundamental law, but they still cannot then explain the more fundamental law without invoking a still further fundamental law. And the cycle becomes endless. What happened that caused our most fundamental laws of science to exist? And thus we have a mighty question that science is unable to answer.

"Irreducible complexity" rests on the misconception that evolution can only operate by a step by step addition of "parts." Leaving aside the fact that Behe never really defines exactly what a "part" is, evolution can also work by subtraction or modification of proteins, organs, whatever. It also doesn't have to have a particular function as an end point. Modification of whatever you want to call a "part" can co-opt something with one function for a completely different function. These facts essentially nullify Behe's entire thesis.

As to your second question, while we know as Christians that God is ultimately responsible for everything, the only proper scientific answer one can give is "We don't know how." Leaving aside the fact that this question is completely outside the realm of biology, let alone evolution, acknowledging God from a religious point of view contributes nothing from a scientific point of view, and this whole thing is allegedly about what we can conclude scientifically, not what may ultimately be "The Truth." It's dangerous to harbor one's faith in areas of ignorance.

Originally posted by

Reed Hanson

Thank you to Dr Wise and Dr Vogel for their interesting article on ID and Darwinian theory...

However, I must ask a few questions:

First, if the flagellum can still function with only 10 of its 50 parts, this still does not disprove irreducible complexity. For natural selection to work, it has to work at each point in the natural selection process. So it has to perform a function with 1 part, 2 parts, 3 parts, etc. If it fails at any point in this chain of events before it becomes a full-fledged flagellum, it has dealt a serious blow to natural selection. Just because its true in a couple instances in a long, necessary chain of events does not make it true of the whole. The authors of this article are guilty of a fallacy of composition.

Secondly, even if you assume that Darwinian evolution by natural selection etc is TRUE, what do you offer as the explanation for how such undirected processes came into existence? Did the laws of physics and biology and chemistry just always exist? In my experience, it has never occurred to me (and I've never heard a scientist claim) that the laws simply invented themselves. So where did they come from? This is the fundamental problem with all naturalistic philosophies and theories. They can explain each process or law with a more fundamental law, but they still cannot then explain the more fundamental law without invoking a still further fundamental law. And the cycle becomes endless. What happened that caused our most fundamental laws of science to exist? And thus we have a mighty question that science is unable to answer.

Two quick points. The prediction of irreducible complexity (IC) is an effort to falsify evolutionary theory, and in fact, comes directly from a passage written by Darwin. Even if IC is found to be true (and so far it seems to be false), disproving an alternative theory (evolution) does not make your theory (ID) automatically correct. This is truly a logical fallacy. I await the publication, in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, on even ONE ID predictive hypothesis, experiment, and result that provides POSITIVE proof for ID. Disputing evolution is not proof of ID; ID will have to have positive evidence in its favor before one scientist will bother to consider it seriously.

Second, isn't is hypocritical to accuse scientists of being "unable to answer" questions (a fact scientists freely admit), when at the same time ID "theorists" declare repeatedly that the designer's identity, timing, and mechanisms employed are off-limits to further discussion? Why is it OK to have no answers for fundamental questions on one side, but not OK to say "I don't know" when that is simply a statement of current scientific reality?

Originally posted by

Reed Hanson

Thank you to Dr Wise and Dr Vogel for their interesting article on ID and Darwinian theory...

However, I must ask a few questions:

First, if the flagellum can still function with only 10 of its 50 parts, this still does not disprove irreducible complexity.

This is what is known as "moving the goalposts." It is often done by those in this 'debate' when one of their 'challenges' has been met.
Rather than admit that the challenge has been met, simply change the challenge and voila! The challenger can still claim 'victory'. [quote]

For natural selection to work, it has to work at each point in the natural selection process. So it has to perform a function with 1 part, 2 parts, 3 parts, etc. If it fails at any point in this chain of events before it becomes a full-fledged flagellum, it has dealt a serious blow to natural selection. [/quote]
First, I have to wonder who declared or decided that selection muust work at each of those steps, and who decided that each 'intermediate' must have had some function.
Second, I see that you have totally misunderstood a basic concept of evolution - their is no goal. Some cell lacking a flagellum did not say to itself one day, "Gee, I sure would like a flagellum. Now, I will start the evolution process so that my descendants will have one." And the 'intermediates' produced via mutation were not "selected" because they were on their way to becoming a flagellum. [quote]


Just because its true in a couple instances in a long, necessary chain of events does not make it true of the whole.[/quote]
And just because it may not be true in one instance does not mean it is false in all instances. [quote]

The authors of this article are guilty of a fallacy of composition.
[/quote]
And you are guilty of, at the very least, the strawman fallacy.[quote]
Secondly, even if you assume that Darwinian evolution by natural selection etc is TRUE, what do you offer as the explanation for how such undirected processes came into existence? Did the laws of physics and biology and chemistry just always exist? In my experience, it has never occurred to me (and I've never heard a scientist claim) that the laws simply invented themselves.[/quote]
I see you do not understand the concept of 'scientific laws' either.

They are not called 'laws' because someone or something decided what they should be, they are called 'laws' because what they describe is not seen to differ regardless of the conditions. We refer to gravity as the 'law of gravity' because we have yet to observe an instance in which it does not exist. That is not because somebody one day said "I think I will make masses attract each other, and I call this a Law, a Law of Gravity!"


Of course, none of this has anything to do with evolution, which is another logical fallacy, the fallacy of conflation.

To Reed Hanson,
Re your 1st point about the necessary chain, yes its possible that the chain may fail at some point, but the creationists claim that the removal of ANY part (or parts presumably) would render the system useless. This claim has been disproved by the observation cited. Now you would like to shift the burden of proof, by insisting on an explanation of EVERY single step. Perhaps this can be done, perhaps not. In the mean time, the steps that HAVE been tested have continued to support the hypothesis. Perhaps the creationists would like to come to the party and locate the impossible step for us.

Re the 2nd bit about "where did the laws come from?" etc etc. Much the same reply: you insist on a complete explanation for every law of nature, every atom. Perhaps these were given by the big fella in the sky, so Evolution could then do its stuff. It has no bearing on the correctness or otherwise of Evolution (or any other bits of science).

Originally posted by

Reed Hanson

Thank you to Dr Wise and Dr Vogel for their interesting article on ID and [evolutionary] theory...

However, I must ask a few questions:

First, if the flagellum can still function with only 10 of its 50 parts, this still does not disprove irreducible complexity. For natural selection to work, it has to work at each point in the natural selection process. So it has to perform a function with 1 part, 2 parts, 3 parts, etc. If it fails at any point in this chain of events before it becomes a full-fledged flagellum, it has dealt a serious blow to natural selection. Just because its true in a couple instances in a long, necessary chain of events does not make it true of the whole. The authors of this article are guilty of a fallacy of composition.

Mr. Reed, brings up a great point. This doesn't falsify ID. In fact ID theory's central claim- these irreducible complexities arose from a designer- is not testable. This is why ID is not scientific. Drs. Wise and Vogel did however, show that what we may perceive as irreducible complexities are in fact reducible.
You are also guilty of setting a strawman. Evolutionary process is by "descent with modification." (i.e. the fin of a dolphin is the modification of their ancestor's forearms which were used for walking) What we may observe as the critical components of the flagellum served different functions prior to origin of the flagellum.

ID proponents repeatedly claim evolutionary process is undirected, but evolution is driven by natural selection. This claim in contrast is testable