Evolution is about HOW, not WHO

[arendt]

Evolution is about HOW, not WHO
by arendt

As many scientists have pointed out, the Intelligent Design (ID) argument
strongly resembles a classic cartoon of a scientist standing in front of
a blackboard full of equations and one arrow labelled "and then a miracle
occurs". In other words, ID is such a bad way to do science, it is a joke.

The whole point of science is mechanism and reproducibility. If the
phenomenon in question can't be reproduced, it can't be studied. That's
why parapsychology has such a tough time being accepted as science.

For an theory to be scientific, it must make "falsifiable" predictions; and
the experiments or observations that support the theory must be reproducible.
In the case of evolution, the time scale is very long. So, most theories will
be based on observation. (Although, bacteria evolve fast enough to do
experiments.)

Here is an example of observation-based evolutionary science: someone
discovers an old skull and makes claims about it, other scientists examining
that single skull must be able to reproduce those claims (date it by radio-isotopes,
measure its volume, observe the grinding marks on the teeth, etc., fit it into
all the other observed facts about skulls).

Notice that for a theory to be valid, scientists don't look to WHO proposed the theory;
they look at HOW the theory explains and predicts facts.

If the ID people could supply the MECHANISM that their god has used to actively
intervene in the natural process of evolution or of the creation of the universe (big bang),
that would be science. Saying that because we can't explain something, god did it -
that is not science. By that reasoning, saying in 1800 that "spontaneous generation"
was a mystery would have been ID. Unfortunately for these fictitious Napoleonic-era IDers,
50 years later, Pasteur proposed the germ theory of disease and produced experiments
to verify it.

If the ID people had one shred of scientific integrity, they would undertake a scientific
research program to uncover the MECHANISM by which their creator caused evolution
to happen. But, of course, they have no integrity. They are fighting the classic rearguard
action against the truth. Two hundred years ago, they argued for instantaneous creation
of all species, which remained fixed for all of history. When fossil EVIDENCE and
millions of previously-unknown species made that argument ridiculous, they switched
to a guerilla war against science, otherwise known as fundamentalism.

As Sam Harris recounts in "The End of Faith", religious types rush to put forward
EVIDENCE in their favor, like the Shroud of Turin. But, when the evidence is against
them (like the carbon dating of the Shroud of Turin), out comes the FAITH card.
They then claim that they have FAITH that the EVIDENCE will eventually, someday,
prove them right. This double standard about evidence is at the bottom of all the posing
and posturing about ID being science. Science demands EVIDENCE, not FAITH.

So, the next time some IDer opens his mouth, ask him HOW god caused Intelligent
Design to happen over billions of years of time. This ought to blow fuses. Since the
"god created all species in the first six days" argument is out of bounds by the very
premise of ID, they must talk about how god actively intervened. But the interventions
would have to be at minute statistical levels in order not to already have been found.
Basically, the IDers are looking for a biological equivalent of the "ether" in which
electromagnetic waves were believed to propagate before Einstein.

Wouldn't it be simpler, in the sense of the beloved-by-scientists Occam's Razor, to
assume that god arranged the laws of the universe so that these minute statistical
interventions occurred naturally (god as the clockmaker of the universe, not the
grubby mechanic of billions of species' DNA code)? Of course, the IDers reject that
theory, because it is Deism (you know, the religion of America's Founding Fathers).

What the average deliberately-miseducated person doesn't understand about science
is that it is a million-dimensional jigsaw puzzle. There is very little "wiggle room" to
change one single fact without disturbing millions of other observations in hundreds
of scientific sub-disciplines. The IDers want the freedom to write "hippopotamus"
into the crossword when the clue says "personal vehicle, 3 letters" and the crossed word
is "dawn".

And, that is when you need to call them. Attacking the incompleteness of other theories
is not a theory. It is not science. They have to be made to put up (a falsifiable theory)
and some EVIDENCE to support it, or they have to shut up.

Just remember, HOW, not WHO. EVIDENCE, not FAITH.

[JDPriestly]

1. Excellent. I recommend it.

[silverweb]

2. Thank you!

You have clarified the crux of the debate in irrefutable terms. If you don't mind, I'm saving this for future reference to use as needed (with proper credit, of course).

[arendt]

3. That's why I wrote it: a soundbite for science n/t

[HereSince1628]

4. You do realize the lack of mechanism that makes evolution vulnerable?

At least I hope you do.

For all our understanding of genetics and vertical and horizontal transmission of heritable material in the various types of biotic entities on/in this planet, the crux of the issue, speciation is woefully short on evidence of mechanism.

Many posters on DU and elsewhere have a very incomplete understanding of evolutionary biology in general and accept without question the idea that accumulation of genetic change in a population leads to speciation. Well, that is too simplistic. It is possible to have much genetic change without speciation.

Stephen J. Gould went to his grave having a written a major opus on his understanding of the structure of evolutionary theory. One of his major disappointments in tens of hundreds of pages is that the event of speciation remains very very much still to be understood.

The great evidence of evolution is that biotic processes of everything is so very much much the same and yet there is so much diversity.

The great evidence IS NOT the demonstration of one or several mechanisms of speciation.

[arendt]

5. Good point, but I think I covered that...

by the "million-dimensional jigsaw" (your similarity
of biotic processes).

We now have hundreds of species complete genomes. You
can do mathematical analysis that generates a relationship
(i.e., evolutionary) tree among these species that corresponds
to what we know about species from field work.

Yes, speciation is still unknown. But there are emerging
clues. For instance, it is clear that two creatures will
not produce off-spring if the number of chromosomes in the
two are not equal. The un-paired chromosomes usually abort
the genetic program.

Also, it has recently been shown that there are certain
enzymes which can actually up-regulate the mutation rate
by down-regulating the proof-reading of DNA copying.

----

I agreee with your assessment. I just don't see how to get
the distinction you are making into the heads of people who
think "survivor" is thought-provoking. That's why I keep to
soundbite slogans, just like the other side.

arendt

[HereSince1628]

8. Don't over-interpret clasdistic analysis of the biomolecular data.

Yes, it reveals that diversity shows genetic relatedness.

Nonmolecular date is consistent with the same thing.

Indeed every form of evidence supporting macroevolution reveals that variations exist. So much so that virtually every biologist and I think that macroevolution is very well evidenced.

But I'll go out on a limb and say NONE of the cladistic data I am aware of is adequate to reveal a mechanism.

In general, analysis of genetic and gene-product sequences can best be explained by relatedness. But relatedness does not show the mechanism, it says much about the result.

We don't yet have a way of determining which genetic changes were critical to macroevolution. We don't have the means to evaluate the significance of molecular genetics of paleospecies or even neospecies in population/ecological contexts that would allow us to appreciate the functional (mechanistic) significance of individual or groups of genetic differences that generate macroevolutionary diversity.

That's both unfortunate for the theory and intriguing to biologists who believe in mechanisms and damn well want to be able to discuss mechanisms but can't. At least, yet.

The answer still lies within the noise. Evaluating what gene product's gene sequence is is less important with respect to macroevolution than other variations of gene products is currently beyond us. Face it, we currently appreciate the function of variant gene products in retrospect...we suppose those things that worked in the context of speciation/divergence were propagated...other things weren't. But we can't tell which were key to the event.

If we could actually appreciate the function of a gene product in the context of the population/community ecological events on which divergence of type (speciation) also depends we could perhaps judge some genetic changes as important and others as irrelavent.

But we can't.

Evidence of the results of macroevolution are abundant. Evidence of the specific mechanisms that macroevolution employed is not.

[arendt]

10. I think we agree, with different emphasis...

we agree that none of the data shows a MECHANISM.

And as you point out, that is what makes evolution
and the big bang vulnerable to ID.

But, as the old saying goes, "absence of evidence
is not evidence of absence".

The points you are raising are valid scientific points.
BUT, they make Joe Average's eyes glaze over. We have
to get to them with something simple: EVIDENCE vs FAITH.
HOW vs WHO.

I don't think you disagree. It sounds like you might
have gotten ambushed by the tricky rhetoric the IDers
have crafted. I saw a story about how science museums
were giving training to their guides in order to counter
ID fanatics interrupting tours with their rantings.

My position is that the minute you get down to specifics,
you've lost. You have to keep the argument on the level
of "what is science? what is a theory?"

As they teach in philosophy class, "If I accept your premise,
I've already lost the argument." I refuse to discuss specifics
with IDers. They are not scientists.

arendt

[HereSince1628]

14. I am pretty sure we agree on the science, but after that...well...

we do have differences of opinion.

I really think it is a mistake for science to cast its explanations within the limits of Joe Average's training and intellectual ability.

In this respect I support scientists who refuse to enter into political debates about subjects for which the political system has no jurisdiction.

Interpreting what is known about science per se, is the job of science educators and science entertainers not scientists.

Most people don't ever study evolution in anything like a serious manner. Most people who attend college and actually take a biology course will only experience evolution as several lectures in a 15 week semester. I know I spent a career teaching undergraduate biology. It is, in fact, simply impossible to adequately expose the average student to elementary principles of population biology involved in evolution in that time frame. Considering that evolution will get a similar treatment in the single high school biology course that Joe Average takes, we arrive (disappointingly) at the conclusion that most Americans have at most TEN to FIFTEEN class periods of formal education on the topic of evolution and much of it was redundant and at a introductory level.

You certainly wouldn't call yourself informed on early English literature if the only thing you knew about it were late night readings and supporting Clift notes for Beowulf and several of the Canterbury tales.

You wouldn't call yourself informed in computer science if you had learned how to sum a column of numbers in Quattro Pro.

After school, the Average Joe hasn't the freedom or the interest to spend thousands of hours needed to deal with the nuances of biotic phenomena that impose on evolution (just look at all the DUers that write blithely about viral mutation and are completely ignorant of the recombinatory processes that are much more likely to produce a human to human transferred variant of avian flu). Understanding evolution cannot really be expected of the Average Joe.

What Joe Average knows about advances is evolution is acquired mostly through television documentaries and the odd popular science article in newspapers and journals. Which is to say that Joe Average knows about the same amount of the weaknesses of evolution as most Creationists know about the failings of Intelligent Design. If you know more than that you sure as hell are not Joe Average with respect to understanding the phylogenesis of biotic diversity on planet earth.

And Science really is not the issue. Intelligent Design is a political tool, promoted by a fundamental wing of a limited number of western religious movements primarily for use in the American legal system. The intent of its application is to prevent the products of the enlightenment (secular explanations) from completely displacing the utility of and opportunity for the existance of institutions (and their fruits) that are based on myth, superstition, and metaphysical belief.

[StClone]

6. Evolution is a description of what is observed but ID is

created by stupid people to legitimize a (religious) view. Science versus an agenda driven "theory".

[arendt]

7. Don't language it that way, you are buying into their frame

What they have is not a scientific theory. It is
not even a layperson's theory. It is basically
"I give up, its too hard for me to figure out."

Do not allow these political operatives to politicize
the neutral language of science. ID is not a theory.
It is not falsifiable. It makes no testable propositions.

ID is not science.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

arendt

[progressoid]

9. La la la la la la la - I can't hear yoooooou.

:hide: I'm gonna stay right here in my bunker and wait for the lawd to strike you down.

[arendt]

11. Is that "lawd" or "lard"? Is Limbaugh after me? n/t

[progressoid]

15. Same thing? Doesn't Rush think he's god?

Actually, my la la la la reference was kinda personal. I get the "lets not talk about it" at home all the time.

But its also true of a lot of Christians (liberal ones too). They prefer to see the IDers as loonies but don't want to investigate why that is. Too much analysis might cause a revelation that their own beliefs are...well...loony.

[mike_c]

12. good post-- kicked and recommended....

--Mike C. Biologist and evolutionist.

[arendt]

13. front page kick n/t