Nathan Lents in USA Today: Evolution is Certain

Darwin’s Dangerous Idea

In a recent USA Today opinion piece evolutionist Nathan Lents states that the human race has “evolved through a long line of ancestry that connects with all other living things going back nearly 4 billion years.” And if there was any doubt, Lents later clarifies that it is “the undeniable scientific truth that the human population evolved from ancestor ape species and shares common descent with all living things.” Simply put, Lents is stating that evolution is an undeniable scientific truth.

This claim of high certainty is nothing new. From the Epicureans in antiquity, to their modern descendants, mandates of a strictly naturalistic origins have consistently been foisted with no less confidence. Lents’ certainty is the rule, not only for today’s evolutionists, but in the long history of Epicurean thought.

One immediate sign of trouble is that such claims of certainty are inevitably in conflict. For example, proponents of monergistic and synergistic theories of the origin of the Solar System (where the Sun and planets formed simultaneously or in sequence, respectively), were both certain their theories were correct. But they cannot both be right. As Dire Straits put it, “Two men say they’re Jesus, one of them must be wrong.”

Lack of detail is another sign of trouble. How can we be certain of theories which gloss over a host of details, and really are little more than just-so stories?

But it gets worse. For inevitably, such claims of certainty are made about theories that make little scientific sense. Daniel Bernoulli was certain the solar system resulted from the solar atmosphere forcing the planets into the ecliptic. Bernoulli was a brilliant scientist, but in this case, not so much. The irony is that he chose to express absolute confidence in what was undoubtedly the biggest blunder of his career.

It is no different with evolutionists today. They are absolutely certain, but their certainty is exceeded only by their inability to defend their theory. Evolution has left a trail of failed predictions. And with each failure the theory becomes more contorted, complex, and mysterious. There is no explanation, beyond mere hand-waving, of how the entire biological world is supposed to have arisen by itself—spontaneously. The idea is a scientific failure.

All of this leads to the inevitable question of why. Why do Lents and the epicureans make such claims? Surely they must know better.

Indeed they do know better, or at least should know better. There simply is no question that Lents and his fellow evolutionists are aware of the science. In a very real sense they are without excuse. They massively misrepresent the science, and it is tempting to brand them as liars and be done with it. And indeed, in a sense they are liars—they make ridiculously false claims and they know it. Given their training and experience, there simply is no way they could be innocently naïve of the basic scientific facts they so consistently contradict with complete assurance.

But to stop there would superficial. Anyone who knows evolutionists knows they do not easily fit into the liar category. To begin with, evolutionists really do believe what they say. A liar makes statements he knows are false.

So how can evolutionists understand the science and yet believe evolution is true? The answer is a long story but, suffice it to say, it is a story about religion. What we are dealing with here is much more complicated than a simple lie. And much more dangerous.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

Centrobin Found to be Important in Sperm Development

Numerous, Successive, Slight Modifications

Proteins are a problem for theories of spontaneous origins for many reasons. They consist of dozens, or often hundreds, or even thousands of amino acids in a linear sequence, and while many different sequences will do the job, that number is tiny compared to the total number of sequences that are possible. It is a proverbial needle-in-the-haystack problem, far beyond the reach of blind searches. To make matters worse, many proteins are overlapping, with portions of their genes occupying the same region of DNA. The same set of mutations would have to result in not one, but two proteins, making the search problem that much more tricky. Furthermore, many proteins perform multiple functions. Random mutations somehow would have to find those very special proteins that can perform double duty in the cell. And finally, many proteins perform crucial roles within a complex environment. Without these proteins the cell sustains a significant fitness degradation. One protein that fits this description is centrobin, and now a new study shows it to be even more important than previously understood.

Centrobin is a massive protein of almost a thousand amino acids. Its importance in the division of animal cells has been known for more than ten years. An important player in animal cell division is the centrosome organelle which organizes the many microtubules—long tubes which are part of the cell’s cytoskeleton. Centrobin is one of the many proteins that helps the centrosome do its job. Centrobin depletion causes “strong disorganization of the microtubule network,” and impaired cell division.

Now, a new study shows just how important centrobin is in the development of the sperm tail. Without centrobin, the tail, or flagellum, development is “severely compromised.” And once the sperm is formed, centrobin is important for its structural integrity. As the paper concludes:

Our results underpin the multifunctional nature of [centrobin] that plays different roles in different cell types in Drosophila, and they identify [centrobin] as an essential component for C-tubule assembly and flagellum development in Drosophila spermatogenesis.

Clearly centrobin is an important protein. Without it such fundamental functions as cell division and organism reproduction are severely impaired.

And yet how did centrobin evolve?

Not only is centrobin a massive protein, but there are no obvious candidate intermediate structures. It is not as though we have that “long series of gradations in complexity” that Darwin called for:

Although the belief that an organ so perfect as the eye could have been formed by natural selection, is enough to stagger any one; yet in the case of any organ, if we know of a long series of gradations in complexity, each good for its possessor, then, under changing conditions of life, there is no logical impossibility in the acquirement of any conceivable degree of perfection through natural selection.

Unfortunately, in the case of centrobin, we do not know of such a series. In fact, centrobin would seem to be a perfectly good example of precisely how Darwin said his theory could be falsified:

If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. But I can find out no such case.  

Darwin could “find out no such case,” but he didn’t know about centrobin. Darwin required “a long series of gradations,” formed by “numerous, successive, slight modifications.”

With centrobin we are nowhere close to fulfilling these requirements. In other words, today’s science falsifies evolution. This, according to Darwin’s own words.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

Meet Jamie Jensen: What Are They Teaching at Brigham Young University?

Bacterial Resistance to Antibiotics

Rachel Gross’ recent article about evolutionist’s public outreach contains several misconceptions that are, unfortunately, all too common. Perhaps most obvious is the mythological Warfare Thesis that Gross and her evolutionary protagonists heavily rely on. Plumbing the depths of ignorance, Gross writes:

Those who research the topic call this paradigm the “conflict mode” because it pits religion and science against each other, with little room for discussion. And researchers are starting to realize that it does little to illuminate the science of evolution for those who need it most.

“Those who research the topic call this paradigm the ‘conflict mode’”?

Huh?

This is reminiscent of Judge Jones endorsement of Inherit the Wind as a primer for understanding the origins debate, for it is beyond embarrassing. Exactly who are those “who research the topic” to which Gross refers?

Gross is apparently blithely unaware that there are precisely zero such researchers. The “conflict mode” is a long-discarded, failed view of history promoted in Inherit the Wind, a two-dimensional, upside-down rewrite of the 1925 Monkey Trial.

But ever since, evolutionists have latched onto the play, and the mythological history it promotes, in an unabashed display of anti-intellectualism. As Lawrence Principe has explained:

The notion that there exists, and has always existed, a “warfare” or “conflict” between science and religion is so deeply ingrained in public thinking that it usually goes unquestioned. The idea was however largely the creation of two late nineteenth-century authors who confected it for personal and political purposes. Even though no serious historians of science acquiesce in it today, the myth remains powerful, and endlessly repeated, in wider circles

Or as Jeffrey Russell writes:

The reason for promoting both the specific lie about the sphericity of Earth and the general lie that religion and science are in natural and eternal conflict in Western society, is to defend Darwinism. The answer is really only slightly more complicated than that bald statement.

Rachel Gross is, unfortunately, promoting the “general lie” that historians have long since been warning of. Her article is utter nonsense. The worst of junk news.

But it gets worse.

Gross next approvingly quotes Brigham Young University associate professor Jamie Jensen whose goal is to inculcate her students with Epicureanism. “Acceptance is my goal,” says Jensen, referring to her teaching of spontaneous origins in her Biology 101 class at the Mormon institution.

As we have explained many times, this is how evolutionists think. Explaining their anti-scientific, religious beliefs is not enough. You must believe. As Jensen explains:

By the end of Biology 101, they can answer all the questions really well, but they don’t believe a word I say. If they don’t accept it as being real, then they’re not willing to make important decisions based on evolution — like whether or not to vaccinate their child or give them antibiotics.

Whether or not to give their child antibiotics?

As we have discussed many times before, the equating of “evolution” with bacterial resistance to antibiotics is an equivocation and bait-and-switch.

The notion that one must believe in evolution to understand bacterial resistance to antibiotics is beyond absurd.

It not only makes no sense; it masks the monumental empirical contradictions that bacterial antibiotic resistance presents to evolution. As a university life science professor, Jensen is of course well aware of these basic facts of biology.

And she gets paid to teach people’s children?

Religion drives science, and it matters.

Rewrite the Textbooks (Again), Origin of Mitochondria Blown Up

There You Go Again

Why are evolutionists always wrong? And why are they always so sure of themselves? With the inexorable march of science, the predictions of evolution, which evolutionists were certain of, just keep on turning out false. This week’s failure is the much celebrated notion that the eukaryote’s power plant—the mitochondria—shares a common ancestor with the alphaproteobacteria. A long time ago, as the story goes, that bacterial common ancestor merged with an early eukaryote cell. And these two entities, as luck would have it, just happened to need each other. Evolution had just happened to create that early bacterium, and that early eukaryote, in such a way that they needed, and greatly benefited from, each other. And, as luck would have it again, these two entities worked together. The bacterium would just happen to produce the chemical energy needed by the eukaryote, and the eukaryote would just happen to provide needed supplies. It paved the way for multicellular life with all of its fantastic designs. There was only one problem: the story turned out to be false.

The story that mitochondria evolved from the alphaproteobacteria lineage has been told with great conviction. Consider the Michael Gray 2012 paper which boldly begins with the unambiguous truth claim that “Viewed through the lens of the genome it contains, the mitochondrion is of unquestioned bacterial ancestry, originating from within the bacterial phylum α-Proteobacteria (Alphaproteobacteria).”

There was no question about it. Gray was following classic evolutionary thinking: similarities mandate common origin. That is the common descent model. Evolutionists say that once one looks at biology through the lens of common descent everything falls into place.

Except that it doesn’t.

Over and over evolutionists have to rewrite their theory. Similarities once thought to have arisen from a common ancestor turn out to contradict the common descent model. Evolutionists are left having to say the similarities must have arisen independently.

And big differences, once thought to show up only in distant species, keep on showing up in allied species.

Biology, it turns out, is full of one-offs, special cases, and anomalies. The evolutionary tree model doesn’t work.

Now, a new paper out this week has shown that the mitochondria and alphaproteobacteria don’t line up the way originally thought. That “unquestioned bacterial ancestry” turns out to be, err, wrong.

The paper finds that mitochondria did not evolve from the currently hypothesized alphaproteobacterial ancestor, or from “any other currently recognized alphaproteobacterial lineage.”

The paper does, however, make a rather startling claim. The authors write:

our analyses indicate that mitochondria evolved from a proteobacterial lineage that branched off before the divergence of all sampled alphaproteobacteria.

Mitochondria evolved from a proteobacterial lineage, predating the alphaproteobacteria?

That is a startling claim because, well, simply put there is no evidence for it. The lack of evidence is exceeded only by the evolutionist’s confidence. Note the wording: “indicate.”

The evolutionist’s analyses indicate this new truth.

How can the evolutionists be so sure of themselves in the absence of literally any evidence?

The answer is, because they are evolutionists. They are completely certain that evolution is true. And since evolution must be true, the mitochondria had to have evolved from somewhere. And the same is true for the alphaproteobacteria. They must have evolved from somewhere.

And in both cases, that somewhere must be the earlier proteobacterial lineage. There are no other good evolutionary candidates.

Fortunately this new claim cannot be tested (and therefore cannot be falsified), because the “proteobacterial lineage” is nothing more than an evolutionary construct. Evolutionists can search for possible extant species for hints of a common ancestor with the mitochondria, but failure to find anything can always be ascribed to extinction of the common ancestor.

This is where evolutionary theory often ends up: failures ultimately lead to unfalsifiable truth claims. Because heaven forbid we should question the theory itself.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

The Unauthorized Answers to Jerry Coyne’s Blog

What Your Biology Teacher Didn’t Tell You

Jerry Coyne’s website (Why Evolution Is True) has posed study questions for learning about evolution. Evolutionists have responded in the “Comment” section with answers to some of the questions (see here, here, and here). But when I posted a few relevant thoughts, they were quickly deleted after briefly appearing. That’s unfortunate because those facts can help readers to understand evolution. Here is what I posted:

Well the very first question is question begging:

“Why is the concept of homology crucial for even being able to talk about organic structure?”

It isn’t. We are “able to talk about organic structure” without reference to homology. In fact, if you are interested in biology, you can do more than mere talk. Believe it or not you actually can investigate how organic structure works, without even referencing homology. The question reveals the underlying non-scientific Epicureanism at work. This is not to say homology is not an important concept and area of study. Of course it is. But it is absurd to claim it is required even merely to talk about organic structure. Let’s try another:

“What is Darwin’s explanation for homology?”

Darwin’s explanation for homology is that it is a consequence of common descent. He repeatedly argues that homologous structures provide good examples of non-adaptive patterns as well as disutility, thus confirming common descent by virtue of falsifying the utilitarianism-laden doctrine of creation. See for example pp. 199-200, where Darwin concludes:

“Thus, we can hardly believe that the webbed feet of the upland goose or of the frigate-bird are of special use to these birds; we cannot believe that the same bones in the arm of the monkey, in the fore leg of the horse, in the wing of the bat, and in the flipper of the seal, are of special use to these animals. We may safely attribute these structures to inheritance.”

Pure metaphysics, and ignoring the enormous problem that non-adaptive patterns cause for evolutionary theory. Oh my. Well, let’s try another:

“How does Darwin’s account of serial homology (the resemblance of parts within an organism, for example, the forelimbs to the hindlimbs, or of a cervical vertebra to a thoracic vertebra) depend on the repetition of parts or segmentation?”

Hilarious. It’s a wonderful example of teleology, just-so-stories, and metaphysics, so characteristic of the genre, all wrapped up in a single passage (pp. 437-8). Darwin goes into a typical rant of how designs and patterns (serial homologies in this case) absolutely refute utilitarianism. “How inexplicable are these facts on the ordinary view of creation!,” he begins. Pure metaphysics.

He then provides a just-so story about how “we may readily believe that the unknown progenitor of the vertebrata possessed many vertebræ,” etc., and that like any good breeder, natural selection “should have seized on a certain number of the primordially similar elements, many times repeated, and have adapted them to the most diverse purposes.”

Seized on? Wow, that natural selection sure is good—long live Aristotelianism. Gotta love this mythology.

This Didn’t Evolve a Few Mutations At a Time

Action Potentials

Are there long, gradual, pathways of functional intermediate structures, separated by only one or perhaps a few mutations, leading to every single species, and every single design and structure in all of biology? As we saw last time, this has been a fundamental claim and expectation of evolutionary theory which is at odds with the science.* If one mutation is rare, a lot of mutations are astronomically rare. For instance, if a particular mutation has a one-in-a-hundred million (one in 10^8) chance of occurring in a new individual, then a hundred such particular mutations have a one in 10^800 chance of occurring. It’s not going to happen. Let’s have a look at an example: nerve cells and their action potential signals.

[* Note: Some evolutionists have attempted to get around this problem with the neutral theory, but that just makes matters worse].

Nerve cells have a long tail which carries an electronic impulse. The tail can be several feet long and its signal might stimulate a muscle to action, control a gland, or report a sensation to the brain.

Like a cable containing thousands of different telephone wires, nerve cells are often bundled together to form a nerve. Early researchers considered that perhaps the electronic impulse traveled along the nerve cell tail like electricity in a wire. But they soon realized that the signal in nerve cells is too weak to travel very far. The nerve cell would need to boost the signal along the way for it to travel along the tail.

After years of research it was discovered that the signal is boosted by membrane proteins. First, there is a membrane protein that simultaneously pumps two potassium ions into the cell and three sodium ions out of the cell. This sets up a chemical gradient across the membrane. There is more potassium inside the cell than outside, and there is more sodium outside than inside. Also, there are more negatively charged ions inside the cell so there is a voltage drop (50-100 millivolt) across the membrane.

In addition to the sodium-potassium pump, there are also sodium channels and potassium channels. These membrane proteins allow sodium and potassium, respectively, to pass through the membrane. They are normally closed, but when the decaying electronic impulse travels along the nerve cell tail, it causes the sodium channels to quickly open. Sodium ions outside the cell then come streaming into the cell down the electro-chemical gradient. As a result, the voltage drop is reversed and the decaying electronic impulse, which caused the sodium channels to open, is boosted as it continues on its way along the nerve cell tail.

When the voltage goes from negative to positive inside the cell, the sodium channels slowly close and the potassium channels open. Hence the sodium channels are open only momentarily, and now with the potassium channels open, the potassium ions concentrated inside the cell come streaming out down their electro-chemical gradient. As a result the original voltage drop is reestablished.

This process repeats itself as the electronic impulse travels along the tail of the nerve cell, until the impulse finally reaches the end of the nerve cell. Although we’ve left out many details, it should be obvious that the process depends on the intricate workings of the three membrane proteins. The sodium-potassium pump helps set up the electro-chemical gradient, the electronic impulse is strong enough to activate the sodium channel, and then the sodium and potassium channels open and close with precise timing.

How, for example, are the channels designed to be ion-selective? Sodium is about 40% smaller than potassium so the sodium channel can exclude potassium if it is just big enough for sodium. Random mutations must have struck on an amino acid sequence that would fold up just right to provide the right channel size.

The potassium channel, on the other hand is large enough for both potassium, and sodium, yet it is highly efficient. It somehow excludes sodium almost perfectly (the potassium to sodium ratio is about 10000), yet allows potassium to pass through almost as if there were nothing in the way.

Nerve cells are constantly firing off in your body. They control your eyes as you read these words, and they send back the images you see on this page to your brain. They, along with chemical signals, control a multitude of processes in our bodies, and there is no scientific reason to think they gradually evolved, one mutation at time.

Indeed, that idea contradicts everything we know from the science. And yet this is what evolutionists believe. Let me repeat that: evolutionists believe nerve cells and their action potential designs evolved one mutation at time. Indeed, evolutionists believe this is a proven fact, beyond all reasonable doubt.

It would be difficult to imagine a more absurd claim. So let’s have a look at the details of this line of thinking. Here is a recent paper from the Royal Society, representing the state of the art in evolutionary thinking on this topic. The paper claims to provide a detailed explanation of how early evolution produced action potential technology.

Sounds promising, but when evolutionists speak of “details,” they have something slightly different in mind. Here are several passages from the paper which reveal that not only is there a lack of details, but that the study is thoroughly unscientific.

We propose that the next step in the evolution of eukaryote DCS [membrane depolarization (through uncontrolled calcium influx), contraction and secretion] coupling has been the recruitment of stretch-sensitive calcium channels, which allow controlled influx of calcium upon mechanical stress before the actual damage occurs, and thus anticipate the effects of membrane rupture.

The recruitment of calcium channels? And exactly who did the recruiting? Here the authors rely on vague terminology to paper over a host of problematic details of just how random mutations somehow performed this recruiting.

To prevent the actual rupture, the first role of mechanosensory Ca++ channels might have been to pre-activate components of the repair pathway in stretched membranes.

“To prevent”? Let’s spell out the logic a little more clearly. The authors are hypothesizing that these calcium channels evolved the ability to pre-activate the repair pathway “to prevent” actual rupture. By spelling out the logic a bit more clearly, we can see more easily the usual teleology at work. The evolution literature is full of teleology, and for good reason. Evolutionists are unable to formulate and express their ideas without it. The ever-present infinitive form is the tell-tale sign. Aristotelianism is dead—long live Aristotelianism.

As another anticipatory step, actomyosin might have been pre-positioned under the plasma membrane (hence the cortical actomyosin network detected in every eukaryotic cell) and might have also evolved direct sensitivity to stretch … Once its cortical position and mechanosensitivity were acquired, the actomyosin network could automatically fulfil an additional function: cell-shape maintenance—as any localized cell deformation would stretch the cortical actomyosin network and trigger an immediate compensatory contraction. This property would have arisen as a side-effect (a ‘spandrel’) of the presence of cortical actomyosin for membrane repair, and quickly proved advantageous.

An “anticipatory step”? “Pre-positioning”? Actomyosin “evolved” sensitivity to stretch? The position and mechanosensitivity “were acquired”? The network could “fulfil an additional function”? Sorry, but molecular machines (such as actomyosin) don’t “evolve” anything. There is more teleology packed into these few sentences than any medieval tract. And for good measure the authors also add the astonishing serendipity that this additional function “would have arisen as a side-effect.” That was lucky.

Once covering the cell cortex, the actomyosin network acquired the ability to deform the cell by localized contraction.

The actomyosin network “acquired the ability” to deform the cell by localized contraction? Smart move on the part of the network. But may we ask just how did that happen?

Based on the genomic study of the protist Naegleria which has a biphasic life cycle (alternating between an amoeboid and a flagellated phase), amoeboid locomotion has been proposed to be ancestral for eukaryotes. It might have evolved in confined interstitial environments, as it is particularly instrumental for cells which need to move through small, irregularly shaped spaces by exploratory deformation.

Amoeboid locomotion evolved “as it is particularly instrumental.” No infinitive form but this is no less teleological. Things don’t evolve because they are “instrumental.” What the authors fail to inform their readers of is that this would require an enormous number of random mutations.

One can hypothesize that, if stretch-sensitive calcium channels and cortical actomyosin were part of the ancestral eukaryotic molecular toolkit (as comparative genomics indicates), membrane deformation in a confined environment would probably trigger calcium influx by opening of stretch-sensitive channels, which would in turn induce broad actomyosin contraction across the deformed part of the cell cortex, global deformation and cell movement away from the source of pressure.

The concept of a “molecular toolkit” is standard in evolutionary thought, and another example teleological thinking.

One can thus propose that a simple ancestral form of amoeboid movement evolved as a natural consequence of the scenario outlined above for the origin of cortical actomyosin and the calcium–contraction coupling; once established, it could have been further elaborated.

Amoeboid movement evolved “as a natural consequence,” and “once established” was “further elaborated”? This is nothing more than teleological story-telling with no supporting evidence.

It is thus tempting to speculate that, once calcium signalling had gained control over primitive forms of amoeboid movement, the same signalling system started to modify ciliary beating, possibly for ‘switching’ between locomotor states.

Calcium signaling “gained control” and then “started to modify” ciliary beating “for ‘switching’ between locomotor states”? The “for switching” is yet another infinitive form, and “gained control” is an active move by the calcium signaling system. Pure, unadulterated, teleology.

Possibly, in ancestral eukaryotes calcium induced a relatively simple switch (such as ciliary arrest, as still seen in many animal cells and in Chlamydomonas in response to high Ca++ concentrations), which was then gradually modified into more subtle modulations of beating mode with a fast turnover of molecular actors mediated by differential addition, complementation and loss.

“Calcium induced a relatively simple switch”? Sorry, ions don’t induce switches, simple or otherwise. And the switch “was then gradually modified into more subtle modulations”? Note how the passive voice obviates those thorny details. The switch “was modified” conveniently omits the fact that such modification would have to occur via random mutation, one mutation at a time.

Alternatively, control of cilia by calcium could have evolved convergently—but such convergence would then have been remarkably ubiquitous, as there seems to be no eukaryotic flagellum that is not controlled by calcium in one way or another.

“Could have evolved convergently”? And exactly how would that happen? At least the authors then admit to the absurdity of that alternative.

Unfortunately, they lack such sensibility for the remainder of the paper. As we saw above, the paper is based on a sequence of teleological thinking. It falls into the evolutionary genre where evolution is taken, a priori, as a given. This going in assumption underwrites vast stretches of teleological thought, and cartoon-level story telling. Not only is there a lack of empirical support, but the genre is utterly unscientific, as revealed by even a mildly critical reading.

And needless to say, the paper does absolutely nothing to alleviate the problem we began with. The many leaps of logic and reasoning in the paper reveal all manner of monumental changes evolution requires to construct nerve cells and the action potential technology. We are not looking at a narrative of minute, gradual changes, each contributing to the overall fitness. Many, many simultaneous mutations are going to be needed. Even a conservative minimum number of 100 simultaneous mutations leads to the untenable result of a one in 10^800 chance of occurring.

It’s not going to happen. Religion drives science, and it matters.

Here is How Evolutionists Respond to the Evidence

Unresponsive

Mutations are rare and good ones are even more rare. One reason mutations are rare is because there are sophisticated error correction mechanisms in our cells. So according to evolution random mutations created correction mechanisms to suppress random mutations. And that paradox is only the beginning. Because error correction mechanisms, as with pretty much everything else in biology, require many, many mutations to be created. If one mutation is rare, a lot of mutations are astronomically rare. For instance, if a particular mutation has a one-in-a-million (one in 10^6) chance of occurring in a new individual, then a hundred such particular mutations have a one in 10^600 chance of occurring. It’s not going to happen.

How do evolutionists reckon with this scientific problem?

First, one common answer is to dismiss the question altogether. Evolution is a fact, don’t worry about the details. Obviously this is not very compelling.

Second, another common answer is to cast the problem as a strawman argument against evolution, and appeal to gradualism. Evolutionists going back to Darwin have never described the process as “poof.” They do not, and never have, understood the process as the simultaneous origin of tens or hundreds, or more mutations. Instead, it is a long, slow, gradual process, as Darwin explained:

If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. But I can find out no such case […] Although the belief that an organ so perfect as the eye could have been formed by natural selection, is enough to stagger any one; yet in the case of any organ, if we know of a long series of gradations in complexity, each good for its possessor, then, under changing conditions of life, there is no logical impossibility in the acquirement of any conceivable degree of perfection through natural selection

The Sage of Kent could find “no such case”? That’s strange, because they are ubiquitous. And with the inexorable march of science, it is just getting worse. Error correcting mechanisms are just one example of many. Gradualism is not indicated.

What if computer manufacturers were required to have a useful, functional electronic device at each step in the manufacturing process? With each new wire or solder, what must emerge is a “long series of gradations in complexity, each good for its possessor.”

That, of course, is absurd (as Darwin freely confessed). From clothing to jet aircraft, the manufacturing process is one of parts, tools, and raw materials strewn about in a useless array, until everything comes together at the end.

The idea that every single biological structure and design can be constructed by one or two mutations at a time, not only has not been demonstrated, it has no correspondence to the real world. It is just silly.

What evolution requires is that biology is different, but there is no reason to believe such a heroic claim. The response that multiple mutations is a “strawman” argument does not reckon with the reality of the science.

Third, some evolutionists recognize this undeniable evidence and how impossible evolution is. Their solution is to call upon a multiverse to overcome the evidence. If an event is so unlikely it would never occur in our universe, just create a multitude of universes. And how many universes are there? The answer is, as many as are needed. In other words, when confronted with an impossibility, evolutionist simply contrive a mythical solution.

Forth, another common response that evolutionists make is to appeal to the fitness of the structure in question. Biological designs, after all, generally work pretty well, and therefore have high fitness. Is this not enough to prove that it evolved? For evolutionists, if something helps, then it evolves. Presto.

To summarize, evolutionists have four different types of responses to the evidence, and none of the responses do the job.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

How Embryonic Development Bears on Evolution

Follow the Theory

In order for evolution to have occurred, the intricate embryonic development stages of species must have evolved. Indeed, the developmental pathways of the species would be crucial in such a process. If we are to believe the evolutionary claim that the species spontaneously arose, then untold embryonic development pathways must have somehow undergone massive change. But while evolutionists expected the study of such evolution of development to yield great insight into the evolutionary process and history, it has underwhelmed. This shortcoming is well known, as exemplified in this 2015 paper:

First, traditional comparative approaches to the evolution of development—whether focused on the morphological or on the molecular/genetic level—are reaching their limits in terms of explanatory power.

Except that this is an overstatement. To say that comparative approaches “are reaching their limits in terms of explanatory power” is to suggest that there was, at one time, some significant level of explanatory power provided. That would be a very optimistic interpretation of the data.

The paper continues:

The more we learn about the evolution of pattern-forming gene networks, or the ontogeny of complex morphological traits, the more it becomes clear that it is less than straightforward to conclude anything about evolutionary origins or dynamics based on such comparisons alone.

“Less than straightforward”? Let’s be clear—a more accurate descriptor would be “impossible.” In fact, the evidence does not reveal an evolutionary history, but rather is supported by the theory. Evolutionary theory does not follow the data, as Huxley prescribed, but rather the data follow the theory.

The paper continues:

On the one hand, homoplasy or convergent evolution abounds at all levels of investigation. One of the most lauded major insights of EvoDevo is that a common toolkit of genes and signaling pathways is reused over and over again to create a large diversity of different body plans, shapes, and organs.

Most lauded major insights? That would be the mother of all euphemisms. Evolutionists are always rationalizing devastating contradictions as teachable moments, and here we have yet another example. To cast the nonsensical finding of a “common toolkit” as a “major insight” is laughable.

This becomes clear as the paper continues:

Because of this, similarities in gene expression patterns or morphological structure often do not necessarily imply common ancestry, since they may as well reflect the frequent reuse of the same regulatory or morphogenetic modules.

Profound similarities “do not necessarily imply common ancestry.” We have now entered a Lewis Carroll world, as Sober would put it. The whole point of evolution was that such similarities revealed and mandated common descent. But now, we have the exact opposite, as similarities cannot be due to common descent, but must have arisen independently. And this is an “insight”? A fundamental prediction is demolished and evolutionists do not skip a beat. This is not science.

But it gets worse:

On the other hand, developmental system drift allows conserved networks to change considerably in terms of their component genes and regulatory interactions without changing the phenotypic outcomes such systems produce. This means that even functionally conserved regulatory networks can become unrecognizably divergent at the molecular and genetic level, especially across large evolutionary time spans.

We have now reached the height of absurdity. First, profound developmental similarities were found which could not be ascribed to common descent. Now we find that those developmental pathways which can (theoretically) be ascribed to common descent are profoundly different.

When will this bad dream end? The science contradicts the theory. Over. And over. And over. And over.

It never ends. Religion drives science, and it matters.

[h/t: El Hombre]

Blindness in Cave Fish is Due to Epigenetics

Evolutionists Say “We See”

A recent paper out of Brant Weinstein’s and William Jeffery’s laboratories on eye development, or the lack thereof, in blind cave fish has important implications for evolutionary theory (paper discussed here). The study finds that the loss of eyes in fish living in dark Mexican caves is not due to genetic mutations, as evolutionists have vigorously argued for many years, but due to genetic regulation. Specifically, methylation of key development genes represses their expression and with it eye development in this venerable icon of evolution. But the finding is causing yet more problems for evolutionary theory.

Darwin appealed to the blind cave fish in his one long argument for evolution. It is a curious argument in many ways, and the first sign of problems was in Darwin’s presentation where he flipped between two different explanations. At one point he explained the loss of vision in the cave fish as an example of evolutionary change not due to his key mechanism, natural selection. Instead, the Sage of Kent resorted to using the Lamarckian mechanism or law of “use and disuse.” Privately Darwin despised and harshly criticized Lamarck, but when needed he occasionally employed his French forerunner’s ideas.

Elsewhere Darwin hit upon a natural selection-based mechanism for the blind cave fish, explaining that elimination of the costly and unneeded vision system would surely raise the fitness of the hapless creatures.

This latter explanation would become a staple amongst latter day evolutionary apologists, convinced that it mandates the fact of evolution. Anyone who has discussed or debated evolutionary theory with today’s Epicureans has likely encountered this curious argument that because blind cave fish lost their eyes, therefore the world must have arisen by itself.

Huh?

To understand the evolutionary logic, or lack thereof, one must understand the history of ideas, and in particular the idea of fixity, or immutability, of species. According to evolutionists, species are either absolutely fixed in their designs, or otherwise there are no limits to their evolutionary changes and the biological world, and everything else for that matter, spontaneously originated.

Any evidence, for any kind of change, no matter how minor, is immediately yet another proof text for evolution, in all that the word implies.

Of course, from a scientific perspective, the evidence provides precisely zero evidence for evolution. Evolution requires the spontaneous (i.e., by natural processes without external input) creation of an unending parade of profound designs. The cave fish evidence shows the removal, not creation, of such a design.

The celebration of such evidence and argument by Darwin and his disciples reveals more about evolutionists than evolution. That they would find this argument persuasive reveals their underlying metaphysics and the heavy lifting it performs. It is all about religion.

We are reminded of all this with the news of Weinstein’s new study. But we also see something new: The insertion, yet again, of Lamarck into the story. The irony is that the epigenetics, now revealed as the cause of repressed eye development in the cave fish, hearkens back to Lamarck.

Darwin despised Lamarck and later evolutionists made him the third rail in biology. Likewise they have pushed back hard against the scientific findings of epigenetics and their implications.

The environment must not drive biological change.

False.

Well such biological change must not be transgenerational.

False.

Well such inheritance must not be long lasting, or otherwise robust.

False again.

This last failure is revealed yet again in the new blind cave fish findings.

False predictions count. A theory that is repeatedly wrong, over and over, in all of its fundamental expectations, will eventually be seen for what it is.

The rise of epigenetics is yet another such major failure. Evolutionists pushed back against it because it makes no sense on the theory, and that means it cannot now be easily accommodated.

One problem is that epigenetics is complex. The levels of coordination and intricacy of mechanism are far beyond evolution’s meager resources.

It’s not going to happen.

Another problem is the implied serendipity. For instance, one epigenetic mechanism involves the molecular tags places on the tails of the DNA packing proteins called histones. While barcoding often seems to be an apt metaphor for epigenetics, the tagging of histone tails can influence the histone three dimensional structures. It is not merely an information-bearing barcode. Like the tiny rudder causing the huge ship to change course, the tiny molecular tag can cause the much larger packing proteins to undergo conformational change, resulting in important changes in gene accessibility and expression.

This is all possible because of the special, peculiar, structure and properties of the histone protein and its interaction with DNA. With evolution we must believe this just happened to evolve for no reason, and thus fortuitously enabled the rise of epigenetics.

Another problem with epigenetics is that it is worthless, in evolutionary terms that is. The various mechanisms that sense environmental shifts and challenges, attach or remove one of the many different molecular tags to one of the many different DNA or histone locations, propagate these messages across generations, and so forth, do not produce the much needed fitness gain upon which natural selection operates.

The incredible epigenetics mechanisms are helpful only at some yet to be announced future epoch when the associated environmental challenge presents itself. In the meantime, selection is powerless and according to evolution the incredible system of epigenetics, that somehow just happened to arise from a long, long series or random mutations, would wither away with evolution none the wiser.

These are the general problems with epigenetics. In the case of the blind cave fish, however, there is possible explanation. It is a longshot, but since this case specifically involves the loss of a stage of the embryonic development, evolutionists can say that genetic mutations caused changes in the methylating proteins, causing them to be overactive.

This explanation relies on the preexistence of the various epigenetic mechanisms, so does not help to resolve the question of how they could have evolved. What the explanation does provide is a way for evolutionists to dodge the bullet presented by the specter of the cave fish intelligently responding to an environmental shift.

Such teleology in the natural world is not allowed.

So the evolutionary prediction is that these proteins will be found to have particular random changes causing an increase in their methylation function, in particular at key locations in key genes (i.e., the genes associated eye development).

That’s a long shot, and an incredible violation of Occam’s Razor.

My predictions are that (i) this evolutionary prediction will fail just as the hundreds that came before, and (ii) as with those earlier failures, this failure will do nothing to open the evolutionist’s eyes.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

Welcome to Alt-Science

Expelled

Sometimes it’s obvious, as in the case of the scientific research paper that was rejected after it was accepted. While the paper was well accepted and given positive comments from peer reviewers, certain members of the editorial board of a seemingly scientific journal noticed that the results had negative implications for evolution. And so months after the editor had told the authors he was happy “to proceed with publication,” the paper suddenly was, “on further reflection and discussion,” summarily rejected.

And what exactly was the “discussion” about? That “the unspoken implication of the article is that, probabilistically, random undirected evolution is impossible.”

And that, dear scientists, is not allowed.

Random undirected evolution is, by definition, a fact. Break that ground rule, and pay the price. This isn’t about science or truth. This is the alt-science that seeks to control everything from publications and textbooks to careers and funding.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

New Study: Transgenerational Epigenetics Can Have a Profound Impact

The Third Rail of Evolution

In the spring of 2006 I gave a talk on the campus of Cornell University and afterwards was joined by then Cornell professors Richard Harrison and Kern Reeve for a sort of panel discussion or debate about biological evidences and origins. I presented a dozen or so interesting and important evidences that I felt needed to be recognized in any discussion of origins. The evidences falsified key predictions of evolution and so needed to be acknowledged and reckoned with, one way or another. One of the items on my list was the so-called directed adaptation mechanisms which, broadly construed, can include everything from non random, directed, mutations to transgenerational epigenetic inheritance. But I was in for a big surprise when Harrison and Reeve gave their response.

Directed adaptation is reminiscent of Lamarckism. Rather than natural selection acting over long time periods on biological variation which is random with respect to need, directed adaptation mechanisms provide rapid biological change in response to environmental challenges. Like physiological responses, directed adaptation can help an organism adjust to shifts in the environment. But those adaptations can then be inherited by later generations. Stresses which your grandparents were subjected to may be playing out in your own cells.

In the twentieth century evolutionists had strongly rejected any such capability. Lamarckism was the third rail in evolutionary circles. And for good reason, for it would falsify evolutionary theory. But empirical evidence had long since pointed toward the unthinkable, and by the twenty first century the evidence was rapidly mounting.

While there was of course still much to learn in 2006 about directed adaptation (as there still is today for that matter), it could no longer be denied, and needed to be addressed. At least, that is what I thought.

I was shocked when Harrison and Reeve flatly denied the whole story. Rick waved it off as nothing more than some overblown and essentially discredited work done by Barry Hall and John Cairns, back in the 1970s and 80s (for example here).

But there was a body of work that had gone far beyond the work of Hall and Cairns. Incredulously I responded that entire books had been written on the subject. Rick was quick to respond that “entire books are written about all kinds of discredited things.”

True enough. It was me versus two professors on their home turf with a sympathetic audience, and there was no way that I was going to disabuse them of what they were convinced of.

Confirmation testing and theory-laden evidence are not merely philosophical notions. They are very real problems. I’m reminded of all this every time a new study adds yet more confirmation to the directed adaptation story, such as the recent paper out of Nicola Iovino’s lab on transgenerational epigenetic inheritance in house flies, which states:

Gametes carry parental genetic material to the next generation. Stress-induced epigenetic changes in the germ line can be inherited and can have a profound impact on offspring development.

The press release gives little indication of the controversy as it admits that these findings were once considered impossible:

It has long been thought that these epigenetic modifications never cross the border of generations. Scientists assumed that epigenetic memory accumulated throughout life is entirely cleared during the development of sperms and egg cells.

It is hard enough to see how organisms can respond intra-lifetime to environmental challenges, but how can it be inherited as well? For epigenetic changes that occur in somatic cells, that information must also enter into the germ line as well. Somehow it must be incorporated into the sperm and/or egg cells.

It is an enormous problem to explain how such capabilities evolved. Not only are a large number of mutations required to make this capability work, it would not be selected for until the particular environmental condition occurred. That means that, under evolution, it would be not preserved, even if it could somehow arise by chance.

Current Biology: RNA-Only Life Coming Soon

It Fills “A Gaping Hole”

Here is a trade secret: Evolutionists acknowledge scientific problems only after they find solutions. We have seen this repeatedly. Evolutionists evade the science, and ridicule their critics, only later to confess readily that the problem was real. The difference is they have found what they think is a solution to the problem they once so steadfastly denied. To wit, our latest example comes from Michael Gross’s recent article in Current Biology on the RNA world praising the progress made in developing the on-again / off-again RNA World hypothesis. Gross is sufficiently confident that the hypothesis is “on-again” that he can now agree with critics that the origin of life was once a big problem:

Just how the transition from non-life to life may have happened was indeed a gaping hole in our understanding of evolution in the 20th century, which a few inspired experiments like Stanley Miller’s famous 1952 primordial soup kitchen couldn’t quite bridge.

Indeed a gaping hole? Couldn’t quite bridge?

You would never know this from the evolutionist’s rosy assessments, and ridicule of anyone suggesting the science indicated otherwise. As Carl Zimmer wrote more than 15 years ago, scientists “have found compelling evidence that life could have evolved into a DNA-based microbe in a series of steps.” Perhaps he had read the National Academy of Science’s 1999 claim that

For those who are studying the origin of life, the question is no longer whether life could have originated by chemical processes involving nonbiological components. The question instead has become which of many pathways might have been followed to produce the first cells? [1]

Of course for the Mother of all such absurd, non scientific, statements we can go back to Alexander Oparin’s 1924 prediction that origin of life research would be solved “very, very soon.”

But now, almost a century after Oparin’s slightly premature forecast, the evolutionists feel they have finally arrived. And so now Gross can admit to what we have been inconveniently pointing out all along: There has been “a gaping hole in our understanding of evolution.”

Evolutionists can finally admit to this because they are rather confident that they are on the cusp of a profound break-through: A compelling demonstration of the feasibility of the origin and operation of RNA-based life. That is, the RNA World hypothesis:

it appears conceivable that a working model of RNA-only life could be synthesized soon.

At least Gross did not say “very, very soon.” Nonetheless, we think evolutionists are, yet again, speaking a bit prematurely.

That, however, is neither here nor there. For our purposes what is important about Gross’ article is not his proclamation of imminent success—which until it actually happens carries no more weight than the boatload of other failed evolutionary expectations—but rather the delayed admission of “a gaping hole in our understanding of evolution.”

Now that we have that cleared up, we can apparently all agree that until the RNA World, or some other miracle breakthrough, is demonstrated, evolutionary theory has “a gaping hole.” That’s progress.

1. National Academy of Sciences, Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences, 2d ed. (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1999) 6.

ASCB Addresses Problem of False Science

The Most Important Recommendation of All

The American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) task force on reproducibility in life science research has issued an undated white paper on scientific rigor. The problem is, as we discussed here and here, life science research has been found to lack reproducibility. John Ioannidis is a bit more blunt as he explains that “most published research findings are false,” and that “claimed research findings may often be simply accurate measures of the prevailing bias.” The ASCB white paper is no doubt a step in the right direction. It offers 13 recommendations to encourage more rigor in training, publishing, and standards. But the most important recommendation of all continues to be ignored.

Daniel Sarewitz has noted not only the problem of bias in scientific research but also the causes. Note his final thought in this quote:

All involved benefit from positive results, and from the appearance of progress. Scientists are rewarded both intellectually and professionally, science administrators are empowered and the public desire for a better world is answered. The lack of incentives to report negative results, replicate experiments or recognize inconsistencies, ambiguities and uncertainties is widely appreciated — but the necessary cultural change is incredibly difficult to achieve.

And so it is that science’s much touted self-correcting, feedback loop which ensures science converges on the truth (after all, that’s what Mr. Wells told us in seventh grade science class) is sometimes a little slow to act.

And if the ASCB is still needing to remind scientists to clean their beakers and use checklists, imagine the difficulty in achieving more fundamental change?

This brings us to the recommendation that ASCB did not make—the most important of all. And that is for science to free itself of the excessive metaphysics. Unfortunately, progress on that front is glacial. As Sarewitz notes, one reason bias persists, and is so harmful, is that in the moment it is not perceived as bias. Asking an evolutionist to stop with the metaphysics goes nowhere because it isn’t recognized as metaphysics. Deep philosophy is a part of their “science” as much as red meat is a part of hamburgers.

Even if the ASCB task force members wanted to address this fundamental problem, they wouldn’t for the backlash would be overwhelming and their professional reputations would be ruined.

So while the pipettes will be sterilized and results double checked to the third decimal point, ASCB will continue to publish junk science driven by the Epicurean mandate that the world must have arisen spontaneously. Unfortunately, the ASCB task force has missed the most important recommendation of all.

Name It / Claim It: Epigenetics Now Just Another Evolutionary Mechanism

In Spite of the Cognitive Dissonance

It is often said that all truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. And so it is with epigenetics which evolutionists opposed and blackballed for a century before finally appropriating it as just another mode of evolutionary change. (see here, here, and here for more discussion of this history of misdirections regarding Lamarckism and epigenetics). Here is an example of evolutionists, after a century of denial and rejection, claiming epigenetics as their own.

Our example comes from this 2011 review paper on epigenetics in plants. Since plants are sessile they cannot simply move away from environmental challenges that occur. Therefore they need adaptation mechanisms. And since seeds are dispersed not too far from the parent plant, the next generation is likely to face the same environmental challenge. Therefore the adaptation mechanisms should be transgenerational, or heritable. Finally, since environmental challenge may be relatively short lived, lasting only a few generations, there is insufficient time for evolution by random mutations and natural selection to act. Therefore the adaptation mechanisms need to be fast-acting and reversible. These various requirements make epigenetics an “attractive alternative”:

The heritability of reversible epigenetic modifications that regulate gene expression without changing DNA sequence makes them an attractive alternative mechanism.

Note the design language. Not only are evolutionists naming and claiming the once evil epigenetics as just another mode of evolution, they also identify it as “an attractive alternative mechanism,” which is precisely how engineers discuss their design options.

Note, as we have discussed, the notion that such epigenetic mechanisms are just another mode of evolution makes no sense for several reasons. Unlike evolutionary change which is slow, epigenetics is fast. Unlike evolutionary change which propagates through the population from a single mutation occurring in a single individual, epigenetics works in parallel, occurring in many individuals across the population. Unlike evolutionary change which must come about by the selection of changes that must not be induced by the environment, epigenetics is induced by the environment. Unlike evolutionary change which generally is not repeatable, epigenetics is repeatable.

Furthermore, epigenetic mechanisms are, themselves, sophisticated designs. Their origin is far beyond evolution’s meager resources. Random mutations are not going to produce such directed adaptation mechanisms. And even if such a miracle were to occur, it would not survive, because it would not be selected for. This is because such mechanisms provide a differential reproductive advantage, and therefore a fitness improvement, not under the current conditions, but under some future, unforeseen conditions. There is no fitness improvement at the time of origin by random mutations.

There is a reason why evolutionists have so vehemently opposed this Lamarckian idea—it contradicts evolutionary theory. But like saltationism which was once rejected (by Darwin) due to its obvious implications, only to be guardedly accepted years later when the coast was clear (though it makes no sense on evolution), so too epigenetics must be accepted while downplaying the cognitive dissonance it forces on evolution.

Debate Debrief: The Two-Prong Canard Demonstrated Within 24 Hours

The Curious Case of Nylonase

Organisms have remarkable adaptation capabilities and evolutionists, ever since Darwin, have insisted that is powerful evidence of evolution. This is a blatant misrepresentation of science—when a heater turns on to warm the room do you think it must have therefore evolved?—and it is being revealed in the findings of epigenetics and directed adaptation. As I recently explained (The New Epigenetic Lie), rather than acknowledge and reckon with these findings, evolutionists have resorted to a two-prong canard: (i) claim that evolution knew it all along and (ii) claim that directed adaptation is simply a mode of evolutionary change. In other words, after resisting and rejecting directed adaptation for a century—and holding back science in the process—evolutionists are now claiming it as their own. Readers may have doubted my reporting. Do evolutionists really commit such a flagrant and bogus misdirection? But that was before last night’s “What’s Behind It All? God, Science, and the Universe” debate.

Within twenty four hours of my explaining the evolutionist’s two-prong canard, evolutionist Denis Lamoureux, in a futile attempt to refute the overwhelming science that Stephen Meyer alluded to regarding the impossibility of the chance origin of a protein-coding gene, gave a live demonstration of the canard. Lamoureux cited nylonase—enzymes that rapidly arose in bacteria, in the last century, and are able to breakdown byproducts of the nylon manufacturing process. Lamoureux made the non scientific claim that such enzymes demonstrate that the chance origin of a protein-coding genes is not a problem. They could have evolved with no problem, after all, we just witnessed it occur with the origin of nylonase.

This is the second prong: “directed adaptation is simply a mode of evolutionary change.” In other words, evolution is directed adaptation writ large.

That is a blatant misdirection.

Unfortunately, many in the audience were fooled by this canard. Evolutionists often make scientific-sounding claims, laden with jargon, and those not familiar with the scientific details are none the wiser.

In the case of nylonase, as with all cases of directed adaptation, the adaptation was in response to the environment. In other words, the environment influenced the adaptation. This is not a case of evolutionary change. The nylonase enzymes did not arise from a random search over sequence space until the right enzymes were luckily found and could be selected for. That would have required eons of time. Instead, cellular structures rapidly formed new enzymes in an evolutionary nano second.

Such adaptation to nylon manufacture byproducts has been repeated in laboratory experiments. In a matter of months bacteria acquire the ability to digest the unforeseen chemical. Researchers speculate that mechanisms responding to environmental stress are involved in inducing adaptive mutations.

That is not evolution. In fact it refutes evolution. Evolution does not have the resources to have created directed adaptation mechanisms. And even if it did, such mechanisms would not have been selected for because they provide no immediate fitness improvement.

And it is not evidence that protein-coding genes can evolve by chance. A new gene, arising within a modern cell responding to an environmental challenge, is not analogous to chance origin. Unfortunately evolutionists have a long history of inappropriately claiming otherwise.

There is still much to learn about directed adaptation. Unfortunately, evolutionists continue to obfuscate the path.

The New Epigenetic Lie: How Easily a Failure Becomes a Friend

Phony History

In graduate school I had an evolution professor who made the absurd claim that he had solved the protein folding problem—one of the most challenging conundrums in molecular biology. And did he have any examples? No, that was left to the student. It was embarrassing. At another time he referenced a proof of evolution. But again, it was a hollow claim. Unfortunately this sort of phony science is what evolution is all about. The latest example is in how evolutionists are handling epigenetics.

As the old proverb has it, first they'll reject the truth and then they'll appropriate it and say they knew it all along. In the case of epigenetics, after resisting and rejecting it for a century—and holding back science in the process—evolutionists are now entering the “we knew it all along” phase.

In this latest version of Whig history evolutionists have a two-pronged canard. First, they say Darwin proposed Lamarck’s inheritance of acquired characteristics. It was temporarily set aside later due to a lack of scientific evidence, but now in the emerging field of epigenetics, we see Darwin was right all along.

Second, as more and more cases of directed adaptation can no longer be denied, evolutionists are now suddenly referring to it as a new version of evolution. Their old enemy is now their new toy. In fact it resolves so many quandaries. How did new species appear so suddenly in the fossil record? Well now we see evolution occurring before our eyes.

My gosh, evolution works even better than we ever imagined.

For example, one paper concludes that the directed adaptations brought about by a genetic modification “have clear evolutionary implications,” for “this mechanism can give rise to a selectable, coordinated set of mutations under particular environmental stresses that can result sizeable, rapid, adaptive evolutionary responses.”

An evolutionary response? How easily a failure becomes a friend. Never mind that it refutes evolutionary theory. We solved the protein folding problem didn’t we?

As for the other prong, it is a good lie because, like all good lies, it contains a grain of truth. Yes, Darwin proposed Lamarck’s inheritance of acquired characteristics, but only under duress. Darwin’s relationship with Lamarckism was complex. He privately castigated the French biologist’s ideas, but publicly employed them at his convenience.

One problem for Darwin was that the blending inheritance idea he used in his theory of evolution were being demolished, for example by Fleeming Jenkin. The problem was sufficiently troubling that Darwin resorted to giving a nod to Lamarck’s inheritance of acquired characteristics.

Darwin did not accept or advocate inheritance of acquired characteristics; rather, Lamarck’s idea was Darwin’s backup plan. The Monday morning claim that Darwin’s proposing of the inheritance of acquired characteristics was a serious theoretical move is absurd. It is Whig history all over again. You can read more about this here.

But that now is becoming the ever more popular claim of evolutionists. As epigenetics becomes increasingly undeniable—an idea that is the polar opposite of evolution—evolutionists increasingly are resorting to this two-prong canard: We knew it all along, and after all it’s actually just another mode of evolutionary change.

Nothing strange here, move along.

Consider a new paper out of Johannes Beckers’ group on transgenerational epigenetic change in mice. The research used in vitro fertilization to confirm that epigenetic inheritance of obesity and diabetes in mice is transmitted via the gametes, and not via other factors such as behavior of the parents or lactation.

It is yet another confirmation of how epigenetics works, and another opportunity to advance the canard. As Beckers absurdly claims:

From the perspective of basic research, this study is so important because it proves for the first time that an acquired metabolic disorder can be passed on epigenetically to the offspring via oocytes and sperm--similar to the ideas of Lamarck and Darwin.

There you have it—Darwin knew it all along.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

It’s Official: Lamarckism has Now Joined the Narrative

Our Menu Items Have Changed

It is often said that all truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. Yesterday with the publishing of a new paper out of Israel, and two centuries later, Lamarck’s pre Darwinian theory of evolution, sometimes referred to as the inheritance of acquired characteristics, completed the cycle.

Darwin joined in the early nineteenth century ridicule of Lamarck but Darwin also quietly admired the Frenchman’s genius and at one point made considerable use of Lamarckian ideas, particularly toward the end of his first and into his second Transmutation Notebook where Darwin found Lamarck’s ideas on habits fruitful in dealing with William Kirby’s challenge on instincts. (For a good treatment of the Darwin-Lamarck relationship see George James Grinnell’s 1985 paper, The Rise and Fall of Darwin’s Second Theory).

It is often the case that Darwin’s personal journey presages evolutionary thought in general, and Darwin’s relationship with Lamarck, in many ways, is no exception. Darwin’s ridicule at times turned into harsh opposition. In an 1844 letter to friend J. D. Hooker, Darwin castigated Lamarckism as absurd and “veritable rubbish.” In later years Darwin deplored comments, even by supporters of his theory, that linked his new theory of evolution with Lamarckism in any way.

And yet, in the end, Darwin had no idea how biological variation occurred, and how it could provide the necessary material for natural selection. For such thorny problems the Sage of Kent could refer to Lamarck’s ideas as a rear guard. Ultimately, Lamarck was needed by Darwin, as he is today, a century and a half later, by evolutionists.

But in making that journey, evolutionists first went through the ridicule and violent opposition stages that Darwin had traversed. Darwin would have been delighted to see the early twentieth century’s merger of Mendelian genetics with Darwinian evolution, bringing with it the death knell for Lamarckism. This new form of Darwinism (neoDarwinism) or Modern Synthesis, required that Lamarck’s inheritance of acquired characteristics be false. Evolutionists spent that century in unbridled opposition to Lamarck (see here, here and here for just a few examples).

Vestiges of that hatred remain quite evident today even though the science has overwhelmingly proved them wrong (by the way, all the other major tenets of neoDarwinism have also turned out to be false). Inheritance of acquired characteristics has been observed for most of a century and in recent years progressive evolutionists changed direction and began acknowledging those Lamarckian ideas.

This brings us to yesterday’s new paper entitled “The Lamarckian chicken and the Darwinian egg” which now suggests the inheritance of acquired characteristics as a legitimate mechanism of evolution. First, the authors explained what went wrong:

Evolution according to Lamarck, as described 50 years before the publication of Darwin’s work, is driven by the inheritance of acquired characteristics. According to Lamarck, organisms adapt by developing new variations in response to changing environments, and these new adaptive traits become heritable. Because of the apparent teleological nature of his theory, since it appears to clash with Mendelian genetics, and because no mechanism that enables inheritance of acquired traits was known, Lamarck’s theory was considered, for 200 years, to be completely wrong.

And not just considered completely wrong, but vilified as well. But now evolutionists begin to consider Lamarck’s ideas as legitimate:

We suggest that the original “Chicken or Egg” dilemma (how did chicken come to be?) is not a paradox, it is explained by evolution, and that each evolutionary change could map to either a pure Darwinian world (or “Weissmanian” really), in which the metaphorical “Egg” must have preceded the “Chicken,” or to a “Lamarckian” world in which the metaphorical chicken “comes first.”

Soon Lamarckian mechanisms will be self-evident. Evolutionists have already begun to prepare the way for this tectonic shift in their thinking. First, their venerable prophet must be rescued and protected from the fallout. The founders of neoDarwinism will have to take the hit—Darwin must be protected at all costs. Here is how Denis Noble laid out the strategy two years ago:

I will use the term ‘Modern Synthesis’ rather than ‘Neo-Darwinism’. Darwin was far from being a Neo-Darwinist (Dover, 2000; Midgley, 2010), so I think it would be better to drop his name for that idea. As Mayr (1964) points out, there are as many as 12 references to the inheritance of acquired characteristics in The Origin of Species (Darwin, 1859) and in the first edition he explicitly states ‘I am convinced that natural selection has been the main, but not the exclusive means of modification’, a statement he reiterated with increased force in the 1872, 6th edition.

This is, of course, a classic example of whig history. Darwin’s statement about natural selection comes at the end of his introduction to Origins and has nothing to do with Lamarckism. Darwin was softly promoting his theory to a skeptical reader and leaving himself wiggle room, not referring to the inheritance of acquired characteristics. For instance, Darwin would refer to sexual selection, as an addendum to natural selection. Darwin would have liked nothing more than rid his theory of anything linking it to Lamarck. He expressed that many times in no uncertain terms. Darwin’s rare employment of Lamarck’s ideas was strictly a rear guard action.

And for good reason. As with today, Darwin employed Lamarck only because he had to. Darwin needed at least some idea for how the plethora of biological variation would come about. Otherwise Lamarck was not welcome for, as yesterday’s paper explains above, Lamarckism smacked too much of teleology. Biological change arising in response to the needs of the organism? That was biology’s answer to Aristotelian, not Newtonian physics.

What Darwin needed, and what he posthumously got in neo Darwinism, was blind change. As Nobel Laureate Jacques Monod put it in 1971:

chance alone is at the source of every innovation, of all creation in the biosphere. Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, at the very root of the stupendous edifice of evolution: this central concept of modern biology is no longer one among other possible or even conceivable hypotheses. It is today the sole conceivable hypothesis, the only one that squares with observed and tested fact. And nothing warrants the supposition—or the hope—that on this score our position is likely ever to be revised.

To suggest that Darwin would have been opposed to this neo Darwinism is, like the Warfare Thesis, more photoshopping of history. The problem, then and now, is that the inheritance of acquired characteristics demolishes evolutionary thinking. That is why evolutionists have resisted and opposed Lamarckism so strenuously. But like it or not, that is the scientific evidence. So evolutionary theory will become even more ridiculous, if that were possible, as evolutionists spin tall tales of how the inheritance of acquired characteristics is, after all, simply another wonder of evolution. The abuse of science will continue. Rather than dealing with the evidence evolutionists will engage in yet more fairy tales.

Miracles are a Glaring Problem for Evolution, and Here’s Why

Begging the Question

A commenter recently reminded me of one of the many fundamental fallacies of evolutionary thought. When I point out problems with evolution, and make arguments against evolutionary thought, it is not because I am against the idea or want it to be false. Life would be much easier if the evidence simply supported evolution, if evolutionary thought was a stellar example of intellectual progress, if—to put it simply—evolution was an undeniable scientific fact, just as evolutionists insist. But it’s not. Evolution is not any of those. Evolution is not supported by the empirical evidence, it is not a rational, intellectual movement, and it is not a scientific fact, undeniable or otherwise. I’m not grinding a personal ax here, I’m simply pointing out the obvious. It makes no difference to me if evolution is true, false, or somewhere in between. But it does make a difference when we lie to ourselves.

One of the lies we tell ourselves is about miracles and how they relate to evolution. Specifically, evolutionists have been making arguments against miracles for centuries. A convenient starting place is seventeenth century church history, when Roman Catholic and Protestant elements of the church argued with each other, and between themselves, about miracles. It is a long story, but the upshot was that miracles were increasingly viewed with disdain for several reasons.

By the time David Hume arrived in the mid eighteenth century, the dust was settling. Hume is well known for his arguments against miracles, but he was largely repackaging sentiment that had long since been expressed.

Some arguments were epistemological. Others were theological, philosophical or ontological. But the short version is that evolutionary thought emerged in a milieu in which miracles were on the way out, both as explanatory mechanisms and as historical reality. Darwin contemporary David Friedrich Strauss, and his Life of Jesus, is but one of many examples of this broad, robust movement.

The movement against miracles was, not surprisingly, influential in the natural sciences. Simply put, if we’re not to appeal to miracles, then the world must have arisen naturalistically. This had a profound effect on the critical thinking, or lack thereof, of the time. Speculative hypotheses, with little basis in fact, enjoyed serious consideration and triumphant acceptance.

The bar was placed exceedingly low for such theories as pure conjecture became acceptable and celebrated science. Monumental scientific problems with the notion of spontaneous origins went ignored and evolutionary theories (from cosmological to biological) soon became “fact.”

Today strictly naturalistic, evolutionary, theories are a given. They simply are accepted as true, or as true as anything in science can be. And it also is a given that miracles are false. But what evolutionists prefer to overlook is that there is a causal relationship here. The latter made way for, and mandated, the former.

What an incredible coincidence it would be if, on the one hand, miracles were known to be false and, on the other hand, the empirical evidence turned out to prove a naturalistic origins. Theology, philosophy and science would have converged on the same truth.

But there is no such convergence.

The “convergence” that occurred is artificial. It is artificial because the empirical scientific evidence was interpreted according to the cultural mandate. Science was told what to do.

Indeed, from an objective, theory neutral, perspective, evolution is unlikely. It is not good science. In fact it is an outstanding example of bad science, breaking all the rules of what the textbooks tell us about how science is supposed to work. The idea that the multitude of species, the cosmos, consciousness and, well, everything, arose spontaneously by the interplay of chance contingencies of history and natural laws is silly. And that is being kind.

The problem of miracles is another example of the failure of evolutionary thought. Religion drives science, and it matters.

Zack Kopplin: There is No Scientific Evidence Against Evolution

A Product of the Warfare Thesis 

Zack Kopplin is the face of rational thought. Kopplin is a bright, energetic young man opposing the forces of anti intellectualism and ignorance that deny science and the fact of evolution, and seek to inject religious beliefs into the public schools. There’s only one problem. While we are delighted to see young people get involved in public policy issues, Kopplin is feverishly promoting precisely what he claims to be opposing.

Kopplin insists that there is no scientific evidence against evolution. While there is room for debate about particular biological evidences and exactly how they bear on the theory of evolution, there simply is no question that there is scientific evidence against evolution. Plenty of it. To deny that would be the height of anti science denialism. Yet this is precisely what evolutionists claim.

Kopplin explains that the church burned people alive for believing the Earth was round and that the Earth rotated the sun. A myth such as this is sure to move audiences, and is red meat for evolutionists, but it is, nonetheless, a myth. Historians call it the Warfare Thesis myth, but evolutionists won’t stop using it.

Not surprisingly Kopplin wants evolution to be taught in the public schools. But evolution is full of religious claims. Kopplin is pushing to have religious beliefs injected into the public schools—precisely what he claims to oppose.

This is the fruit of evolutionary thought.

Richard Lenski: “It is an incontrovertible fact that organisms have changed, or evolved”

The Mother of All False Dichotomies

Practically since Darwin the various species of finches on the Galápagos Islands have been declared to be decisive, powerful examples of evolutionary theory. An undeniable confirmation of the age-old Epicurean idea that the world arose spontaneously. But exactly how do some bird species on an island group in the middle of the ocean demonstrate such a bold claim?

The answer involves much more than science. For these cute little birds do not tell us that single-celled bacteria somehow arose from a lifeless collection of chemicals. They don’t tell us that those bacteria gave rise to the complicated eukaryotes, and then to multicellular organisms, and then to fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. The Galápagos finches don’t even tell us how they themselves could have evolved.

What they do tell us is that nature’s organisms can change. Darwin inferred this, and more recent studies have uncovered some of the specifics. With changing weather patterns and food supplies, the birds respond accordingly. They adapt—a feature that is ubiquitous in biology.

The various species have some fantastic adaptation capabilities, and it’s nothing like evolution’s story of blind mutations hitting on better designs on rare occasion. Instead, it is a rapid shifting between preexisting designs, enabled by preexisting and very complicated mechanisms.

But it is change. And that, for Darwin and later evolutionists, is all they need. You see Darwin and evolutionists in general hold to a doctrine of creationism where the Creator constructs the species to be unchanging. In the eighteenth century it was referred to as the “fixity” or “immutability” or “stability” of species.

So if the finches could, in fact, change, then for evolutionists the fixity of species—and all of creationism along with it—must be false. And if creationism is false, then evolution must be true. As Darwin wrote in his notebook, if there was the slightest foundation for this idea, it “would undermine the stability of species.” Thus the template was cast for evolutionists to come.

What is striking is the heavy reliance on metaphysics. Nothing about the science here tells us, or even hints, that the biological world arose spontaneously as evolutionists insist is true. The underlying foundation of evolutionary thought is religious. As NT Wright recently quipped, “Oh my goodness, he [Darwin] has discovered some very interesting finches, this means we can’t believe in Genesis anymore.”

One recent study highlights this gap between the metaphysics and the science. The study further demonstrates the adaptive capabilities of species such as the finches. It also further demonstrates that adaptation is not evolution. The birds are quick to adapt but they are simply tracking the environment and food supply. The hallmark is their flexibility and adaptiveness.

As one scientist put it, “there has been no long-term specialised evolution.” For many years now even evolutionists have recognized that adaptation does not add up to the large-scale change evolution requires. Some other mechanism is needed.

Nonetheless the Galápagos finches continue to be celebrated as a proof text of evolution. They are an example of change, and evolution is equated with change—any kind of change. Even a mere altering of gene frequencies in a population is, for evolutionists, nothing less than full blown evolution. Such a trivial change becomes proof that the biological world arose spontaneously. It is the mother of all false dichotomies.

As evolutionist Richard Lenski put it, “It is an incontrovertible fact that organisms have changed, or evolved, during the history of life on Earth.” Yes, it is an incontrovertible fact that organisms have changed. But it is not an incontrovertible fact that they have evolved. The equating of change with evolution rests on deeply-held religious beliefs.

As NT Wright might say, “Oh my goodness, Lenski has discovered some very interesting bacteria, this means we can’t believe in Genesis anymore.” The idea that changing gene frequencies, or an occasional genetic mutation, proves that the species spontaneously arose is truly one of the greatest leaps of logic you will ever see. You can see more such examples here and here.

Religion drives science, and it matters.