Science and Culture Today | Page 1305 | Discovering Design in Nature

So far as I know, there is no name for a particular kind of science article in which an observation is offered of some sort of animal behavior, and then, under the Darwinian assumption that humans are simply advanced animals, concludes that the behavior is somehow indicative of how humans too should be able to act. This week’s model for human behavior comes, via Scientific American, from the Central Park Zoo, and involves two male penguins named Roy and Silo. The first order of business in such an article is to make the behavioral observation. In this case, we find animals engaged in deviant behavior. We go now to the action in Central Park: “Two penguins,” says writer Emily V. Read More ›

Note: This is part of a series of posts excerpted from my book, Billions of Missing Links: A Rational Look at the Mysteries Evolution Can’t Explain. The upright posture of plants is a striking design that falls short of a clear explanation. The pat answer is that prehistoric flat plants decided to go vertical to compete for more sun. But where did this need to compete arise? And how could a limp ground hugger accidentally develop systems to support excessive weight — maybe tons of wood — root systems to support the weight, transport systems to move the water and nutrients up, and defense mechanisms against weather and pests? Much of it had to be there at the same time. Read More ›

[UPDATE: I have responded to Carl Zimmer’s critiques with updates and corrections, here.] I recently picked up Your Inner Fish, a highly simplified science book written for a popular audience by paleontologist Neil Shubin that promotes the alleged intermediate fossil between fish and tetrapods, Tiktaalik roseae. On page 83, Shubin’s book contains a nice diagram comparing the skull-components of a human head to the skull of a primitive craniate fish. It’s a vague comparison that does little to convince that fish-heads formed the template for mammal heads. But that’s not the focus of Shubin’s book. The primary feature that excites Shubin and other evolutionary paleontologists about Tiktaalik isn’t found in its head: it’s that this fossil is allegedly “a fish Read More ›

New Scientist is up in arms over the successful passage of the Louisiana Science Education Act (“New legal threat to teaching evolution in the US“). NS Reporter Amanda Gefter devotes the article to the narrative of Barbara Forrest, portrayed as a weary warrior against the powers of darkness (that would be us, in case you’re wondering). While this makes for an interesting, Alice-through-the-Looking-Glass foray into utter nonsense, the falsehoods and misinformation presented as historical fact need correcting.

The most obvious untruth is Gefter’s regurgitation of the old myth that intelligent design came after Edwards v. Aguillard, the 1987 case where the Supreme Court ruled creation science unconstitutional. As a matter of historical record, intelligent design can be traced back to ancient Greece, and the modern theory of ID was born by the early 1980s, as Jonathan Witt recounts in “The Origin of Intelligent Design.”

Saturday night in Las Vegas will be hot. Outside it will be 100+ degrees. Inside Bally’s will be hot too, when CSC Director Stephen Meyer and Discovery senior fellow George Gilder face off with Darwinists Michael Shermer, publisher of Skeptic Magazine, and Ronald Bailey, science writer for Reason. The debate question: “Is there scientific evidence of intelligent design in nature?”

The debate is the closer of a three day conference, Freedomfest that will feature other speakers like Steve Forbes and Ron Paul, as well as other debates, such as Friday night’s between Dinesh D’souza and Christopher Hitchens.
C-SPAN is scheduled to cover the debate and we’ll let you know when they plan to air as soon as that is announced.

In the past, I have observed that the newsmedia and scientific establishment commonly promote the Darwinist bias against intelligent design (ID), where the media “carefully selects the sources of information it will broadcast to the public on this issue.” (To see how various groups in the establishment serve as checkpoints to prevent scientific information that challenges neo-Darwinism from reaching the public, observe the diagram at left.) National Geographic (NG) is doing its job as a media checkpoint, promoting biased information to the public on ID. In an article yesterday about a new fish fossil-find, the NG news headline states, “Odd Fish Find Contradicts Intelligent-Design Argument.” According to the story, “Intelligent design advocates have seized on the idea of instant flatfish Read More ›

The Washington Post‘s Michael Gerson recently wrote: The latest findings of the Pew Forum’s massive and indispensable U.S. Religious Landscape Survey reveal some intriguing confusion among Americans on cosmic issues. About 13 percent of evangelicals, it turns out, don’t believe in a personal God, leading to a shameful waste of golf time on Sunday mornings. And 9 percent of atheists report that they are skeptical of evolution. Are there atheist creationists? Well, there probably aren’t any atheist creationists, although, if Richard Dawkins can be an “Atheist for Jesus,” anything is possible. Yes, these folks may be severely confused (“deluded,” if you prefer). However, perhaps many of these atheists, while not being creationists, are simply skeptical of the Darwinian mechanism. (Gerson Read More ›

Floyd & Mary Beth Brown at Townhall.com understand what really happened in Louisiana when Gov. Jindal signed the LSEA, calling it “an important blow for academic freedom.” Their news analysis piece, “Evolutionists Fear Academic Freedom,” gets it right: academic freedom is a common-sense approach with bipartisan support, evolutionists are truly afraid of the scientific challenges to Darwinism that critical thinking might lead to, and the mainstream media (in this case, the New York Times in an editorial) works to discredit Darwin skeptics and apply national political pressure on local and regional decision-makers: One would think legislation which allows an environment that promotes “critical thinking” and “objective discussion” in the classroom would please everyone — it did the bipartisan group of Read More ›

CSC’s John West has a very good piece at National Review Online today. Defending the Louisiana Science Education Act, West echoes the themes and ideas that he wrote about in his book Darwin Day in America, pointing out that in today’s schools political correctness, not critical thinking, is what most students are learning.

Note: This is part of a series of posts excerpted from my book, Billions of Missing Links: A Rational Look at the Mysteries Evolution Can’t Explain. The adhesive used by barnacles is among the strongest in the world. It is reported that a layer merely 3/10,000 of an inch thick can support a weight of 7000 pounds. This relative of the shrimp and crab glues its head down and keeps its feet up to catch the next meal. Its adhesive sets in water at any temperature and will not dissolve in most acids, bases, and solvents. Fossil records suggest it has been used by barnacles unchanged for 400 million years. Nothing seems to be known about its intermediates before that. Read More ›