Science and Culture Today | Page 1313 | Discovering Design in Nature

In the debate between dualists and materialists over the relationship between the mind and the brain, materialists often invoke neuroscience to buttress their assertion that the brain causes the mind entirely, without need for an immaterial mind or soul. Indeed neuroscience has demonstrated many examples of correlation between physical brain processes and mind states. Do examples of correlation between brain states and mind states genuinely provide evidence for the materialist claim that mind states are merely brain states?

The wild claims of neuroscientists, such as the astonishing claim by atheist Yale neurologist Steven Novella that “the materialist hypothesis– that the brain causes consciousness — has made a number of predictions, and every single prediction has been validated,” suggest that some materialists, such as Dr. Novella, don’t even understand the core issues in the mind-brain debate.

David Chalmers, a leading philosopher of the mind and a particularly lucid thinker on the matter of consciousness, published a paper in the Journal of Consciousness Studies in 1995 entitled “Facing Up to the Problem of Consciousness.” The seminal paper has given rise to much debate, and I believe that Chalmers clarifies the important issues in the mind-brain debate in a very important way.

Don’t read into this post too much, but take it as a series of curious observations. We’re often told that Darwinism is like a scientific magic bullet that can solve anything. Darwinists love to quote Theodosius Dobzhansky saying, “nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” We’re also told that intelligent design threatens to destroy science. Nonetheless, I can’t help but notice that when engineers design technology to be sold to the public, they prefer to tell them about processes of intelligent design over unguided selection and random mutation. As a silly anecdote, I recently came across this Hyandai car advertisement, stating: “the i30 name has been chosen to reflect the car’s European styling and its all-round Read More ›

The Associated Press has an article on Louisiana’s Academic Freedom bill which quotes a Darwinist professor at Louisiana State University asserting that “biological evolution really is not scientifically controversial.” The article did observe that biologist Caroline Crocker testified in favor of the bill, but left out the fact that multiple other scientists (including professional biologists) also testified that there are scientific problems with evolution. As I recount here, three professional biologists and one chemist, all with Ph.D.’s, testified about scientific problems with Darwinian evolution before Louisiana’s House Education Committee on Wednesday. But the Associated Press chose not to report that fact, instead deciding to serve as a checkpoint to prevent its readers from learning about scientists who doubt Darwin.

[Note: For a more comprehensive defense of Ben Stein’s documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, please see: NCSE Exposed at NCSEExposed.org] In Part 1 I explained how Alan Boyle and Sean B. Carroll unashamedly agree that scientists should keep “quiet” about their support intelligent design (ID). In this final response, I will discuss how the scientific evidence cited by Boyle does little to demonstrate the power of the neo-Darwinian mechanism. In Alan Boyle’s attack upon Expelled, he uses biologist Sean B. Carroll as his big gun scientist to attack intelligent design, touting Carroll’s book Making of the Fittest. In that book, Carroll argues that “[t]he argument for design by some external intelligence is eviscerated.” Last year I wrote a response to Read More ›

[Note: For a more comprehensive defense of Ben Stein’s documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, please see: NCSE Exposed at NCSEExposed.org] We’ve known for a long time that MSNBC’s “Cosmic Log” writer Alan Boyle doesn’t like intelligent design, and in his coverage of Expelled, Boyle is no exception to the “checkpoint” pattern described earlier here on ENV. This time, he’s got scientists from the academy “checkpoint” to back him up. Thus, he feels confident to attack Expelled as, “creepy … campaign ad, aimed at swiftboating science.” Enter Sean B. Carroll, a prominent biologist from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Boyle’s big gun who also happens to dislike intelligent design. Boyle quotes Carroll in a one-two punch that essentially states that scientists who Read More ›

A new six part series of interviews has popped up on Youtube featuring attorney Ed Sisson. Sisson you may remember was a key player in the Kansas state board of education’s hearings on science standards in 2005. He also happens to have been Dr. Caroline Crocker’s pro-bono attorney when she was ousted from George Mason University for teaching some of the scientific evidence that challenges Darwinian evolution. So, he knows a bit about academic freedom and free open scientific inquiry. The main thrust in this interview is Sisson’s contention that Darwinian evolution should be open to scrutiny, both in the classroom and the courtroom.Sisson wrote to tell us about the video: “Although I gave the talk two years ago, it Read More ›

Download this response as a PDF Opponents of academic freedom in Louisiana have been putting out a smokescreen of misinformation in their effort to kill legislation to protect the rights of Louisiana’s science teachers. Rather than discuss the real issues at stake, they are trying to get their way through misrepresentations, scare tactics, and the demonization of those who support honest discussion of scientific controversies. Their misinformation campaign shouldn’t be allowed to obscure key facts: 1. Louisiana’s academic freedom legislation is not about “creationism.” It’s about protecting the rights of teachers to teach good science. Many teachers remain confused and fearful about what information they can legally teach regarding controversial scientific topics such as evolution. By enacting a limited right Read More ›

Baton Rouge, LA — Yesterday the Louisiana House Education Committee unanimously passed SB 733, an academic freedom bill. The bill requires that Louisiana schools shall “create and foster an environment within public elementary and secondary schools that promotes critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories being studied including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.” The passage followed testimony from four Ph.D. scientists, including three biologists, who testified in favor of the bill. One biology professor from Louisiana College, Dr. Wade Warren, testified about how during his graduate studies at Texas A & M, the dean ordered him cease discussing scientific problems with students. Another biochemist, Dr. Read More ›

In Louisiana, a state legislative committee unanimously has passed to the full state house a bill that will protect the rights of teachers to present scientific evidence both for and against modern evolutionary theory. A slew of local scientists were on hand to support the bill, along with educators and students. It’s not hard to understand why when you know what the bill actually says: “teachers shall be permitted to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories pertinent to the course being taught.” The next step is for the House side of the legislature to vote on the bill, which has already passed the Senate with Read More ›

Note: This is the third in a series of posts excerpted from my book, Billions of Missing Links: A Rational Look at the Mysteries Evolution Can’t Explain. A design must be considered improbable if it is highly functional and durable yet too complex to have come about spontaneously or by intermediate steps. Think of the subway system in any large metropolitan area. Could the combination of tracks, stations, tunnels, signs, vending machines, stairwells, lighting, trains, billboards, ticket booths, turnstiles, benches, platforms, security measures, and restrooms have happened all at once or did it come about by stages? If these commuter systems were to follow the tenets of the theory of evolution, the tracks going off in every direction might be Read More ›