Science and Culture Today | Page 1314 | Discovering Design in Nature

Yale neurologist Dr. Steven Novella and I have been involved in a vigorous discussion (example here) of the mind-brain problem in science and philosophy. There are real-world implications of our understanding of the mind, and nowhere are these implications more important than in the medical management of people with severe brain damage. Dr. Novella recently posted a commentary on the Terri Schiavo case. Dr. Novella’s post was prompted by a study just published in the journal Neurology that analyzes the media coverage of the affair and offers suggestions as to how experts and journalists can convey the truth of such complex cases to the public more effectively. These are laudable goals.

The crux of the matter, of course, is this: what are the facts in the Schiavo case, and, more generally, what are the real issues involved in the diagnosis of persistent vegetative state (PVS)?

[Note: For a more comprehensive defense of Ben Stein’s documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, please see: NCSE Exposed at NCSEExposed.org] CSC Fellow Richard Weikart sent us his article, “‘Expelled’ and the Darwinism-Nazi Connection: A Response to Jeff Schloss,” which is now up at the American Scientific Affiliation (ASA) website. Weikart details the historical connection between Darwin’s theory and Hitler’s Nazi ideology, responding to a similarly ASA-published article by Jeff Schloss.There’s a history with Schloss, which Bill Dembski explains over at Uncommon Descent. Suffice it to say that Schloss is critical of intelligent design and quick to repeat the standard objections to the connection Expelled draws between Darwin and Hitler… and Weikart doesn’t let him get away with it: In his Read More ›

How many times have we heard the old Darwinist canard that the human eye is “poorly designed”? As the argument goes, the vertebrate eye is poorly designed because our photoreceptor cells face away from the incoming light and the optic nerve extends over them, allegedly blocking some light. William Dembski and Sean McDowell’s new book Understanding Intelligent Design has an easily accessible and forceful rebuttal to this poorly designed Darwinist objection to ID, explaining that the design of the human eye is actually quite optimal: The photoreceptors in the human eye are oriented away from incoming light and placed behind nerves through which light must pass before reaching the photoreceptors. Why? A visual system needs three things: speed, sensitivity, and Read More ›

It’s not easy being an evolutionist these days. You have to feel a pang of pity for the critics at New Scientist, who have resorted to a new argument against intelligent design:The more complex things are, the more we see that there’s no way intelligence could have created them.That’s right — complexity is now an argument against intelligent design. From yesterday’s print edition: As Socrates knew, the really intelligent know the limits of their own ability, an idea we seem to be relearning. You might say supporters of intelligent design have it backwards: the more we observe the complex workings of our universe, the more we must conclude that no single intelligence could have created them.

The Toronto Sun is reporting on a new poll finding that “58% of Canucks think humans evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years, and 22% believe God created people in their present form within the last 10,000 years.” The article thus proudly asserts that “[a] majority of Canadians believe in the theory of evolution.” But what about those Canadians who accept the conventional geological age of the earth but are skeptical of neo-Darwinian evolution? Obviously they don’t accept the young earth creationist view, but contrary to what the pollsters and newsmedia suggest, they also might not “believe in the theory of evolution.” Or what about those Canadians who believe in some form of God-guided evolution, where God’s Read More ›

The Chronicle of Higher Education shows courage in publishing a non-P.C. article by Peter Wood of the National Association of Scholars that describes the real, as opposed to the putative, obstacles to increasing the number of American-born and educated scientists. Anti-intellectualism is a big part of it.

There is a problem, however, that Peter Woods overlooks, either because it doesn’t occur to him or because he doesn’t wish to spur the science establishment to even more outrage by mentioning it. That problem is the contemporary hostility that many committed Christian young people, and perhaps other religious youth, encounter in the sciences these days. Even those who have not experienced it become alert to it and, in turn, may be discouraged.

Darwinists can deny that this is the case, but a serious study, I submit, would show that it is so. Asked in private, when their words can’t be twisted and asked in a neutral manner, many religious students report a classroom environment that demeans religious belief and demeans religious people. If it is known that they do not accept Darwinian accounts of the rise and development of life, or even the development of universe before life arose on Earth, students know that they could be graded down in some classes (a certain University of Minnesota biology class comes to mind, but it is unusual only in the professor’s lack of subtlety). If they decide to seek an advanced degree the opposition will be stronger and they normally dare not express their convictions. If they somehow get a doctorate, they cannot expect a teaching position, or recommendations, once any serious dissent from Darwinism is detected. And if they secure a job they will not get tenure if word leaks out (see Expelled). Even after they have tenure they can still be maligned and harassed and even effectively demoted.

Here’s some exciting news from the UK, where 300 biologists, computer scientists, physicists, mathematicians, philosophers and social scientists from around the world have gathered “to address one of the greatest challenges in modern science: how to create a genuine artificial life form.” (“Can we make software that comes to life?” Telegraph)
Despite the image of Wall-E (with the amusing caption “self-aware computers such as Pixar’s Wall-E are surprisingly tricky to put together” — no, really? Every nerdy kid who ever tried to make a robot in 6th grade science camp could tell you that), the focus of the story is on evolution and — wait for it — the failure of Darwin’s theory to explain complex creatures.
Using computer programs to test evolution, researchers are learning that natural selection lacks the creative power to evolve complex life — and so they’re looking for answers.

What many people observing the debate over intelligent design and evolution don’t get is that intelligent design is not merely an American phenomenon. As the debate continues in every corner of the globe, design proves to be an interesting and legitimately explorable scientific concept. Take the latest from today’s Economic Times, out of India. Columnist Mukul Sharma notes writes in “Design argument and beyond“: One of the core arguments of Intelligent Design is that the fundamental constants of physics and chemistry are just right or fine-tuned to allow the universe and life as we know it to exist. They are precisely the values needed to have a universe capable of producing life. In other words, everything in the cosmos tends Read More ›

Academic freedom doesn’t protect a professor’s right to talk about the scientific evidence favoring intelligent design. But it does protect a professor’s right to belittle his students’ fundamentalist religious beliefs. That’s the hypocritical view being championed by Des Moines Register columnist Rekha Basu.

Unfortunately, her mindset reflects the views of a lot of pro-Darwin apologists in the media.

When astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez was being harassed and discriminated against at Iowa State University (ISU) because of his support for intelligent design, Basu actually cheered on the inquisitors. When atheist religion professor Hector Avalos spearheaded a campus petition against intelligent design in 2005, for example, Basu wrote that “it would be would be a serious breach of academic integrity” for universities to hire intelligent design proponents.

Basu even demanded that ISU impose a gag order to prevent any professor from defending intelligent design as science in ISU classrooms:

Over the past couple years, Tiktaalik, a fossil allegedly documenting parts of the transition from fish to tetrapods, has become a new celebrated icon of evolution. PBS’s “Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial” documentary featured Tiktaalik as their premier transitional fossil, an anachronism since it wasn’t even reported until months AFTER the Dover trial concluded. The NAS’s recent “Science, Evolution, and Creationism” booklet also prominently pushes Tiktaalik, calling it “a notable transitional form.” Darwinists have a lot of rhetorical capital invested in this fossil, and it thus comes as no surprise that they are quick to defend it with the “zero-concession policy” vehemence we’ve come to expect from internet Darwinists. As William Dembski writes regarding this policy: Our critics have, Read More ›