Darwin's Illusion

[cladking]

Evolutionists on the thread keep trying to make the discussion appear to be about “Darwin's Illusion” to make it look like irrelevant discussion. Yes, Darwin has his illusion but it's not really about Darwin. The core discussion has been about the Neo-Darwinism /Modern Synthesis, the mainstream evolutionary theory today being false.

Yes, I know.

But I believe The most destructive and most wrong part of Darwin still stands in the minds of laymen and scientists alike; "survival of the fittest". While Darwin was wrong across the board modern scientists have dressed "survival of the fittest" up in fancy new clothes and enshrined it.

This is due to the nature of reductionistic science that can't be experimented away. Results are always dependent on the terms, definitions, and assumptions we start with whether we perform science correctly or just use Look and See Science and the opinion of Peers.

Of course Darwin was wrong about everything as this thread (and you) has done an excellent job of detailing but people still believe in his fundamental assumption that some individuals are inherently more fit than others and that it is the will of nature that the most fit create new species on an ongoing basis a little at a time. Science has shown this to be untrue as well but people still want to believe and each assumes he himself is among the most fit who will help lead the human race to nirvana.

All individuals are equally fit (and worthy) to survive. We thrive under different conditions and with the best of luck. But these differences and luck do not drive change in species that like all change in all life at all levels is always sudden. Looking at groups (called "species") to understand how life changes is the very worst possible perspective for understanding the processes and forces that actually cause speciation. Darwin was wrong and the modern theories are still wrong, merely less wrong. And the wrongest parts are the beliefs in "natural selection" (SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST) and gradual change. These things are illusions caused by Darwin, definitions, and the devilish predisposition of people to believe in simple answers.

If there were such a thing as "fit" individuals they would merely produce a more fit "species", not a slightly better, different, or evolved species. This is more visible if one merely looks at life as being ONLY individual and ONLY based on consciousness. As long as one believes "species" is more than just a word, an abstraction, and a means of communication it's very difficult not to believe in Darwin and Evolution. As long as one believe that reductionistic science necessarily exposes only relevant parts of reality we will extrapolate and interpolate the results to fit our preexisting beliefs, definitions, and models. "Science" is the set of axioms and experimental results and if these things aren't kept in mind we will see what's not there. We will see every answer. Homo omnisciencis.

 

[Jose Fly]

And what framework? Do you mean the EES?

No. Remember we went over this before and when I pointed out that the EES is merely the reshuffling of known evolutionary mechanisms and the addition of a few more, you said you didn't care about the EES.

When I mention Noble's framework, I'm talking about his claims that mutations are non-random and that all the central tenets of evolution have been overturned.

Since Noble made those claims, no one has adopted them and is using them in their work. So when it comes to the nuts and bolts of doing work, his framework is completely irrelevant.

It’s the other way around; you are the one who is obviously equating the EES with the refutation of the MS as I explained above. Yet you blame it on me!!

No, see above.

As I said many times, I’m not concerned about the EES

Yet you keep bringing it up.

Being cited numerous times means that his paper is an acknowledged scientific reference in scientific research

Again, no one....no university, biotech firm, gov't agency, genetics lab....no one operates under the Noble's framework. It's irrelevant.

Your article is promoting the performance of SIFTER in comparison to other inference algorithms. Yet the same article said about the inference algorithms “Computational methods are widely used for automated annotation. Unfortunately, these predictions have littered the databases with erroneous information, for a variety of reasons including the propagation of errors and the systematic flaws in BLAST and related methods”.

SIFTER Protein Function Prediction (berkeley.edu)

Statistical inference of function is a matter of interpretation, even so SIFTER has been shown to outperform other methods such as BLAST but to put things in perspective, at 99% specificity, approximately 24.4% of the annotations are correct in SIFTER vs. 2.4% correct annotations in BLAST. Again, SIFTER is only one of many available inference algorithms with varying levels of accuracy.

2019, an article published by BMC addressing protein function prediction concluded the following, “We conclude that while predictions of the molecular function and biological process annotations have slightly improved over time, those of the cellular component have not. Term-centric prediction of experimental annotations remains equally challenging; although the performance of the top methods is significantly better than the expectations set by baseline methods in C. albicans and D. melanogaster, it leaves considerable room and need for improvement.”

The CAFA challenge reports improved protein function prediction and new functional annotations for hundreds of genes through experimental screens | Genome Biology | Full Text (biomedcentral.com)

Do you remember the original point and the reason I posted about SIFTER in the first place? It was to demonstrate that evolutionary common ancestry is a useful framework that provides very real and important results. All you're doing here is confirming that.

Irrelevant, all other inference of function methods (such as BLAST) are based on evolutionary principles.

Exactly! So now that we've clearly established the utility and importance of evolutionary common descent, one has to wonder.....where is the equivalent work done under the framework of special creation?

The rest of your post is merely you repeating yourself yet again (still citing/quoting Noble's paper) and conflating the EES with Noble's claims about non-random mutations and such.

Do you have anything else besides that?

 

[Jose Fly]

What on earth would constitute a "single scientific entity" or indeed Noble's framework? The man was a crucial figure in the development of systems biology and a major source for work across disciplines relating to conceptual reforms in biology and related fields. He's a leading research scientist and one of the more influential researchers in the life sciences of the latter 20th and 21st centuries. This is so tired. Coming back at an argument with "it's not used" isn't an argument even if it were true, and it isn't.

No one is saying that Noble isn't a prominent and important scientist in the field of physiology. And when I say "Noble's framework", I'm primarily referring to his claims about mutations being non-random (as well as acquired characteristics, DNA isn't a unit of reproduction, evolution is saltational, speciation hasn't been observed).

Just for fun, I went looking a bit for some papers that didn't just rely on Noble's work but built specifically on that paper (although most of the time that's not how scientific research works at all, nor references in a scientific paper either, in which it is typical to site sequentially work that is done over years by one or more individuals on a single research project or question or the like ). It didn't take long to find counterexamples for you. I mean, one recent paper literally opens with references to Noble and his work:

"In his recent article, Noble listed the four illusions of the Modern Synthesis (MS) that have been exposed by the development of science largely this century, some eighty years after their formulation (Noble, 2021a). They are: Natural Selection, Weissmann Barrier, Rejection of Darwin Gemmules, and Central Dogma. He ascribed these illusions to unintended errors of eminent scientists due to imprecise and misleading use of linguistic terms in interpreting evidence and theorizing about evolution. As a physiologist and a systems' biologist who is thinking deeply about evolution, he wants readers to change their view of how organisms work, away from MS's upward causality of “DNA brain” controlling every function of a cell, to a downward hierarchical causality of the wholeness of the cellular system, his principle of biological relativity. To uncover MS's illusions, he uses many arguments and concepts that the careful reader will find in this paper as well.

Noble's perspectives also reflect the general viewpoints promoted by the extended evolutionary synthesis (EES), the movement that was initiated in the 1950s by Wadington (1957), popularized in the 1980s by Gould and Eldredge (1993), and reconceptualized by Pigliucci (2007) and Muller (2007)."

Crkvenjakov, R., & Heng, H. H. (2021). Further illusions: On key evolutionary mechanisms that could never fit with Modern Synthesis. Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology.
(see attached)

I appreciate you taking the time to look that up and post it. However, the paper is making a case for the EES, which is not what I've been talking about with @LIIA and actually, when I pointed out to LIIA what the EES actually is, he declared that he didn't care about the EES and wasn't advocating for it.

Not that this was it, of course:
"we ourselves and many others over the years have considered neo-Darwinism itself as being in need of major conceptual reform. While it unquestionably deserves respect as the over-arching foundation theory of biology it no longer reflects the actual state of affairs concerning the totality of life, its history and how it may have emerged and evolved both on Earth and throughout the Cosmos (Steele, 1979, Hoyle and Wickramasinghe, 1981, Hoyle and Wickramasinghe, 1982, Bateson et al., 2017, Noble, 2013, Noble, 2017, Noble, 2019)."
Steele, E. J., Gorczynski, R. M., Lindley, R. A., Liu, Y., Temple, R., Tokoro, G., ... & Wickramasinghe, N. C. (2019). Lamarck and panspermia-on the efficient spread of living systems throughout the cosmos. Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology, 149, 10-32.

"Adaptive improvisation as a complement for natural selection at the single individual level
This principle of self-organization offers a conceptual process enabling adaptation to novel stressful conditions occurring during the lifetime of every single individual. As such, it addresses a critical limitation of natural selection and specifies an efficient new way in which physiology might contribute to evolutionary processes [50, 143, 144]."
[NOTE: 143 is Noble's paper in question, although he also authored or co-authored 50 and 144]
Soen, Y., Knafo, M., & Elgart, M. (2015). A principle of organization which facilitates broad Lamarckian-like adaptations by improvisation. Biology direct, 10(1), 1-17.

Noble's paper you dismiss along with others is even incorporated into cutting edge cancer research:
"Currently, as interest in identifying different organic codes increases (Barbieri, 1998, 2018), it is necessary to unify these codes under system inheritance (Heng and Heng, 2021). Such discussions will also promote a 21st century view of evolution (Shapiro, 2011, 2019; Noble, 2013, 2016).

Traditionally, most evolutionary researchers are not familiar with cancer evolution and consider cancer unsuitable for organismal evolutionary studies (Heng, 2015). Curiously, some well-respected scholars such as Huxley and Van Valen have long considered cancers as new biological species. In recent years, an increased number of evolutionary researchers have joined this exciting field (Ling et al., 2015; Roche et al., 2018; Sun et al., 2018; Somarelli et al., 2020). By showing how cancer can be used as a system to study evolutionary principles, we hope more evolutionary biologists will join its ranks. This was one of the main goals of our Cancer and Evolution Symposium (see Shapiro, Shapiro, and Noble, in this issue)." (emphases added)

Heng, J., & Heng, H. H. (2021). Two-phased evolution: Genome chaos-mediated information creation and maintenance. Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology, 165, 29-42. (see attached}

Really, this is getting pathetic. It's the kind or argument I expect from creationists. Back-peddling, ad hominem attacks on a researcher, special pleading, and general denigration of any work presented as counter-evidence.

Dude, relax. And next time before you jump into the middle of someone else's conversation and start name calling, take the time to read through the thread and understand the context of what's being discussed.

 

[gnostic]

This is due to the nature of reductionistic science that can't be experimented away. Results are always dependent on the terms, definitions, and assumptions we start with whether we perform science correctly or just use Look and See Science and the opinion of Peers.

You still don’t understand that the models in sciences required testing.

These test included all observations of the physical evidence. And experiments are evidence and observations, which you repeatedly sciences to be the “Look and See Science”.

Experiments are “Look and See”, too, but I preferred to use the term “observation”, “observe” or “detect”.

Observations are just what you can see with your eyes. Observations include any device, instrument or equipment that can help with observations, which detection, quantifying, measurements, comparisons and testing.

Observations and testing don’t have to always apply to lab experiments. Observations and testing can done in the fields, where evidence can be discovered, and you can do all the testing required onsite, that would include taking measurements, quantities, etc.

You are really being biased on how science should be carried out.

I am not discounting lab experiments, but it is not the only ways to find evidence.

As to Peer Review, I have nothing more to say on the subject, because you refused repeatedly to understand what Peer Review is, which isn’t some baseless and imaginary conspiracies that you have made up about it, in your paranoid and convoluted mind.

 

[cladking]

You still don’t understand that the models in sciences required testing.

I'm not very familiar with the definition of "model" you are using here. "Model" is what each of us builds in his mind as a sort of mnemonic to remember experiment.

"Hypotheses" require testing. Paradigms, experimental interpretation require testing. Theory requires experiment.

You still seem to think that committees, Peers, and "scientists" think. You could not possibly be more wrong. A child has more profound and important thoughts than any committee or Congress because ONLY individuals think. Your usage of "model" is nothing I talk about.

You are really being biased on how science should be carried out.

No. I'm being metaphysical. Science works only through experiment because we each see and experience only what we believe. Without experiment there would never be any new knowledge and the status quo could never change. Without experiment even paradigms would become entrenched. "Evidence" has little meaning unless it can be quantified. Estimating the age of a fossil is not quantification. The observation that all the fossils change at the same time with each new epoch is evidence but it does not support Darwin or his beliefs in gradual change or survival of the fittest. That all observed change in life is sudden is evidence but it can't be quantified so is hardly determinative.

Science IS "Observation > Experiment" by DEFINITION. Things that fall outside of this definition are ONLY relevant to the interpretation of experiment which I would define as "paradigmatical" rather than "science": It is related only indirectly to science because of the way we think and communicate. We can not hold all science in mind without building mental models and it is these models held together with the glue of paradigms.

You are confusing style for substance and personality for soul. You are looking at the books about science but not thinking about how science operates or progresses.

As to Peer Review, I have nothing more to say on the subject, because you refused repeatedly to understand what Peer Review is, which isn’t some baseless and imaginary conspiracies that you have made up about it, in your paranoid and convoluted mind.

No!

I never said I believe in any conspiracy.

I have said many times that YOU believe that experts get together and vote on what's what. You believe only experts have enough knowledge to determine where funding should be spent and who should get grants. I'm the one who says history has always proven all of the experts wrong. No, not as wrong as Darwin but still very very wrong.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

And when I say "Noble's framework", I'm primarily referring to his claims about mutations being non-random (as well as acquired characteristics, DNA isn't a unit of reproduction, evolution is saltational, speciation hasn't been observed).

1) That isn't really "Noble's framework" at all. The idea of directed evolution, non-random mutations, mutational biases (see e.g., Mutation bias reflects natural selection in Arabidopsis thaliana, epigenetic inheritance, and other formulations of this idea predate Noble and have been developed independently both before and after his initial contributions here. There are views more extreme than Noble's here, mostly bunk but still developed enough to be part of the scientific literature. Also, you're source just seems to be a rant that doesn't connect much with Noble's work (of which the author admits to being basically ignorant, justifying his refutation of Noble with his (Coyne's) expertise on the subject matter).
2) Noble does not argue that speciation hasn't been observed. In his book Dance to the Tune of Life, he states (p. 228) "Evidence for evolutionary change and for speciation is now so extensive as to be virtually incontrovertible. It is often taken to be evidence for Neo-Darwinism as a specific theory of how it all happened. But that evidence is perfectly consistent with other mechanisms outside the standard framework of Neo-Darwinism." (emphasis added)
3) If you need a more specific counterexample, biologist Peter Corning's “Inclusive Biological Synthesis” incorporates and builds specifically on (among others) Noble's work:

Corning, P. A. (2020). Beyond the modern synthesis: A framework for a more inclusive biological synthesis. Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology, 153, 5-12.
(see attached)
In this paper specifically, he ends his acknowledgement section with the following:
"This paper grew out of this author’s participation in an informal group of scholars, organized by Denis Noble, James Shapiro and Raju Pookottil, who are collaborating in an effort to move the biological sciences beyond the Modern Synthesis, and various recent extensions. (The group is known as The Third Way of Evolution). The author is particularly grateful to Denis Noble and James Shapiro, whose many contributions are reflected throughout this paper." (emphases added)
4) It isn't a question of non-random vs. random per se. At the same time Noble published his 2013 paper, Masatoshi Nei published one of his last monographs Mutation-Driven Evolution, which was aimed directly at challenging neo-Darwinian thought in a fundamental way, precisely because he argued that evolution was primarily and indeed essentially random and concerned random mutations.

5) Most importantly NONE of this really matters. I've been following this "debate" for over 100 pages and I don't know how much time (I started reading the discussion shortly after it started). The same tired arguments get played out with the same tired responses and it is actually (unfortunately) refreshing to see someone arguing against evolution with some actual knowledge about the subject. You're cut and past responses are, though, typical and are the kind of the kind of standard counter-creationist arguments that are by and large inaccurate and misinformed (though, of course, not nearly so much as creationist arguments themselves).
If Noble himself were right, and the entirety of researchers across disciplines and fields working in some manner on issues relating to or concerning evolutionary theory suddenly agreed en masse that Noble was correct, this would not give any weight to any form of creationism nor any credence towards creationist arguments.
Countering creationists who quote-mine sources or even intelligently collect and disseminate from the literature they find favorable with an attempt to delegitimize even the most radical attempts at a conceptual revolution of evolutionary theory is not only pointless, it is a tacit agreement with creationist over the nature of scientific theory (i.e., as formed primarly via hypotheses that become theories in some sort of isolated stagnation rather than broader frameworks that involve constant changes and developments along with continual disagreements over even core principles, although far more frequently over the cutting edge).
It doesn't matter is the modern synthesis and its creators were heavily informed by eugenics and now outdated views on the nature of inheritance and race. Most of modern statistics grew out of eugenics too, but this doesn't make statistical methods invalid any more than the fallacies and outright ideological blunders of eugenics somehow means something about current evolutionary theory.
It doesn't matter if neo-Darwinism (whatever one takes that to be, as it differs) is in dire need of an overhaul, that happens. We didn't abandon physics when quantum theory emerged (we didn't even abandon classical physics) and I personally believe the "classical" perspective in neuroscience and cognitive sciences more generally should be replaced with the several decades-long development of embodied cognition. Nothing of this sort suggests that evolutionary theory is wrong.
The better way to counter claims that evolution is wrong because X turned out to be not true (or sort of not true, or incomplete, or whatever) therefore Y is to point to the actual nature of science as opposed to elementary textbook definitions. It is to correct misconceptions about the nature of scientific theories as in general stand-alone ideas that are capable of falsification in the strict sense and note that falsification was adopted by sciences in name only while Popper's actual philosophy didn't describe the science he sought to and does not anymore today. Theories are too inter-connected and often too broad to make wholesale falsification possible. Counterevidence is almost always brought not against some theory per se but to aspects of it, and this is a crucial part of scientific progress.
Getting into a back-and-forth about whether Noble (or anybody else) is correct is to fight the wrong battle.

 

[Jose Fly]

1) That isn't really "Noble's framework" at all.

In the context of this thread, it is. LIIA has been advocating non-random mutations and has been citing Noble's paper ad nauseum.

2) Noble does not argue that speciation hasn't been observed.

Thanks, I'll look into that.

3) If you need a more specific counterexample, biologist Peter Corning's “Inclusive Biological Synthesis” incorporates and builds specifically on (among others) Noble's work

I'm aware of the Third Way folks, thank you.

5) Most importantly NONE of this really matters. I've been following this "debate" for over 100 pages and I don't know how much time (I started reading the discussion shortly after it started). The same tired arguments get played out with the same tired responses and it is actually (unfortunately) refreshing to see someone arguing against evolution with some actual knowledge about the subject. You're cut and past responses are, though, typical and are the kind of the kind of standard counter-creationist arguments that are by and large inaccurate and misinformed (though, of course, not nearly so much as creationist arguments themselves).
If Noble himself were right, and the entirety of researchers across disciplines and fields working in some manner on issues relating to or concerning evolutionary theory suddenly agreed en masse that Noble was correct, this would not give any weight to any form of creationism nor any credence towards creationist arguments.
Countering creationists who quote-mine sources or even intelligently collect and disseminate from the literature they find favorable with an attempt to delegitimize even the most radical attempts at a conceptual revolution of evolutionary theory is not only pointless, it is a tacit agreement with creationist over the nature of scientific theory (i.e., as formed primarly via hypotheses that become theories in some sort of isolated stagnation rather than broader frameworks that involve constant changes and developments along with continual disagreements over even core principles, although far more frequently over the cutting edge).
It doesn't matter is the modern synthesis and its creators were heavily informed by eugenics and now outdated views on the nature of inheritance and race. Most of modern statistics grew out of eugenics too, but this doesn't make statistical methods invalid any more than the fallacies and outright ideological blunders of eugenics somehow means something about current evolutionary theory.
It doesn't matter if neo-Darwinism (whatever one takes that to be, as it differs) is in dire need of an overhaul, that happens. We didn't abandon physics when quantum theory emerged (we didn't even abandon classical physics) and I personally believe the "classical" perspective in neuroscience and cognitive sciences more generally should be replaced with the several decades-long development of embodied cognition. Nothing of this sort suggests that evolutionary theory is wrong.
The better way to counter claims that evolution is wrong because X turned out to be not true (or sort of not true, or incomplete, or whatever) therefore Y is to point to the actual nature of science as opposed to elementary textbook definitions. It is to correct misconceptions about the nature of scientific theories as in general stand-alone ideas that are capable of falsification in the strict sense and note that falsification was adopted by sciences in name only while Popper's actual philosophy didn't describe the science he sought to and does not anymore today. Theories are too inter-connected and often too broad to make wholesale falsification possible. Counterevidence is almost always brought not against some theory per se but to aspects of it, and this is a crucial part of scientific progress.
Getting into a back-and-forth about whether Noble (or anybody else) is correct is to fight the wrong battle.

Your suggestions are noted. If you believe you have a better way to debate this, then be my guest. Otherwise, you're just throwing rocks from the sidelines.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Absolutely. It is one of the thing I find most baffling in "arguments" presented by proponents of ID/creationists. For a long time, I couldn't really understand even the motivation behind e.g., attacking Darwin or presenting evidence against a version of evolutionary biology that predated our understanding of basic cellular processes as if this somehow meant something about modern evolutionary theory. To me, it was like trying to argue against nuclear physics or quantum chemistry by showing how ancient Greek atomists were clearly wrong.
Some of it is due to parroting arguments read, of course, but I've read Behe and some of the other oft quoted creationists (or "ID proponents" as the rebranding campaign would have it), and this kind of strategy is at best only a part of the usual "argument". Rather, the "present counter-evidence to outdated notions and claims" strategy seems prevalent mostly online or in the published equivalent.

What clued me into a possible explanation is how many would-be stalwart proponents of science "countered" such crude tactics. It's almost exclusively in such discussions that I've encountered the long-suffering explanation that "in science, a theory is..." followed by some primary school textbook formulation of The Scientific Method Myth.
And I realized that, often enough, parties on both sides shared a lot of the same misconceptions. And why not? It's so ingrained in so much of scientific education (up to and including university level courses) that it takes some time for practicing scientists to realize it doesn't describe what they do in the slightest.
But for those who don't actually do scientific research, this version of "science" tends to be how they conceive of it. And in this educational myth of the nature of scientific method, scientific research and practice consists mainly of formulating hypothesis in order to disprove (or at least test) them until one finds a hypothesis one cannot disprove. Then, after more testing by other scientists, this hypothesis somehow becomes "theory" (probably at the International Society of Scientists' Elite Task Force Committee that is held after the Global Scientists Symposia presentation where scientists are given the opportunity to submit hypotheses they believe have been tested enough to warrant the rank of "Theory" by the SoS's Elite Task Force Committee).
In this "science education" narrative, everything from testing hypotheses to the role of theory in scientific research all constitute relatively isolated, disparate components of a given scientific discipline. Since a given hypothesis (which, after all, is supposed to mature into a full-grown theory on a diet of experimental data) is basically fixed, so are theories. And therefore, a scientific theory somehow exists as an abstract statement that is supposed to be supported by extensive testing and is more or less stagnant and unchanging unless it is eventually rejected and/or replaced.
So, too often, both creationists and proponents of "science" whose background consists entirely on elementary science education and popular science sensationalism have a similar view of the status and nature of scientific theories. And they are wholly and completely wrong.
And it's incredibly tiring. Theories are continually evolving, and the vast majority of scientific research is dedicated to this process. Nor is their some sort of universal type of scientific "theory". In reality, the term as used scientific literature can refer to anything from a guess to something that encompasses entire fields and is the foundation for huge swathes of scientific research (and is therefore supported, extended, and continually tested/researched by the work of scientists who successfully use the theory to formulate and test hypotheses or otherwise engage in theoretical or experimental science).
Evolutionary theory is a prime example. Whole fields are built upon it, and it is used as a successful framework in everything from the foundations of many medical sciences to theoretical computer science. It is ludicrous to suppose that attacking "Darwin" or some version of "Darwinism" means anything at all. The same may be said of attacking the "modern synthesis". It was formulated during the heyday of eugenics, it was never mean to be some sort of "theory of everything" in biology, and claims by various biologists and other scientists and philosophers that it is badly in need of a conceptual reform are all claims made within evolutionary theory, and many well-known proponents are very tired of having their works cherry-picked in order to support ideologies like creationism they are radically opposed to (Massimo Pigliucci comes to mind, as I was around him once when he went off on this).


That's true, but it can mist the point. Agreement over a theory is seldom all or nothing in science. Most of the cutting edge research and many competing research programs work to settle questions or disagreements about certain aspects of a given theory or framework. It could be something like whether the neural code should be understood in terms of rate coding vs. temporal coding (a problem that is somewhat unresolved but mostly increasingly irrelevant as it becomes clearer that it may be neither or both and that probably something of both but in a more complicated formulation). Using creationist rhetorical strategies, one would try to "disprove" neuroscience by showing the evidence temporal coding proponents have marshalled over the rate coding paradigm. But both camps, as is almost invariably the case, are firmly situated in neuroscience and agree on much more than they disagree with.
Or, to turn to physics, there were at least two crises in the formulation of modern physics during the attempt to obtain a relativistic (covariant) formulation of quantum mechanincs. The first was resolved by the proper understanding of the Klein-Gordon and Dirac equations in terms of a field theory and (the now somewhat anachronistic) second quantization scheme as well as the successful regularization and renormalization procedures (then largely separate from one another) that made QED so incredibly successful and gave it such unbelievable accuracy. Then, when the field theory approach was extended to atomic and nuclear physics (in particular to the parton models, and nuclear forces beyond that of electromagnetism), it seemed to fail. For a time, a fair number of physicists developed an approach first championed by Heisenberg that became known as the S-matrix bootstrap program or just the S-matrix theory. This was a kind of radical democratic take on nuclear and subatomic interactions that eschewed field theory, and many a well-known physicist worked on it or something like it to explain experimental data while remaining field theorists dwindled in number and in successes. That changed with the advent of the quark model and what essentially became the standard model we know today. The S-matrix remains as a useful calculational tool in field theory and beyond. It was the approach to the S-matrix and the attempt to accept it as somehow fundamental over and against field theory that was abandoned.
At no time, however, did physicists give up on physics, or relativity, or quantum theory, or any number of other things one could claim was "disproved" using creationist logic.

These "arguments" just completely fail to capture the nature of science, scientific research, and scientific knowledge.

We have basically two camps opposed to evolution on this thread. Neither is represented by anyone that appears to have a solid understanding or knowledge of science.

There is the traditional, typical camp of ideological creationism/intelligent design that I think fits with your description of parroting. Repetition of a large volume version of the same cherry-picked promotional add pointing out a disagreement in science as the deal breaker that is going to bring it down. Then place that add in heavy rotation while ignoring all valid criticism. I find this approach is one of the basic models that ends in "therefore science fails and my (fill in your favorite belief system) wins by default".

The other camp exploits a position that is equally, if not more, out of touch with reality. The intent seems to be on creating a unique reality from scratch that only touches occasionally on the trivial surface of history and science. It appears to be more reliant on the development of conspiracy theories and semantic arguments to the point that scientific terms are redefined to fit an entirely new and unknown version of reality. Entire concepts are created without explanation or any support as if they were imagined into existence out of some 50's science fiction novel.

I don't see the goal of either camp to be similar except that both are promoting a believed view as science. But radically different believed views from what I have seen. Both fit the pigeon chess analogy in how these camps are presented.

There really isn't anything useful that I have found from either position except perhaps encouraging me to learn more about the extended synthesis. Or to corroborate how ignorant of science that those opposed to it are and the tactics they will employ to force these views into the public square. To be honest, I have lost interest in the repetition and the pointlessness of the claims. I don't even read those posts anymore. It seems like getting a response to hold the camp together is the only goal going forward. Not something I have any interest in helping to perpetuate.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Absolutely. It is one of the thing I find most baffling in "arguments" presented by proponents of ID/creationists. For a long time, I couldn't really understand even the motivation behind e.g., attacking Darwin or presenting evidence against a version of evolutionary biology that predated our understanding of basic cellular processes as if this somehow meant something about modern evolutionary theory. To me, it was like trying to argue against nuclear physics or quantum chemistry by showing how ancient Greek atomists were clearly wrong.
Some of it is due to parroting arguments read, of course, but I've read Behe and some of the other oft quoted creationists (or "ID proponents" as the rebranding campaign would have it), and this kind of strategy is at best only a part of the usual "argument". Rather, the "present counter-evidence to outdated notions and claims" strategy seems prevalent mostly online or in the published equivalent.

What clued me into a possible explanation is how many would-be stalwart proponents of science "countered" such crude tactics. It's almost exclusively in such discussions that I've encountered the long-suffering explanation that "in science, a theory is..." followed by some primary school textbook formulation of The Scientific Method Myth.
And I realized that, often enough, parties on both sides shared a lot of the same misconceptions. And why not? It's so ingrained in so much of scientific education (up to and including university level courses) that it takes some time for practicing scientists to realize it doesn't describe what they do in the slightest.
But for those who don't actually do scientific research, this version of "science" tends to be how they conceive of it. And in this educational myth of the nature of scientific method, scientific research and practice consists mainly of formulating hypothesis in order to disprove (or at least test) them until one finds a hypothesis one cannot disprove. Then, after more testing by other scientists, this hypothesis somehow becomes "theory" (probably at the International Society of Scientists' Elite Task Force Committee that is held after the Global Scientists Symposia presentation where scientists are given the opportunity to submit hypotheses they believe have been tested enough to warrant the rank of "Theory" by the SoS's Elite Task Force Committee).
In this "science education" narrative, everything from testing hypotheses to the role of theory in scientific research all constitute relatively isolated, disparate components of a given scientific discipline. Since a given hypothesis (which, after all, is supposed to mature into a full-grown theory on a diet of experimental data) is basically fixed, so are theories. And therefore, a scientific theory somehow exists as an abstract statement that is supposed to be supported by extensive testing and is more or less stagnant and unchanging unless it is eventually rejected and/or replaced.
So, too often, both creationists and proponents of "science" whose background consists entirely on elementary science education and popular science sensationalism have a similar view of the status and nature of scientific theories. And they are wholly and completely wrong.
And it's incredibly tiring. Theories are continually evolving, and the vast majority of scientific research is dedicated to this process. Nor is their some sort of universal type of scientific "theory". In reality, the term as used scientific literature can refer to anything from a guess to something that encompasses entire fields and is the foundation for huge swathes of scientific research (and is therefore supported, extended, and continually tested/researched by the work of scientists who successfully use the theory to formulate and test hypotheses or otherwise engage in theoretical or experimental science).
Evolutionary theory is a prime example. Whole fields are built upon it, and it is used as a successful framework in everything from the foundations of many medical sciences to theoretical computer science. It is ludicrous to suppose that attacking "Darwin" or some version of "Darwinism" means anything at all. The same may be said of attacking the "modern synthesis". It was formulated during the heyday of eugenics, it was never mean to be some sort of "theory of everything" in biology, and claims by various biologists and other scientists and philosophers that it is badly in need of a conceptual reform are all claims made within evolutionary theory, and many well-known proponents are very tired of having their works cherry-picked in order to support ideologies like creationism they are radically opposed to (Massimo Pigliucci comes to mind, as I was around him once when he went off on this).


That's true, but it can mist the point. Agreement over a theory is seldom all or nothing in science. Most of the cutting edge research and many competing research programs work to settle questions or disagreements about certain aspects of a given theory or framework. It could be something like whether the neural code should be understood in terms of rate coding vs. temporal coding (a problem that is somewhat unresolved but mostly increasingly irrelevant as it becomes clearer that it may be neither or both and that probably something of both but in a more complicated formulation). Using creationist rhetorical strategies, one would try to "disprove" neuroscience by showing the evidence temporal coding proponents have marshalled over the rate coding paradigm. But both camps, as is almost invariably the case, are firmly situated in neuroscience and agree on much more than they disagree with.
Or, to turn to physics, there were at least two crises in the formulation of modern physics during the attempt to obtain a relativistic (covariant) formulation of quantum mechanincs. The first was resolved by the proper understanding of the Klein-Gordon and Dirac equations in terms of a field theory and (the now somewhat anachronistic) second quantization scheme as well as the successful regularization and renormalization procedures (then largely separate from one another) that made QED so incredibly successful and gave it such unbelievable accuracy. Then, when the field theory approach was extended to atomic and nuclear physics (in particular to the parton models, and nuclear forces beyond that of electromagnetism), it seemed to fail. For a time, a fair number of physicists developed an approach first championed by Heisenberg that became known as the S-matrix bootstrap program or just the S-matrix theory. This was a kind of radical democratic take on nuclear and subatomic interactions that eschewed field theory, and many a well-known physicist worked on it or something like it to explain experimental data while remaining field theorists dwindled in number and in successes. That changed with the advent of the quark model and what essentially became the standard model we know today. The S-matrix remains as a useful calculational tool in field theory and beyond. It was the approach to the S-matrix and the attempt to accept it as somehow fundamental over and against field theory that was abandoned.
At no time, however, did physicists give up on physics, or relativity, or quantum theory, or any number of other things one could claim was "disproved" using creationist logic.

These "arguments" just completely fail to capture the nature of science, scientific research, and scientific knowledge.

One of the problems that exists, and one often highlighted in discussions like this, is the dual use of the term theory in both the colloquial and scientific definitions. Even some scientists mix it up, though I hope in serious discussion none of them are using theory interchangeably with guess.

A few months ago, one of the ministers at church referred to the theory of evolution as a guess which tells me how little that science is understood by strict creationists or how little understanding is desired. I didn't pick it as a battle that I perceived I could win, so I remained silent on the issue. That audience is not really interested in learning and understanding the subject matter. Perhaps that makes me a hypocrite, though I consider it an exercise in wisdom.

I still marvel at how naive and ignorant it is, this idea that the theory of evolution has been recently falsified. Or that acceptance of the extended synthesis would somehow render the observations of evolution somehow moot. Even if it were falsified, the "default paradigm" doesn't exist as a replacement.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

My problem with most creationists is they think that we treat Charles Darwin is some gods or a prophet, hence they think of evolution as a religion.

I know of Darwin’ limitations and some of his errors, but he is no god, but attacking Darwin or calling evolution a religion, don’t refute Evolution at all.

Evolution can only be refuted by evidence, which they don’t have.

And you’re right, there are still not enough consensus for extended synthesis to completely replace the current model of evolution.

I think that is part of the problem of approaching science from a perspective of belief. Science and historical science is seen in the same terms as used for religious texts and views.

Attacking the positions of science and scientists hundreds of years dead may be the only way they can rally up any enthusiasm for carrying on. The deification of Darwin and then unseating him is easy pickings and of no relevance to the science or their cause at the same time.

I find the one gem out of this entire thread has been the inspiration to learn more about the extended synthesis and what really is being said about it. The biased promotional advertisements on this thread haven't proven useful for anything else. They certainly aren't working as advertised for the id movement and they aren't disseminating information of any use in science education.

As a result of wanting to know the truth about the extended synthesis, I found this interesting paper that explains how the claims of directed mutation are unfounded.

Maisnier-Patin, S., & Roth, J. R. (2015). The origin of mutants under selection: how natural selection mimics mutagenesis (adaptive mutation). Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in biology, 7(7), a018176.
https://cshperspectives.cshlp.org/content/7/7/a018176.full.pdf

 

[rational experiences]

Real human advice.

Man and men. Just humans. Did not invent creation. They invented arose a dead machine.

Inside the machine they put the mass they want to convert to say my man's creation.

Exact an attack to destroy.

Is what you are all possessed by today. Your first ever evil human man's thoughts. As just humans.

Knowing you mutated or simply destroyed life or type on earth yourselves as a man scientist.

 

[gnostic]

Attacking the positions of science and scientists hundreds of years dead may be the only way they can rally up any enthusiasm for carrying on. The deification of Darwin and then unseating him is easy pickings and of no relevance to the science or their cause at the same time.

I find the one gem out of this entire thread has been the inspiration to learn more about the extended synthesis and what really is being said about it. The biased promotional advertisements on this thread haven't proven useful for anything else. They certainly aren't working as advertised for the id movement and they aren't disseminating information of any use in science education.

You’re right, because I don’t see how bringing up the extended synthesis in any way bolster the Intelligent Design or the YEC camp.

It certainly don’t refute the current theory of Evolution in general.

As you can see from my recent replies, I have not said anything about at all about extended synthesis or about Noble, mainly because I know very little about it, so I have just been watching the exchanges from others.

From what I can tell by people’s responses to Noble and extended synthesis, the impromptu either, appeared to be overblown.

 

[YoursTrue]

Yes, I know.

But I believe The most destructive and most wrong part of Darwin still stands in the minds of laymen and scientists alike; "survival of the fittest". While Darwin was wrong across the board modern scientists have dressed "survival of the fittest" up in fancy new clothes and enshrined it.

This is due to the nature of reductionistic science that can't be experimented away. Results are always dependent on the terms, definitions, and assumptions we start with whether we perform science correctly or just use Look and See Science and the opinion of Peers.

Of course Darwin was wrong about everything as this thread (and you) has done an excellent job of detailing but people still believe in his fundamental assumption that some individuals are inherently more fit than others and that it is the will of nature that the most fit create new species on an ongoing basis a little at a time. Science has shown this to be untrue as well but people still want to believe and each assumes he himself is among the most fit who will help lead the human race to nirvana.

All individuals are equally fit (and worthy) to survive. We thrive under different conditions and with the best of luck. But these differences and luck do not drive change in species that like all change in all life at all levels is always sudden. Looking at groups (called "species") to understand how life changes is the very worst possible perspective for understanding the processes and forces that actually cause speciation. Darwin was wrong and the modern theories are still wrong, merely less wrong. And the wrongest parts are the beliefs in "natural selection" (SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST) and gradual change. These things are illusions caused by Darwin, definitions, and the devilish predisposition of people to believe in simple answers.

If there were such a thing as "fit" individuals they would merely produce a more fit "species", not a slightly better, different, or evolved species. This is more visible if one merely looks at life as being ONLY individual and ONLY based on consciousness. As long as one believes "species" is more than just a word, an abstraction, and a means of communication it's very difficult not to believe in Darwin and Evolution. As long as one believe that reductionistic science necessarily exposes only relevant parts of reality we will extrapolate and interpolate the results to fit our preexisting beliefs, definitions, and models. "Science" is the set of axioms and experimental results and if these things aren't kept in mind we will see what's not there. We will see every answer. Homo omnisciencis.

I'd love to be able to understand what you're saying and I can't go through the whole thread right now, but I wonder: are you saying you do or don't believe in the theory of evolution?

 

[YoursTrue]

I think that is part of the problem of approaching science from a perspective of belief. Science and historical science is seen in the same terms as used for religious texts and views.

Attacking the positions of science and scientists hundreds of years dead may be the only way they can rally up any enthusiasm for carrying on. The deification of Darwin and then unseating him is easy pickings and of no relevance to the science or their cause at the same time.

I find the one gem out of this entire thread has been the inspiration to learn more about the extended synthesis and what really is being said about it. The biased promotional advertisements on this thread haven't proven useful for anything else. They certainly aren't working as advertised for the id movement and they aren't disseminating information of any use in science education.

As a result of wanting to know the truth about the extended synthesis, I found this interesting paper that explains how the claims of directed mutation are unfounded.

Maisnier-Patin, S., & Roth, J. R. (2015). The origin of mutants under selection: how natural selection mimics mutagenesis (adaptive mutation). Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in biology, 7(7), a018176.
https://cshperspectives.cshlp.org/content/7/7/a018176.full.pdf

Oh, wow. All I can say is, it's all projection. And that alone is somewhat amazing. Not truly amazing. Insects and birds and clouds are truly amazing.

 

[LIIA]

1) That isn't really "Noble's framework" at all. The idea of directed evolution, non-random mutations, mutational biases (see e.g., Mutation bias reflects natural selection in Arabidopsis thaliana, epigenetic inheritance, and other formulations of this idea predate Noble and have been developed independently both before and after his initial contributions here. There are views more extreme than Noble's here, mostly bunk but still developed enough to be part of the scientific literature. Also, you're source just seems to be a rant that doesn't connect much with Noble's work (of which the author admits to being basically ignorant, justifying his refutation of Noble with his (Coyne's) expertise on the subject matter).
2) Noble does not argue that speciation hasn't been observed. In his book Dance to the Tune of Life, he states (p. 228) "Evidence for evolutionary change and for speciation is now so extensive as to be virtually incontrovertible. It is often taken to be evidence for Neo-Darwinism as a specific theory of how it all happened. But that evidence is perfectly consistent with other mechanisms outside the standard framework of Neo-Darwinism." (emphasis added)
3) If you need a more specific counterexample, biologist Peter Corning's “Inclusive Biological Synthesis” incorporates and builds specifically on (among others) Noble's work:

Corning, P. A. (2020). Beyond the modern synthesis: A framework for a more inclusive biological synthesis. Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology, 153, 5-12.
(see attached)
In this paper specifically, he ends his acknowledgement section with the following:
"This paper grew out of this author’s participation in an informal group of scholars, organized by Denis Noble, James Shapiro and Raju Pookottil, who are collaborating in an effort to move the biological sciences beyond the Modern Synthesis, and various recent extensions. (The group is known as The Third Way of Evolution). The author is particularly grateful to Denis Noble and James Shapiro, whose many contributions are reflected throughout this paper." (emphases added)
4) It isn't a question of non-random vs. random per se. At the same time Noble published his 2013 paper, Masatoshi Nei published one of his last monographs Mutation-Driven Evolution, which was aimed directly at challenging neo-Darwinian thought in a fundamental way, precisely because he argued that evolution was primarily and indeed essentially random and concerned random mutations.

5) Most importantly NONE of this really matters. I've been following this "debate" for over 100 pages and I don't know how much time (I started reading the discussion shortly after it started). The same tired arguments get played out with the same tired responses and it is actually (unfortunately) refreshing to see someone arguing against evolution with some actual knowledge about the subject. You're cut and past responses are, though, typical and are the kind of the kind of standard counter-creationist arguments that are by and large inaccurate and misinformed (though, of course, not nearly so much as creationist arguments themselves).
If Noble himself were right, and the entirety of researchers across disciplines and fields working in some manner on issues relating to or concerning evolutionary theory suddenly agreed en masse that Noble was correct, this would not give any weight to any form of creationism nor any credence towards creationist arguments.
Countering creationists who quote-mine sources or even intelligently collect and disseminate from the literature they find favorable with an attempt to delegitimize even the most radical attempts at a conceptual revolution of evolutionary theory is not only pointless, it is a tacit agreement with creationist over the nature of scientific theory (i.e., as formed primarly via hypotheses that become theories in some sort of isolated stagnation rather than broader frameworks that involve constant changes and developments along with continual disagreements over even core principles, although far more frequently over the cutting edge).
It doesn't matter is the modern synthesis and its creators were heavily informed by eugenics and now outdated views on the nature of inheritance and race. Most of modern statistics grew out of eugenics too, but this doesn't make statistical methods invalid any more than the fallacies and outright ideological blunders of eugenics somehow means something about current evolutionary theory.

It’s actually refreshing to see ethical, rational argument from the opposite side. I appreciate it.

Mere denial/dishonest tactics to force a flawed view without any willingness to understand the subject matter only reflects that the person is neither confident about his own position nor can engage in a rational argument.

Obviously, we have different views, we exchange evidence and demonstrate the reasons of our different positions for the benefit of all but that doesn’t justify the concealment of facts or employing dishonest tactics merely to win a false argument. It's neither a fight nor it should be one; we all can demonstrate our reasons in an ethical manner and then we are all free to accept which view to adopt.

Ad hominem and accusations of being "the enemy of science" is not acceptable, the real enemies of science are those how deliberately conceal the facts (if they are not ignorant of it).

Thank you for your ethical and rational comments and the honest acknowledgment of Nobel’s status as a leading research scientist and one of the more influential researchers in the life sciences of the latter 20th and 21st centuries.

I also thank you for your acknowledgment of the latest scientific advances that challenged/disproved the central assumptions of the Modern Synthesis, and I really appreciate sharing the articles by Henry H. Heng, Julie Heng and Peter A. Corning.

On my end, disproving all assumptions/mechanisms of the theory means that the modern synthesis is a theory with no basis to stand on, a theory that contradicts empirical evidence of latest science. I.e., a false theory, hence, all interpretations on the basis of a false theory are necessarily false.

Other than the modern synthesis, there is no agreed upon framework to replace the classical model of evolution. This is where we are today.

On your end, you (as well as many scientists) believe that the disproved modern synthesis doesn’t disprove evolution. You are entitled to your view but it’s important to understand that the core argument that lasted more than 100 pages in this thread is specifically about the fact that all central assumptions of the mainstream evolutionary theory that is being specifically advocated by almost all proponents of evolution and still being taught in biology textbooks and accepted as a fact (Neo-Darwinism/Modern Synthesis) is disproved.

If we are in agreement about this specific point, then we have nothing to argue about. There is no point of arguing about future framework yet to be agreed upon or established to replace the MS.

If Noble himself were right, and the entirety of researchers across disciplines and fields working in some manner on issues relating to or concerning evolutionary theory suddenly agreed en masse that Noble was correct, this would not give any weight to any form of creationism nor any credence towards creationist arguments.

What argument? The core argument in this thread has always been about the central assumptions of the modern synthesis being disproved.

As I said many times in this thread, my religious views have nothing to do with the MS being scientifically disproved.

The better way to counter claims that evolution is wrong because X turned out to be not true (or sort of not true, or incomplete, or whatever) therefore Y is to point to the actual nature of science

Our core argument in this thread was never about Y, it was always about X being challenged/false.

The claim of some about Y is merely a tactic to move the goalposts and get the argument out of track.

 

[LIIA]

Yeah, I suspend judgment on what objective reality really is. But I still have faith. But that is in part personal in my faith.

At the crossroads, it’s not enough to know that you have options. You have to make a choice. If you don’t, you stay stuck at the middle of the road. You don’t get anywhere.

If you are really neutral about the subject matter and open to possibilities, check the line of evidence in the link below especially #2 & #3.

Near-Death Experiences Evidence for Their Reality

If you are interested to see more about NDE, you may see #60, #66, & #75 of the thread “What happens after we die”

What happens after we die

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

At the crossroads, it’s not enough to know that you have options. You have to make a choice. If you don’t, you stay stuck at the middle of the road. You don’t get anywhere.

If you are really neutral about the subject matter and open to possibilities, check the line of evidence in the link below especially #2 & #3.

Near-Death Experiences Evidence for Their Reality

If you are interested to see more about NDE, you may see #60, #66, & #75 of the thread “What happens after we die”

What happens after we die

You are not me and I can still do it differently no matter how much it doesn't make sense to you. You do as you do and I do as I do.

 

[cladking]

I'd love to be able to understand what you're saying and I can't go through the whole thread right now, but I wonder: are you saying you do or don't believe in the theory of evolution?

I believe experiment. Experiment does not support "Evolution". It does not support a gradual change in life or that change in life is caused by survival of the fittest. Darwin was completely wrong. The modern theories are less wrong but still very wrong.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

You’re right, because I don’t see how bringing up the extended synthesis in any way bolster the Intelligent Design or the YEC camp.

It certainly don’t refute the current theory of Evolution in general.

As you can see from my recent replies, I have not said anything about at all about extended synthesis or about Noble, mainly because I know very little about it, so I have just been watching the exchanges from others.

From what I can tell by people’s responses to Noble and extended synthesis, the impromptu either, appeared to be overblown.

The intent from the creationist position here is to use the extended synthesis to declare the theory of evolution dead and slander anyone that accepts it as some sort of religious believer. If you do not think the modern synthesis requires replacement you are doomed to be labelled dogmatic. If you do accept the extended evolutionary synthesis, then you are doomed for jumping blindly from belief in one theory to the next I suppose.

There are many reasons why the EES has been proposed and many reasons why most do not accept it. All of these that I have read are based on evidence, how that evidence is weighed and where one places a perspective with regards to a genetic or organismal basis. Acceptance of the current theory based on the evidence does not render a person a dogmatist. Both are scientific, using evidence and logical argument. The creationist dogma all boils down to the "Default Paradigm" Declare the theory of evolution dead and whatever belief desired becomes the replacement by default. But no rational person is going to accept the declaration of some random poster on an internet forum as the final say in the acceptance of a scientific theory.

The facts of evolution exist. Darwin's original theory was formulated to explain those facts. In the mid-20th Century, a revised version of the theory (the Modern Synthesis) was formulated to include new information on population biology and genetics. The facts of evolution remained and many, many more had become known at that point. If the EES survives to become a new formulation of the theory of evolution, there will be even more facts for it to explain. Clearly, creationists equate the facts of evolution and theories of evolution to be the same thing. Kill one and all the facts are scattered with it by default. But we were still held to the Earth when Einstein came along and upturned Newton's theory. It isn't as if we all suddenly flew into space. And we still use Newton to this day, despite it being incomplete in comparison to Einstein's.

It is ridiculous to consider such an irrational position in light of the evidence and the explanatory power of theory. I know that some people are simply ignorant and don't know enough to properly evaluate these things, but some know enough to know what they are doing and the ethics associated with that effort. It would be difficult to convince me otherwise from what I have seen of wordy mantras placed in heavy rotation, declarations of a win that hasn't happened and passive aggressive defamation. That is the chess we all see played here.

 

[Firenze]

Darwin's Illusion

Darwin believed that life can be explained by natural selection based on his expectation that organic life was exceedingly simple.
He lived in a time when people believed a brood of mice could suddenly appear in a basket of dirty clothes. In other words Darwin was under the illusion that life could appear spontaneously under the right conditions.
Based on this ignorance, he crafted an explanation for variation within a species, and formulated a theory explaining the process whereby life could arise from nonliving matter and mutate to the variety of living entities we see today.

It is postulated that this narrative has been overwhelmingly accepted in educated circles for more than a century even though the basic mechanisms of organic life remained a mystery until several decades ago- as a convenient alternative to belief in a creator.

After 1950 biochemistry has come to understand that living matters is more complex than Darwin could ever have dreamed of.

So, in view of this, what happened to Darwin allegedly elegant and simple idea ?
Although not a single sector of Darwinic evolution can offer uncontested proof that it is nothing more than a imaginative theory it is acclaimed by mainstream scientists as a science.

Lynn Margulis a distinguished University Professor of Biology puts it this way:
"History will ultimately judge neo-Darwinism as a minor twentieth-century religious sect within the sprawling religious persuasion of Anglo-Saxon biology"
She asks any molecular biologists to name a single, unambiguous example of the formation of a new species by the accumulation of mutations. Her challenge to date is still unmet.
She says " proponents of the standard theory [of evolution] wallow in their zoological, capitalistic, competitive, cost-benefit interpretation of Darwin..."

I'm still waiting for one of these evolution deniers to publish their refutations of the millions of data points proven in evolution and collect their Nobel Prize.
It's 52 years and counting.....