Author: David Klinghoffer
When a Book Review Is Not a “Book Review”
Last updated 3/9/10, 7:00 pm. As a former book review editor (at National Review), I take a professional interest in book reviews and all the things that can go right or wrong with them. I confess, though, I’ve never seen anything quite like the treatment of Stephen Meyer’s book, Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design, on BioLogos, the curious website funded by the Templeton Foundation and specializing in Christian apologetics for Darwin. The site published what was clearly, unambiguously written to look like a review by biologist Francisco Ayala that, as Steve Meyer pointed out already, actually gave every evidence that Ayala had not read the book. (My colleague Dr. Meyer thinks Ayala did read Read More ›
Primordial Soup? Would You Believe…
Life arose without design or direction from any intelligent agent. Would you believe it did so in a sun-warmed ocean surface? No? Would you believe an earth-heated vent at the bottom of the same ocean? Would you believe an office microwave that hasn’t been cleaned since the Bush Administration? The past week’s startling news of backpedaling from the “primordial soup” theory rang a bell, though I wasn’t instantly able to say whose comedy routine it put me in mind of. Hm, was it Monty Python? ScienceDaily carries the story: For 80 years it has been accepted that early life began in a “primordial soup” of organic molecules before evolving out of the oceans millions of years later. Today the “soup” Read More ›
Lying for Darwin
Over the past couple of months at Jerry Coyne’s blog, Why Evolution Is True, he and Matthew Cobb have written several blog posts attacking Stephen Meyer’s Signature in the Cell — by my count, five posts. The most recent by Coyne accusesMeyer of dishonesty: Meyer does not mean well. He is spreading lies and confusing people by distorting real science. Is that the unfortunate result of “meaning well”? Do you think that because somebody is a “Christian brother,” he’s incapable of lying for Jesus? Isn’t it strange, though, that for all the persistent attacks on Meyer, in quite personal terms, Professor Coyne hasn’t dared toactually read Steve’s book? That’s obvious because Coyne’s throwaway summary ofits contents — Signature “maintains that Read More ›
Just a Coincidence?
I admit to a fond wish to impute significance to coincidences. Cynics such as Matthew Cobb writing at Jerry Coyne’s blog, Why Evolution Is True, explain away such things, like they do absolutely everything, as a function of survival value tucked into our genome from ancient days. In some recent posts, Cobb was full of mockery for people like me:
“Design”? Don’t Panic, It’s Only a Metaphor!
In the Darwinist community there’s a general acceptance, however uneasy, of the necessity of speaking in design-related metaphors to describe features of organisms. Such language may be regrettable since it attracts the attention of the bogeyman, “creationism,” but really it’s kind of unavoidable. In Darwin and Design, Michael Ruse sought to offer solace to fellow Darwinians. He asked, We still talk in terms appropriate to conscious intention….In biology, we still use forward-looking language of a kind that would not be deemed appropriate in physics or chemistry. Why is this? His answer: Organisms, produced by natural selection, have adaptations, and these give the appearance of being designed….If organisms did not seem to be designed, they would not work and hence would Read More ›