Category: Evolution
Evolution By Intelligent Design is Intelligent Design
A short news article in Molecular Systems Biology is another example of scientists discussing the controversy that doesn’t exist over irreducible complexity. In an article discussing how some molecular biologists increased the selectivity of certain enzymes for their substrates by inducing mutations, they conclude: “Finally, they assumed that the mutations were additive–that the effect on selectivity of combining two mutations could be predicted by adding the effect of each mutation done singly. With this assumption, it was straightforward to predict combinations of single mutations identified as controlling selectivity without decreasing the total productivity. The striking result of this design is that the simple additivity assumption was validated–the authors obtained several triple to quintuple mutants with nearly perfect selectivities for the Read More ›
Evidence for Human Evolution Still Scant and Controversial After 25 Years
A post made 2 weeks ago highlighted how in 1981, Constance Holden wrote in Science that emotions, rather than abundant evidence, often rule the field of paleoanthropology and its claims about human evolution. Yesterday, an article by Charles Matthews in the San Jose Mercury News reiterates that same point. Reviewing a book by Ann Gibbons, Matthews notes: “Gibbons, who reports on human evolution for Science magazine, gives a lucid account of the science involved in finding fossils, establishing how old they are, and ascertaining whether they in fact belong to the ancestors of humankind. She also shows how difficult and sometimes dangerous the work of hunting for 7 million-year-old fossils can be. And that, like most humans, anthropologists are subject Read More ›
For Darwinian Evolution, It’s One Step Forward, Acknowledging Two Steps Back: Taking A Look at Tiktaalik
I love it when new “missing links” are discovered, because it’s then–and only then–that Darwinists admit how precious little evidence had previously existed for the evolutionary transition in question. When reports came out this week of an alleged example of a fossil representative of the stock that might have led from fish to tetrapods — Tiktaalik roseae — evolutionists finally came clean about the previous lack of fossil evidence for such a transition: “The relationship of limbed vertebrates (tetrapods) to lobe-finned fish (sarcopterygians) is well established, but the origin of major tetrapod features has remained obscure for lack of fossils that document the sequence of evolutionary changes.” (Edward B. Daeschler, Neil H. Shubin, and Farish A. Jenkins, “A Devonian tetrapod-like Read More ›
AAAS Fears Academic Freedom, Free and Open Inquiry, in Oklahoma
A great opinion article in Friday’s Tulsa Today reiterates a point I made in an ENV post last week: Darwinists oppose academic freedom legislation because they want to censor scientific evidence which some scientists think challenges biological evolution. In the article, Jonathan Bartlett critiques Alan Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), who opposed the Academic Freedom Bill in Oklahoma: “First, the bill only covers scientific views and scientific information. Therefore, Intelligent Design can only be included if it is scientific. If Intelligent Design isn’t scientific, Leshner has nothing to worry about. If Intelligent Design is scientific, then Leshner is playing politics with science by trying to limit scientific views by law.” Bartlett is absolutely Read More ›
Personal Persecution Story Inspired Alabama Academic Freedom Bill
Introduction The Alabama Academic Freedom Act was originally proposed by Senator Wendell Mitchell (Democrat) in the Alabama State Legislature in 2004 to protect the rights of teachers and students to present scientific views and hold positions regardless of their views on biological evolution. It was re-proposed this year. This legislation is needed in light of the threat to teacher academic freedom to present scientific evidence that might challenge evolution, prohibited by Judge Jones in his Kitzmiller ruling. Sadly, it looks like the bill will not pass this year because Alabama State Senator Jim Preuitt (Democrat) pulled an unfair political power-play and demanded that the bill have its application to the K-12 grade levels removed if he were to permit it Read More ›