Thank you Elizabeth for this opportunity-
Good day- Over the past many, many years, IDists have been telling people that intelligent design is not anti-evolution. Most people understand and accept that, while others just refuse to, no matter what.
With that said, in this post I will provide the evidence (again) that firmly demonstrates that ID is not anti-evolution. I will be presenting several authoritative definitions of “evolution” followed by what the ID leadership has to say about evolution. So without any further adieu, I give you-
Intelligent Design is NOT Anti-Evolution
”.
In order to have a discussion about whether or not Intelligent Design is anti-evolution or not we must first define “evolution”. Fortunately there are resources available that do just that.
Defining “evolution”:
Finally, during the evolutionary synthesis, a consensus emerged: “Evolution is the change in properties of populations of organisms over time”- Ernst Mayr page 8 of “What Evolution Is”
Biological (or organic) evolution is change in the properties of populations of organisms or groups of such populations, over the course of generations. The development, or ontogeny, of an individual organism is not considered evolution: individual organisms do not evolve. The changes in populations that are considered evolutionary are those that are ‘heritable’ via the genetic material from one generation to the next. Biological evolution may be slight or substantial; it embraces everything from slight changes in the proportions of different forms of a gene within a population, such as the alleles that determine the different human blood types, to the alterations that led from the earliest organisms to dinosaurs, bees, snapdragons, and humans. Douglas J. Futuyma (1998) Evolutionary Biology 3rd ed., Sinauer Associates Inc. Sunderland MA p.4
Biological evolution refers to the cumulative changes that occur in a population over time. PBS series “Evolution” endorsed by the NCSE
Biological evolution, simply put, is descent with modification. This definition encompasses small-scale evolution (changes in gene frequency in a population from one generation to the next) and large-scale evolution (the descent of different species from a common ancestor over many generations) UC Berkley
In fact, evolution can be precisely defined as any change in the frequency of alleles within a gene pool from one generation to the next. Helena Curtis and N. Sue Barnes, Biology, 5th ed. 1989 Worth Publishers, p.974
Evolution- in biology, the word means genetically based change in a line of descent over time.- Biology: Concepts and Applications Starr 5th edition 2003 page 10
Those are all accepted definitions of biological “evolution”. (Perhaps someone will present some definitions that differ from those. Most likely I will only comment on any differences if the differences are relevant.)
With biology, where-ever there is heritable genetic change there is evolution and where-ever you have offspring that are (genetically) different from the parent(s) you have descent with modification.
Next I will show what Intelligent Design says about biological evolution and people can see for themselves that Intelligent Design is not anti-evolution:
Intelligent Design is NOT Creationism (MAY 2000)
Scott refers to me as an intelligent design “creationist,” even though I clearly write in my book Darwin’s Black Box (which Scott cites) that I am not a creationist and have no reason to doubt common descent. In fact, my own views fit quite comfortably with the 40% of scientists that Scott acknowledges think “evolution occurred, but was guided by God.”- Dr Michael Behe
Dr Behe has repeatedly confirmed he is OK with common ancestry. And he has repeatedly made it clear that ID is an argument against materialistic evolution (see below), ie necessity and chance.
Then we have:
What is Intelligent Design and What is it Challenging?– a short video featuring Stephen C. Meyer on Intelligent Design. He also makes it clear that ID is not anti-evolution.
Next Dembski and Wells weigh in:
The theory of intelligent design (ID) neither requires nor excludes speciation- even speciation by Darwinian mechanisms. ID is sometimes confused with a static view of species, as though species were designed to be immutable. This is a conceptual possibility within ID, but it is not the only possibility. ID precludes neither significant variation within species nor the evolution of new species from earlier forms. Rather, it maintains that there are strict limits to the amount and quality of variations that material mechanisms such as natural selection and random genetic change can alone produce. At the same time, it holds that intelligence is fully capable of supplementing such mechanisms, interacting and influencing the material world, and thereby guiding it into certain physical states to the exclusion of others. To effect such guidance, intelligence must bring novel information to expression inside living forms. Exactly how this happens remains for now an open question, to be answered on the basis of scientific evidence. The point to note, however, is that intelligence can itself be a source of biological novelties that lead to macroevolutionary changes. In this way intelligent design is compatible with speciation. page 109 of “The Design of Life”
and
And that brings us to a true either-or. If the choice between common design and common ancestry is a false either-or, the choice between intelligent design and materialistic evolution is a true either-or. Materialistic evolution does not only embrace common ancestry; it also rejects any real design in the evolutionary process. Intelligent design, by contrast, contends that biological design is real and empirically detectable regardless of whether it occurs within an evolutionary process or in discrete independent stages. The verdict is not yet in, and proponents of intelligent design themselves hold differing views on the extent of the evolutionary interconnectedness of organisms, with some even accepting universal common ancestry (ie Darwin’s great tree of life). Common ancestry in combination with common design can explain the similar features that arise in biology. The real question is whether common ancestry apart from common design- in other words, materialistic evolution- can do so. The evidence of biology increasingly demonstrates that it cannot.- Ibid page 142
And from one more pro-ID book:
Many assume that if common ancestry is true, then the only viable scientific position is Darwinian evolution- in which all organisms are descended from a common ancestor via random mutation and blind selection. Such an assumption is incorrect- Intelligent Design is not necessarily incompatible with common ancestry.– page 217 of “Intelligent Design 101”
That is just a sample of what the Intelligent Design leadership say about biological evolution- they are OK with it. And the following is from “Uncommon Descent”:
9] “Evolution” Proves that Intelligent Design is Wrong The word “evolution” can mean different things. The simplest meaning is one of natural history of the appearance of different living forms. A stronger meaning implies common descent, in its universal form (all organisms have descended from a single common ancestor) or in partial form (particular groups of organisms have descended from a common ancestor). “Evolution” is often defined as descent with modifications, or simply as changes in the frequencies of alleles in the gene pool of a population.
None of those definitions can prove ID wrong, because none are in any way incompatible with it.
ID is a theory about the cause of genetic information, not about the modalities or the natural history of its appearance, and is in no way incompatible with many well known patterns of limited modification of that information usually defined as “microevolution.” ID affirms that design is the cause, or at least a main cause, of complex biological information. A theory which would indeed be alternative to ID, and therefore could prove it wrong, is any empirically well-supported “causal theory” which excludes design; in other words any theory that fits well with the evidence and could explain the presence or emergence of complex biological information through chance, necessity, any mix of the two, or any other scenario which does not include design. However, once we rule out “just-so stories” and the like, we will see that there is not today, nor has there ever been, such a theory. Furthermore, the only empirically well-supported source of functionally specific, complex information is: intelligence. To sum it up: no definition of evolution is really incompatible with an ID scenario. Any causal theory of evolution which does not include design is obviously alternative to, and incompatible with, ID.
However, while many such theories have indeed been proposed, they are consistently wanting in the necessary degree of empirical support. By contrast, design is an empirically known source of the class of information – complex, specified information (CSI) — exhibited by complex biological systems.
They go on to say:
10] The Evidence for Common Descent is Incompatible with Intelligent Design ID is a theory about the cause of complex biological information. Common descent (CD) is a theory about the modalities of implementation of that information. They are two separate theories about two different aspects of the problem, totally independent and totally compatible. In other words, one can affirm CD and ID, CD and Darwinian Evolution, or ID and not CD. However, if one believes in Darwinian Evolution, CD is a necessary implication.
CD theory exists in two forms, universal CD and partial CD. No one can deny that there are evidences for the theory of CD (such as ERVs, homologies and so on). That’s probably the reason why many IDists do accept CD. Others do not agree that those evidences are really convincing, or suggest that they may reflect in part common design. But ID theory, proper, has nothing to do with all that. ID affirms that design is the key cause of complex biological information. The implementation of design can well be realized through common descent, that is through implementation of new information in existing biological beings. That can be done gradually or less gradually. All these are modalities of the implementation of information, and not causes of the information itself. ID theory is about causes.
And finally there is front loaded evolution (Mike Gene) and a prescribed evolutionary hypothesis (John Davison)- both are ID hypotheses pertaining to evolution.
Mutations are OK, differential reproduction is OK, horizontal gene transfer is OK. With Intelligent Design organisms are designed to evolve, ie they evolve by design. That is by “built-in responses to environmental cues” ala Dr Spetner’s “non-random evolution hypothesis” being the main process of adaptations.
As Dembski/ Wells said Intelligent design only has an issue with materialistic evolution- the idea that all organisms have descended from common ancestors solely through an unguided, unintelligent, purposeless, material processes such as natural selection acting on random variations or mutations; that the mechanisms of natural selection, random variation and mutation, and perhaps other similarly naturalistic mechanisms, are completely sufficient to account for the appearance of design in living organisms. (Also known as the blind watchmaker thesis)
Intelligent Design is OK with all individuals in a population generally having the same number and types of genes and that those genes give rise to an array of traits and characteristics that characterize that population. It is OK with mutations that may result in two or more slightly different molecular forms of a gene- alleles- that influence a trait in different ways and that individuals of a population vary in the details of a trait when they inherit different combinations of alleles. ID is OK with any allele that may become more or less common in the population relative to other kinds at a gene locus, or it may disappear. And ID is OK with allele frequencies changing as a result of mutation, gene flow, genetic drift, natural and artificial selection, that mutation alone produces new alleles and gene flow, genetic drift, natural and artificial selection shuffle existing alleles into, through, or out of populations. IOW ID is OK with biological evolution. As Dr Behe et al., make very clear, it just argues about the mechanisms- basically design/ telic vs spontaneous/ stochastic.
Now we are left with the only way Intelligent Design can be considered anti-evolution is if and only if the only definition of evolution matches the definition provided for materialistic evolution. However I cannot find any source that states that is the case.
So the bottom line is Intelligent Design says “evolved, sure”. The questions are “evolved from what?” and “how did it evolve?
I NEVER saids anything about Morris – you have serious issues….
E. coli could not get to the cutrate- citrate could not pass through its membrane- the machinery to digest citrate already existed. all that happened was now the citrtae was allowed to pass through the membrane to get to the already existing machinery.
Wow, just wow.
All experiments and observations say evolution doesn’t do much. But that does not mean ID is anti-evolution.
It means that your sorry position has a lot of explaining to do because it appears your “evidence” is nothing more than imagination.
No, I made a correction- however I do say that “artificial” would be immaterial in that things that are artificial are not reducible to matter, energy, necessity and chance.
So describe the kind of GA you think the designer wrote – how would it differ from a regular GA? And why couldn’t a regular GA do the job?
Also I’m not putting “the designer into a hole of [my] creation” 🙂 I’m just trying to understand your thesis.
My point is that that ribosomes et al – every single one in your body – is created by means of physics and chemistry within your cells, and every new cell, with all its transcription and translation properties is created by physics and chemistry.
It seems to me that what you are saying is that an ID must have been responsible for designing the first cell, and each new DNA sequence in order to enable the desired physical/chemical processes to take place. Or are you saying that every physical/chemical process in every living cell is individually guided by an Intelligent Designer?
OK, so you envisage the first cells as having been created ex nihilo? What about variants of those cells? Does the ID guide every mutation?
A GA similar to the GAs used in “Evolving Inventions”- http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=evolving-inventions
And we don’t have any idea how ribosomes are constructed. I would bet there is software ditrecting it. There isn’t any evidence it “just happens”.
The designer just needs to write a GA – no intervention required.
Gotta go- may be back this afternoon…
Joe G: The GA/ program is in the cell/ organism.
How can we find out where? Well Venter already started by replacing an organisms DNA with his synthesized DNA and the organism was viable- that tells me the GA/ program is not in the DNA.
If the “GA” is not in the DNA, then how does it propagate from generation to generation? Especially in sexually reproducing populations?
Where is the “goal” of the GA stored Joe?
Is each extant species the result of its own specific pre-canned GA “goal’?
When was the GA first implemented by the Designer?
You ignored these very important questions Joe. Please answer them.
OK, so are you saying that the designer just needed to build a starting population of self-replicators who could self-replicate with variance (i.e. with basic self-replication machinery), and let them evolve within the natural fitness landscape?
Again, this doesn’t help you. If the designer exists, ID can’t explain that. And certainly parts of the existence narrative can be explained. But here you go – ZERO support for ID, just bashing evolution. ID in a nutshell.
Again, plain for all to see; NO POSITIVE CASE OR SUPPORT FOR ID, just evolution bashing.
OK got a break- Look Rich the way to the design inference is THROUGH your position. Newton’s First rule and the explanatory filter mandate that.
So yes by demonstrating your position is nonsense is does help support design as that is one of the main tenets for getting to a design inference.
We don’t know but what you said is a possibility- that is the first living organisms- much more than a self-replicator- would have been designed to evolve via the implanted GAs.
As I wrote on my blog:
In Genetic/ Evolutionary Algorithms and My Front-Loaded Evolution I stated the case for front-loaded evolution via genetic/ evolutionary algorithms.
Today I will expand on that by telling you what gets front-loaded- well I will be telling those who are not up to the task of putting that together from what I had posted in that blog:
So what gets front-loaded?
1- You need a target-> the goal-> what it is you are trying to achieve. No need to write an algorithm if there isn’t a problem to solve-
“I wrote an algorithm”
“What does it do?”
“It’s an algorithm, stupid.”
“How do you know when its done?”
So the specifications of what you are trying to achieve are front-loaded. As the algorithm chugs along it keeps checking for any match to those specs.
2- You need to figure out a valid starting point- those initial conditions- one way is to determine what it is minimal you can do, without any algorithm, to get as close to the target.
The initial condition(s) is(are) front-loaded
3- You need the proper resources that the algorithm can use to get from starting point to the target.
Those resources are front-loaded.
4- Then there is that algorithm or algorithms that, from the initial conditions and the provided resources, some of which can be by-products of the algorthim(s), can produce the desired solution.
The algorithm(s) is(are) front-loaded.
That should be it- once you do all of that and hit “go” it is hand’s off for the designer(s).
What did Dawkins do for “weasel”- He had a specified sentence in mind. He set the initial conditions as a sequence of letters. He had the resource of the alphabet to call upon and then wrote an algorithm that would make it so.
Who sez your questions are important? You? LoL.
If the GA is in the cell, as I said, then it would be passed on just as DNA is passed on, duh.
The goal is part of the GA.
Yes each species could be the result of it’s own GA or there could be ONE GA that also evolved along with the organisms.
Don’t know when, but it would have been some time before living organisms appeared.
Not bashing evolution, Rich. I am just exposing your double-standards.
And I am glad that bothers you.
BTW I bash the blind watchmaker, so please watch your equivocation.
AGAIN- I NEVER said anything about self-assembly.
Thank you for proving that you should be ignored.
Joe, I agree with you regarding ‘Newton’s first rule”, so why are you positing an unneeded (and unknowable, undetectable, unnameable etc) Designer?
No one doubts that there are gaps in evolutionary understanding, but at least there is mechanistic and evidential substance, which is completely lacking in ID. If some portion of evolutionary theory is wrong, it adds nothing to ID: ID remains vacuous.
ID is basically: “Horses can’t tap-dance, therefore dragons”
Bad logic, not science, and I suspect religiously motivated.
What’s the target Joe? Was it humans? Did each extant species have its own target? How do you know?
What were the initial conditions Joe, and how did you determine them?
What resources were front-loaded Joe, and how did you determine them?
Software algorithms need a hardware platform to run on Joe. It can’t be the organisms themselves, because that’s what the algorithm is acting on.
What were these algorithms front-loaded TO?
How did the designer / algorithm accommodate mass extinction causing natural disasters like the K/T asteroid impact?
He also had a computer to run the program on. What do your GAs run on Joe?
Assertion after assertion, but we never get any answers about Joe’s claims.
Dude, the evidence says a designer is required.
Ya see the whole problem is your position is totally void of content = vacuous
Yes thortard can ask question as any 5 year old would. unfortunately it can never answer anything.
Geez thortard your whole positiion is assertion after assertion but no answers for any of its claims.
Double-standards…
For example please tell us how many mutations and to what genes produced an upright biped from a knuckle-walker?
How many mutations and to what genes caused an engulfed prokaryote to “evolve” into mitochondria?
These are just naked assertions, Joe. And let me go further, there is NO evidence for a designer. Which is why your GA / Monster under the bed would be scientifically interesting, except you can’t tell us where it is.
Well Rich, there isn’t any evidence for your position so I guess we don’t exist.
And I told you where the GA is- strange, that…
Rich,
Your entire position is a naked assertion and relies on imagination for evidence.
And taht is beyond pathetic…
By what mechanism Joe? You already told us it’s not in the DNA.
Evidence please. Where in the organism is the GA stored?
Again you’re making up crap as you go along.
Which living organisms Joe? How was the algorithm stored and run before living organisms appeared?
Assertion after assertion, but we never get any answers about Joe’s claims.
Thortard- more than DNA gets passed down- are you ignorant of all biology or are you just ignorant of reproduction?
For example please tell us how many mutations and to what genes produced an upright biped from a knuckle-walker?
How many mutations and to what genes caused an engulfed prokaryote to “evolve” into mitochondria?
Still waiting….
Joe – we’re all trying to move forward in good faith, so please understand that the following asymmetry is frustrating:
When you ask for evidence and it’s provided you tell us that the evidence also supports ID or barimonlogy or that ‘kinds’ weren’t changed, or that tiktaalik was found in the wrong place by accident, etc.
When we ask you for evidence, you claim that there’s no evidence for our position either!
Let’s frame your GA in Lenski’s experiment. We understand that very well from a ‘blind watchmaker’ standpoint. What’s you GA / ID take?
What evidence has been provided Rich?
And thanks for admitting your ignorance of baraminology.
BTW I supported my claim about Tiktaalik- you ignored it, as usual.
But not to worry I just submitted my next post which deals with that.
Lenski has proven that evolution is incompetent. Why do you keep referrencing him?
“Yes each species could be the result of it’s own GA or there could be ONE GA that also evolved along with the organisms.”
Okay – so scientifically you’ve hit the ‘conjecture’ part. Not science yet, but a good start. Now you need a testable hypothesis. It seems that you think the GA itself might evolve, which is perhaps more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_programming
Okay, what’s your next step?
Please present a testable hypothesis for blind and undirected processes so I will know what you will accept.
Let’s see evos say that amphibians evolved from fish- ie amphibs have fish for a common ancestor.
OK what would be the next step? You would think it would be to take fish embryos and subject them to targeted mutagenesis and artificially select the survivors and keep going.
Why hasn’t anyone ever done such a thing?
What has any evo done to support their claims?
Ah yes – The e-coli was exposed to a potential new food source and then they all died. It only took 2 weeks. Evolution is rubbish, therefore design.
Another dodge, Joe? How tiresome.
Why do you post about a GA and then change the subject?
Well in Lenski’s case, we’d look at the genome, point mutations, frame shifts etc.
That’s been done. Can we look at the GA now please?
By what mechanism does your hypothetical GA get passed down Joe? Please be specific.
Where in the cell does this hypothetical GA exist and run?
It is passed down via REPRODUCTION- The GA runs throughout the cell
That’s not a testable hypothesis and no one has determined taht the processes were blind and undirected.
Yes you can look at the GA as soon as we can look at fish evolving into amphibians.
Wrong again, as usual- and another round of equivocation to boot.
Yes, your dodges are tiresome.
Your double-standards are tiresome too
“That’s not a testable hypothesis and no one has determined taht the processes were blind and undirected.”
Its testible – and repeatable. beyond that, its not a hypothesis, but data which supports a hypothesis.
“no one has determined taht the processes were blind and undirected.” – what should we do, Check the security camera footage? Is it your contention that a designer sneaked in the lab some how to make it look like E-coli was evolving all by itself? Does the designer make every mutation happen, even teh bad and nuetral ones?
Joe – we’re all trying to move forward in good faith, so please understand that the following asymmetry is frustrating:
When you ask for evidence and it’s provided you tell us that the evidence also supports ID or barimonlogy or that ‘kinds’ weren’t changed, or that tiktaalik was found in the wrong place by accident, etc.
When we ask you for evidence, you claim that there’s no evidence for our position either!
Except you have NOT provided any evidence Rich and I explained tiktaalik and you ignored it, as usual.
IOW your “good faith” is a bunch of BS
Yup, just as i thought- you are totally clueless
Strange that evotards think tat ID needs to have ALL the answers when their position has none…
Please engage what I’m writing, rather than Gish-Galluping.
“Yet evos say individuals do not evolve.”
“More to the point evos say all mutations are random yet they cannot tell anyone how tat was determined.”
“Strange that evotards think tat ID needs to have ALL the answers when their position has none…”
“IOW all I am doing is asking evotards to actually ante up and support their position. But they are obvioulsy too cowardly to do so.”
BUT (headline!) – “Intelligent Design is NOT Anti-Evolution”
As I see it, if I was an Intelligent Designer, and I wanted to create a population of living things that would thrive and evolve, I would design a starting population of self-replicators that self-replicated with variance, and provide it with a natural environment to evolve in. That way I would have done exactly what a human GA designer does. I don’t need to specify any solutions, as you say – all that has to happen is that the population “figures out” how to thrive in the provided environment.
So if that is what you call “front-loading” by “implanted GAs”, then all you have actually done is to propose Darwinian evolution! You have simply invoked an ID for the OOL part.
Is your argument, then, simply that an ID was required for OOL?
I think you are being misled by “weasel”. Weasel isn’t a good example because in Weasel, the landscape is identical to the solution to thriving in the landscape.
In any practical GA, or in nature, as you say on your blog, it is not necessary to specify a solution (and there may be vast numbers of solutions, different ones being found on every run), what is required is to specify the landscape the virtual population must evolve to thrive in.
So if all “front-loading” is is providing an environment – why call it “front-loading”? Why not simply “adaptation”?
This is EXACTLY the same text you used when I destroyed you in our ‘debate’ on this subject.
Then, as now, you and I are using quotes from THE SAME SOURCES that support both sides of the argument. According to Dembski, Behe, and Meyer, ID is both anti-evolution and not anti-evolution.
The only possible conclusion is that the Dembski, Behe, and Meyer (et. al.) are just making up stuff to cover whatever their audience wants to hear… which is not the way to define a subject area for study.
Ladies and gentlemen, I suggest you read through the debate on this subject here:
So if that is what you call “front-loading” by “implanted GAs”, then all you have actually done is to propose Darwinian evolution! You have simply invoked an ID for the OOL part.
If evolution requires an ID oracle in OOL GAs to be successful, it’s not “Darwinian”.