Complexity, inevitability, and life — Evolution 2.0 on Unbelievable?

Listening to the latest Unbelievable? show from Premier Radio I was struck by what appeared to be a failure of imagination on the part of Perry Marshall, who was debating evolutionary biologist PZ Myers about the former's recent book, Evolution 2.0. Not being a biologist of any kind I'm unable to comment authoritatively on the actual mechanisms of evolution, but having followed PZ Myers' blog Pharyngula in the past (less so these days) I'm fairly confident he knows what he's talking about when it comes to his own subject. Perry Marshall's background, however, is in engineering and marketing, which on the face of it should make me wary of pronouncements that are outside his field of expertise.

Myers rubbished pretty much everything Marshall proposed, and given the above I'm prepared to accept that Myers is right and Marshall is wrong. The debate was fairly technical, but seemed to me to boil down to Marshall's claim that the “random” part of random mutation is insufficient to explain how evolution works (notwithstanding other aspects of evolution such as horizontal gene transfer).

At one point Marshall stated that the code in DNA could fit on a Compact Disc, and that if you eliminated “junk DNA” the code would be merely ten percent of what could fit on a CD. The core of his argument appeared to be disbelief that such a relatively small amount of information could produce the complexity we see in living organisms today. By comparison he cited the amount of code required to install modern computer operating systems such as Windows 10 and Mac OS X.

Marshall's engineering background has hampered his thinking here. Engineers who design systems, be they engines, bridges, or computer operating systems, need to specify mechanisms in minute detail (or make use of minutely detailed specifications already available) in order to make their systems work. This notion of "engineering ex nihilo" is what in my opinion leads to the essential failure-of-imagination exhibited by intelligent design proponents and creationists (of whom a disproportionately large number are engineers) — “it's all so complicated it must have been minutely designed by an intelligence of some kind.”

But imagine a software programmer who has never encountered fractals is shown a picture of the Mandelbrot set, and is given the task of writing code to generate the same picture from scratch. Without knowledge of the simple equation that produces fractals the picture could indeed be generated, but I suspect the code would be somewhat large. Or imagine a manufacturer of breakfast cereal wants its packaging department to come up with a special gadget to ensure that each carton of cornflakes contains a gradation of flakes, such that the larger flakes are mostly towards the top of the carton and the smaller ones mostly towards the bottom. I'm sure such a gadget could be made, but it's not actually necessary as the cornflakes tend to sort themselves out this way on their own.

Such self-organisation is, in my view, an aspect of the discussion about complexity that is often overlooked. If things inevitably organise themselves in a particular way, trying to make them happen in other ways, against the natural order, will indeed require complex intervention. “Going with the flow” on the other hand, will often require no intervention at all. It seems to me that much of the complexity we see in nature is there because in a given environment, things tend to work out that way rather than any other, just like in a packet of cornflakes.

A small part of the Mandelbrot set

This is applicable in other systems too, such as how you organise your life. For instance, it makes sense to keep things you need regularly in designated places, so that you don't have to embark on a time-consuming search every time you need them. If you need to take something with you when you go out, you could set an alarm on your smartphone to remind you to pick it up at the appropriate time — or you could simply place the item where you will see it when you do go out.

To put this another way: don't expend energy trying to achieve things in spite of your environment. Rather, create, encourage and adjust your environment such that it allows those things to be achieved automatically. (There you go — who'd have thought a debate on evolution would lead to productivity advice and life-coaching?)

UPDATE 2016-01-04: Perry Marshall has published online his transcript of the debate, along with some restrospective comments:
http://cosmicfingerprints.com/pz-myers/
...And here's PZ Myers' response to the comments:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2016/01/03/perry-marshall-2-0/

UPDATE 2016-01-10: Looks like this will run and run. Perry Marshall has responded to PZ Myers' response to his comments on his transcript:
http://cosmicfingerprints.com/pz-mcclintock/

UPDATE 2016-01-12: ...and PZ Myers further responds here:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2016/01/11/everything-existing-in-the-universe-is-the-fruit-of-chance-and-necessity/ 

UPDATE 2016-01-22: Will this never end? Perry Marshalls's next shot:
http://cosmicfingerprints.com/telorexia/

...And possibly the last from PZ Myers?:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2016/01/12/my-last-post-on-perry-marshall/

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PZ Myers' blogpost about his encounter with Perry Marshall is here:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2016/01/01/another-day-another-creationist/

We know what we believe — now let's find some evidence to support it

In an email today:

“No matter the political or educational background, we can all agree that individuals from all walks of life have contributed to the success of America, and of democracy as a whole, through their hard work and dedication.

“There is another group of people who are largely unnoticed as they labor day in and day out for the cause of truth.”

Who are these paragons?

“Of course I am talking about the scientists, scholars, and administrative staff who work to present the truth of intelligent design.”

Oh, them.

“They are paving the way for an era of scientific endeavor guided by the overarching principle that life on earth and all aspects of the Universe are the result of intelligent design, and not the product of blind purposeless processes.”

I see, a scientific endeavour that is deliberately steered in a particular direction. So much for going where the evidence leads.

(Yes, the Discovery Institute is yet again asking me for money.)

Signs of desperation at C4ID

I can't remember exactly how I got on the mailing list of the Centre for Intelligent Design, but the result is I get the occasional peevish missive from its director Alastair Noble:

Dear Paul,

Teach science, not secular dogma

You may have noticed that the Education Secretary, the Rt Hon Michael Gove MP, announced recently that the revision of the National Curriculum will include teaching evolution in primary schools.

Now you may wonder what is wrong with that, given that the scientific establishment regards evolution as a 'fact'.  Well, there are two problems.  Firstly, every scientific theory is tentative and subject to revision as fresh evidence is uncovered.  You can be sure that the growing body of evidence against the all-pervasive theory of evolution will not be considered.

Sounds like Noble is against teaching of the theory of gravity as "fact" because it is "tentative and subject to revision as fresh evidence is uncovered."

And here's what children won't be told about evolution:
Evolution has no explanation for the origin of life in the first place.  By saying evolution doesn't deal with that, while implying it does, just highlights its deficiency.

But neither does the theory of gravity explain the origin of life. Is this a reason for not teaching children about gravity? Gravity doesn't deal with the origin of life — and as far as I'm aware no-one claims (or implies) that it does. Neither does anyone (apart from creationists) imply that evolution deals with the origin of life.

Random mutation and natural selection cannot explain the synthesis of the hundreds of complex bio-molecules, like proteins, which are necessary for life.
The mechanism of evolution - natural selection acting on random mutation - has been shown to be unequal to the task of creating new organisms[1].

May I suggest Alastair Noble peruses the Talk Origins archive? There's really no excuse for this kind of wilful ignorance.

The 'junk DNA' hypothesis, an integral part of the teaching of evolution, has now been abandoned in light of recent work on the human genome[2].

The fact that science changes its theories in the light of new evidence is one of the reasons it actually works and is a path to new knowledge.

The much-vaunted 'tree of life' is being increasingly shown to be highly speculative and at odds with the evidence[3]. The fossil record is not consistent with the numerous slight successive changes required by evolution, as Charles Darwin himself recognised[4].

I note that this reference to Darwin is footnoted not to Darwin's text but to a book by an ID proponent (as are all the references, which doesn't inspire confidence in the impartiality of Noble's sources).

Evolution is completely unable to explain the existence of the complex genetic information carried by every living cell in its DNA[5].

It's true that there are gaps in the theory, but "completely unable" is over-egging the argument, especially as ID has no alternative explanation.

Evolution has no explanation for mind and consciousness, other than that it is an accidental by-product of chemistry and physics[6].

"[A]ccidental by-product" or "emergent property" — take your pick. The alternative offered by ID proponents isn't an explanation, so I don't understand what their problem is.

Any other scientific hypothesis with such glaring deficiencies would certainly not be taught as 'fact' in schools.

Noble is spinning these imponderables as "glaring deficiencies" when they are merely the fuzzy edges of a science that is on a constant quest to elucidate and illuminate the world we live in, bringing amazing new discoveries every week. To suggest that it should not be taught in schools is tantamount to criminal intellectual negligence.

But the second problem is that, behind all this, there are now, as Prof Phillip Johnson has pointed out, two definitions of science[7].  The first is the popular definition which insists science can only deal with natural processes and, for example, cannot contemplate any explanation about origins which suggests a non-material explanation such as 'mind before matter'.  The older and more honest definition is that science goes where the evidence leads and does not rule out any possible explanation before it is given due consideration.

Science must be confined to methodological naturalism if it is to make any progress. The alternative — the invocation of some undefined, unknown, untestable causal agent — has zero explanatory power. Worse, it has nowhere else to go. It you decide to "explain" some phenomenon by saying NotGoddidit, what's the next step? What are you supposed to do in order to expand your knowledge of this "causal agent"? Pray?

It is clear then that evolution is based on the first definition.  It is essentially materialistic dogma, not science.  It persists for ideological reasons, despite the evidence.

It is clear Alastair Noble doesn't understand what science is. We should be grateful he is no longer inspecting schools.

So what is going to be taught in primary schools is the secular, humanistic, naturalistic worldview which rules out any possibility of design in nature, even before the evidence is considered.  It is, in fact, a form of secular indoctrination.

Perhaps Noble would like to state what evidence there is for "design in nature" — other than "it looks terribly complicated, and I can't imagine how it could come about by natural processes."

The scientific study of origins is unlike any other because it has to consider the possibility of deliberate design in nature.  That's why we argue that Intelligent Design should also be considered in any scientific study of origins.

Intelligent Design is not science. By all means discuss it (and its implications) in a philosophy class, but it has no place in science classes.

Interestingly, in Radio 4's Today programme on March 6th, 2004, Sir David Attenborough said, 'The problem Darwin never solved was how one inorganic molecule became a living one.  We're still struggling with that one.'  That's the kind of honesty science needs, even though it is less apparent in some of his nature programmes.  And in the film 'Expelled'[8] Richard Dawkins, in an interview with Ben Stein, validates intelligent design by admitting that the intricacies of cellular biology could lead to us to detect the existence of a 'higher intelligence' or 'designer' (his words).  So why wouldn't we explore that with students?

The reason why we shouldn't explore that with students (at least in a science class) is because science education should be about teaching established science. David Attenborough was talking about abiogensis, which is not what evolution is about, and as for Expelled — the less said about that despicable piece of trash (more or less outright lies from start to finish), the better.

It is high time we stopped indoctrinating pupils with the philosophy of naturalism dressed up as the scientific consensus.  We should do what all honest scientists do, which is to go where the evidence leads.  As has been observed, it takes years of indoctrination to miss the obvious signs of design in nature.

It's interesting that ID proponents are unable to tell us how they can tell that something is designed — other than "it looks like it" — despite their insistent claims.

If schools are not going to be allowed to explore all the dimensions of origins, then perhaps it's time parents and churches did so!  Or maybe even Free Schools! 

Churches? What happened to "we're not saying anything about the designer, nudge nudge, wink wink"?

The rest of the email is taken up with a call to arms — encouraging parents and others to write to Michael Gove and to sign up for the C4ID email newsletter. There are also the footnotes: references to pro-ID books and Noble's "32-page booklet 'An Introduction to Intelligent Design'" available for £2 (plus pp!). Is cash-flow at C4ID so strapped that Noble has to shill for a 32-page document that could easily be linked as a PDF? Perhaps we should take that as a good sign.

Jehovah's Creationists

One Saturday in January, thinking the doorbell indicated the postman delivering an expected package, I opened the door to two gentlemen whom I instantly identified (don't ask me how) as either Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses. Their first question confirmed my initial assessment: they asked me what I thought God's name was. My reply — that I didn't think there was any such entity as God, and so his name was of no importance to me — brought a suggestion that they read me something from the Bible, but I interrupted with a counter-suggestion that quoting Bible verses to an atheist was a hiding to nothing.

The younger guy who had so far conducted this conversation seemed a bit deflated by this, but the older one stepped in at this point to ask me why I was an atheist. I said I hadn't come across convincing evidence for the existence of any gods. Cue the creationist argument: had I looked at the multitude of living things and how marvellous and complicated they were? Yes I had, and I understood that they are all related, with common ancestry, and had come about over very long periods of time through a process of random mutation and natural selection.

Then he began talking about "kinds" and separate creation, and that different kinds could not breed with each other. I said that if he meant species, this was a reasonable definition, but although different species can't in general inter-breed, it's useful to consider the analogy of language. Children understand the language of their parents, who understand the language of their parents, and so on, and if you go back far enough you'll find a couple speaking one language who are direct ancestors of people alive today who can't understand each other's languages. And so it is with evolution.

But then he changed tack and talked about the eye, saying it couldn't have come about by evolution, to which I responded that it probably could, starting with something as simple as a patch of skin that had randomly developed some basic sensitivity to light. I think at this point he realised that he was talking to someone who has actually thought about such things, and suggested I might like to read something, to which I responded that, yes, I would. (This whole conversation took place on my doorstep, and I had things to do.)

They gave me a brochure entitled Was Life Created? And in return I gave them an Atheist Tract — several copies of which I keep by the door specifically for occasions like this. I thanked the pair of them, wished them good morning and closed the door.

But what of the brochure?

Was Life Created? is published by Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania, in 2010. Though the masthead says "Made in Britain", spellings reveal it was written for an American audience. I read it through, making a few notes, and a quick check of the Jehovah's Witnesses' website turned up a PDF (the PDF, however, says "Made in the United States of America").

From the first section, "What do you believe?":

It is not the purpose of this material to ridicule the views either of fundamentalists or of those who choose not to believe in God. Rather, it is our hope that this brochure will prompt you to examine again the basis for some of your beliefs. It will present an explanation of the Bible’s account of creation that you may not have previously considered. And it will emphasize why it really does matter what you believe about how life began.

First, note the implication that atheism is a choice. This, no doubt, is tied up with what Paul says in Romans 1:20, about being "without excuse", though that part is left out of the quote when it appears later in the brochure.

The next section, "The Living Planet" — which is essentially a crude rendering of the fine-tuning argument — contains a number of loaded phrases that might be missed by those unfamiliar with the low-grade apologetic techniques employed here.

Are earth’s features a product of blind chance or of purposeful design? Without its tailor-made moon, our planet would wobble like a spinning top... ...earth is protected by amazing armor—a powerful magnetic field and a custom-made atmosphere. Earth’s atmosphere and magnetic field truly are marvels of design that are still not fully understood.

Note the language of design and manufacture taken for granted in these question-begging excerpts. The circularity, however, does not end there; next we have a section titled "Who designed it first?" which aims to catalogue instances of engineering and science taking their inspiration from nature.

As you consider the following examples, ask yourself, ‘Who really deserves the credit for these designs?’
...
Who deserves the credit? 
...
Who is nature’s patent holder?

They quote Michael Behe, who says (essentially, as all Intelligent Design proponents do, no matter what fancy language they use) it's designed if it looks designed.

Each section of the brochure ends with a couple of questions, and most of these are loaded or begged in some way. The section just covered ("Who designed it first?") asks:

• Does it seem logical to you to believe that the brilliant engineering evident in nature came about by accident?
  

To which I would answer, no it doesn't, because that's not what happened. Natural selection is not an accidental process — indeed it could be considered the very opposite. Evolution by random mutation and natural selection occurs because of environmental pressure — it's a process that occurs because it's taking the line of least resistance. Statistically speaking, it couldn't happen any other way.

There's then a subsection headed "Was it designed? If the copy requires a designer, what about the original?" Unfortunately for the brochure's thesis, this subheading appears to undermine itself. The copy doesn't require a designer, it only requires a copier — which is what the "original" does, albeit imperfectly. Indeed it is this very imperfection that drives evolution.

The next section — "Evolution myths and facts" — attempts to discredit the theory of evolution and claims that the fossil record doesn't provide evidence of what creationists and ID proponents like to call "macro-evolution". They claim to be happy with the idea that species can change (or "adapt") due to environmental pressure, but only up to a point. And that point appears to be arbitrarily undefined. What it comes down to is analogous to believing that it is possible for someone to stand on a step, but quite impossible to ascend a flight of stairs. Much is made of "Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig, a scientist from the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research in Germany," who claims that:

“Mutations cannot transform an original species [of plant or animal] into an entirely new one. This conclusion agrees with all the experiences and results of mutation research of the 20th century taken together as well as with the laws of probability.”

Some Googling reveals that Lönnig is an ID proponent who, like Michael Behe, appears to have been disowned by his own institution. The brochure includes a footnote:

Lönnig believes that life was created. His comments in this publication are his own and do not represent the opinion of the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research.

Fond though they are of footnotes, the JW's are not above making a bald assertion:

To date, scientists worldwide have unearthed and cataloged some 200 million large fossils and billions of small fossils. Many researchers agree that this vast and detailed record shows that all the major groups of animals appeared suddenly and remained virtually unchanged, with many species disappearing as suddenly as they arrived.

If this was Wikipedia, that phrase "Many researchers agree" would be immediately followed by "[citation needed]".

The final main section is titled "Science and the Genesis account". Jehovah's Witnesses, apparently, are not young-earth creationists, but old-earth creationists. How, then, do they reconcile the conflicting information in Genesis? Do they claim it's meant to be poetic? Metaphorical? Wrong? Untrue? No, they don't. This section, it turns out, is one huge exercise in semantic gymnastics. I won't go into it here — read the linked PDF if you're interested. Suffice to say, if the JW's really think that reading scripture in this way can reveal truth of any kind there's no hope for them — they are beyond logic. The Bible, for them, can mean anything they want it to mean.

The final section, "Does it matter what you believe?" seems to be an argument from consequences. After quoting William Provine saying, "I can see no cosmic or ultimate meaning in human life," they ask:

Consider the significance of those words. If ultimate meaning in life were nonexistent, then you would have no purpose in living other than to try to do some measure of good and perhaps pass on your genetic traits to the next generation. At death, you would cease to exist forever. Your brain, with its ability to think, reason, and meditate on the meaning of life, would simply be an accident of nature.

Well, yes.

That — apart from the "accident" bit (see above) — is how it is.

Get used to it.

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This post is based on one of my segments in a recent episode of the Skepticule podcast.

Edited 2022-06-08 to update links to JW.ORG and Jason Curry's Atheist Tract.

ID proponents still pretending to do "science"

On the 17th of November last year Stephen C. Meyer delivered a lecture at the Royal Horseguards Hotel in London, at an event sponsored by the Centre for Intelligent Design. The lecture, hosted by Lord Mackay of Clashfern, was titled "Is there a Signature in the Cell?" — presumably based on Meyer's similarly titled book, Signature in the Cell. The three Pauls talked about the lecture on our Skepticule Extra podcast, but I thought it might be useful to put my own thoughts on it in writing (though much of this will be a repeat of what I said on on the podcast).

The event was shrouded in a certain amount of spurious secrecy, as can be seen from this extract from the C4ID website:

The audience of some 90 invited guests included leading scientists, philosophers, Parliamentarians, educationalists, theologians, lawyers, and representatives of the media and business sectors.  Given the controversial nature of the subject and the desire not to inhibit discussion, C4ID requested that the identity of the participants remain protected.  The attendance of so many significant figures signals real interest in the topic, but, as Lord Mackay stressed in his introduction, their presence was not taken as an indication of support for the position of Intelligent Design (ID)

Also in the audience was Justin Brierley, host of Premier's Unbelievable? radio programme, who posted this on Facebook:

I have a confession... I'm coming off the fence over ID, well certainly at least with the origin of DNA. This lecture which I attended recently and the shows I have done convince me that when it comes to biogenesis, ID makes sense.

I've been criticised by theistic evolutionists for featuring ID on the show. But when it comes down to it, I don't see the difference. If TE says that the process that kick started evolution was in some sense goal oriented by divine guidance - then isn't that the same as saying that the assembly of the first self replication molecule was not down to blind forces and chance? Which is essentially what Stephen Meyer argues.

Some Christian don't like the theological implications of God "tinkering" but if we believe God intervenes in all kinds of other ways in miracles, the resurrecion etc. why shoudn't the moment of life's creation fall under this? And if the problem is that it doesn't look good theologically, then aren't the TEs doing what they critices YECs for - allowing their theological presuppositions to dictate what is allowed in the scientific realm.

I dont have a theological axe to grind when it comes to ID, I just think that given what we know now, and because I can't see good reason why deisgn isn't a viable explanation, it is the best explanation.

Just my musings, feel free to tear them apart!

Some months after the lecture a video of it was made available on YouTube, so I decided to watch it. What follows are some thoughts triggered as I watched.

http://youtu.be/NbluTDb1Nfs


Meyer begins with some sensible localisation, stating that in the United States Intelligent Design is perceived as connected to Young Earth Creationism. This is not so in the United Kingdom — because in the UK we never had the equivalent of the Scopes trial. This is presumably because in the UK we don't have separation of Church and State (even though we might be viewed as a more secular society than the US).

Meyer goes on to make a number of general points, beginning with the main point of ID, the Question of Design — is there a mind behind biological complexity? He mentions Richard Dawkins, oddly suggesting that he's not regarded as seriously as he used to be, due to his media involvement. This might be wishful thinking on Meyer's part, but nevertheless Meyer says he likes Dawkins' directness.

Meyer then claims that "today there is a very spirited discussion going on about the adequacy of natural selection and random mutation to produce not the minor variations … but the fundamental innovations in the history of life." He doesn't cite any sources for these spirited discussions, which makes me think this is merely sowing the seeds of doubt, as he's clearly doing when he claims that many evolutionary biologists are now saying that neo-Darwinian mechanics of mutation and selection are insufficient to produce large scale innovations. Again no direct sources — how many is 'many'? And the introduction of "large scale innovations" hints that he's favouring "micro-evolution" over "macro-evolution".

The origin of life — of the first cell — is not explained by Darwinian evolution, Meyer says, which appears to be an effort on his part to bias the story. He's asking how can Darwin be said to have refuted the design argument if he was unable to explain the "design" of the first cell. As far as I'm aware that's not what happened; Darwin showed that a designer was not necessary for evolution, but admitted ignorance of the origin of life. ID proponents such as Meyer are spinning this as a disingenuous claim by evolutionists, when it's nothing of the kind.

Meyer says the acceptance of ignorance about the origin of the first cell is due to a prevailing view that life was simple — a globule of plasm — and the intellectual leap to evolving life wasn't that great. Then we're on to some particular buzzwords beloved by the ID crowd, beginning with "sequence specificity". Something is "sequence specific" if the sequence determines the form (and therefore the function). Meyer shows an animation to illustrate how proteins are synthesized — starting with the sequence of genes along the spine of a DNA molecule. It all looks very complicated, but presumably illustrates how present-day cells work. It's likely, it seems to me, that the very first self-replicating cells were far simpler.

The "DNA Enigma", Meyer claims, concerns the origin of information, and he explains that there are two* types of information: Shannon information — the reduction of uncertainty, by which the more improbable an event, the more information is conveyed by the outcome of that event (in a strictly mathematical sense), but this cannot account for 'specified' complexity. He seems to be saying that specified complexity is present if you recognize what a given sequence represents. That, it seems to me, is post hoc rationalisation, as if "specified complexity" refers to complexity that contains information that has no apparent correlation to the function it produces — suspiciously like an argument from ignorance — and yet can only be recognised after the fact. As usual with ID proponents, this claim to be able to identify design isn't elaborated before we're on to something else — in this case a quotation from Jacques Monod: "A striking appearance of design." Monod apparently attributes this striking appearance to chance or necessity, or a combination of the two, in explaining natural processes.

Meyer says chance can produce the "appearance of design", but it's only good for short sequences. But what about selection? Meyer claims that applying natural selection to the origin of life is begging the question — invoking replication and 'life' in order to explain life's origin. I think, however, that he may be too restrictive in his ordering — natural selection doesn't have to kick in only after DNA, it can presumably operate on the simplest self-replicating molecules — the very first precursors to DNA/RNA etc.

Meyer goes on to mention the RNA world (which approximates to what I suggested above). He says the RNA world is problematic and he's happy to speak about it in the Q&A and that he covers it in his book. This, to me, seems like a cop-out.

Monod's third option is self-organisation. But chemistry alone, Meyer says, cannot determine the sequence of bases in DNA. So we don't know what determines the base sequence — once again we're back to an argument from ignorance. He says it's not the physics and chemistry that determines the sequence — when what he probably means is that he can't think of any mechanism by which physics and chemistry could determine the sequence.

Meyer then invokes an "inference to the best explanation", but unfortunately what he proposes isn't actually an explanation. It offers nothing extra, over and above what "I don't know" offers. The reason why we can make inferences to the best explanation in other areas — why we can speculate about possible causes for events or phenomena, is we understand how those causes work. It's no good proposing a cause when we don't know how that cause works, because that doesn't have any explanatory power. "It was designed" doesn't explain anything unless we can say how it was designed. This is my fundamental objection to ID.

By way of example of such an inference Meyer uses the presence of geological layers of volcanic ash. That's a valid example, because we know how volcanoes produce layers of volcanic ash. It's not valid for inferring a design to first life.

Meyer concludes with a lame graphic to illustrate the argument he uses in his book, Signature in the Cell. He has four options to explain the appearance of design: 1) Chance; 2) Necessity; 3) Chance plus Necessity; 4) ID — and then he eliminates all but ID. But he's not established that these are the only options, and they could all be wrong.

The video then jumps to the Q&A session, but apparently only the final question. The screen indicates Meyer might have been discussing the accusation that ID is an argument from ignorance, but from what's actually on the screen I don't think he could have done it very well, as the graphics seemed to reinforce the idea that ID is indeed an argument from ignorance.

The final question was "What is Science?" Meyer says it's a method, and mentions that this is relevant to whether ID is or is not science. But he says he's not interested in whether ID is science, only in whether it's true (or more likely to be true). He claims that the accusation that ID is not science is a ploy to avoid discussing it scientifically. I could just as easily say that his lack of concern about whether ID is science is a ploy to avoid applying the scientific method to it. He claims throughout his lecture, however, that he's using the kind of science employed by Charles Darwin.

A URL at the end of the video invites people to download a free digital companion to the book. I did this, even though I had to register with the Discovery Institute in order to get the PDF, though I've not yet read it. It appears to be a response to various criticisms of Signature in the Cell.

Most apparent from this lecture is that despite a resurgence of interest in the UK (manifested by the formation of C4ID in Scotland), ID has nothing new to offer on the question of life's origins, and remains hidebound in a tacit endorsement of scriptural infallibility. ID is an explanation of sorts, if you have fairly low expectations of what an "explanation" is supposed to tell you, but isn't in any sense a scientific explanation.

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As far as I recall, Meyer didn't elucidate the second type.

Intelligent design in the pub

Today I received email from someone willing to give talks on their chosen subject, anywhere in the UK, for free. This person is also "happy to participate in more intimate settings like a dinner or supper event."

Sounds to me a bit like Skeptics in the Pub, so I'm wondering if I should suggest this person to Trish — the convenor of my local (Portsmouth) Skeptics in the Pub — as a possible future speaker. My emailer's subject is one that concerns many skeptics, and is often discussed when skeptics get together.

The talks seem likely to be of a professional standard, after all the email states: "I have a number of illustrated presentations which are suitable for college, university, church or public audiences..."

Seems too good to be true, although that fleeting reference to "church" might give one pause. Perhaps I should write back to the sender, thanking him for his kind offer, and (after consulting with Trish) suggest a few dates. Of course I'd have to come clean as to my own identity and my own stance on his particular subject, as I've blogged about my emailer before — which might make him think twice about travelling the length of the country in order to give a talk to an audience who would most likely disagree with him.

So despite his claim that he's happy to "speak at any event, anywhere in the UK, which you may wish to organise," I think this is one invitation Dr. Alastair Noble, Director of the Centre for Intelligent Design, would probably decline.

The Secret Life of Chaos

I watched this one-off documentary yesterday (it was rebroadcast earlier this year, and it's taken me a while to get round to watching it again). Jim Al-Khalili explains how we get complexity from simplicity, and as far as abiogenesis is concerned the implication is clear. It makes "intelligent design" a superfluous theory.

The hour-long documentary is no longer available on iPlayer, but there's a dedicated webpage with several clips, and with luck it will be rebroadcast yet again. (It was apparently available on YouTube for a while, but all instances appear to have been removed.)

Here's the blurb from the BBC website:

Chaos theory has a bad name, conjuring up images of unpredictable weather, economic crashes and science gone wrong. But there is a fascinating and hidden side to Chaos, one that scientists are only now beginning to understand. 

It turns out that chaos theory answers a question that mankind has asked for millennia - how did we get here? In this documentary, Professor Jim Al-Khalili sets out to uncover one of the great mysteries of science - how does a universe that starts off as dust end up with intelligent life? How does order emerge from disorder?

It's a mindbending, counterintuitive and for many people a deeply troubling idea. But Professor Al-Khalili reveals the science behind much of beauty and structure in the natural world and discovers that far from it being magic or an act of God, it is in fact an intrinsic part of the laws of physics. Amazingly, it turns out that the mathematics of chaos can explain how and why the universe creates exquisite order and pattern.

And the best thing is that one doesn't need to be a scientist to understand it. The natural world is full of awe-inspiring examples of the way nature transforms simplicity into complexity. From trees to clouds to humans - after watching this film you'll never be able to look at the world in the same way again.

Inspiring stuff.

A short rant on "explanatory power"

This was sparked off by this week's Atheist Experience TV show, in which Matt Dillahunty encapsulated in very few words why I find intelligent design wholly unsatisfactory:

"...we tend to explain things in terms of things that we understand."

This is science, this is maths, this is software development, this is education in general. This is how we find out how things work and why.

What Matt is describing in that almost throwaway line is the progressive method of explanation. When faced with something complex, which as a whole we might not understand, we tend to break it down into its component parts and seek to understand them. If these components parts are also complex, we will further break them down until we get to a level we do understand. This is a lot like maths. Higher mathematics can be complicated, but it's built up from lesser principles, all of which can be ultimately reduced to something basic and comprehensible.

Likewise engineering, technology, and indeed all of education can be seen as a series of hierarchical steps based on something lower down the tree of complexity. We explain things in terms of other things for which we already have explanations.

Intelligent design proponents don't use this method, so their claim of "explanatory power" is bogus. Trying to explain something in terms of something else that we don't understand is clearly a non-starter. It's not helpful, and it's not explanatory.

http://blip.tv/the-atheist-experience-tv-show/atheist-experience-719-greg-paul-and-the-problem-of-evil-5408591

How to argue for intelligent design without doing any science

Well, this is a surprise. At last we have something of substance in Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God — shame it's the very last chapter in the section titled The Question of Science. In "The Vise Strategy — Squeezing the Truth out of Darwinists", William Dembski sets out a list of questions to ask those who are skeptical of intelligent design. It could be done as a flow chart, significantly not one with a single starting point, like Darwin's Tree of Life, but with a number of disparate roots.

Initially Dembski's questions are all about establishing why intelligent design should be considered science.

Is it fair to say that you regard intelligent design as not a part of science? Would you agree that proponents of intelligent design who characterize it as a "scientific discipline" or as a "scientific theory" are mistaken?

Would you characterize intelligent design as a "pseudoscience"?

Would it be fair to say that, in your view, what makes intelligent design a pseudoscience is that it is religion masquerading as science? If ID is something other than science, what exactly is it?

Are you a scientist?

Do you feel qualified to assess whether something is or is not properly a part of science? What are your qualifications in this regard? [Take your time here.]

Do you think that simply by being a scientist, you are qualified to assess whether something is or is not properly a part of science?

Have you read any books on the history and philosophy of science

[If yes:] Which ones? [e.g., Herbert Butterfield, Ronald Numbers, Thomas Kuhn]

Would you agree that in the history of science, ideas that started out as "pseudoscientific" may eventually become properly scientific, for example, the transformation of alchemy into chemistry?

Is it possible that ID could fall in this category, as the transformation into a rigorous science of something that in the past was not regarded as properly scientific? [If no, return to this point later.]

We can see where this is going, but it's predicated on false assumptions. For instance, take that last question, suggesting that ID could become science in the same way that alchemy became chemistry. The problem for Dembski is that alchemy did not become chemistry. Alchemy is still alchemy, even today, and chemistry is something else. Also note the disingenuous assertion in asking whether the "Darwinist" has read any history or philosophy of science. This is akin to criticisms of the likes of Richard Dawkins because they don't know any "sophisticated theology".

Let's consider one very commonly accepted criterion for what's in and what's outside of science, namely, testability. Would you say that testability is a criterion for demarcating science? In other words, if a claim isn't testable, then it's not scientific? Would you agree with this?

Would you give as one of the reasons that ID is not science that it is untestable? [Return to this.]

Let's stay with testability for a bit. You've agreed that if something is not testable, then it does not properly belong to science. Is that right?

Have you heard of the term "methodological materialism" (also sometimes called "methodological naturalism")?

Do you regard methodological materialism as a regulative principle for science? In other words, do you believe that science should be limited to offering only materialistic explanations of natural phenomena?

[If you experience resistance to this last question because the Darwinist being interrogated doesn't like the connotations associated with "materialism" try:]

This is not a trick question. By materialistic explanations I simply mean explanations that appeal only to matter, energy, and their interactions as governed by the laws of physics and chemistry. Do you regard methodological materialism in this sense as a regulative principle for science? [It's important here to get the Darwinist to admit to methodological materialism — this is usually not a problem; indeed, usually they are happy to embrace it:]

Could you explain the scientific status of methodological materialism? For instance, you stated that testability is a criterion for true science. Is there any scientific experiment that tests methodological materialism? Can you describe such an experiment?

Are there theoretical reasons from science for accepting methodological materialism? For instance, we know on the basis of the second law of thermodynamics that the search for perpetual motion machines cannot succeed. Are there any theoretical reasons for thinking that scientific inquiries that veer outside the strictures of methodological materialism cannot succeed? Can you think of any such reasons?

A compelling reason for holding to methodological materialism would be if it could be demonstrated conclusively that all natural phenomena invariably submit to materialistic explanations. Is there any such demonstration?

[Suppose here the success of evolutionary theory is invoked to justify methodological materialism — i.e., so many natural phenomena have submitted successfully to materialistic explanation that it constitutes a good rule of thumb/working hypothesis. In that case we ask:]

But wouldn't you agree that there are many natural phenomena for which we haven't a clue how they can be accounted for in terms of materialistic explanation? Take the origin of life? Isn't the origin of life a wide open problem for biology, one which gives no indication of submitting to materialistic explanation.

To my mind, methodological naturalism is the only effective method of doing science. Anything that attempts to stray outside methodological naturalism may be interesting, even fruitful in terms of philosophy, but it isn't science. Whether or not you hold to metaphysical naturalism (and I understand that many scientists don't, or at least consider it an open question), the process of science must assume methodological naturalism to provide meaningful results. If unexplained stages in any set of causal relationships can be replaced with "and then a miracle happened", this doesn't actually pull any explanatory weight. If there are indeed "natural phenomena for which we haven't a clue how they can be accounted for in terms of materialistic explanation" then what we have is something that's unexplained. Any supposed "explanation" outside of methodological naturalism isn't an explanation at all.

Would you agree, then, that methodological materialism is not scientifically testable, that there is no way to confirm it scientifically, and therefore that it is not a scientific claim? Oh, you think it can be confirmed scientifically? Please explain exactly how is it confirmed scientifically? I'm sorry, but pointing to the success of materialistic explanations in science won't work here because the issue with materialistic explanations is not their success in certain cases but their success across the board. Is there any way to show scientifically that materialistic explanations provide a true account for all natural phenomena? Is it possible that the best materialistic explanation of a natural phenomenon is not the true explanation? If this is not possible, please explain why not. [Keep hammering away at these questions until you get a full concession that methodological naturalism is not testable and cannot be confirmed scientifically.]

Since methodological materialism is not a scientific claim, what is its force as a rule for science? Why should scientists adopt it? [The usual answer here is "the success of science."]

But if methodological materialism's authority as a rule for science derives from its success in guiding scientific inquiry, wouldn't it be safe to say that it is merely a working hypothesis for science? And as a working hypothesis, aren't scientists free to discard it when they find that it "no longer works"?

Dembski is claiming that because methodological naturalism hasn't solved every single known scientific problem — that because there are still gaps in scientific knowledge — therefore he is justified in rejecting it. This is plainly nonsense.

Then comes some effort to show that ID is not creationism. It's futile stuff, because though the identity of the designer is often obfuscated by ID proponents, we know where they are going with it, and despite Dembski's insistence that there are atheists who consider ID a valid theory, we also know that the vast majority of ID proponents are theists (including, of course, Dembski himself).

Let's return to the issue of testability in science? Do you agree that for a proposition to be scientific it must be testable? Good.

Would you agree, further, that testability is not necessarily an all-or-none affair? In other words, would you agree that testability is concerned with confirmation and disconfirmation, and that these come in degrees, so that it makes sense to talk about the degree to which a proposition is tested? For instance, in testing whether a coin is fair, would finding that the coin landed heads twenty times in a row more strongly disconfirm the coin's fairness than finding that it landed only ten heads in a row? [Keep hammering on this until there's an admission that testing can come in degrees. Examples from the history of science can be introduced here as well.]

Okay, so we're agreed that science is about testable propositions and that testability of these propositions can come in degrees. Now, let me ask you this: Is testability symmetric? In other words, if a proposition is testable, is its negation also testable? For instance, consider the proposition "it's raining outside." The negation of that proposition is the proposition "it's not the case that it's raining outside" (typically abbreviated "it's not raining outside" — logicians form the negation of a proposition by putting "it's not the case that …" in front of a proposition). Given that the proposition "it's raining outside" is testable, is it also the case that the negation of that proposition is testable?

As a general rule, if a proposition is testable, isn't its negation also testable? [If you don't get a firm yes to this, continue as follows:] Can you help me to understand how a proposition can be testable, but its negation not be testable? To say that a proposition is testable is to say that it can be placed in empirical harm's way — that it might be wrong and that this wrongness may be confirmed through empirical data, wouldn't you agree? Testability means that the proposition can be put to a test and if it fails the test, then it loses credibility and its negation gains in credibility? Wouldn't you agree? [Keep hammering on this until you've gotten full submission.]

This question of negation is no more than wordplay. People often claim, "You can't prove a negative," but that's a self-refuting statement (because it is itself a negative statement), so if it's true it's also false. People often claim that you can't prove God doesn't exist, but if God is defined in such a way that his existence should necessitate certain obvious manifestations in the world, and those manifestations aren't in evidence, then this ought to count as evidence (although not proof, which is usually confined to mathematics) against his existence. Faced with this (lack of) evidence, theists usually redefine God to be something whose manifestation would not be so obvious.

Dembski's "hammering" is all towards the idea that you can't rule out "intelligence" as one of the forces that drives evolution. I'd like to offer an additional force that drives evolution: magic pixie dust. By Dembski's own criteria he can't rule it out, even if he's no idea how it actually works. There are certainly gaps in our knowledge of evolution, and especially abiogenesis, but these gaps can be filled by maintaining that the magic pixies use the awesome power of pixie dust to transmute inanimate matter into living, replicating cells. They also, incidentally, help out with those awkward transitions between organisms when random mutation and natural selection don't quite seem up to the job.

Next we have cellular engineering, the bacterial flagellum, complexity and the rest of the ID arsenal. But it won't wash. Dembski appears desperate to have ID accepted as science, but he won't do the one thing necessary for that to come about. He philosophizes, picks holes in evolutionary theory, plays word-games, and generally complains that the scientific community won't let him in — all the while refusing to take the entrance exam. All he needs to do is some actual research, and get it published in a respected peer-reviewed scientific journal. We've come to the end of the section entitled The Question of Science, but Dembski — who co-edited this entire book — hasn't given us any actual science.

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4truth.net
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbscience.aspx?pageid=8589952933

It's designed if it looks designed?

Here we go again. "The Scientific Status of Design Inferences" by Bruce L. Gordon is Chapter 25 of Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God. It begins by doubting that methodological naturalism must be the necessary limit on the scope of science. With liberal use of technical terms from the philosophy of science (without citations), Gordon considers three accounts of "what it means to offer a scientific explanation for a phenomenon." These are the deductive-nomological model, the causal-statistical model, and the pragmatic model. They appear to be different ways of identifying causes that are both necessary and sufficient to explain any particular phenomenon. And they're quite interesting, though Gordon gets bogged down in the minutiae — which would be excusable if it was going somewhere useful. But as usual with intelligent design proponents, he promises much and delivers next to nothing. There's stuff that sounds a bit sciencey, but no actual science.

As William Dembski points out, drawing design inferences is already an essential and uncontroversial part of various scientific activities ranging from the detection of fabricated experimental data, to forensic science, cryptography, and even the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence (SETI). He identifies two criteria as necessary and sufficient for inferring intelligence or design: complexity and specification. Complexity ensures that the event in question is not so simple that it can readily be explained by chance. It is an essentially probabilistic concept. Specification ensures that the event in question exhibits the trademarks of intelligence. The notion of specification amounts to this: if, independently of the small probability of the event in question, we are somehow able to circumscribe and define it so as to render its reconstruction tractable, then we are justified in eliminating chance as the proper explanation for the event. Dembski calls such an event one of specified small probability.

Sounds reasonable, doesn't it? Except that it's no practical advance on saying "it's designed if it looks designed." Note the use of "somehow" — this ought to be a teaser for what's to come, but despite not-so-vague promises, we never find out how this specification is to be assessed. (Also note the inclusion of SETI in this block of things supposedly exhibiting intelligence. SETI, however, is not expecting — or hoping — to receive signals containing information, and without information there can be no intelligence.)

One of Dembski's important contributions has been to render the notion of specification mathematically rigorous in a way that places design inferences on a solid foundation.

That's a big claim to rigour and solidity, but where is this rendition? It's often parroted by Dembski's acolytes, but never delivered.

The mathematical analysis used to determine whether an event is one of specified small probability rests on empirical observations set in the context of the theoretical models used to study the domain (quantum-theoretic, molecular biological, developmental biological, cosmological, etc.) under investigation, but the design inference itself can be formulated as a valid deductive argument. One of its premises is a mathematical result that Dembski calls the law of small probability. That the design inference lends itself to this precision of expression is significant because it enables us to see that a rigorous approach to design inferences conforms to even the most restrictive theory of scientific explanation, the D-N model. In fact, even though the accounts of scientific explanation we considered were inadequate as universal theories, all three of them captured important intuitions. Furthermore, it is short work to see that rigorous design inferences satisfy the conditions imposed by all of them.

But we've yet to see the touted "precision of expression". Where are these "rigorous design inferences"? Are they anything more than "if it looks designed, it must have had a designer"? Gordon mentions "design-theoretic analysis" several times in this essay, but gives no actual examples of it (or any references). Why is this? Is it, perhaps, because such analysis has never actually been done?

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4truth.net
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbscience.aspx?pageid=8589952949

Is the intelligent designer a prankster?

This is a quote from "Panning God — Darwinism's Defective Argument against Bad Design" by Jonathan Witt — Chapter 23 of Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God:

In an interview for The Philadelphia Inquirer, biologist and leading Darwinist Kenneth Miller said, "The God of the intelligent-design movement is way too small . . . . In their view, he designed everything in the world and yet he repeatedly intervenes and violates the laws of his own creation. Their god is like a kid who is not a very good mechanic and has to keep lifting the hood and tinkering with the engine" (1). Miller is a Roman Catholic, but notice how blithely he equates the designer's ongoing involvement in creation with incompetence. Why? What if the creator prefers to stay involved? What if he doesn't intend to wind up the watch of the cosmos and simply leave it to wind out everything from supernovas to sunflowers? What if he wishes to get his hands dirty making mud daubers? (p 116.)

Well, what if he does? Is there any way of knowing what the creator's wishes are? No, it's all pointless speculation. Or if it has a point, that point is to try by any means possible to refute Darwin's theory of evolution by random mutation and natural selection. In that effort it fails. The entire chapter is a claim that the intelligent designer works in a mysterious way, and evolutionists' challenges regarding the inefficiency of certain evolved parts of living organisms are invalid because evolutionists don't know what was in the mind of the designer. Well neither does anyone else — the creator, you see, is ineffable.

The most that could be said — as attributed to J. B. S. Haldane — is that the creator has "an inordinate fondness for beetles". But using Witt's logic, one could just as easily speculate that the creator wasn't overly fussed about them, but wanted entomologists to be fully occupied because ... well, they might otherwise spend their time doing crossword puzzles instead of catalogueing all the different species of cockroach (and the creator thinks crossword puzzles are frivolous). Yes, it's a daft suggestion, but you can't prove it's not correct, in the same way you can't prove that the creator didn't give the panda opposable thumbs because he likes a bit of joke  — yes, Witt actually suggests this in his essay — p 117.

After complaining that metaphors are often stretched beyond breaking point, Witt then uses Shakespeare as a metaphor for God  — "the god of the English canon" (p 118.) and proceeds to show how criticisms of Shakespeare have since been shown not to be fully understanding of the Bard's oeuvre. Shakespeare, however, was not a god, he was a jobbing playwright and actor who was not above including things in his plays for popular or political effect. Witt's comparisons are spurious.

What Witt misses in this whole chapter is that without his and other ID proponents' insistence on "design", evolutionary biologists would have no need to speculate on the inefficiency of the designer. Darwinian evolution by random mutation and natural selection provides a sufficient (and magnificently elegant) mechanism that explains the evolution of living things on Earth through undirected natural processes. It doesn't matter whether their criticisms of the "designer" are thorough or deep, because they aren't even necessary.

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4truth.net
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbscience.aspx?pageid=8589952945

It's soooo complicated, it must have been...

The Question of Science — the "science" section in Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God — has so far been mostly pushing intelligent design and little else. But we know that intelligent design is a philosophical idea, not a scientific one.

And so we come to Chapter 22, "Molecular Biology's New Paradigm — Nanoengineering Inside the Cell" by Bill Wilberforce (not his real name — see the bio on 4truth.net for why). It's more of the same: cells are highly complex and could not have evolved, so they must have been designed by an intelligence. Wilberforce quotes Michael Behe in support of this, but once again omits a crucial point (a point, incidentally, that all ID proponents omit).

Biologists most often identify the high-tech nano-engineer as Nature herself, and the implications of intelligent activity are quickly brushed aside. But, as Lehigh University biochemist Michael Behe has said in regard to this situation, "If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck". Behe's "inducktive" reasoning is quite sound. In any other field, things that look like they have been carefully engineered are presumed to be engineered.

But in any other field, the presumption of a designer is that the designer is human. The only designers we have ever encountered are human (at least as far as any appreciable level of complexity is concerned). Based on Behe's reasoning the only sound "inducktive" conclusion is that the cell was designed by a human. Reasoning that the designer is non-human is far from "sound". We have no idea what non-human design is like, because we have no examples of it. But no humans have come forth to claim authorship of the cell, and it seems reasonable to suppose they never will. Therefore the suggestion that the cell's complexity arose naturally by a series of gradual stepwise refinements is entirely legitimate.

Wilberforce asks whether continued research into cellular biology will reveal naturalistic explanations, or highlight further complexity, and answers himself thus:

From everything we have learned thus far, the answer seems to be the latter. Though it is possible that the tools of molecular biology will uncover some self-engineering mechanism (akin to self-organization, but which produces complex machines instead of repeating fractal patterns), this scenario seems unlikely. For starters, the trend has been toward the unveiling of more and more complicated systems, not mechanisms that show how they are produced. Furthermore, laws of information production, developed to address questions arising in our computer-driven information age, weigh heavily against such a mechanism.

That's surprisingly tentative, given the insistence ID proponents usually indulge in. It's a mere assertion; Wilberforce provides no figures to back up his "weight" — no science, in fact. It's just so much unsubstantiated speculation. If ID proponents really think their idea has legs, then they should run with it: go into the lab, do some actual science, write it up and get it published in a respected peer-reviewed scientific journal. Then, and only then, will ID be worth anyone's time.

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4truth.net
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbscience.aspx?pageid=8589952935

Why does the intelligent designer do such a bad job?

If God's so clever, why do his creations appear so naff? Maybe he couldn't be bothered to do a proper job. Sure, he's the perfect creator of the whole universe, but that doesn't mean he's much into the arts and crafts thing. He'd rather be smiting, or failing that, his favourite hobby — voyeurism.

Pardon the levity, but that's the only message I can take from Chapter 21 of Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God, entitled "Intelligent, Optimal, and Divine Design" by Richard Spencer. It begins thusly:

If something has been intelligently designed, people often expect to see structures that are perfectly crafted to perform their individual tasks in the most elegant and efficient way possible (e.g., with no extra components). This expectation is incorrect not only for human design but also for divine design. (p 108.)

Isn't it amazing how divine design exactly mirrors human design? And Spencer knows this how? Then he goes on to look at microprocessor design:

If we tried to optimize every little part of the circuit design, we would never complete the design! This limitation does not, of course, affect divine design. (p 108.)

Of course it doesn't. Hold on, why doesn't it? Because God can do anything? And Spencer knows this how? Then comes this wonderfully equivocating paragraph:

In the same way, but for different reasons, God usually makes use of secondary agents to accomplish His work. Such secondary agents include physical laws since these laws do, at least sometimes, define, or help to define, structures in nature. For example, there are physical laws and properties of matter that determine the physical structure of certain objects, and once the laws and properties are in place, God does not need to individually create each atom, cell, or higher-level object. Having created physical laws, God is constrained by them unless He specifically chooses to suspend them. As a logical possibility, God is of course free to suspend the physical laws he has instituted. Yet, I don't know a single unequivocal example in which He has done so. This is not to deny miracles. I am simply saying that I don't know of any examples of miraculous structures in nature, and that includes biological structures. (p 109.)

Naturally Spencer is fully acquainted with what God usually does, and what God needs, or does not need, to do. God, you see, is constrained by physical laws, except when he isn't, and he's totally capable of making a biological miracle, except he hasn't actually done it.

A third reason why even divine designs may appear to be less than optimal is that we are rarely in a position to fully understand all of the design objectives and constraints. This point is subtle but significant. I have sometimes thought some part of a circuit or system design was done poorly only to find out later that it was actually quite clever. I simply didn't fully understand the intended purpose or constraints when I first looked at the system. (p 110.)

Well God's God, and mysterious. We can't be expected to know what's in his mind — except, it seems, when we can. Lest you think that we're not being scientific about all this, we'll quote a bit of Francis Collins, just to reinforce the idea that our puny minds can't hope to comprehend the intentions of the all-powerful, all-knowing creator of the universe (although we know precisely, minutely, chapter-and-versely what God wants everybody not to do with their private parts).

I wholeheartedly agree with Dr. Collins. While we do not fully comprehend why God allows sin to exist, the Bible gives us many examples of how God uses the painful trials that result from a sinful world to bring us to a greater sense of humility and dependence on Him. We must also remember that the world we are observing is not the original creation. It is a corrupted version of the creation. I personally think that many, if not all, of the arguments made by the opponents of intelligent design would remain unchanged even if they observed the world prior to the fall. But there is still an unknown factor to deal with since we are not able to observe the original creation at this time. (p 110.)

So God designed us suboptimally, to teach us a lesson. If only we hadn't fallen, God might not have given up on Mankind 2.0, which presumably he would have retrofitted into the perfect world if only it hadn't been messed up by those pesky humans, who were designed by ... oh wait, there's something not quite right about this. Well never mind, I'm sure God's got it all in hand. He always has, you know.

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More of this ridiculous piffle is available at 4truth.net:
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbscience.aspx?pageid=8589952937

Making stuff up is not an argument

Against my better judgement I followed a link posted by Unbelievable? on Facebook (and also apparently on Twitter):

Exploring Why Richard Dawkins Is Chickening Out « With All I Am

It's part of the general Christian hay-making over Richard Dawkins' refusal to debate William Lane Craig. I've already stated why I think Dawkins is right not to waste his time so I won't reiterate that here. The purpose of this post is to deal with repeated nonsense of Craig's that some theists think are valid arguments.

Craig claims to have refuted the arguments Dawkins uses in The God Delusion. The first time I saw these refutations I was unimpressed but didn't consider them further. So I'm a little surprised (perhaps I shouldn't be, now that I'm more familiar with Craig's modus operandi) to find them still quoted — as they are in the linked post:

First, in order to recognize an explanation as the best, one needn’t have an explanation of the explanation. This is an elementary point concerning inference to the best explanation as practiced in the philosophy of science. If archaeologists digging in the earth were to discover things looking like arrowheads and hatchet heads and pottery shards, they would be justified in inferring that these artifacts are not the chance result of sedimentation and metamorphosis, but products of some unknown group of people, even though they had no explanation of who these people were or where they came from. Similarly, if astronauts were to come upon a pile of machinery on the back side of the moon, they would be justified in inferring that it was the product of intelligent, extra-terrestrial agents, even if they had no idea whatsoever who these extra-terrestrial agents were or how they got there. In order to recognize an explanation as the best, one needn’t be able to explain the explanation. In fact, so requiring would lead to an infinite regress of explanations, so that nothing could ever be explained and science would be destroyed. So in the case at hand, in order to recognize that intelligent design is the best explanation of the appearance of design in the universe, one needn’t be able to explain the designer.

Sorry, but if you don't have any kind of explanation for the designer, you can't claim the designer as an explanation for anything else. Craig's example of finding alien artefacts on the far side of the moon would lead us to further investigations. We wouldn't simply stop there and say Aliensdidit. That wouldn't be an explanation, it would be mere speculation.

Secondly, Dawkins thinks that in the case of a divine designer of the universe, the designer is just as complex as the thing to be explained, so that no explanatory advance is made. This objection raises all sorts of questions about the role played by simplicity in assessing competing explanations; for example, how simplicity is to be weighted in comparison with other criteria like explanatory power, explanatory scope, and so forth. But leave those questions aside. Dawkins’ fundamental mistake lies in his assumption that a divine designer is an entity comparable in complexity to the universe. As an unembodied mind, God is a remarkably simple entity. As a non-physical entity, a mind is not composed of parts, and its salient properties, like self-consciousness, rationality, and volition, are essential to it. In contrast to the contingent and variegated universe with all its inexplicable quantities and constants, a divine mind is startlingly simple. Certainly such a mind may have complex ideas—it may be thinking, for example, of the infinitesimal calculus—, but the mind itself is a remarkably simple entity. Dawkins has evidently confused a mind’s ideas, which may, indeed, be complex, with a mind itself, which is an incredibly simple entity. Therefore, postulating a divine mind behind the universe most definitely does represent an advance in simplicity, for whatever that is worth.

This is a spectacular failure in argumentation. Craig's description of "an unembodied mind, as a remarkably simple entity" is sheer invention. There's nothing whatever to back up this assertion. "A divine mind is startlingly simple," says Craig. Based on what? He's making this stuff up and pretending it's real. It's not, and it's certainly not a refutation of Dawkins' argument or anyone else's.