Recently in ID/Creationism Category

LEO Weekly, an alternative weekly published in Louisville, Kentucky, reports that fundraising for the Ark Park has gone virtually nowhere since last May. Groundbreaking, if it was ever planned at all, has been postponed and postponed and postponed until next spring at the earliest.

LEO Weekly reports that the Ark Park has raised only about $1 million since last May and has raised a total of $4 million altogether. Its goal is to raise approximately $25 million. A representative of the Ark Park says, “Funding is progressing, a little slower [sic] due to the very slow economy.” He says further that they are 3-4 months behind schedule and adds, “We are considering a few options to help speed up the construction and possibly open to guests earlier than our original schedule. Once we have more information developed I’ll update you – probably by the first of the year.” LEO Weekly estimates that at the present rate groundbreaking might be scheduled for 2024.

My own estimate is that their timescale is skewed by their belief that the Earth is around 5000 years old. It is in fact more like 5 billion years old. Thus, if we take 3-4 months and multiply it by the ratio of 5 billion years to 5000 years, we estimate that the groundbreaking ceremony will take place in 3 million months, or 250,000 years.

Anyone who wonders where the money may be going in the meantime might consider the review by a volunteer named Roxy, posted at Charity Navigator. Additionally, comments to the LEO article claim that the Ark Park itself is a for-profit venture, but the Ark Encounter Website is not completely clear (to me, at least), and I cannot independently verify the claims. I cannot, however, find Ark Encounter in IRS Publication 78 .

Joe Thornton is a distinguished researcher who works on reconstructing ancient biomolecules to study how they evolved into their present forms. Recently ID creationist Michael Behe has commented on Thornton’s work, interpreting it to mean that the molecules couldn’t have evolved. On Carl Zimmer’s Loom Thornton eviscerates Behe’s misintepretation. A couple of quotes to give the flavor:

Behe contends that our findings support his argument that adaptations requiring more than one mutation cannot evolve by Darwinian processes. The many errors in Behe’s Edge of Evolution – the book in which he makes this argument – have been discussed in numerous publications.

and

Behe’s discussion of our 2009 paper in Nature is a gross misreading because it ignores the importance of neutral pathways in protein evolution.

and

This brings us to Behe’s second error, which is to confuse reversal to the ancestral sequence and structure with re-acquisition of a similar function.

and

Behe’s argument has no scientific merit. It is based on a misunderstanding of the fundamental processes of molecular evolution and a failure to appreciate the nature of probability itself. There is no scientific controversy about whether natural processes can drive the evolution of complex proteins. The work of my research group should not be misintepreted by those who would like to pretend that there is.

Read the whole thing. (And don’t miss Matheson’s remarks on natural selection at the link below.)

Hat tip to Steve Matheson for calling my attention to Thornton’s piece..

Over at Uncommon Descent, Eric Holloway has declared that the critics of William Dembski’s 2002 book No Free Lunch actually accept that the No Free Lunch Theorem applies to evolution. He uses as his evidence the replies to Dembski’s use of the NFLT by Allen Orr and by David Wolpert (who co-wrote the original NFL paper). They had argued that evolution was a more complicated process than the simple model used in the NFLT, a model that for evolution would associate fitnesses with genotypes in a simple search for the genotype of highest fitness. So aren’t computer scientists (Wolpert) and biologists (Orr) implicitly acknowledging that the NFLT theorem applies to any such simple model, and prevents it from searching effectively?

But there have been other criticisms of Dembski’s use of the NFLT, and Holloway does not cite them. I summarized them in a 2007 article I wrote in Reports of the National Center for Science Education. And in the matter of the use of the NFLT my criticisms were actually not new — as I noted there, the fundamental point had been made many times since 2002, originally in a 2002 article by Richard Wein, and also in articles by Jason Rosenhouse (2002), Mark Perakh (2003), Jeffrey Shallit and Wesley Elsberry (2004), Erik Tellgren (2005), and Olle Häggström (2007). I will immodestly claim that my article is the clearest of these many clear articles.

So what is this oft-repeated criticism? When we have a simple model of evolution with genotypes and phenotypes, the NFLT argues that if we average over all the ways that set of fitnesses could be associated with the genotypes, that a simple model of search that climbs uphill on the fitness surface cannot do any better than a random search by pure mutation (one which is unaided by natural selection). That is disastrously bad. It sounds like it says that natural selection in such a model cannot work at all.

But notice the averaging part. It is critical to Wolpert and Macready’s theorem. In effect, it says that we are dealing with an infinitely rough fitness surface. If we change a genotype by making one mutation — changing a single position in its DNA — we arrive at a genotype whose fitness is randomly chosen from the whole set of possible fitnesses. In effect, a single mutation has the same effect as mutating every site in the genome simultaneously. (I apologize for shouting, but the point is not being noticed over at UD).

Of course real biology doesn’t work like this. Mutations are on average worse, but they mostly don’t instantly reduce the organism to rubble. In the real world, nearby genotypes are usually similar in fitness — often a bit worse but sometimes a bit better. In the NFLT world essentially all mutations are disastrous, and evolution would not work. So the No Free Lunch Theorem does not model real biology, not even in a simple model of evolution searching for genotypes of higher fitness on a fitness surface.

So far Holloway has not cited any of these criticisms, and when asked by a polite commenter whether there are any such criticisms, he has simply declared that

I spent some time reading the critics, and this bore [sic] my frustration. I could not find one author who treated Dembski’s work fairly! If someone could fairly refute Dembski’s work I’d be all over it, but I haven’t found anyone! Instead its all passive aggressive ad homineum [sic] and brow beating, with ample burning of strawmen, very tiring to read.

So the discussion at UD continues, hermetically sealed in a self-reinforcing bubble (though I notice now that in that discussion Elizabeth Liddle has tried to raise the relevant point).

Note added 8/29/2011: Eric Holloway has now replied to this post in a post he made recently at Uncommon Descent. For my response to this reply, see the two comments I have made below dated 8/29/2011 at 1:17am and the one following that.

Guest commentary by Dan Phelps, [Enable javascript to see this email address.].

On the evening of August 9, 2011, the City of Williamstown, Grant County, Kentucky, and Ark Encounter (AE)/Answers in Genesis (AIG) held a “Listening Session” at Williamstown High School to discuss local concerns about the Ark Park. Government officials present included Williamstown Mayor Rick Skinner, the entire Williamstown City Council, members of the Dry Ridge City Council, Wade Gutman of the Grant County Industrial Board, Sally Skinner of the Williamstown Independent School Board, members of the Grant County School Board, the Grant County Planning Board, the Grant County Tourism Board, the Rural Development Board, Royce Adams of the Kentucky House of Representatives, a representative of the Veteran’s Cemetery, and Judge Executive Darrell Link of the Grant County Fiscal Court. Representing Ark Encounter/AIG were Mike Zovath and attorney Jim Parsons. Tad Long of the Kentucky League of Cities served as a facilitator. The local cable access channel videotaped the meeting. I made an audio recording.

Approximately 450 to 500 citizens attended the meeting; all seats were taken and a number of people had to stand along the walls. Interestingly, the majority of attendees appeared to be forty or older. The event was well organized and friendly throughout. Mayor Skinner briefly introduced the various people giving presentations and those available to answer questions.

A reader sent me this link with the subject line above. The state and the county have committed $40 million in tax credits, as well as other perks, to a for-profit venture to build an Ark Park in order to spur “economic development.” Someone may correct me, but unless I am mistaken such enticements for sports stadiums and other ventures almost never pay for themselves. Besides, a state senator notes at the bottom of the article, the developer said it did not need the incentives, so why were they offered?

See also an earlier article here.

As predictable as the sunrise, creationists are launching another round of the disgusting practice of trying to tie every mass murderer to Darwin and evolution, self-consistency and logic be damned. This time it’s about Brevik, the bomber and shooter in last Friday’s killings. We saw this at Uncommon Descent on Sunday (“Norway shooter a Darwinian terrorist?”) – itself relying on an article from the fundamentalist WorldNetDaily (“Terrorist proclaimed himself ‘Darwinian,’ not ‘Christian’”), and today from alleged scholar John West at the Discovery Institute (“Fundamentalist Christian or Deranged Social Darwinist?”).

West does the usual thing, word-searching Brevik’s 1500-page screed for the few references to Darwin, and brazenly playing down the hundreds of references to Christianity and God and the Templars and Christian holy war against Islam. These are just brushed off by West. West pretends that Brevik calls himself a “Christian atheist” through pretty optimistic (optimistic from West’s perspective) readings of some Brevik passages, which completely ignores the various quite direct references that Brevik makes towards his own belief in God. Here’s West:

[Republished from Homologous Legs]

The Novellatron¹ - the skeptical, alien-made robot also known as Dr. Steven Novella - has many detractors in the worlds of pseudoscience and antiscience, but none that I would call his nemesis: other than perhaps that of Dr. Michael Egnor, conservative Catholic neurosurgeon and ID proponent. Hmm, then again, maybe “nemesis” is too strong a word, and one that gives too much credit to Egnor. But he does seem to be the one person that keeps coming back for more slices of Novellatron pie, time after time, as unwise as that is.

Despite his fierce Internet battles with the Novellatron over dualism, neuroscience and, of course, intelligent design/evolution, Egnor never had a website of his own, instead using the resources of the Discovery Institute’s main blog, Evolution News & Views. Until now, of course.

So, I give to you: Egnorance. Yes, that is its name (and don’t worry about it wearing out). It has to be the single boldest attempt at derogatory nickname-reclaiming I’ve ever witnessed, based purely on the fact that the term can’t really be anything but a pun revolving around how ignorant Egnor is about many of the topics he passionately defends. He’s too conservative and middle-aged to be a hipster, so the ironic angle doesn’t work either. How perplexing.

Anyway, he’s in sparkling form over there, throwing out posts with rather alarming speed. (The speed almost gets me thinking about how he could possibly be keeping up with his professional career in surgery.) The usual topics are covered, including atheism, evolution, abortion, same-sex marriage and climate change: it’s all as you would expect from a pro-ID, arch-conservative Catholic.

I won’t talk in detail about anything he says (even though I easily could - there’s just so much to choose from!), lest I provoke his wrath and he writes something about me. Then again, would that be such a bad thing after all?

Good luck with reclaiming your writing’s nickname, Michael Egnor. Good luck. You’ll need it.

—

1. This is my nickname for Steve, and it is fast becoming his official nickname. It will be confirmed for certain when I go to TAM 9 next month, just you wait.

A venerable claim of creationists is that evolution somehow or other violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics. In its tradition of recycling old-line creationist claims, the intelligent design movement, in the person of Granville Sewell, a professor of mathematics at the University of Texas El Paso, has taken up the creationist Second Law claim. For the few here who don’t regularly read him, I have to say that Jason Rosenhouse’s takedown of Sewell’s claims (and in particular Sewell’s whining about a rejected ms.) is lovely. Highly recommended.

by Joe Felsenstein,
http://evolution.gs.washington.edu/felsenstein.html

There’s a remarkable statement over at Uncommon Descent right now. Gil Dodgen is, as always, drawing dramatic conclusions that Darwinism has collapsed and that scientists refuse to recognize it (he’s very good at drawing that conclusion - evidence is another matter).

Anyway, he opens with a statement that, for once, evolutionary biologists can agree with:

At UD we have many brilliant ID apologists, and they continue to mount what I perceive as increasingly indefensible assaults on the creative powers of the Darwinian mechanism of random errors filtered by natural selection.

I really can’t think of anything to add to that.

by Joe Felsenstein,
http://evolution.gs.washington.edu/felsenstein.html

Over at Uncommon Descent, “niwrad” is back with more calculations showing that conventional figures for comparing sequences of genomes are all wrong. Last time “niwrad” showed that humans and chimp genomes match only about 62% of the time. The usual figure given is 98.77%. Niwrad did this by taking 30-base chunks of one genome, finding the best match in the other genome, and then asking what fraction of the time there was a perfect match of all 30 bases. That’s where the 62% figure comes from. I immediately pointed out here at PT that this was expected and did not represent some insightful new way of calculating these figures.

Now Niwrad has turned to comparing two human genomes. The figure for 30-base perfect matches is about 96%. The conventional figure is about 99.9%. Let’s see what is expected. If a single base position has a 0.999 probability of matching, two bases have a 0.999x0.999 probability, three bases a 0.999x0.999x0.999 probability. 30 bases then have a probability that is 0.999 raised to the 30^th power. Which turns out to be (ta-da!) 0.97. Not a bad fit.

Niwrad proudly notes that in the previous discussion

it seemed to me that the general feeling at the end was that my statistical method for performing genome-wide comparisons might have some merit, after all.

(Niwrad must have missed the discussion over here).

It does have merit: It’s a way of taking a close match and making it sound much less close – without changing anything. I have a suggestion: why not try 100-base chunks? That way human/chimp match will drop to only about 29%, while human/human will drop to 90%. Or how about 1000-base chunks? (human/chimp would be only about 0.00042 of a percent, and human/human would be down to about 37%). Where will this all end?

I guess everyone knows it by now, but the world ends tomorrow. I anticipate a headline the day after tomorrow, “The world ended yesterday.”

Nevertheless, this human-interest article in the Times was disturbing. For example,

Late last month, Casey Luskin wrote an article advocating a positive case for ID creationism. Jack has already done a good job of refuting Casey’s wishful hand waving.

However, in the comments of the post, Casey and I had a little exchange in which I tried to get him to commit to developing a positive model of common design, and he just, well, assured me that his legal education prepared him to deal with the statistics that he was butchering left and right. Yeah, umm … anyways, my last comment was never published, and now enough time has passed that I feel I can share it with you and let you decide why it never showed up on the DI’s website.

[Republished from Homologous Legs]

A well-accepted characteristic of a scientific hypothesis is that it must generate predictions about the world against which tests can be run - confirming or falsifying those predictions and thus supporting or not supporting the hypothesis in question. Understandably then, intelligent design proponents need to demonstrate that ID can produce predictions if it is to be taken seriously as a scientific hypothesis and alternative to evolutionary theory.

Historically (as much as I can say “historically” in the context of such a new movement), this has not been a major goal of ID proponents. Most of their previous efforts have gone into either arguing against evolution (see Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box) or trying to justify ID in a pseudomathematicophilosophical ¹ way, bypassing the normal scientific process (see William Dembski’s design inference/explanatory filter). Neither of these routes have been very successful, as much as ID proponents will try to tell you otherwise, and combined with a substantial amount of scientific and philosophical attack against the ideas of the ID movement, they have begun to change tactics a little bit, and talk about predictions and testability has crept back into discussions about ID, both online and in books.

The newest edition of the Carnival of Evolution is up at Quintessence of Dust. Support your local carnival, especially if you’re curious about chemotaxis, pit vipers, kin selection, or human penises. Yes, it’s the 1 April edition. No, that last entry is not a joke. But it should get you moving.

Recently I’ve been thinking that it might be possible to test a subset of creationist arguments: that molecular similarities are better explained by common design than common descent.

I believe that using a Bayes factor-based analysis along the lines of Theobald (2010) would be the appropriate approach. Not only would this force the construction a positive model of design (a first in creationism), but one can also integrate over the different intelligent designers that the DI likes to throw out there. So whether Hanuman, God, Jesus, God, the Holy Ghost, God, Richard Dawkins, God, Moses, God, Uranus, God, Thor, God, Prof. X, or God is the true common designer (or a mixture of the ones above), they all can be included in the model.

Of course, ID advocates would probably insist on using a Dirac delta function as the prior.

by Joe Felsenstein
http://evolution.gs.washington.edu/felsenstein.html

Over at Uncommon Descent an unusual discussion has erupted. A commenter named “MathGrrl” who has been occasionally active there as a critic of ID has actually been allowed to make a guest posting. She gave several examples of situations where one could make a specification of what were the best genotypes, and asked how in these cases Complex Specified Information could be defined. She has handled the discussion with great restraint. Several hundred comments later no consensus has emerged. Commenters at anti-ID blogs ( here, here, here, here, and here), have concluded from this that the concept of CSI is vacuous.

I’d like to give a perspective that may be unpopular here. I don’t think Complex Specified Information is a vacuous concept, though we usually do not have enough information to actually calculate numbers for it.

I had the displeasure of personally experiencing Kan Ham’s vitriol, applied to scientists at the time, way back in 1995, when he brought his creation seminar to Albuquerque. Time has passed, but Ham is still dispensing the vitriol. What’s changed is that now, he’s railing against his fellow Creationists!

The Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader reported on March 24^th that

Ken Ham, the man behind the Creation Museum and the future Ark Encounter amusement park, has been disinvited from a homeschool convention in Cincinnati next week because he made “ungodly, and mean-spirited” comments about another speaker, according to the convention’s organizers.

Ham also will be excluded from future conventions, according to a statement by Brennan Dean of Great Homeschool Conventions.

“The board believes that Ken’s public criticism of the convention itself and other speakers at our convention require him to surrender the spiritual privilege of addressing our homeschool audience,” Dean said in the statement.

…

At issue are criticisms by Ham of Peter Enns of the Biologos Foundation, who has said the fall of Adam and Eve can be construed as a symbolic story of Israel’s beginnings, rather than a literal description of human beginnings.

On his blog and in other statements, Ham takes issue with this view and Enns’ homeschool curriculum.

“In fact,” Ham wrote in a recent blog post, “what he teaches about Genesis is not just compromising Genesis with evolution, it is outright liberal theology that totally undermines the authority of the Word of God.” …

On the Web: Answers in Genesis Explains the Rift

Discuss.

Intelligent design news from the 16^th of March to the 22^nd of March, 2011.

So, another week of intelligent design! The Discovery Institute was fairly quiet this week, with only five posts published on Evolution News & Views, a below average result, but quite a bit of it was pure gold. Well, for me, anyway. The fact that I do this every week means that I must be getting some entertainment out of it, right? I hope so - I don’t see myself as the masochistic type…

But anyway, this week’s three posts are on ID research (and rhetoric), revisiting the concept of biological “mistakes” as evidence against ID, and ID proponents in academia and the “Dissent from Darwin” list. Let’s get into it!