1

Joe,

The problem is, there simply is not a Theory of Intelligent Design that makes testable predictions.
Many of us who are interested in this issue have been asking the IDCists for some time to provide some testable predictions, to no avail.

Do you have any testable predictions you can offer from ToIDC and if so what are they?

~DS~

2

What testable predictions does the neo-Darwinian synthesis offer us?

3

I would hope evolutionary pyschology isn't taught in the public schools.

4

Steve,

Transitional fossils, vestigial/atavastic organs/structures, deep time, common and derived characteristics in both mt and nuclear DNA as well as in homolgy and physiology, biostratifications of the fossil record..etc. We can discuss specific evolutionary evidence later if you wish.
These are just a few of the overall general predictions and consequences made by the assumption of common ancestry among extant and widely diverse populations.
But let's stipulate purely for the purposes of discussion that evolution is not valid; What is the Theory of Intelligent Design, and what testable predictions does it make?

~DS~

5

Quote: Oddly enough, while there may be little differences in methodology between ID and EP, one is prohibited from being taught in schools while the other is encouraged. Both of these scientific theories are, after all, based on detecting design in nature.

But unlike science, ID relies on elimination of ALL possibilities to reliably infer design. This means that ID is based on our ignorance, or in other words ID is based on a 'GAP approach'.
Nothing wrong with that other than that ID really does not provide for any positive approaches. That ID is a failure scientifically is self evident in that despite years of effort, the ID movement has yet to show that ID has scientific relevance.

Del Ratzsch for instance states the reality quite succinctly in his book

[quote]
“I do not wish to play down or denigrate what Dembski has done. There is much of value in the Design Inference. But I think that some aspects of even the limited task Dembski set for himself still remains to be tamed.” “That Dembski is not employing the robust, standard, agency-derived conception of design that most of his supporters and many of his critics have assumed seems clear.”
[/quote]

which leads Del to make the following observation

[quote]
So typically, patterns that are likely candidates for design are first identified as such by some unspecified ("mysterious") means, then with the pattern in hand S picks out side information identified (by unspecified means) as releavant to the particular pattern, then sees whether the pattern in question is among the various patterns that could have been constructed from that side information. What this means, of course, is that Dembski's design inference will not be particularly useful either in initial recognition or identification of design
[/quote]

Del Ratsch, “Nature design and science”

Or

Wimsatt, who was featured on the cover of Dembski's first book comments as follows on the claims made in NFL

[quote]Unfortunately "popular" presentations of "Intelligent Design" have tended to give the impression that it rested solely on mathematical demonstrations. Anyone who could have succeeded in showing that natural selection is incapable of generating biological structures according to standards from mathematics or logic would have constructed a mathematical proof that would have dwarfed Godel's famous Undecideability theorem in importance. As one who read Dembski's original manuscript for his first book, found much to like in it, and had appreciative remarks on the dust jacket of the first printing, I can say categorically that Demski surely has shown no such thing, and i call upon him as a mathematician to deny and clarify the implications of this advertising copy.
[/quote]

Until ID can contribute in a non-trivial manner to scientific knowledge, and I'd argue it has failed to do so sofar, it will remain scientifically irrelevant

6

I would add to what DS said that the negation of evidence for one theory cannot logically imply another theory which seems to be both the opposite and also has no known testability.

7

D.S.,

Do you have any testable predictions you can offer from ToIDC and if so what are they?

Sure. Bill Dembski provides a rather good on Dembski based on ID's contention that the bacterial flagellum is an irreducibly complex struture:

“To falsify such a claim [that it is irreducibly complex], a scientist could go into the laboratory, place a bacterial species lacking a flagellum under some selective pressure (for mobility, say), grow it for ten thousand generations, and see if a flagellum--or any equally complex system--was produced. If that happened, my claims would be neatly disproven."

8

Steve: I agree. Neo-Darwinism has reached the stage where its proponents believe it is above reproach.

Josiah: EP is being taught in high schools that offer Psychology classes.

D.S. We can discuss specific evolutionary evidence later if you wish. Perhaps you can provide some evidence that homology proves an evolutionary relationship.

PvM: Nothing wrong with that other than that ID really does not provide for any positive approaches. What seems to have been forgotten is that the scientific method works best by disproving theories. While a theory can be adequately falsified, it can rarely be completely proven to be correct.

Mike: I would add to what DS said that the negation of evidence for one theory cannot logically imply another theory which seems to be both the opposite and also has no known testability. The negation of evidence approach can work if the theories are directly contradictory. If one claims that a biological structure is irreducibly complex and another theory claims it isn't, then the negation of either side could be used as positive evidence for the opposite theory.

9

Joe, let me point out that the fact that the passage is much like ID reasoning is precisely because ID proponents chose their terminology and marketing to appear more like the scientific mainstream.

Nonetheless, the meaning of "design" in the passage you quoted above is quite a bit different from the meaning of "Design" in "Intelligent Design".

The key, of course is "Intelligent". ID believes in purposeful, guided design. The passage you quoted refers to design as "suitedness for the environment", leaving unspecified whether such suitedness was intentional or emergent.

And the confusion is generated by the ID movement's choice of terminology.

10

Joe,

I disagree. We could only deduce certain things:

1. Evolution has not occured here
2. There is a strong possibility that ID was what created us.

However we have no proof that evolution doesn't occur on other worlds nor do we have definitive proof that the creation happened the way that the Book of Genesis says it did.

11

To put some of the objections here another way, please describe the Theory of Intelligent Design in positive terms. That is, what does ID theory specifically tell us, and what is the evidence that supports ID theory. All too often, the case for ID is made in terms of evidence against evolution. So pretend the theory of evolution was never even posited, and make your case for ID.

12

Mike:
...nor do we have definitive proof that the creation happened the way that the Book of Genesis says it did.

To that point, the old hypothetical "did Adam & Eve have navels" question, as well as the question about if you cut down the largest tree in Eden on the eighth day, how many rings would it have.

I would like to think that assuming God exists, he gave us the ability to do deductive reasoning for a reason, and that he wouldn't fault us for where that reasoning takes us, unless it's somehow morally unconscionable.

13

(of course, if God does exists, what I or anyone else would like to think is irrelevant...)

14

Evolutionary Psych is taught in schools? God help us. It's interesting to note that many of the criticisms of ID are used against EP, and with good reason. Non-comparative versions of EP (think Toobey and Cosmides, David Buss, or even Steven Pinker now)generally produce untestable theories, experiments that (predictably) do not test those theories, and explanatory stories that are, at best, speculations based on simplistic and untested ideas about how things might have been at some point in our evolutionary history. Teaching that version of EP would be just about as bad as teaching ID.

Fortunately, the APA site linked above focuses mainly on comparative psychology, with the possible exception being the following:
"Providing examples of the interaction of evolutionary mechanisms with the environment in the areas of gender differences and aggression."
The APA is hardly endorsing EP as its commonly practiced here.

15

DS: [quote]Transitional fossils, vestigial/atavastic organs/structures, deep time, common and derived characteristics in both mt and nuclear DNA as well as in homolgy and physiology, biostratifications of the fossil record..etc. We can discuss specific evolutionary evidence later if you wish.[\quote]

The problem with these 'predictions' is they are not falsifiable, and/or based on arguments from ignorance and story telling.

For instance - Homology is not always a sign of close evolutionary relationship (i.e. convergent evolution is claimed).
Vetigial structures are decided because we don't know about a function for a body part. Many cases have been shown that later on vetigial structures do have functions.
Transitional Fossils - Are normally claimed for anything with mixed characteristics (e.g. reptile/bird) even if the fossil being examined does not fit within any sort of timeline involving creatures of one type slowly evolving into another.
DNA common characteristics - is just another example of the homolgy argument. Discarded when it doesn't fit

16

Alan: The problem with these 'predictions' is they are not falsifiable, and/or based on arguments from ignorance and story telling.

I guess that creationists trying to falsify these predictions are somewhat delusional then? How ironic. Rather than claiming, without much evidence, that these concepts are not falsifiable, why not address some real examples and show that they are arguments from ignorance.

Vestigial organs are NOT organs with no known function for starters. Transitional fossils are welll described here for instance

17

Pim Van Meurs: Wants examples

Sure: How about http://www.nature.com/cgi-taf/DynaPage.taf?file=/nature/journal/v428/n6981/full/428373a_r.html&filetype=&dynoptions=

Where 'scientists' guess that weaker jaw muscles lead to brain case size increases (In primates anyways). Note also the comments about the extreme rarity of what can really be classed as transitional fossils.

How about
http://www.nature.com/nsu/040216/040216-20.html
Printing articles about panspermia in Nature?
Perhaps you would like to answer how this is testable? Note how this is suggested because the authors know of no way that life could start with any real probability on earth

Or how about
Current Biology - Aug 19
“Evolution: the erratic path towards complexity,”
Nick Barton and Willem Zuidema

"A *central goal* of evolutionary biology is to *explain* the *origin of complex organs* – the *ribosomal machinery* that translates the genetic code, the *immune system* that *accurately* distinguishes self from non-self, *eyes* that can resolve precise images, and so on. Although we understand [sic] in broad outline how such *extraordinary systems* can evolve by natural selection, *we know very little about the actual steps involved, and can hardly begin to answer general questions about the evolution of complexity.* For example, *how much time is required for some particular structure to evolve?"

So we don't know how structures evolved, how long it took, and we can't reproduce it (as it was a singular unrepeatable event in the past). The best we can do is show that it was possible that it might have happened in some way. Which is essentially a probabilistic argument (as we do not know all the possible alternatives), the same as intelligent design.

Finally, how about homology? How can you claim this is a prediction? Even remotely? This was something already observed and what evolution was meant to explain. As such, it IS NOT a prediction.
How can you even claim it as evidence? When you argue that similar morphology points to close evolutionary relationships, surely when you find similar morphology and they are not thought to be closely related (i.e. where convergent evolution is claimed) or when you find very different morphology and they organisms are closely related (e.g. asparagus and orchids [I think it was these 2]), then the whole idea of homology as evidence for evolution is reduced to story telling...

18

Last respondant. Your name field is empty, so we don't know how to reference a comment to you.

The original question was 'what testable predictions does neo-Darwinian synthesis offer us?"
My response was that it predicts a huge range of derived/common features, as well as physical evidence, and I provided a brief synopsis of some of those topics.
I encourage you to look more deeply into the underlying science of all of them. They're fascinating topics. I'd suggest you direct your biology questions to the biologists present. I'm not a biologist. I can take a whack at answering, but I'd have to actually do some WORK and Lord know's that would be against my nature.
If you're unable to find anyone willing to respond to you, I'll give it a shot.
~DS~

19

teve,

Transitional fossils,

Non-existant

vestigial/atavastic organs/structures,

Purely speculation

deep time,

Believed in by both ID and nD.

common and derived characteristics in both mt and nuclear DNA as well as in homolgy and physiology,

Fully consistant with both ID and nD.

biostratifications of the fossil record..etc.

Fully consistant with nD and ID.

We can discuss specific evolutionary evidence later if you wish.

I'm familiar with it, and its lack of scientific viability.

These are just a few of the overall general predictions and consequences made by the assumption of common ancestry among extant and widely diverse populations.

They are invalid because they can't falsify your hypothesis, and because they are equally explanable by ID.

But let's stipulate purely for the purposes of discussion that evolution is not valid; What is the Theory of Intelligent Design, and what testable predictions does it make?

Irreducible complexity, for one.

20

Steve,

You bring up some potentially fruitful points of dicussion. I want to give others a chance to hop in.
If no one does, then later today I'll respond OK?

~DS~

21

Personally, I think ID is more flexible and can be argued better than the traditional "six-day-zap" creationism we've seen up to this point.

However, some scientists who might have been open to the idea (at least as something to investigate) are probably real gun-shy that it is just a new "stealth version" of the "Six Day Zap or Burn in Hell!" approach.

And has anybody considered the idea that God doesn't need to follow our Noah's Flood Young Earth proof texts or End Time Prophecy charts and schedules, that He just might have some ideas of his own on the subject?

Aslan is NOT a tame lion.

I AM THAT I AM, not I AM (whatever agrees with your own idea of what I do).

22

1. No matter how much heat is generated by the debate, you will never "prove" either nD or ID. After the fact, all we can do is discuss probabilities. Thus the fallacious statement above that one only has to negate one instance of posited irreducible complexity is nonsense, and the writer knows it- that is nothing more than a cheap shot debating attempt to infer different conclusions than Behe was actually providing. Behe's thesis is not about any particular instance- he uses examples, but what he is saying is that there are cases of irreducible complexity and to negate the concept you need to eliminate all of them, not one.

2. It seems that no matter what the context of the naturalism vs. whatever you call "some higher power had a template" the naturalists can never resist tossing cheap shots at easy targets like the "God wears a Timex" young earthers. Get over it; there are too many people who see through it, including everyone here.

3. The chief quarrel many of us have, knowing that neither view is provable, both are subject only to levels of probability, is not that schools don't teach Genesis. It is that schools don't acknowledge the holes in nD- the massive missing pieces that Colin Peterson and Richard Lewontin at least admit are filled with a naturalistic faith- which all of us know are there. Instead, in a unique and politically correct display of hubris, they are taught to empty heads as though we had all the answers. We don't.

4. None of this will be proved; it's time to stop pretending that it can be. All we can do is tinker around the edges of the probabilties and rule out indvidual theoretical mechanisms as we learn more.

23

Duane,

Science uses terms like evidence, plausibility, etc. Proof is for liquor, court, and formal systems.

~DS~

24

Don't condescend, DS. I work in a large research university and live with PIs all day long, from p is less than .001 to anova. My daughter is a biophysicist with a decent PUBS CV.

Read the next line, which addresses probabilities, as does the remainder of the post. If you read some of the comments above, and all the other nonsense spewed out in the origins debate under the guise of "science" by Dawkins, Emery, every major biology text, etc., you see constant terms of certainty with virtually no use of the types of disclaimers or caveats you listed.

If the naturalism propagandists actually consistently addressed this issue in the way you suggest, I would have no objection.

25

[Don't condescend, DS. I work in a large research university and live with PIs all day long, from p is less than .001 to anova. My daughter is a biophysicist with a decent PUBS CV.]

Which only makes it more puzzling that you would employ a term like 'prove' in regard to science.

But, perhaps I mistook your request for proof or lack thereof, as a stealthy attempt to bring evolutionary biology down to the same level of confidence as magical, mythical, unsupported, speculations. Maybe I'm nitpicking.

If so I apologize. I/we see ill conceived creationist arguments everyday which take on the form "We cannot be 100 % certain that the moon is made of mineral compounds. Nor can we be 100% certain the moon is made of green cheese. More research needs to be done before we can 'prove' or 'disprove' either 'theory'."

With the unstated implication being that the Green Cheese Theory really exists and is a legitimate contender with the Mineral Theory, because of a lack of proof.

~DS~

26

Mr. Carter, you said that:

"To falsify such a claim [that it is irreducibly complex], a scientist could go into the laboratory, place a bacterial species lacking a flagellum under some selective pressure (for mobility, say), grow it for ten thousand generations, and see if a flagellum--or any equally complex system--was produced. If that happened, my claims would be neatly disproven."

Guess what? I began such an experiment in late 1999, selecting for motility towards sucrose in a sucrose-dependent strain of E.coli with all its flagellar genes removed, and a 1.5% agar solution in LB media (to increase resistance) at 37 degrees. To my surprise, the bacteria evolved a very strange propellar-like structure which I have not seen before in the literature.

Here's the problem: this took approximately 80,000 generations. Does that still count? Also, I'm not sure if this structure is "equivalently complex" to the strain's "natural" flagellum. Since you are understand this stuff, I'm going to need your help making that determination. What do you need to know exactly? I filed my patent application on this strain last month so please let me know what other information you need.

Oh, and I re-checked the sequence of my new strain to make sure that some random E.coli didn't get into the broths at any point and contaminate the results. There is nothing remotely homologous (at the DNA sequence level anyway) to the old flagellar genes and although I don't have all the sequence data yet, the new loci I've identified show that at least some of the new sequences are derived (but by no means identical to) other structural and motor proteins (e.g., there is some homology to the bacterial mating genes). I used Hfr strains because they tend to grow best on the relatively "dry" agar plates I'm using.

This is going to be hot! The ID creationists will be all over this as it will really open up the field for them. Everything hinges on the equivalently complex issue. For starters, I can tell you that there are no fewer than twenty (!) different proteins involved, at least judging from their motility on an SDS-PAGE gel. And while there appears to be some ATPase activity, I was able to detect rotary movement of the propellar structure in the presence of ATP-gammaS (admittedly, this can be hydrolzyed at a low rate by some motor proteins). So, thankfully, there is no violation of Maxwell's law (yet -- I need to repeat the experiment with some truly non-hydrolyzeable analogues, such as AMP-PNP but the supply room is out).

Again, let me know regarding the "equivalently complex" issue and whether the 10,000 generation number is key for Mr. Dembski's analysis. I've read everything Mr. Debmski's written but, to be frank, I find it incredibly dense and hard to follow. Help!

27

My, Dr. Strickland, sounds like an intelligent guy (you) designed something there.

28

Really? Do you think if I sent a sample of this strain to Dembski along with a few nice electron micrographs and no other information that he could tell me if the mechanism which allows my bacteria to translocate on an agar plate was designed versus selected in a lab versus naturally arising?

What criteria would he use to make that determination?

29

The champion of irreducible complexity is Behe, not Dembski. Address it with him. And he will dig into the issue of which proteins you provided, etc.

You started by answering a lot of the questions by how the experiment was set up- one issue that Dembski, et al, address, is the probablity that those conditions are present at the same time as all of the conditions need to be optimum.

Stanley Miller, call in.

30

Duane, what difference would it make to Dembski or Behe how the experiment was "set up"? I thought the whole point was that they could determine with their equations whether the translocation-enabling motor in my strain was intelligently designed or whether it evolved as a result of selection? It seems like it should be enough to just send them the strain and maybe some additional details about the motor structure (just to save them time).

What is their contact information anyway?

31

It's interesting that when provided the criteria the IDC advocate demanded with the confident belief it could never be produced, they suddenly move the goal posts to the opposite end of the field.

IDC advocate:
"Put some bacteria in a lab and let them produce an IRC motility system using natural selection ...Buahahahaha, like that will EVER happen!"

Dr. Strickland:
"Ok, here's one..."

IDC Advocate:
"What I really meant when I said do it in a lab under controlled conditions, was 'show me one in the natural world which is not being controlled or observed by an intelligent designer such as yourself Dr Strickland' "

This is a good example of how the IDC advocates simply reject the very evidence they asked for. Not one IDCist on this forum has as far as I know reviewed Dr Strickland's data, yet they're CERTAIN it doesn't count.

Joe, since you did advance this criteria as a test for evolutionary validity- albeit vicariously with a refrence to Dembski- and implied this is what it would take for you to accept evolution and/or reject IRC, I expect you to keep your word on this.

"Thou Shalt Not Lie"

With the understanding that you deserve a reasonable amount of time to review the data for legitimacy.

I understand this discussion may not be your primary responsibility in life. It's fair to give you some time.
If Dr Strickland turns out to be legit, when can you review the data and when can we reasonably expect a retraction or a technical rebuttal?

Also, since this was Bill Dembski's proposal, wouldn't it be incumbant on anyone who values truth seeking to notify Dembski that his condictions may have been met, and ask that he also retract his statement or engage in defending it in light of this development?

~DS~

32

Hey D.S.,

Joe, since you did advance this criteria as a test for evolutionary validity- albeit vicariously with a refrence to Dembski- and implied this is what it would take for you to accept evolution and/or reject IRC, I expect you to keep your word on this.

Oh, I have every intention of keeping my word.

With the understanding that you deserve a reasonable amount of time to review the data for legitimacy.

Before I can review it I would need to see the data. Perhaps Dr. Strickland can provide a journal article, a link to a website, a paper he's written...heck, anything at all would help. So far, though, I haven't seen any actual "data." I was also unable to find the patent application that Dr. Strickland mentions. Perhaps he could provide us with more information so that we could draw a conclusion on the matter.

33

Joe,

[Before I can review it, I'd like to see the data]

Agreed. I'd like to know more about it also.

Furthermore, I understand that it could conceivably take quite a bit of time. Dr Strickland may be writing a paper, so he may not fell like divulging details on this until that time. Or for all I know this could be old news.

I don't know about you, but as a lowly mathematician, even if the data is provided, it would take me a lot of time to read through it and see if I even understand the lingo. I'd probably have to rely on the interp of a molecular bio expert on some points.

Assuming the experiment is as straightforward as Dr Strickland relates, I'd be very interested in Dembski's reaction.

~DS~

34

Joe,

This link to Ken Miller's website, shows that cellular motility is not IC.

http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/evol/design2/article.html

In which case Behe's thesis collapses. It is not incumbent on science to porvide a step by step description of how cellular motility developed in order to demonstrate that evolution occurred any more than it is incumbent on a geologist to precisely describe in a step by step manner how North America was put togethar in order for someone to accept the reality of plate tectonics.

You're backing the wrong horse, IC was dead in the starting gate. And (un)specified complexity is to nebulous a term to have any scientific meaning. And in an effort to prop up this dead horse you are now making logical fallacies.

Stuart

35

Dr. Roland Strickland,

Is this work of yours published anywhere?

36

I'd like to see it also. So would a growing number of my associates.
I tried e-mailing Dr Strickland at the posted blog addy, but it bounced.

~DS~

37

Dr. Strickland,

Dr. Behe can be reached at his office at Lehigh University. His e-mail address is listed at their website.

Dr. Dembski may be contacted through the Discovery Institute, sometimes. You may find his e-mail links at their website.

I've never been successful finding a Baylor address for him, though I suspect one exists.

Perhaps more importantly for this discussion, is there some way we can verify your claims? Is the patent application under a different name? Do you have any publications which might suggest your bona fides?

I like not to be a nasty skeptic, but when I mentioned your work to a couple of other biology researchers, they raised questions about the workability of the methods (even assuming much detail was left out), and questions about the testing of the results. What should I tell them?

38

I think "Dr Strickland" needs to publish these amazing results, fast.

I've never heard of him, nor have I seen any published description of this experiment. And it's more than a little peculiar to announce such an experiment on the weblog of an evangelical christian who doesn't know much about science.

39

Having just read through the above series of comments/exchanges, it still escapes me entirely just what alterantive to evolution the IDC "theorists" are offering. In his book, Behe openly declares that he concedes the likelihood of deep time and that he also concedes the likelihood of common ancestry of extant organisms. Just becuase he can gaze at an EM of a bacterial flagellum, operationally define it as "irreducibly complex" (an operational definition that means nothing regarding the plausibility of how it might have come to be "IC" as far as I can see) to me continues to be obviously nothing more intellectually deep than pointing at a gap in his understanding and invoking God. Please explain how IDC ala Behe is something more valuable than hole plugging. For the life of me I can't see how IDC offers us something fundamentally more useful than the explanatory power of material naturalism/scientific method.

40

hi, your post is very important for me, thanks