The ID Report

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

When I first encountered Biola adjunct prof Cornelius G. Hunter's Science's Blind Spot: The Unseen Religion of Scientific Naturalism (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2007), I was intrigued by the possibility that it might help me understand the people who want to destroy the careers of anyone who doubts that Darwinian evolution can produce mind from mud, and ultimately you from goo.

I fear it is somewhat like trying to understand the jihadis. Friends have told me that, to understand jihadis, I must try, at least briefly, to see the world as they do. Similarly, to understand Darwin's most committed followers, I must undergo a similar mental exercise. For me at least, such exercises do not result in conversion to the alien belief system; rather, they help me make decisions about how to deal more effectively with the believers.

Blind Spot led to a surprising discovery: According to Hunter, the Darwinists are much more religious than I am. Many of them - especially the ones who attend church - are zealous for God's honour in a way that I would never think of. For them, God is too great to provide evidence for his work in any sense that I could view and understand. And this universe is not good enough to have been created by him.

From the book, a brief explanation:

The theological mandates for naturalism fall into several categories. Their common theme is that God ought not to intervene in the creation and care of the world. Nature should operate primarily, or even exclusively, via actual laws, and it is not exclusively God's design. Naturalism in the sciences did not arise from an empiricist urge; it arose from several theological axioms and concerns. These concerns were not antireligious. Though at times they were raised disingenuously by religious skeptics, more often they were raised quite seriously by theists who were trying to elucidate the relationship between God and creation. (p. 20)

also

Theological naturalism is not opposed to all things religious - it IS religious. Theological naturalism mandates a nonintervening god; it does not mandate no god. It means that divine action must not be empirically detectable. Hence theological naturalism mandates methodological naturalism-the idea that science ought to pursue naturalistic explanations. It is not that there is no god but that creation must always operate according to uniform natural laws. (P. 31)

And then there is the question of evil and suffering: The idea that God would actually design the world we see, where inelegance sometimes rules, the cat plays with the mouse, and children sometimes die from painful diseases is unthinkable. Theistic naturalists believe that they honour God and rescue his reputation when they insist that there is no detectible design in nature. Things happen because of random mutations and natural laws.

If God would have made nature perfect according to our sensibilities, and it obviously was not, then God must not have created nature. This was Hume's, and after him Darwin's, powerful argument. Too often commentators today miss the crucial point. Darwin advanced naturalism with religious arguments rather than with compelling scientific explanations. (P. 107)

Put simply, God is not a designer, because if he were, he would have to take credit for things that no reputable designer would do, at least in the theological naturalist's view. Defending his interpretation, Hunter quotes many instances of such views from the writings of Ken Miller, Francisco Ayala, Howard Van Till, Ian Barbour, and Keith Thomson. God sees the sparrow fall, but he hasn't explicitly chosen to create a system that lets it fall. The system evolves with no help from God.

Yes, God is somehow behind it all. But he is apprehended by faith alone - faith that requires no evidence, or even despises it. And if you point to any apparent evidence of design in nature ... well, the theistic naturalist asks, what is going to happen to your faith when science proves you wrong? You will lose your faith in God, right? Because science can always show that there is no design in nature. Always.

Part One: Theological naturalism: Why we owe it to God to believe in Darwin
Part Two: Rationalism vs. empiricism: What must be true vs. what the evidence shows
Part Three: Why rationalists cannot live with uncertainty

Next: Part One: Theological naturalism: Why we owe it to God to believe in Darwin

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

As noted in the Introduction, Hunter argues that the preference for naturalism is both theologically motivated and theologically justified. Ken Miller, Francisco Ayala, Howard Van Till, Ian Barbour, and Keith Thomson all use essentially theological arguments, as Hunter notes, along the lines of "God wouldn't ..."

Recognizing the pattern he identifies solved one big mystery for me. It explains why the Darwinist argues in good faith that bad design means no design. Now that point is so obviously not true in general (think Edsel) that some thought process that requires unpacking must underlie it. And here is that thought process: The universe is imperfect. God would have created a perfect universe. God's honour is at stake. God must therefore be protected from being seen as the author of the universe in any hands-on way.

Therefore, it follows, we must believe in Darwin. When we confront evidence from nature that doesn't support the idea that natural selection or some similar process acted on random mutation to produce every aspect of life, we must strive to overcome our temptation to doubt. It is best, of course, to rid ourselves of any tendency to even see such evidence.

I suppose I have never been religious enough to see nature the way Francis Collins and Francisco Ayala do. I have always been able to live with the idea that God might not do things the way we expect. But, according to Hunter, that is probably because I am an empiricist, not a rationalist.

Next: Part Two: Rationalism vs. empiricism: What must be true vs. what the evidence shows

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Hunter contrasts two views of science: rationalism and empiricism: Rationalism posits a theory of nature and looks for the evidence to support it. Empiricism assembles evidence, and builds on the evidence to form a picture of nature. Without insisting on total symmetry, Hunter uses Rene Descartes as a general example of rationalism and Francis Bacon as a general example of empiricism. Both thinkers made massive contributions to science and are honoured worldwide today.

What difference does it make which approach you take to science?

Well, here are some differences:

1. If you are a rationalist, you will favour the evidence for the pattern you think nature should follow and discount the evidence against it. If you are convinced that there must be no evidence of intelligent design in nature, you can discard any evidence for it without qualms. For example, Hunter notes, "Descartes argued that having a plausible yet incorrect description was better than no description at all." (P. 18)

However, if you are an empiricist like Bacon, you will be much less likely to do that. You would prefer to alter your idea of what the pattern shows.

2. An empiricist makes a distinction between experimental sciences like chemistry and physics and historical sciences like geology and evolution. The subjects of experimental sciences are here before us in the present day and can be directly tested in real time. The rationalist assumes that all past events that fit his rationally derived theory should be treated the same way as the current findings of experimental sciences. Darwin was definitely in this camp:

... Darwin argued for an uninterrupted continuum of natural history. Indeed, for theological naturalists there must be an uninterrupted continuum. There must be no principled distinction between the experimental and historical sciences. Natural laws that explain how the planets move must also be sufficient to explain how they originated. ... Our complex world, they say, must unfold as a result of the interplay of natural laws." (P. 38 )

3. Theistic naturalism is NOT a refundable proposition, because once you are in it, there is no way out. Remember, you are to discard evidence that does not fit the pattern. Hunter writes,

The problem with science is not that the naturalistic approach might occasionally be inadequate. The problem is that science would never know any better. This is science's blind spot. When problems are encountered, theological naturalism assumes that the correct naturalistic solution has not yet been found. Nonnatural phenomena will be interpreted as natural, regardless of how implausible the story becomes. Science has no mechanism to detect the possibility of nonnatural phenomena. It does not consider the likelihood that a phenomenon might not be purely naturalistic. (P. 44-45)

What happens then? If design IS in fact the best explanation for a given phenomenon, theistic naturalism will simply mislead us. As Hunter notes,

Theological naturalism has no way to distinguish a paradigm problem from a research problem. It cannot consider the POSSIBILITY that there is no naturalistic explanation for the DNA code. If a theory of natural history has problems - and many of them have their share - the problems are always viewed as research problems and never as paradigm problems. (P. 45)

As a result, theistic naturalism can never contemplate the possibility that its explanations are wrong (unless they are replaced by other naturalistic explanations):

There are problems with many naturalistic explanations, but this is not why naturalism is ailing. It is ailing because it cannot contemplate the possibility that it may be wrong. It cannot evaluate these problems from a larger perspective. Naturalistic explanations work well in many cases and break down in other cases. But theological naturalists cannot allow their science the latitude to incorporate nonnaturalistic explanations, or even to consider such a hypothesis. For them science must be firmly restricted to naturalistic explanations. (P. 50)

One specific result of theistic naturalism - which we see every day in the popular science press - is that any naturalistic explanation, no matter how foolish, appears more believable to the naturalist than any non-naturalistic explanation. THAT observation helped me understand something that had puzzled me much, while co-writing The Spiritual Brain: No matter how foolish a naturalistic proposition regarding the human mind was, it had to be preferred to a sensible non-naturalist one.

My favourite example - with apologies to those who are put off by its sheer vulgarity - is the Big Bazooms Theory of Human Evolution: According to that theory, men like women with big busts because they know whether they are still fertile (and what men like is governed by the desire of their selfish genes to spread themselves around).

Now, an obviously simpler and more reasonable explanation for a masculine preference for well-endowed women would be our general human desire for abundance rather than scarcity. But wait! The simpler explanation may feel unsatisfactory to the committed naturalist. After all, it implies the existence of a mind that prefers. And the mind is one of the very things that naturalism must consider an illusion. Our "minds" are the buzz of neurons in our brains. Some of that buzz is generated by the selfish genes that want to spread themselves. So whatever men prefer in women must somehow be linked to the women's fertility. That is a clumsy, complex, and unconvincing explanation but the committed naturalist knows that it should be preferred to any explanation that allows the man's mind to cause anything to happen by itself.

As Hunter notes

... those committed to naturalistic explanations, like those committed to supernaturalistic explanations, can always devise a theory to explain what we observe. Like supernaturalism, naturalism can never be judged a failure, for there is no test for failure. Failed hypotheses simply lead to more complex hypotheses.

Theological naturalism does not and cannot provide a balanced assessment of its own theories, and eventually moves to simply silence those who disagree. After all, God's honour is at stake. And there can be no uncertainty about that.

Next: Part Three: Why rationalists cannot live with uncertainty

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Hunter is somewhat sympathetic to theistic naturalism, and - unlike many of naturalism's opponents - does not argue that most theistic naturalists are closet atheists. Indeed, he writes,

The urge toward naturalism is understandable, and charges of atheism and materialism are unfounded and unhelpful. But the rationalists also need to be careful. With their metaphysical and methodological a priori axioms in place, rationalists make high truth claims. Their powerful epistemological foundation allows them to firmly pronounce what is true and what is false. How often do we hear that this or that evidence PROVES evolution to be true? A little bit of data goes a long way when one has the framework of theological naturalism already in place. The universally held position is that evolution is not a model or hypothesis but an undeniable fact. In all this there is an unspoken dependency on controversial premises. (p. 140)

Still, Hunter is obviously in the empiricists' camp because he devotes several chapters to evidence from nature that presents conundrums for the orthodox naturalist - evidence that is routinely avoided when addressing the public.

That is because the rationalist must deny every instance of design. The empiricist has no similar problem with law or chance:

For empiricists, the scientific information we have does not readily convert to comprehensive explanations that we can know to be true. When it comes to origins, we are still left with many questions. Of course, empiricists have their own opinions about these questions, but they differ among themselves, and typically they are less sure than are rationalists.

One reason that empiricists lack well-defined philosophical assumptions is the complexity of these issues. For instance, where rationalists are quick to employ the infinite regress to argue for naturalism, empiricists engage in lengthy, detailed debates about what it portends. ... Empiricists differ among themselves and feel free to proceed with the science without having all the difficult questions firmly resolved. (P. 141)

Hunter concludes,

For centuries it has been observed that nature appears to have been designed. But rationalism, with is metaphysical axioms, has constrained the sciences to naturalism. This has led to a blind spot, as only naturalistic explanations may be considered. If those naturalistic explanation are correct, then all is well. But today's rationalism has proclaimed them to be correct by fiat. That is metaphysical certainty, not scientific certainty. ( P. 146 )

He regards intelligent design theory as moderate empiricism:

Intelligent design cuts the strong tie between the historical and experimental sciences that rationalism requires. It is mainly interested in pursuing the experimental sciences without a priori assumptions about what is the right answer ... We should not assume that we know the kind of answers science must produce when there is much uncertainty. The world may have arisen by any of a variety of means and there is little to be gained by prematurely narrowing the choices. (P. 147)

Unless, of course, we are very sure what we must never believe. And if you are a theistic naturalist, remember, God's honour is at stake. And for some reason it is very, very fragile.

Return to Introduction

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

As long as people believe in absurdities, they will continue to commit atrocities. -- Voltaire

People gaze at mountains. People live in valleys. People thrive when the mountain is healthy, channeling water of life to valleys made green and lush. But when the run-off is poisoned with purposelessness and made monstrously meaningless, should it be surprising that a dull, reeking valley of death results? For all its current glory, with affected upward gazes and mandated stares of respect, Darwinism's much-touted and largely doubted mountain of evidence feeds a valley of death--the cold, purposeless, meaningless death of natural selection makes life in the valley heartily attractive to the strong, and hardly attractive to the weak. And though the mountain comes to few, we are all forced to go to it, walking in its shadow, living in its valley. How can we not fear evil?

From Darwin to Hitler, from Darwin to Marx, from Darwin to Stalin, from Darwin to Columbine, from Darwin to eugenics, from Darwin to euthanasia, from Darwin to infanticide . . . . The connections are undeniable except to those who resolutely oppose truth for fear of the obvious. To those who hate truth and love naturalistic Darwinism, denying the obvious implications of their chosen theory must be a learned adaptation, no doubt necessary to survive in the harsh environment of materialistic science, where on the topic of origins Darwinism and reality rarely coincide. Beyond feeding the mountain of theoretical puffery animating just-so meta-narratives, however, Darwin's theory fuels ideas that clash with reality in every area of life, from ethics to politics to religion, where at each turn the Darwin-inspired unnatural election of natural selection as a guiding light wreaks havoc and wrecks lives. Why can't we ask, "Is it true?"

Natural selection. Who could question such a thoroughly impeccant and wholesome idea? How viscerally attractive is the combination of organic earthiness and pro-choice chic. Like a prophet, Darwin's greatest triumph may be his anticipation of a thoroughly secular culture, his terminology reflecting a perfectly humanistic blend of free cosmos and free choice. Unguided choice, unintelligent direction, language trumps logic in a shadowy world of selfish killing to live, the favored races being preserved over the unfavored in a cycle of amoral gene propagation. Would death by any other name smell as sweet?

Make no mistake, natural selection is nothing more than the killing of a weaker, slower, or dumber living being by the elements, or more likely, by a stronger, faster, or smarter living being. No real selection in any real sense of making a choiceful decision among competing alternatives happens, of course. But granting Darwinists their necessary guidance substitute, what is the selected one being selected for? And which one does the selecting? One living being selected for death by another living being (naturally, of course) for no necessary reason beyond bare survival, and even survival is not a reason but a result. That's natural selection. In a Darwinian system, that is the course and coarse of nature, and we are simply one purposeless byproduct. How convenient that our ancestors were better killers than whatever other purposeless existence might otherwise be here now. Are we to lament the flood of blood that washed us up on this present shore? Or are we to celebrate such good fortune? What use is lamenting or celebrating in the absence of reason and purpose? We are not even lucky; we just are.

The great failure of Darwinists is not only their failing to produce any evidence to support their theory in its strong form (all life from non-life in ever increasing information-bearing specified complexity), but in their obstinate refusal to admit and own up to the fact that their force-fed ideas (that few people believe) have predictable consequences (that no one likes). Students taught that they are a result of unguided, purposeless processes that never had them in mind can hardly be expected to see life through any other lens. Such world views produce world leaders whose truthless philosophy ends in ruthless atrocities. Whether kid or king, if people believe they are here only because their ancestors successfully killed off all competition, on what logical basis should they not reciprocate in kind for their offspring?

Ideas have consequences. If Darwinism is correct, and we truly are the result of unguided, chance mutations that made us more successful at killing off weaker beings, then we must live with the difficult task of trying to formulate any reason why we all should not simply continue nature's task. Unguided purposeless processes produced our mind, but what is to produce our morals? If science has defined our facts, can't science define our values? So far Darwinists have not been able to come up with any coherent ethic consistent with both the inherent human ethos and their heartless killing machine. Look it up, no one can do it. And no one ever will.

Many teach Darwinism sincerely out of ignorance, offending the truth in science born of nescience. Others preach Darwinism sincerely in spite of knowledge, suppressing the truth in science without conscience. But whether by omission or commission, sin is no less when lodged in sincere. We must ask, therefore, is Darwinism true? If not, can it be that perhaps not only are we designed as a scientific matter, but we are designed for a higher purpose? Can science help inform society on the human condition beyond the hopeless, clueless foundering of evolutionary thinking? Can we even ask the question?

Roddy Bullock, JD, BSME, is the Executive Director of the Intelligent Design Network of Ohio (www.idnetohio.com) and is the author of The Cave Painting: A Parable of Science, published by Access Research Network. Send comments to: roddybullock@idnetohio.com.

Copyright (C) 2007 Roddy M. Bullock, all rights reserved. Quotes and links permitted with attribution.

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Okay, here at last is Jerry Bergman's review of Stuart Pivar's Lifecode. Yes, Stu Pivar was the friend of Steve Gould who was suing and then unsuing PZ Myers. Also, note the new book announcement about Jerry Bergman.

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Bird brains, far from us on the "tree of life" spur rethinking of intelligence

A fellow journalist's thoughts on neuroscientists and God

Scientist apologist John Lennox todebate atheist crusader Richard Dawkins

How powerful is the placebo effect? If you do not take your sugar pill, you are more likely to die.

New entries to the Evolution in the light of intelligent design encyclopedia

Also - menopause explained, or maybe not

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Here are the new entries to the Encyclopedia: Evolution in the light of intelligent design:

Acritarchs - oldest known protists (Tyler)

The picture emerging of the Late Archaean is one that includes prokaryotes and eukaryotes, photosynthesis, an oxygenated atmosphere and lots of biological activity. This is a big contrast from the picture even 10 years ago. The significance for our thinking about origins is that the eons of time demanded by Darwinian processes are not available.

Archaea - horizontal gene transfer - review of The Archaea's Tale (Tyler)

He presents evidence that Darwinian evolution does not go back to the beginning of life. When we compare genomes of ancient lineages of living creatures, we find evidence of numerous transfers of genetic information from one lineage to another. In early times, horizontal gene transfer, the sharing of genes between unrelated species, was prevalent. It becomes more prevalent the further back you go in time. - Freeman Dyson

Butterfly sex ratios in Samoa - and natural selection (Tyler)

Sex ratios are distorted by the presence of a maternally inherited bacterium which has the effect of selectively killing male embryos. The authors report ratios of >99% female to nearly 1:1. These were different on different islands and at different times. The genetics of this shift of sex ratios is summarised in one paragraph with some supporting online data. There is not enough information here for anyone to either confirm or challenge their conclusions.

Cell - molecular recognition - advantages of cellular key-lock not being an exact fit. (Tyler)

So, something that could have been interpreted as evidence for tinkering evolution is discovered to have advantages after all. Furthermore, it has potential for the design of human systems operating in noisy environments. By invoking "evolutionary selection", the authors suggest an evolutionary context for their work. However, there is no evidence that evolutionary selection was involved, and the link with evolutionary theory is gratuitous.

Central dogma (Tyler)

Casual observers might say they find chaos in the emerging picture of the genome, but systems biology is tracking down extraordinary sophistication at the molecular biology level, indicating that theories (like Darwinism) that are undirected and stochastic have little to offer 21st Century biology.

Exoplanets - atmospheres (Tyler)

Gecko - feet a standard for adhesion (Tyler)

... the gecko does not demonstrate just a single trait with enhanced performance. There are issues of adhesion and delamination, self-cleaning, and achieving a sustained adhesive performance. What we have in the gecko is exquisite design and, for that, biomimetics needs a methodology that can relate well to intelligent engineering design concepts.

Molecular recognition in the cell (Tyler)

Protists - oldest known protists (Tyler)

Sensory perception - advanced perception in Permian amniotes (Tyler)

The discovery of a highly-evolved auditory apparatus in Middle Permian parareptiles even further emphasizes that the entire groundplan for the impressive evolutionary history of amniotes was already largely in place by the end of the Paleozoic; what followed was in fact only a subsequent tinkering of earlier inventions." Darwinism needs time, but the fossil record no longer provides it.

Stasis - tribolites (Tyler)

Trilobites - variation and stasis as a pattern

The research documented both rapid morphological variation and subsequent stasis. ... One hypothesis is that radiations occur because organisms are designed to vary, but the process results in genetic impoverishment that leads to stasis.

Variation - tribolites (Tyler)

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Recently, an article appeared in New Scientist, a magazine for all things Darwin, wherein we are assured that ""Caring grandmas explain the evolutionary role of menopause."

The article argues, based on research in Gambia prior to the introduction of modern medicine, that children were more likely to survive their mother's death if their maternal grandmother was alive (and presumably looked after the child):

... Daryl Shanley and colleagues at Newcastle University, UK, analysed the births and deaths of 5500 people in Gambia between 1950 and 1975 – before a modern medical clinic arrived. They believe this provides an approximation to the situation experienced by females during the evolution of humans.

Interesting idea - that life in Africa has not changed at all since the Old Stone Age.

It's an interesting article, all the more because menopause may not even require an "evolutionary" explanation.

The article explains,

Human female reproductive functions stop around age 50, and start tapering off even earlier. In other mammals, female reproduction simply stops because of ageing, at a variety of ages. But in humans the shutdown is deliberate and early. And it is genetically controlled, meaning the genes responsible were selected by evolution.

Wait a minute ... do we have any good reason to believe that in earliest human history most women even lived to be fifty years of age? How many people over 35 years of age, never mind 50, were the subjects of natural selection (which is what New Scientist means by "evolution")? Also, I wonder how many animals living in nature really outlive their fertility or die of old age.

Doesn't a woman develop all her eggs while a fetus herself, start to release them at menarche and go through them at a rate of about one a month? When the monthly release of eggs stops, that’s menopause.So, why bother with an evolutionary purpose for menopause? Isn’t menopause just the state of outliving one’s fertility?

Of course, in some cultures, mom's mom would raise the child of a dead mother, and in other cultures she might only raise a boy (not a girl). In others, maybe a child whose mother died is bad luck. Indeed, in some cultures I suspect that dad's mom would shove mom's mom out of the way and grab a BOY immediately.

In the cafeteria at Biola University in October 2005, I recall an eager young Darwinist proclaiming to me (rightly, I believe), "Evolution doesn't care about you when you are old." I may have been the only "old" person within 500 metres, but I was hardly alarmed to learn that "evolution" didn't care about me.

(I only wish that the Toronto snow shovelling compliance inspector had the same view ... Unhappily, he knows that I exist, and that I am a few years short of free shovelling, no matter how big the mountain of snow is.)

Hat tip to the first reader to spot an article in New Scientist explaining the evolutionary adaptation of living to be over eighty years of age and being no darn use to anyone who does not want to listen to extended yarns of ye good old days...

Also:

Research: What can you believe about what you read?

Does it matter if materialism is false?

Anarchic Harmony blog on materialists and truth

Expelled! film crew visits Baylor, and most interssting correspondence revealed.

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

I don't know what I would do without my regular fix of Toronto journalist David Warren, who - having made clear that he thinks Darwinism a crock - is constantly hearing from anxious Darwin fans, who don't know what they'll do if it isn't true.

If life cannot be produced accidentally by jiggling chemicals in a test tube, ... apparently life makes no sense to them - or something like that anyway.

Warren continues to offer boilerplate responses (one must live, after all). Indeed, he appears to know some of the same Darwoids as I hear from, to judge from their inimitable prose style:

"Atrociously bad, pig-ignorant garbage." ... "Mixture of gall & negligence." ... "Sheer brazen quality of this ignorance is a wonder to behold."

This is what's said ABOUT the likes of me, third-personally, by the more articulate correspondents advising my editors to sack me. The letters to me personally are, however, much ruder. As usual, among the charges, I am a "faggot," or at least a "closet fag."

[ ... ]

Many, many, of my apoplectic correspondents refer me to websites on "The God Delusion," & other standard sources for atheist proselytizing. Several correspondents refer to a website where Michael Behe's "claims" are "refuted" in a similar manner to the above (i.e. with a lot of more-or-less clinical abusive language).

And apparently, many of these ill-tempered illiterates have taken to styling themselves "the New Enlightenment."

To hear Warren's literate thoughts on "the survival instinct", go here.

Also:

Favorable review of Behe's Edge of Evolution

From the whodathunkit? files: Dan Rather suing CBS over pajamagate

Terminology wars: Materialist philosopher calls agnostic biochemist a creationist

CS Lewis on science writing - why it matters

Milt Rosenberg interviews Mario Beauregard (The Spiritual Brain) and Francis Collins (The Language of God) Thursday night 9:05 Chicago tmei

How memory works: Not like we thought.

Why spiritual histories of countries are necessary

Altruism files: Entrepreneur doctor honours promise despite dotcom disaster

Is the mind just an illusion?

HarperCollins Canada offers free stuff from The Spiritual Brain.

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Apparently, in the most recent edition of First Things, Fr. Richard Neuhaus defends Mike Behe, author of Edge of Evolution. It's not on line yet, but Fr. Neuhaus says, among other things,

You usually know that somebody is losing the argument when he loses his cool and resorts to bluster, abuse, caricature, and the invocation of authorities who agree with him.

He is referring, of course, to Richard Dawkins's attempt to trash Behe's book in The New York Times. He notes the curious fact that the Times should never have given the book to Dawkins to review anyway, without giving Behe the right of reply (which it would never dare to do):

It is hard to know what purpose is served by the Book Review in having Dawkins review Behe, except, possibly, to ostracize anyone who presumes to raise questions about prevailing Darwinist orthodoxies and, perhaps, to pander to the smug prejudices of the presumed readership of the Times. That does not instill confidence in the Darwinist materialism that they are so desperately defending.

This is all particularly interesting because Neuhaus is not especially one of the ID think tank Discovery Institute fans.

Rather, it sounds (especially when you read the whole thing) as though he is beginning to get the same picture as so many of the rest of us: Darwinism is the Enron of biology. The fact that he scolds the New York Times over Dawkins's review is interesting in view of the question raised by some about whether Dawkins had actually read Behe's book.

Also: Cameron Wybrow, who got an honest review of Mike Behe's Edge of Evolution published in the Philadelphia Enquirer, found himself taking to task a completely silly review in the Winnipeg Free Press. Put it this way: It is impossible for U of Winnipeg molecular biologist Janice Dodd to consider the possibility that Darwinism might not be true. So she doesn't. Read her review, then Wybrow's comment.

I was travelling on a Toronto streetcar today with a fellow journalist who was musing about the sheer gullibility of Darwinists. Learned in history, he pointed out that Darwinists had originally attacked Mendel because Mendel cited statistics for genetics - instead of the vagueness the Darwinists so loved. He and I believe in a traditional religion, but the Darwinists believe in magic.

Also: ID materials outselling anti-ID materials? Gotta getta law against that!

Catholic Church continues to reject Darwinism

Is intelligent design biblical?

Jason Rennie's SciPhiShow interview with Denyse O'Leary on The Spiritual Brain.

People who have inspired/intrigued the readers of The Spiritual Brain.

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Creation science museum opens in Alberta, Canada

New entries to the Evolution in the Light of Intelligent Design Encyclopedia.

Intelligent design and popular culture: Where did terms like "intelligent design", "Darwinism" come from?

ID Controversy: Why things shape up differently in Canada

Portuguese language ID blog draws 70 000 visitors over two years

O'Leary's two children's science books just published!

From Mindful Hack: Mother Teresa's dark night of the soul

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

Because so many people have asked me what The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul addresses, I thought I would post the Introduction. It doesn't deal with everything the book addresses, but it gives you some idea.

In this book, we intend to show you that your mind does exist, that it is not merely your brain. Your thoughts and feelings cannot be dismissed or explained away by firing synapses and physical phenomena alone. In a solely material world, "will power" or "mind over matter" are illusions, there is no such thing as purpose or meaning, there is no room for God. Yet many people have experience of these things. We intend to argue that these experiences are real. In contrast, many materialists now argue that notions like meaning or purpose do not correspond to reality; they are merely adaptations for human survival. In other words, they have no existence beyond the evolution of circuits in our brains.

Can we prove God exists from neuroscience? No, but if your mind is real, a cosmic Mind would best account for it. If spirituality is good for you (and it is), that's because spirituality responds to the way things really are in our universe. Come along with us and see for yourself.

Part One: Neuroscience as if your mind is real
Part Two: Who has enough faith to be a materialist?
Part Three: The uses of non-materialist neuroscience
Part Four: Materialism is running on empty

Next: Part One: Neuroscience as if your mind is real

Also:
Denyse writes for Pearcey Report on science reporters and meat puppets ...

Mario Beauregard speaking at mind-brain conference in Finland

Methodological naturalism at the end of its tether

Now it's the birds who explain selfless behavior. Whither the chimps?

Materialist cognitive scientist Steve Pinker's Stuff of Thought

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

What does Bob Marks want? He wants the right to run computer simulations at Baylor that might (possibly) reduce confidence in Darwinian evolution.

That is, the simulations might show that Darwinian evolution is not nearly as probable as professional Darwinists claim.

Actually, the Wistar meetings showed that way back in the 1960s, but Darwinism is just too good a creation story for materialism to pass up. So otherwise respectable scientists have been lying for Darwin ever since, and snuffing out the careers of anyone who breaks rank.

Contrary to popular belief, you need NOT be a creationist or an ID guy. All you have to do is stop believing in magic - Darwinian magic - and ask for evidence.

That's a Big Sin because the evidence does not support Darwinism.

Well, that explains the role of the Darwinist, who can hardly help suppressing evidence, but what about Baylor, the alleged Christian university? Elsewhere, I have pointed out that institutions like Baylor essentially protect Christians from a world that favours materialism. The justification for their existence would be revolutionized if word got out that materialism is largely disconfirmed over a broad area. As I said there,

In a trice, the harsh reality from which the institution protects its dumb sheeplike students is - a harsh UNreality. The students are not meat puppets who foolishly imagine that they have immortal souls and must therefore be humoured by their silly little campus groups. They are people who actually do have immortal souls who are being trained by the institution to accept a culture that lies to them that they are meat puppets. And the institution essentially brokers the lies in the interests of the materialist culture - and to its own prestige.
Now do you see the threat posed by an intellectually rigorous inquiry into intelligent design?

Last night, my mom and I were watching a video of one of my favourite movies - The Great Escape. Suddenly, some of the dialogue seemed startlingly relevant to the struggle of scientists like Marks.

Listen, as the German Colonel Von Luger explains to the Allied prisoners of war:

We have in effect put all our rotten eggs in one basket, and we intend to watch this basket carefully. Very wise. You will not be denied the usual facilities. Sports, a library, a recreation hall, and for gardening we will give you tools. We trust you to use them for gardening. Devote your energies to these things. Give up your hopeless attempts to escape. And, with intelligent cooperation, we may all sit out the war as comfortably as possible.

What institutions like Baylor want is precisely that - faculty who will just "sit out" the war between rampant materialist atheism and all non-materialist traditions, in the comfort of a Christian environment.

But Group Captain Ramsey responds,

Colonel Von Luger, it is the sworn duty of all officers to try to escape. If they cannot escape, then it is their sworn duty to cause the enemy to use an inordinate number of troops to guard them, and their sworn duty to harass the enemy to the best of their ability.

Ramsey's reply is the proper duty of the Christian (or other non-materialist) academic in these times.

It is also the only safe one. There is no surprise, really, in the fact that today's academic environment is quickly losing touch with the goal of intellectual inquiry. As Mario Beauregard and I show clearly in The Spiritual Brain, materialists do not believe in the reality of the mind. In that case, it is more humane as well as easier to just program the young meat puppets to be whatever is needed, and sideline any mis-programmed puppets who interfere.

Only a non-materialist tradition - in which intellect functions as a cause of events - can responsibly support intellectual freedom.

A Christian you say? Well then, do not be a good prisoner of your Christian campus. Be a Bob Marks. BE a problem!

Also:

Spying on a Darwin fan's nightstand

More on why dog breeding cannot explain evolution.

The Mindful Hack on The Complete Idiot's Guide to Life After Death

Wikipedia competitor Citizendium takes dead aim at propaganda, featured as news. And don't miss RationalWiki - more rational than a rabid raccoon.

Also, science journalist notices that people are smarter than apes - wow!

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

The vertebrate eye is NOT wired wrong or backwards, as commonly claimed. If you want your eyes to see as well as to look pretty, and you also want to be a mammal (why?), you need to to be wired that way. Go here and here.

Here's a transcript of a podcast of Beyond the Book on science writing.

Here's a primer on interpreting legacy mainstream media's materialist propaganda.

Here's Physics Nobelist Charles Townes on intelligent design, why he thinks three is something in it.

Can any reader help contribute to The Encyclopedia of Life? Whether you can or not, have fun with Jurustic Park.

How things change in science

Why you will more likely succeed if you are easy to indoctrinate

Media fallout from Baylor's attempt to dismantle Bob Marks's ID-friendly evolutionary informatics lab

Should tenure disappear?, The Scientist asks

ID friendly TV pastor dead at 76.

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

Here's a podcast interview where I reveal key secrets of the evil conspiracies I am part of, whiled discussing The Spiritual Brain . I also Wedge "the Edge", and explain why I don't drink coffee while reading materialist interpretations of spirituality - because choking with laughter while drinking coffee is, like, a bitter experience. I take mine without sugar.

Never shrinking from controversy, and sometimes deliberately provoking it, this book serves as a lively introduction to a field where neuroscience, philosophy, and secular/spiritual cultural wars are unavoidably intermingled. - Publishers Weekly

The belief that the mind does not exist apart from the brain dominated the twentieth century. But can we really dismiss our thoughts and feelings, or furthermore, our religious and spiritual experiences, as simply outcomes of the firing synapses of our brain? In THE SPIRITUAL BRAIN, authors Dr. Mario Beauregard and Denyse O'Leary present the groundbreaking evidence that the mind cannot be simply reduced to physiological reactions in the brain.

Most neuroscientists are committed to the view that mystical experiences are simply the result of random neurons firing, or "delusions created by the brain." THE SPIRITUAL BRAIN takes another approach, powerfully arguing for what many in science are unwilling to consider - that people actually contact a reality outside themselves during intense spiritual experiences. Beauregard uses the most sophisticated technology to peer inside the brains of Carmelite nuns during a profound spiritual state. His results and a variety of other lines of evidence lead him to the surprising conclusion that spiritual experiences are not a figment of the mind or a delusion produced by a dysfunctional brain.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS - Mario Beauregard's work at the University of Montreal on the effects of consciousness and volition on the emotional brain, and the neurobiology of the mystical experience has received international media coverage. Dr. Beauregard was selected by the World Media Net to be one of the "One Hundred Pioneers of the Twenty-First Century." Denyse O'Leary is a Toronto-based journalist who specializes in faith and science issues and who has written for the Toronto Star and the Globe & Mail.

The Spiritual Brain
A Neuroscientist's Case for the Existence of the Soul
By Mario Beauregard & Denyse O'Leary
Published by HarperOne
Hardcover / ISBN 978-0-06-085883-4 / $25.95 / 400 pages / September 2007

Here are some of the comments on The Spiritual Brain

"If you have a mind, you will find The Spiritual Brain a refreshing antidote to the strange arguments offered by some scientists who insist that their minds, and yours, are meaningless illusions." - Dean Radin, PhD, Senior Scientist, Institute of Noetic Sciences and author of The Conscious Universe and Entangled Minds

The Spiritual Brain is a wonderful and important book that provides new insights into our experience of religion and God. It offers a unique perspective to the ongoing dialogue between science and religion. This book is a necessary read for both the scientist and the religious person.
-Andrew Newberg, M.D. Associate Professor of Radiology and Director of the Center for Spirituality and the Mind at the University of Pennsylvania. Co-author of Why We Believe What We Believe.

"The Spiritual Brain is a very important book. It clearly explains non-materialist neuroscience in simple terms appropriate for the lay reader, while building on and extending work that Sharon Begley and I began in The Mind and The Brain, and work that Mario and I collaborated on in academic publications." - neuropsychiatrist Jeffrey Schwartz, author of The Mind and the Brain

"I truly was bowled over by the book, ... In The Spiritual Brain neuroscientist Mario Beauregard and science writer Denyse O’Leary push back hard. First they debunk the most widely touted urban legends of impoverished materialism"
- Michael Behe, author of Edge of Evolution

I've just finished reading The Spiritual Brain (I was sent an advance copy). It's superb, and is a milestone in what I think is going to be a 'long twilight struggle' against materialist neuroscience.
- neurosurgeon Mike Egnor

Today at the Mindful Hack, the blog that supports The Spiritual Brain:

Mind is not merely brain, Spiked reviewer insists.

Lawyer explains why materialist atheism is incoherent

Mathematician David Berlinski says mathematics is more than just climbing "the greasy pole of life."

Hype and the pop science media

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

In his review of ID biochemist Mike Behe's Edge of Evolution, which caused many to wonder whether he had actually read the book he was reviewing, Richard Dawkins indulged in a long and seemingly irrelevant riff on dog breeding. He hoped to convince his readers that complex and fantastical intracellular machines come about by chance (and mind comes from mud) on account of the vast variety that humans can produce by selective breeding of dogs.

Correspondents have pointed out that Dawkins is counting on his readers' ignorance of a fundamental fact about dog breeding- that is depends on existing traits and does not introduce new ones. One writes, for example,

The problem is that the variety of dogs obtained through breeding programs is an example of the variation possible within the dog genome, but (and this is a very big 'but') there are natural limits to variation.

Darwinism predicts that there are no taxonomic limits to variation. However, every breeding experiment of the last 100 years that attempts to see how far variation can go (E. coli, drosophila, etc.) always encounters limits beyond which further change is not possible. Thus, the fundamental prediction of Darwinian theory has been consistently falsified in a century's worth of experimental testing. Dog breeding, itself, encounters these limits.
The bottom line is that dog breeding, and the observed limits to variation within dogs, falsifies the most important prediction of Darwinian theory.

What is he talking about?
Another correspondent, David A. DeWitt, author of Unraveling the Origins Controversy , enlightened me further,

Many of the traits for different dog breeds are examples of neoteny.

Neoteny refers to the maintaining of juvenile characteristics into adulthood. Mutations can prevent proper development and maturation. Even though particular traits might seem like they are novel, in such cases it is really a loss of information since the animal has stunted development in one trait.

This is why some breeds of dogs are so cute and look like puppies even though they are full grown (Jack Russel, Shitzu etc).

Well, that makes sense. The disgusting little freaky-poos that infest my neighbourhood are really just immature? Makes sense, all right.*

I wrote back to ask,

David, is there not also some distortion involved, maintained by selective breeding? I am thinking in particular of the Basset hound, the bulldog , and the dachsund. Do these distortions not shorten life in many cases?

Also, the single most important trait in domestic dogs is that the animal not be aggressive around humans. (That would be the fastest way for a dog to get himself a one-way trip to the vet's office.) But that means selecting for a trait that would NOT aid survival in nature.

The breeds that are commonly trained to BE aggressive toward humans (intentionally) are wolfhounds like German Shepherds. But they have the most characteristics in common with wild animals like wolves.

In other words, domestic breeding not only does not employ natural selection, but it selects for traits that would not be chosen in any process that favoured survivability. Is that correct?

He replied, with a long, careful answer:

Pure breed dogs often do have shorter lives than "mutts". Presumably, this is because of severe inbreeding. The result is that mutations for particular diseases/defects become concentrated.

So when people have selected for those traits that comprise the poodle breed, they have also inadvertently selected several serious genetic defects. Certain breeds are prone to the same diseases and early causes of death.

Regarding the lack of aggression in dogs...this is also considered an example of a neotenous trait (juvenile traits that persist into adulthood).

When wolves are very very young, they are not so aggressive. Many of the behaviors of our dog breeds are also neotenous. There is plenty of information about this on the internet. The less a dog is physically like a wolf, the less aggressive the dog.

The most important thing to understand about dog breeding is that there is not new genetic information (from mutation) that is being supplied. Through breeding, humans are either shuffling genes that pre-exist in the population (like different poker hands from the same deck) or preserving mutations that amount to developmental defects.

While developmental defects can look like new traits (short stubby legs or a short snout for example or a Chihuahua that looks like an embryonic dog) they are not new at all since it is simply preservation of a previous stage.

Another example of a neotenous trait would be a mutation that leads to webbing between fingers in a human. During development, the cells between the fingers are supposed to go through a process of programmed cell death (apoptosis). If the cells do not die (because of a mutation), then the remaining tissue would be webbed fingers.

Since all human babies go through such a stage, it would not be a new trait even though it looks like it. It is preservation of a previous developmental stage because of a mutation in the normal developmental pathway. This highlights another aspect to the limits of Darwinian evolution.

Often, dogs are considered an exception because they are so "plastic". In reality, it is just that we have been able to preserve a wider array of developmental defects. Dawkins pulled a real bait and switch trick when he criticized Behe's Edge of Evolution using dog breeding. Dog breeds highlight the limits of evolutionary change, but Dawkins used the diversity of dogs (from developmental defects) to rebut this fact.

However, since most people do not understand the preservation of juvenile characteristics, they can be fooled into thinking that evolution really can produce new traits.

Hmmm. We hear plenty about Darwin's natural selection, but almost nothing about neoteny. And, to the extent that Dawkins was counting on our ignorance of neoteny, why SHOULD he bother to read Edge of Evolution before discouraging others from reading it?

(*Thanks, Dr. DeWitt! I've been looking for years for a way to insult the local infestation of little canine swine without being cruel. Like, neighbours, please, if you're going to have a dog, have a dog. Otherwise, be a cat person like me.)

Also, at the Post-Darwinist:

Former atheist Antony Flew to author book on God as designer

British sociologist Steve Fuller is prepared to give Darwin a decent burial.

O'Leary's thoughts on "teaching the controversy", riffing off Freeman Dyson

Anti-ID physicist on humans as pollution.

Another undead materialist myth: Copernicus "demoted" man from center of universe

Steve Weinberg flogs the "Christians believe in a flat earth" myth

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of the forthcoming The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

Yesterday, the Baylor University administration shut down Prof. Robert Marks's Evolutionary Informatics Lab because the lab's research was perceived as linked to intelligent design (ID).

Robert J. Marks II, Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Baylor, had hoped that a late-August compromise would save his lab, but the University withdrew from the previous offer yesterday morning. While President Lilley was not at the meeting, an insider senses his hand in the affair, noting that Lilley was the only person with the authority to overturn what the Provost, who was at the meeting, agreed to. [developing story ... go here for more soon]