Science Literature
Archives for: April 2007, 27
04/27/07
Disturbing thoughts about the irreducible nature of eukaryotic cells
The day after James Lake's interesting essay appeared in Nature, acknowledging that the origin of eukaryotes is one of the greatest enigmas in biology, he appeared as a co-signatory to some correspondence, attacking a paper published last year in Science. The paper maintained that hypotheses invoking genome fusion to explain the characteristic features of the eukaryote cell have failed. The authors reviewed recent data from proteomics and genome sequences and suggested that "eukaryotes are a unique primordial lineage".
The critics declared that this paper "delivered only biased opinions" and that the authors "arbitrarily pick and choose among available observations relating to sequence similarity". The end of their critique has this punchline: "Finally, and most disturbing, if contemporary eukaryotic cells are truly of "irreducible nature," as Kurland et al.'s title declares, then no stepwise evolutionary process could have possibly brought about their origin, and processes other than evolution must be invoked. Is there a hidden message in their paper?"
The authors of the paper have responded in a non-inflammatory way. They stand their ground. "Our view is that cellular and molecular biology, especially genomics, reveals signs of an ancient complexity of the eukaryotic cell." They conclude: "our primary conclusion is that there is good progress on understanding the complexity of the ancestral eukaryote cell".
The reason for drawing attention to this critique is that it provides a good example of how 'norms' are sustained within the scientific community. The critics cannot even consider the possibility of "stepwise evolutionary processes" failing to account for eukaryotes, and they have reacted with alarm. Thinking they have detected a hint of intelligent design (by the use the word "irreducible"), they declare this as "most disturbing" and talk about a "hidden message". This reaction moves the critique beyond the realm of scientific discourse into the world of ideological materialism. Those seeking to learn more about ID will do well to recognise the role played by worldviews held by those involved in the debates.
The Evolution of Eukaryotes (Letter )
William Martin, Tal Dagan, Eugene V. Koonin, Jonathan L. Dipippo, J. Peter Gogarten, James A. Lake.
Response by C. G. Kurland, Lesley J. Collins, and David Penny
Science 316, 27 April 2007: 542-543.
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We are a group of individuals, coming from diverse backgrounds and not speaking for any organization, who have found common ground around teleological concepts, including intelligent design. We think these concepts have real potential to generate insights about our reality that are being drowned out by political advocacy from both sides. We hope this blog will provide a small voice that helps rectify this situation.
- The Design Inference - The Writings of William A. Dembski
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Website dedicated to comparing scenes from the "Inherit the Wind" movie with factual information from actual Scopes Trial. View 37 clips from the movie and decide for yourself if this movie is more fact or fiction.
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Don Cicchetti blogs on: Culture, Music, Faith, Intelligent Design, Guitar, Audio
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Australian biologist Stephen E. Jones maintains one of the best origins "quote" databases around. He is meticulous about accuracy and working from original sources.
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Most guys going through midlife crisis buy a convertible. Austrialian Stephen E. Jones went back to college to get a biology degree and is now a proponent of ID and common ancestry.
- Darwinian Fairytales by David Stove
Complete zipped downloadable pdf copy of David Stove's devastating, and yet hard-to-find, critique of neo-Darwinism entitled "Darwinian Fairytales"
- ID The Future
Intelligent Design The Future is a multiple contributor weblog whose participants include the nation's leading design scientists and theorists: biochemist Michael Behe, mathematician William Dembski, astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez, philosophers of science Stephen Meyer, and Jay Richards, philosopher of biology Paul Nelson, molecular biologist Jonathan Wells, and science writer Jonathan Witt. Posts will focus primarily on the intellectual issues at stake in the debate over intelligent design, rather than its implications for education or public policy.
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A Philosopher's Journey: Political and cultural reflections of John Mark N. Reynolds. Dr. Reynolds is Director of the Torrey Honors Institute at
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