25Feb 2021 by Post

Botany Journal Revisits Charles Darwin’s “Abominable Mystery”

American Journal of Botany, Charles Darwin, common ancestor, common descent, Cretaceous Period, Eric Anderson, Evolution, flowering plants, fossil record, Günter Bechly, ID The Future, Intelligent Design, Jurassic, Life Sciences, Neo-Darwinism, paleontology, Podcast, Richard Buggs
A recent paper by Richard Buggs shows that a problem for evolutionary theory has grown more acute since Darwin’s time. Source
Read More
20Oct 2020 by Post

Epiphany — Denton on Nature’s Fitness for Life

astrobiology, carbon, carbon chemistry, carbon-based life, Friedrich Wöhler, intelligent agency, Intelligent Design, Life Sciences, Michael Denton, organic chemistry, silicon-based life, teleology, The Miracle of the Cell, The Wonder of Water, vitalism
Biologists once wondered about a “life force,” but Michael Denton sees intelligence in the design of carbon, its unique properties, and its relation to water. Source
Read More
26Sep 2020 by Post

Intention, Agency, Even in “Simple” Life Is No Illusion

agency, bacteria, biology, illusion, Intelligent Design, intention, life, Life Sciences, Michael Denton, neutrophils, physiology, Purpose and Desire, Robert Crowther, Scott Turner, State University of New York College of Environmental Sciences, The Miracle of the Cell
As biologist Scott Turner explains, the appearance is not false but very real, a fact from whose profound implications most scientists veil their eyes. Source
Read More
02Aug 2020 by Post

The Role of Lignin for Fire, Explained

Carboniferous Period, charcoal, conduction, convection, evaporative cooling, fire, Fire-Maker series, fire-making, fitness, Goldilocks, humus, industrial age, Intelligent Design, iron, Life Sciences, lignin, metallurgy, metals, nature, organic compounds, oxygen, photosynthesis, physiology, plant cells, pottery, radiation, steam engine, trees, wood, woody plants
Without lignin, there would be no woody plants, no wood, no coal, no charcoal, no fire, no pottery, and certainly no iron or metallurgy. Source
Read More
16Jul 2020 by Post

The Advantages of a Bayesian Approach to ID

arrowheads, Bayesian inference, Bayes’ Theorem, Belief, biological design, designer, Evidence, Evolution News, human agents, Intelligent Design, irreducibly complex machinery, Life Sciences, Lydia McGrew, objections to intelligent design, physical sciences, prehistoric civilizations, Recurrent Laryngeal Nerve, suboptimal designs
Lydia McGrew gives the analogy that there is always a possibility that prehistoric civilizations did not have the ability or desire to make arrowheads. Source
Read More
29May 2020 by Post

Applied Intelligent Design: Engineers Know Engineering When They See It

American Chemical Society, biologists, Biomimetics, biomimicry, butterfly wings, China, coral, Duke University, engineers, fish scales, geckos, George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Tech, Intelligent Design, Johns Hopkins University, leaf, leaves, Life Sciences, materials science, Michael Varenberg, Nanjing Tech University, nanowires, New Scientist, polymers, Teflon, telescopes
Engineers of all types (e.g., mechanical, electrical, hydraulic, civil, software) are focused on how to get things to work. They need to pull together all that is known about materials and properties, and organize them to perform a function. They need to meet design requirements: a company or government says “Here is what we need to do; how can we get it done within the limits of cost and time available?” Knowledge of engineering principles grows as the needs of a society grow, often becoming more sophisticated, pushing the boundaries of know-how. Engineers are trained to see design and judge good design. Human engineers must also navigate intellectual property laws, because many engineers want to patent their designs and protect them from theft. There’s a lot of angst going on…
Read More
11May 2020 by Post

In Biology, Intelligent Designs that Amaze, Amuse, and Entertain

Alticini, An Uplifting Story, bottlenose dolphins, catapult, dandelions, Darwinism, dolphins, Evolution, fish stocks, flea beetle, flea beetles, Francis Collins, Illustra Media, infrared cameras, infrared radiation, Intelligent Design, International Society for Photonics and Optics, Keith Moorad, killer whales, leaf beetles, Lehigh University, Life Sciences, Michael Behe, National Institutes of Health, night vision goggles, origami, parachute, Pensoft, PNAS, toothed whales, U.S. Navy, Zookeys
A parade of amazing designs from the living world has passed through these pages over the years, and it shows no sign of stopping. Here are some entertaining examples from recent news. Jump Like a Flea, Beetle Flea beetles, or Alticini, are high-jump champions among the coleopterans (beetles) in the insect world. There are some 9,900 species of flea beetles, a “hyper-diverse group” that inhabits environments from deserts to rainforests all over the world. The Pensoft blog shows a picture of one, saying, “Exceptional catapulting jump mechanism in a tiny beetle could be applied in robotic limbs.”  The fascinating and highly efficient jumping mechanism in flea beetles is described in a new research article in the open-access journal Zookeys. Despite having been known since 1929, the explosive jump — which is also the reason behind the colloquial name of this…
Read More
24Apr 2020 by Post

Sex Chromosomes Refuse to Fit One Origins Theory

angiosperms, biology, Evolution, flowers, Genome Biology and Evolution, Intelligent Design, Life Sciences, Ophrys apifera, sex, sex chromosomes
Doesn’t everyone like sex? Of course they do — and the designer made the sexual organs of angiosperms, namely, flowers, to be the most spectacularly beautiful structures in biology, so he evidently likes sex too.  An invited review (open access) in Genome Biology and Evolution explores the “incredible diversity of sex chromosome systems,” but especially how their evolutionary origins refuse to fit any one theory. See, “Sex chromosome evolution: So many exceptions to the rules.” From the abstract: Despite many convergent genomic patterns exhibited by independently evolved sex chromosome systems, and many case studies supporting these theoretical predictions, emerging data provide numerous interesting exceptions to these long-standing theories, and suggest that the remarkable diversity of sex chromosomes is matched by a similar diversity in their evolution. Photo: Ophrys apifera, also known…
Read More
13Mar 2020 by Post

Lesson from a Carnivorous Plant

Aldovanda, aquatic bladderwort, bladder, carnivorous plants, Dionaea, foresight, Genlisea, Granville Sewell, Intelligent Design, Irreducible Complexity, John Innes Centre, Life Sciences, Marcos Eberlin, Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research, mousetrap, The Evolution of Carnivorous Plants, Utricularia, Venus flytrap, Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig
I won’t pretend to you that this isn’t a stressful time. In search of distraction, today I’ve been thinking about a rather odd water dweller. It’s the carnivorous plant Utricularia, aka aquatic bladderwort. Granville Sewell wrote about it here recently, citing plant geneticist Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig and others, calling it “Michael Behe’s ‘Irreducibly Complex’ Mousetrap in Nature.” Its mechanism is not just complex, but irreducibly so. Like a mousetrap, it requires purpose in its design. Check out these videos: The video from the John Innes Centre in the U.K. concludes, “Plants are seriously smart.” I can’t tell if that’s supposed to be ironic, but the mechanism is indeed ingenious. If your German skills are up for it, you can read Dr. Lönnig’s book on The Evolution of Carnivorous Plants, downloadable here,…
Read More