A Darwinist Recognizes (Some of) the Stakes in the Intelligent Design Debate

Alex Rosenberg, Areo, Atheism, Darwinism, divine image, equality, eugenics, Evolution, evolution debate, Extended Evolutionary Synthesis, human dignity, Human Zoos, Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, Intelligent Design, Jamie Milton Freestone, John West, Michael Behe, neo-Nazis, neo-Nazism, nihilism, non-overlapping magisteria, pseudoscientific racism, Racism, religion, Return of the God Hypothesis, Richard Dawkins, scientific racism, skin color, Stephen Jay Gould, Stephen Meyer, University of Queensland, vitalism
I would be curious to hear how Darwinists like Dr. Freestone reconcile their evolutionism not just with religion but with their commitment to human equality. Source
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Why Something Instead of Nothing? November 19, Oxford’s John Lennox Goes “Against the Tide”

Atheism, atoms, beauty, C.S. Lewis, Christianity, cultural elite, debates, faith, Faith & Science, God’s Not Dead, human consciousness, Internet, J.R.R. Tolkien, John Lennox, Judeo-Christian tradition, Kevin Sorbo, mathematicians, Northern Ireland, Oxford University, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, science, theaters, theism
Trumpeters for atheism are not being truthful when they say things like “Religion teaches us to be satisfied with not really understanding.” Source
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Kimberella Is No Solution to the Cambrian Conundrum

Avalon explosion, Big Bangs, Bilateria, Cambrian Explosion, Cambrian News, Charnia, Cnidaria, comb jellies, Dickinsonia, Ediacaran biota, Ediacaran organisms, Evolution, explosions, fossil record, Intelligent Design, Kimberella, Kimberella series, Lophotrochozoa, macro-organisms, metazoan animals, precambrian fossils, Richard Dawkins, saltations, stem mollusk, Yilingia spiciformis
The fossil record speaks clearly and cries out loud: the history of life on Earth is a history of saltations. Source
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Doctor’s Diary: Evolution in the Country of the Blind

anatomy, animals, apes, atheists, babies, birth canal, Brazilian Academy of Sciences, childbirth, chromosomes, Creativity, DNA, ductus arteriosus, earthquake, Ecuador, foresight, H.G. Wells, heteropalindromes, human evolution, human exceptionalism, Human Origins, humans, Intelligent Design, invention, Marcos Eberlin, Minnesota, orphan genes, oxygen, P.Z. Myers, parable, Periodic Table, phenotypes, Richard Dawkins, The Country of the Blind, Tree of Life
Fans of H. G. Wells are probably familiar with his 1904 short story, “The Country of the Blind.” Source
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Evolutionary Theorizing Depends on Magic Words

AARS, Amber Dance, aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases, automobile, cancer, chassis, crankshaft, Darwinians, engine, enzymes, Evolution, golf, illusion, Journal of Molecular Evolution, magic words, magicians, messenger RNA, natural selection, protein synthesis, rabbits, Richard Dawkins, Robert Shapiro, Scientific American, seats, steering wheel, The Scientist, Tokyo Institute of Science
Here is a quick tale about the evolution of the automobile. Billions of years ago, a chassis appeared.The chassis acquired an engine.The crankshaft found a side gig as a steering wheel.The steering wheel linked up with the brake pedal to form a universal joint.Seats developed. They probably arose when the first hood evolved. Now consider leading journals publishing this account after it has whisked through peer review. Is this not exactly what goes on in evolutionary theorizing? Darwinians have mastered the use of magic words that replace rigor with imagination. And they get away with it; nobody ever blows the whistle on what should be tagged a major scientific foul.  New Findings About Aminoacyl-tRNA Synthetases Here is an example in The Scientist, a news magazine for working scientists who should…
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Darwin’s Desperation?

"survival of the fittest", appendix, beards, BioEssays, Brois Yeltsin, California Science Center, cell's, censorship, chimpanzees, choking, Christians, Communist Party, conferences, Current Biology, Darwin Devolves, Darwinian theory, Dave Speijer, Dover trial, dysteleology, epiglottis, Evolution, Glenn-Peter Sætre, Heretic, Intelligent Design, J.B.S. Haldane, Judge John E. Jones, Kremlin, lip-smacking, Matti Leisola, methodological naturalism, Michael Behe, Norway, peasants, Richard Dawkins, Richard Sternberg, Social media, speech, Stephen Jay Gould, Summers Seminars, Uncommon Descent, University of Oslo
They used to just ignore us. That worked for many years. Rare appearances of the loathsome words “intelligent design” in scientific journals were quickly squashed, as Richard Sternberg can attest. Occasional payouts to avoid lawsuits, like at the California Science Center, could be dismissed as inconvenient hush money, quickly settled and ignored by the press.  Meanwhile, Darwinism marched on, confident and triumphant. Largely unimpeded by any need for debate, evolutionary biologists and psychologists, safe in the accepted custom of methodological naturalism, could spin their just-so stories without fear of contradiction. The media were willing accomplices, keeping the public submissive and quiet, satisfied with the daily illusions pouring forth from the ministry of truth. See how wonderful, elegant, and powerful Darwin’s theory is at explaining everything — from human speech evolving…
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Evolving a Self-Replicating Molecule Is a “Purple Unicorn”

3D printer, Big Bang, biology, Cambrian Explosion, cell's, Charles Darwin, Eric H. Anderson, Evolution, Evolution & Intelligent Design in a Nutshell, ID The Future, Intelligent Design, Irreducible Complexity, origin of life, Podcast, purple unicorn, Richard Dawkins, self-reproducing molecule
On a new episode of ID the Future, Eric H. Anderson reads from his newly co-authored book Evolution and Intelligent Design in a Nutshell, written to provide a clear and simple introduction to the evolution/ID controversy, and a broad overview of the evidence for design in nature. That evidence includes cosmic fine tuning and the Big Bang, the origin of life, irreducibly complex machines, and the Cambrian explosion. Download the podcast or listen to it here. In this excerpt, Anderson tells of Richard Dawkins’s glib assurances that the mystery of the origin of life is one not far from being solved. Not so, Anderson says. Origin-of-life researchers haven’t found a pathway to a self-replicating biological entity, the beginning point for any sort of Darwinian evolution. And it’s not for lack of time, effort,…
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Book Excerpt: A Factory That Builds Factories That Build Factories That…

abiogenesis, bacteria, Charles Darwin, Darwinian evolution, early Earth, factories, Gerald F. Joyce, Harvard University, Holy Grail, Intelligent Design, Jack Szostak, Joseph Hooker, Max Schultze, metabolic pathways, molecules, National Public Radio, natural selection, origin of life, Oxford University, protoplasm, random mutations, Richard Dawkins, self-replication, The Origin of Species, The Selfish Gene
Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from the the new book from Discovery Institute Press, Evolution & Intelligent Design in a Nutshell. Eric H. Anderson is a lawyer, software engineering executive, and writer on intelligent design. Nobel Prize recipient and Harvard origin-of-life researcher Jack Szostak once remarked, “In my lab, we’re interested in the transition from chemistry to early biology on the early earth…. You want something that can grow and divide and, most importantly, exhibit Darwinian evolution.”1 Another noted origin-of-life researcher, Gerald F. Joyce, says much the same thing. When asked about the idea that chemicals might have come together on the early Earth to form something that could copy itself, Joyce responded, “That’s what we and others are interested in because that’s sort of, you know, the…
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The “Why” of the Fly “Y”: Reflections on “Junk” DNA

Alison Nguyen, axioms, Carmen Sapienza, chromosomes, DNA, Doris Bachtrog, Drosophila melanogaster, Emily Brown, euchromatin, Evolution, Francis Crick, fruit fly, genetics, heterochromatic proteins, heterochromatin, Junk DNA, Leslie Orgel, nucleus, organism, phenotype, repetitive sequences, Richard Dawkins, RNA, The Selfish Gene, transposable elements, W. Ford Doolittle, Y chromosome
In April 1980, almost exactly forty years ago, the journal Nature published a pair of highly influential articles on the topic of what has become known as “junk” or “selfish” DNA. Both reflected the key concept of The Selfish Gene, the highly influential 1976 book by Richard Dawkins, namely, that organisms are merely DNA’s way of making more DNA. The first was authored by W. Ford Doolittle and Carmen Sapienza and titled “Selfish genes, the phenotype paradigm and genome evolution.”1 The second was authored by Leslie Orgel and Francis Crick and titled “Selfish DNA: the ultimate parasite.”2 Together they posited an easy-to-grasp way to conceive of “excess” nucleotides along chromosomes — repetitive sequences in general and transposable elements in particular. In short, it was proposed that most such DNA elements…
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