a genetic difference between humans and chimps cannot tell us anything about what caused differences in their brains unless we know what the gene actually does. In this case, as Nature reports, "what the gene does is a mystery."

So after 150 years, Darwinists are still looking for evidence – any evidence, no matter how skimpy – to justify their speculations. The latest hype over the "brain evolution gene" unwittingly reveals just how underwhelming the evidence for their view really is.

Orrin, the fossil-record makes a water-tight case for Darwinism. And just because we don't know everything that is to be known yet, you couldn't just declare creationism as the winner of the dispute. There is no evidence for creationism, unless you want to interprete the Genesis literally and claim that the world was created 6,000 years ago, complete with dinosaur fissils, trees with anual rings, half-eroded mountains etc.

I also don't see why you don't just declare evolution to be the way God is manifesting his will.

Evolution isn't at issue--after all, Genesis is an evolutionary account of Creation. It is Darwinism in particular that is unsupported by, even contradicted by, science.

Evolution isn't at issue--after all, Genesis is an evolutionary account of Creation. It is Darwinism in particular that is unsupported by, even contradicted by, science.

The distinction between evolutionary theory and Darwinism is kind of lost on me.

What Orin Judd means by "Darwinism" is a combination of evolutionary theory and atheism. It isn't entirely a straw-person argument since some people (even a few evolutionary theorists) do think of Darwinism that way.

To us theistic evolutionists, Darwinism amounts to the claim that God used genetic algorithms to develop life.

A bit more than that, I think. Darwinism also implies that the synthesis--undirected and unguided random mutation, natural selection and genetic drift is a complete, self-contained explanation for the development of all life that excludes all others. In fact, non-life too for some. We've had folks around here arguing that Hamlet and the Corvette Stingray are products of it.

Ralf:

When you say you believe the fossil record makes a "water-tight" case for Darwinism, are you referring to a description of what happened or an explanation of what caused or drove it?

Darwinism also implies that the synthesis--undirected and unguided random mutation, natural selection and genetic drift is a complete, self-contained explanation for the development of all life that excludes all others. In fact, non-life too for some.

There are emergent processes, even simple elements acting according to simple rules can lead to highly complex results. Add mechanisms like variance (mutation, so to speak) selection and you can are, over time, looking at a process that resembles evolution.

When you say you believe the fossil record makes a "water-tight" case for Darwinism, are you referring to a description of what happened or an explanation of what caused or drove it?

I refer to a description to what happened. I do think that the causes are natural, but if you want to say. that God is behind what did happen, go right ahead, there is nothing that would disprove your claim. I mentioned 'emergence' above, but it is more a label rather than an explanation. It means that you can't predict what will happen, you have watch what happens to learn what happens.

Either way, I believe that the theory of evolution is correct, but it can't be used to justify atheism.

Ralf:

That's Intelligent Design, not Darwinism. You compare evolution to computer programming but then pretend there's no programmer. It's thoroughly irrational, but a nice illustration of the fact that no one actually believes in Darwinism.

Joseph:

Yes, the Judeo-Christian creation myth is evolutionary, so any scientific theory has to be evolutionary. Darwin proposes that it occurs entirely "naturally." That's fine as a competing faith, but it's not based on any science, which is why Darwinists can offer no instances of Darwinism occurring.

The evidence for creationism is creation. Tautology, yes, but how do you get around it? The universe itself is evidence of God. How can you get around it? Not really a "science" issue. Understanding how things work is really a matter of revelation.

Lets face it folks; whenever a Darwinism/Creationism arguement starts around here (usually with someone telling the host how ridiculous his disparaging remarks against "Darwinism"), any kind of debate with Orrin is forced to take ground on his own self-invented terms that define crucial words Darwinism, Intelligent Design, Creationism, Science, Faith, etc. In this world, no matter what comes to light, Darwinism will always lose. Even if God has revealed himself, in the past century or so, to thousands upon thousands of naturalists, scientific observers, statisticians, geneticists, evolutionary biologists, biochemists, paleontologists, zoologists; They are all wrong; they will always be wrong.

God has, which is indeed why Darwinism lost. Had Darwinism revealed itself it would have won.

Fascinating though the way the refusal of Nature to act as Darwinism predicts hasn't swayed the faithful. If you didn't know better, you'd think it wasn't a science at all.

Ralf and Harvey: Indeed. I also note that OJ has never (AFAIK) laid out an explanation for all the fossil and biological evidence: he just snipes at whatever he calls "Darwinism" and utters cryptic pseudo-aphorisms like "There's no such thing as species." The whole anti-evolution thing just makes many conservatives look dumb, IMHO, because nothing in biology makes sense except in light of evolution. Which is just one reason why, despite his claim that the whole theory is somehow about to collapse, it is actually quite secure.

Remember that Darwin was a Christian when he started his work. He wasn't in some Marx-like revolt against the status quo, he was just explaining the real-world evidence as he saw it. As it turns out he was right in many ways and wrong in others, but to attack him for that is like complaining that the maps Columbus made were inaccurate.

Oh: and before he can bring up Nazis, let me point out that Hitler never mentioned Darwin or natural selection in Mein Kampf, so I don't see how anyone can claim either are central to Nazi ideology.

Papaya:

By now it should be clear to you that assertions about how Darwinism is proven by the fossil record (or assertions about sharing 97.whatever of DNA with chimps)are a kind of argument from authority in the sense that verification is inaccessible to the layman and even, strictly speaking, to the non-biologist or non-paleontologist. As you are no doubt aware, there are plenty of cogent professional critiques about how complete those records are and, more importantly, what they prove or even imply. Given the fact that biologists have been playing a rather desperate game of "Where's Waldo?" for a hundred and fifty years and are clearly trying to substantiate the theory ex post facto (just so stories, etc.), scepticism is more than warranted on scientific grounds alone, never mind religion. As David Cohen has said, the problem with Darwinism isn't that it is factually wrong, but that it is tautological. Natural selection results in mutations that confer survival advantages and the proof of that is that things survived. The other fallacy is the one I call cooking the books. Darwinists love to argue as follows: A)Darwinism is a natural explanation for the history of life; B)there are no other credible or even coherent natural explanations; C)science only deals in the realm of the natural; D)therefore Darwinism is proven until someone comes up with a better natural theory. A,B and C may all be true, but they don't lead to D.

Darwinists simply won't address the implications of the fact that Darwinism is a historical account, not a product of observational science. The analogy I have thrown out and no one has yet reponded to is that of two historians arguing about the fall of Rome. One says it was inflation and economic mismanagement, the other says it was the decline of morals and religion. Great stuff, but the case for the first isn't strengthened by uncovering more and more evidence about how badly the economy was managed.

As to species, it is quite obvious to me that biologists have ceased giving any consistent meaning to the word and now use it willy-nilly to sex up any difference at all, including different coloured wings on butterflies, extra gills on fish etc. In the mid-90's, Berlinski estimated there were just under two hundred fossils that could plausibly be considered transitional. Two hundred out of tens of millions of species over a hundred and fifty years? Only the very easily impressed would be impressed by that. So don't chortle so hard because Orrin has great fun with species. It is you guys that have made a mockery of the whole notion. Scientists invented the term and then kept changing the definition to suit the evidence when it didn't fit. Darwinists are good at that.

As to Nazis, the left has done a great job at convincing us it was all about neo-paganism, chants to Wodin and the old myths about the triumph of the forest people. There was some of that for popular consumption and with some of the weirder of the leaders, but one of Hitler's strongest bases was the universities. It is an open questions as to whether he could have succeeded in getting power without their support. Support for the Nazis swept both students and faculty and it wasn't just German lit. types--science faculties had first-class seats on the train. Nazism and Teutonic superiority based on Darwinist thinking were cutting edged stuff and wildly popular. Why do you think it was so easy for them to get rid of Jewish faculty so early (long before Kristallnacht or the camps got going) and why do you think so many Jewish academics fled so early, before most others woke up? Science faculties were awash in social Darwinism and had been since WW1. The modern myth that Nazism was all about thugs and had no intellectiual respectability is nonsense. But don't take my word for it. It's all been covered thoroughly and honestly by one of your own.

Papaya:

We've laid all of it out repeatedly, as you can see by reading through the Archives:

www.brothersjudd.com/blog/archives/darwinism/

But, again, you reflect the fundamental misunderstanding that your fellows here share. Evolution is true. It is received wisdom. Darwinism is just one of many proposals about how it happened. We depend on the metaphor of evolution, but Darwinism is utterly insignificant to actual science:

www.brothersjudd.com/blog/archives/2005/09/that_ones_gonna.html

A good thing too, since there is no scientific evidence nor any experiment that tends to support it and much to contradict it.

Likewise, your insistence that in order for you to accept that Darwinism isn't true the skeptics have to explain evolution is anti-scientific. But, as noted above, Darwinism is just a faith, not science.

Peter: Evolution by natural selection is no more tautological than astrophysics. And it's absurd to think that biologists and paleontologists have been perpetrating some kind of fraud for a century and a half, or that evolution didn't take its place as the preferred theory after defeating various creationist theories on the field of intellectual combat.

Of course Darwin based his work on history. Too bad his critics don't! They have, AFAIK, no good explanation for the facts of biology and fossil record. Certainly I've never read one here. (Sorry, OJ: I've read most of those postings in your archive, and I never saw one.) The only other explanation I can imagine is a capricious trickster God, who makes weird decisions like giving humans an appendix and men nipples, and has been creating and exterminating species on Earth for a billion years now. Sorry, my sense is that if He exists, He set the process in motion, but isn't meddling in it on a daily basis, making bizarre decisions like various kinds of Australian wildlife.

I'm not going to defend every silly claim made for evolution, especially those in news stories written by ignorant journalists. As for species, news flash: Like "dusk," "race," or even "up," the word "species" is just another example of how human language is often not precise. But you and OJ have to go back to Carl Linnaeus (or earlier) if you really want to attack the concept of species. One could even say the concept is ancient, being in the Bible and all. So I really have no idea why OJ thinks he needs to attack it.

OJ keeps claiming there's no evidence for Darwinian evolution, but that's only because he dismisses all the evidence and arguments and experiments that support it. There are none so blind, as they say.

Papaya:

There you go again. No matter how many times we say we accept that evolution occurred and that genetic mutation is an obvious historical fact and engine of natural history, you insist on arguing as if we didn't. No one is questioning the existence fossil or DNA records, just the conclusions Darwinists are drawing from them.

But you and OJ have to go back to Carl Linnaeus if you want to attack species.

We don't have to go anywhere. We just have to note that the word is used willy-nilly to mean whatever it happens to be convenient for it to mean to make the theory or just-so story or whatever work. "Dusk", "race" and "up" are models of precision by comparison. Papaya, this may come as a surprise to you, but we didn't need men of modern science to tell us there is a difference between horses and cows. That isn't what is being challenged. What is being challenged is that there is a continuum of defined classes or gradations with universal, objective, rational dividing lines and that those lines are "crossed" through natural selection and genetic drift and only through those. It's your theory, you go back to Carl.

Blaming the idiocies of scientists looking for fame and grants on "ignorant journalists" was a nice touch. Are you not aware that most of those stories are simply lifted from press releases?

Papaya:

Of course we have no good explanation for it. The point under discussion is that neither do Darwinists. They have a clearly wrong explanation. Your insistence that critics have to offer a better theory rather than just demonstrate that your own is inaccurate is antiscientific. The irony is that we have greater regard for science and, therefore, don't offer our own bogus theory.

Your point about Linnaeus is spot on. Species is the product of human classification systems. It has nothing to do with biology. Do you believe in the Linnaean system of classification still?

Feel free to offer any piece of scientific evidence: observation or experimentation, that you think shows Darwinism in action. You guys don't do so because there isn't one. Even your peppered moths, long the only example included, are being removed from textbooks since the hoax was exposed.

By the way, the "no more tautological" admission does give away your argument.

No one is questioning the existence fossil or DNA records

Actually, Peter, many (if not most) anti-Darwinists do. Forgive me for getting confused.

What is being challenged is that there is a continuum of defined classes or gradations with universal, objective, rational dividing lines and that those lines are "crossed" through natural selection and genetic drift and only through those.

That seems fair, but does that mean all the anti-Darwin venom around here is because the theory tries to explain biology and paleontology only through those two mechanisms, and doesn't explicitly say "plus any miracles God chooses to make," or "maybe there's something else going on as well we haven't found yet"?

Fine, lifted from the press releases of scientists looking for fame, as written by often-ignorant journalists. I just don't judge all scientists based on the actions of a few.

OJ, your "greater regard for science" rings hollow for me. Everybody's out of step but you and Peter, eh? And you must know that theories live until 1) a better theory comes along, or 2) someone demolishes the theory. For a "clearly wrong" explanation, it has managed to convince 99.9% of the professionals for over a century, and the vast majority of the people who study it at the college level. As yet there's no better theory, and no one has demolished it.

From what I can tell, Peter and you are not on the same page. (No wonder it's hard to argue against the BroJuddBlog anti-Darwinist point of view, if there several distinct types!) Peter seems to be saying Darwinism isn't the whole picture (which I might even agree with), while OJ says it's "clearly wrong" but has "no explanation."

One doesn't see "Darwinism in action" because of the timescales involved. But we see (in the fossil record) adaptation to changing/different environments and specialization over time. We see how animal breeding works, how DNA/RNA relates across biology, we can model things in software and create things very similar to what we see in the real world. We see how it all seems to fit together, the same way we can deduce how stars are born, change, and die over time through physics and observations of various stars, though we haven't been around nearly long enough to see the entire life cycle of a single star. Imperfect, but not tautological at all.

In fact, the DNA evidence was a great test of Darwinism. He wrote of the descent of man and other species, drew treelike charts to show relationships, and generations after his death we got the DNA tools to show the genetic relationships between species (or whatever you want to call them), which are largely what he thought they were.

The Linnaean system of classification is like the periodic table of elements: it's a handy classification tool, but it's not a perfect model of the real world. There are limitations and exceptions and standard map/territory problems.

Papaya:

No, you see a fossil record and then you imagine the way it may have been made. Observation and experiment has subsequently shown that theory to be implausible, so he scientifically minded reject it. Darwinists aren't scientific--they're ideologues.

Especially amusing is your adoption of the notiuon that Darwinism's history just happens to coincide with a pause in Darwinian evolution that makes it impossible to observe in action. It is, at least, an honest admission that there is no instance of Darwinism for you to cite.

You're much closer to a coherent and workable theory when you compare evolution to a software model, unfortunately, at that point you've become an intelligent designest. But no one truly believes in Darwinism, so you're entirely predictable there.

From what I can tell, Peter and you are not on the same page. (No wonder it's hard to argue against the BroJuddBlog anti-Darwinist point of view, if there several distinct types!)

Yes, that is part of our charm. Clever, eh? Of course, you Darwinists speak as one on everything.

How about this for a unified Brosjudd theory: Darwinism is history or philosophy, not objective science. It is perfactly reasonable to believe in it as such because it provides answers to lots of thorny questions, but it is equally reasonable to disbelieve because there are lots of thorny questions it can't answer plausibly. I prefer parliamentary democracy to presidential democracy even though I recognize the weaknesses of the former and the strength of the latter and even though I know 99.9% of Americans would say otherwise. But I am flummoxed by those who scream "The superiority of presidential democracy is a fact!" at me and call for banning the teaching of parliamentary democracy in schools.

Particularly since a constitutional monarchical republic is obviously superior.