Home > Opinion > Darwin, Intelligent Design, and Freedom of Discovery on Evolutionists' Holy Day

Darwin, Intelligent Design, and Freedom of Discovery on Evolutionists' Holy Day

Reader Comments
Back to article

Luskin says: "The problem for Darwinists is obvious: The simplest cell won't function unless this basic machinery is intact, so how does such complexity evolve via a "blind" and "undirected" Darwinian process of numerous, successive, slight modifications?"
It might be an obvious question to the novice, but there is no problem here; only two logical fallacies. First, the suggestion that evolution must have proceeded from "unintact" machinery is only supported by ignoring the possibility of evolving from "intact but different" machinery. Second, the "how does..." argument from ignorance relies on assuming evolution (the generally accepted answer) is false, which is the argument he is trying to make.
So, if you want the gist of this situation, Luskin is incapable of adequately stating the apparently simple and obvious central position of intelligent design.

eeenok 12:47AM February 11, 2009

Another pathetic letter by Casey Luskin and his Deception Institute, surely to be counted as one of his "research papers" on his resume.
Filled with numerous errors, e.g. "February 12 used to be universally recognized as the birthday of Abraham?" Certainly not universally, but perhaps in the U.S?
One of the favorite quote mines of creationists like Luskin is the infamous Darwin quote: "A fair result can only be obtained by stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question."
Darwin really continued to say: "...on both sides of each question; but that cannot possibly be here done." Oops, why did Luskin omit those words? By mistake, not hardly. Darwin addressed his scientific peers, noting there would be objections, yet he would readily meet them head on in the scientific arena (not the high school classroom, Casey), but there was obviously no space in his book to do so.
Creationists like Luskin seek to subvert the words of scientists, e.g., Darwin, to make it appear they support creationism, or in this case "academic freedom" as Luskin imagines it, that high schoolers would debate evolution. Luskin and his fellow creationists and his fellow religious fundamentalists are never to be trusted regarding quotes, but they rely on people taking them for their word and never checking out the facts.
So, out of hundreds of thousands of scientists worldwide, Luskin has managed to get only 750 Ph.D. scientists to sign the Deception Institute's anti-evolution list. An examinate of that list as of 2/10/09 shows at least 4 dead people on the list, but if they choose to have their names removed they only need to contact the Deception Institute! Nice work, Luskin.
Luskin then attempts to look "scientific" with his pretentious cell arguments, like the pseudo-legalist that he is. Unfortunately his arguments are totally vacuous.
Luskin then states that "Darwinists today continue to cite this wildly inaccurate and activist judicial ruling as if one federal judge can settle this entire scientific debate."
For a supposedly legal mind, Luskin has failed to read the Dover trial's transcript. Michael Behe, a DI member, was called as a primary witness for the defense, and asked to support the idea that intelligent design was legitimate science. Behe conceded that
"there are no peer reviewed articles by anyone advocating for intelligent design supported by pertinent experiments or calculations which provide detailed rigorous accounts of how intelligent design of any biological system occurred".
During this testimony Behe also conceded that the definition of 'theory' as he applied it to intelligent design was so loose that astrology would qualify as a theory by definition as well.
Luskin's arguments may sound good to the ignorant and those not familiar with science, but they display a total disregard for the truth.
And it's surprising that even the editors of USN&R did no background check on thi

DavidK of WA 10:49PM February 10, 2009

More religion cloaked as science. Intelligent Design is not science. If it was, you could design an experiment to test it. The tests could be conducted in labs around the world and evidence would accumulate that would support it. This evidence would be published in the form of peer-reviewed scientific journal articles (not magazine/newspaper opinion articles). Go to PUBMED (a comprehensive database of biomedical science literature) and search for ID results..there are none. That's because ID is not even a theory, because theories are based on verifiable facts and repeatable observations. Intelligent Design advocates are, in general, not practicing scientists (although there are a few), but more often religious fanatics who want to transform our society to believe in a literal form of Creationism. To see what the real mission of ID proponents is, read "The Wedge Strategy" from the Discovery Institute, which promotes Intelligent Design "research". Oh, and by the way, all the criticisms above about Darwinian theory are a load of hogwash. It would take longer than you probably care to read for me to refute each half-truth, but if you are interested see the National Academy of Sciences publication called "Science, Evolution and Creationism" (http://www.nationalacademies.org/evolution/Reports.html) which is written and documented better than I can do here. Note, the National Academy is an organization of the most highly recognized scientists in the US and the world and includes many Nobel Laureates. Teaching creationism/ID is great, but not in the science class.

SDH, (Ph.D. in Molecular Biology, Associate Professor) of NY 10:46PM February 10, 2009

Another pathetic letter by Casey Luskin and his Deception Institute, surely to be counted as one of his "research papers" on his resume.
Filled with numerous errors, e.g. "February 12 used to be universally recognized as the birthday of Abraham?" Certainly not universally, but perhaps in the U.S?
One of the favorite quote mines of creationists like Luskin is the infamous Darwin quote: "A fair result can only be obtained by stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question."
Darwin really continued to say: "...on both sides of each question; but that cannot possibly be here done." Oops, why did Luskin omit those words? By mistake, not hardly. Darwin addressed his scientific peers, noting there would be objections, yet he would readily meet them head on in the scientific arena (not the high school classroom, Casey), but there was obviously no space in his book to do so.
Creationists like Luskin seek to subvert the words of scientists, e.g., Darwin, to make it appear they support creationism, or in this case "academic freedom" as Luskin imagines it, that high schoolers would debate evolution. Luskin and his fellow creationists and his fellow religious fundamentalists are never to be trusted regarding quotes, but they rely on people taking them for their word and never checking out the facts.
So, out of hundreds of thousands of scientists worldwide, Luskin has managed to get only 750 Ph.D. scientists to sign the Deception Institute's anti-evolution list. An examinate of that list as of 2/10/09 shows at least 4 dead people on the list, but if they choose to have their names removed they only need to contact the Deception Institute! Nice work, Luskin.
Luskin then attempts to look "scientific" with his pretentious cell arguments, like the pseudo-legalist that he is. Unfortunately his arguments are totally vacuous.
Luskin then states that "Darwinists today continue to cite this wildly inaccurate and activist judicial ruling as if one federal judge can settle this entire scientific debate."
For a supposedly legal mind, Luskin has failed to read the Dover trial's transcript. Michael Behe, a DI member, was called as a primary witness for the defense, and asked to support the idea that intelligent design was legitimate science. Behe conceded that
"there are no peer reviewed articles by anyone advocating for intelligent design supported by pertinent experiments or calculations which provide detailed rigorous accounts of how intelligent design of any biological system occurred".
During this testimony Behe also conceded that the definition of 'theory' as he applied it to intelligent design was so loose that astrology would qualify as a theory by definition as well.
Luskin's arguments may sound good to the ignorant and those not familiar with science, but they display a total disregard for the truth.
And it's surprising that even the editors of USN&R did no background check on thi

DavidK of WA 10:44PM February 10, 2009