Maven
Posts: 1 Joined: Aug. 2005
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The ID debate has really heated up here in PA where we are treated to a daily dose of insanity in the local press. Lehigh University professor Lynn Cassimeris wrote the following op-ed piece for our local paper.
http://www.mcall.com/news....2.story
From The Morning Call Science's fast pace undercuts allure of intelligent design
August 28, 2005
More than 10 years ago, my Lehigh University faculty colleague Michael J. Behe asked me to read a chapter of a manuscript that was later published as ''Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution.'' In this book, Dr. Behe suggested that biochemical systems inside of cells are ''irreducibly complex'' and cannot have evolved without the hand of a supernatural designer. Over the past decade, I have had considerable time to ponder the ideas Dr. Behe put forward in his book, and time and again I concluded that his arguments lack scientific credibility and are equally offensive to religious faith.
Dr. Behe's idea of irreducible complexity suggests that certain structures inside a cell are too complex to have evolved by step-by-step modifications and must therefore have required a designer to make them. Cells do contain seemingly complex biochemical structures, formed of many protein parts, but is it necessary to invoke a supernatural designer to explain their existence?
Without describing the inner workings of a cell, I will use an analogy, much as Dr. Behe does, to illustrate how seemingly complex structures might have evolved. He often uses the mousetrap example to illustrate irreducible complexity, but mousetraps actually better illustrate the concept of evolution of protein complexes.
Catching and killing a mouse is easily achieved by the modern glue trap, requiring nothing more than glue and a cardboard base upon which to spread the glue. Both glue and the cardboard support have other purposes and were only recently brought together to form a mousetrap. Increasing the complexity by a notch, peanut butter can be used to bait the glue trap, and it also has another use. Biologists consider evolution of large protein complexes within cells to have followed a similar course of evolution, taking pieces with one function and co-opting and combining them for another function. Evidence abounds to support the co-opting of one component, much like a piece of cardboard or glue, for different use in the cell.
Dr. Behe uses the bacterial flagellum (a structure that enables bacteria to move) as another model of irreducible complexity, yet recent work has established that one part of the flagellum, a collection of several proteins, is related to a syringe-like structure that many bacteria use to inject a toxin into other cells. Another part of the flagellum is a protein channel through which ions flow. Ion channels are found in all cells, including our own. The bacterial flagellum is just one example of how cells take one part, combine it with a different part, and end up with something new.
We still have much to learn about how our cells function and how structures and biochemical pathways developed over the course of billions of years. To suggest that we throw up our hands and ascribe everything to a supernatural designer does nothing to advance biology. Instead, we need to continue research to better understand how living cells work if we want to conquer current problems, such as the growing bacterial resistance to antibiotics. Progress in understanding cell evolution is likely to gain speed rapidly with Harvard's new initiative to fund research into the origin of life.
The fast pace of scientific progress should give pause to those who would like to see intelligent design taught in the science classroom. The ideas and examples suggesting the need for a designer are likely to fall by the wayside as science progresses. It is not that long ago (1994) that Dr. Behe suggested that whale evolution could not be explained because of gaps in the fossil record. That argument collapsed when three fossil intermediates were discovered within the next year.
Much like filling in gaps in the fossil record, new discoveries at the cellular level will continue to contradict intelligent design and ''irreducible complexity.'' Then what happens to faith built on the so-called evidence for a designer? Does that faith waiver when the ''evidence'' disappears? Faith should not require scientific evidence; looking for physical evidence of a designer only serves to undermine faith. Scientists are battling to keep intelligent design out of the science classroom because it is not science. Religious leaders should join the fight.
Lynne Cassimeris, Ph.D., is a professor in the Biological Sciences Department at Lehigh University. She is a cell biologist studying how cells reproduce and how the errors in cell division associated with birth defects and cancer occur. Copyright © 2005, The Morning Call
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