"If Behe is as open to scientific explanation (Darwinian or otherwise) of his
gaps as Bob's paragraph above suggests, then I would withdraw my
"God-of-the-gaps" characterization of his work."
Behe devotes all of chapter 8 in his book to his search of the literature for
evolutionary explanations of irreducible complexity in biochemical studies.
His conclusion is that "Despite comparing sequences and mathematical
modeling, molecular evolution has never addressed the question of how complex
structures came to be." His exhaustive search would indicate his openness to
evolutionary explanations of irreducible biochemical complexity, and his
conclusion is that he found none, not even attempts to explain it.
Allan also wrote, "There is no getting around the fact that this is a
'God-of-the-gaps' (or at least 'Designer-of-the-gaps') approach." I believe
that most of the time "God-of-the-gaps" is invoked when there is a _gap_ in
our knowledge, or when data are missing to support a theory. In the case of
biochemical irreducible complexity, neither of these conditions apply.
Biochemistry has analyzed many extremely complex structures and processes,
as Behe illustrates. So there are no gaps in our knowledge in that area.
Secondly, the biochemical data do not support a theory of evolution by means
of gradualistic Darwinian mechanisms. That's where the gap lies. The gap is
in Darwinian theory. So call it Designer of the Gaps, if you will.
Intelligent design is a proposal to connect irreducible complexity with a
causal agent, Intelligent Designer.
_Darwin's Black Box_ is must reading for those interested in questions of how
biological design came into being.
In Christ,
Bob