From: Dick Fischer (dickfischer@earthlink.net)
Date: Fri Apr 25 2003 - 11:51:57 EDT
Lain Strachan wrote:
Both Behe and I, as trained biochemists, acknowledge the role of chance
(i.e., in mutations, etc.). We simply argue that chance is not sufficient
to explain many of the complex processes or structures of living organisms.
Here is a point where I agree with Lain. I made this point in my book:
"One area in which the theory of evolution fails to give satisfactory
answers is imbedded in and inseparable from the very data Darwinists have
collected to support their theory of descent with modification. What has
been overlooked is an obvious hypothesis, dare I say theory, suggested by
the data.
What has escaped general recognition is that organisms have demonstrated a
capacity or a capability to make genetic alterations to accommodate changes
in the environment. Although natural selection might explain how
adaptations can be passed down from generation to generation, giving
subsequent populations an edge in survival, it does not resolve how
adaptive mutations arose in the first place.
Darwinian evolutionists will say that within the gene pool of populations
there is enough genetic variability to allow for selections to be made,
which can give succeeding generations an advantage. The adaptive
characteristic is expanded as it is passed down to privileged
offspring. But this is an insufficient explanation that ignores what we
see in nature.
Organisms do appear to make unique and very specific changes in order to
better equip themselves to survive difficulties encountered from
environmental shifts. Some could not make accommodations and became
extinct, but those that did survived. Specific adaptations have occurred
in populations that have been exposed to an environmental threat, and lived
through it. Sufficient evidence exists in nature to support this
hypothesis: Organisms seem to be endowed with an adaptive quality enabling
them to make specific genetic mutations when the need arises, and those
changes may be inherited.
Furthermore, the opposite seems to be true. Organisms tend to shed useless
features when the need for them ceases. In other words, there is
empirical, supporting evidence that a type of stimulus-response mechanism
can induce adaptive changes, that may be incorporated in the DNA of
organisms, and passed to future generations.
In addition to environmental factors being an instrument for modification,
usage also may play a part. Human beings developed larger brains than
their predecessors because they used them. Increased thinking capacity may
accrue to the children of thinking parents. And the same thing may be true
of other physical attributes.
Antibiotics experts have long recognized this adaptive capacity in microbes
that have developed immunities to the drugs designed to wipe them
out. Penicillin was introduced in the early 1940's. Soon after the
infectious disease-causing bacteria were exposed to penicillin, they began
producing an enzyme called beta-lactamase, which destroys penicillin and
related antibiotics.
In the early 1980's broad-spectrum beta-lactams were launched to kill
drug-resistant bacteria. But the bacteria responded by mutating the gene
encoding its defensive enzyme so that it now can ward off these drugs
too. George Jacoby, a specialist in infectious diseases at Massachusetts
General Hospital, remarked, "Bugs are always figuring out ways to get
around the antibiotics we throw at them. They adapt and come roaring back."
Researchers also know that certain genes have a DNA repair function. They
even know there are several DNA repair pathways. Some genes are capable of
repairing DNA without making error, while other genes, in their words, "are
prone to make mistakes." It is suspected strongly that these latter
genes that repair DNA with new coded information cause mutations which
contribute to evolution.
Recent outbreaks of tuberculosis have fostered new research into this
disease. It has been demonstrated that due to a mutation, the bacterium
causing TB is now resistant to isoniazid, the main drug used in
treatment. Thanks to a hard-working research community, a genetic basis
has been identified for TB drug resistance.
What has been recognized already at the level of the microbe can also be
witnessed at the highest levels of life. Among human populations, skin
color affects the absorption of vitamin D from sunlight. Higher latitudes
have decreased sunlight, lighter skin improves absorption, and
lighter-skinned peoples are found at higher latitudes.
Sickle cell anemia is a genetic disease affecting some black
populations. This gene is recessive and appears to afford enhanced
resistance to malaria. The sickle cell trait may have been a genetic
response to an environmental danger.
There is an increased risk of inheriting the genetic disorder, Tay-Sachs
syndrome, among Ashkenazi Jews, and this has been traced to Polish ghettoes
in World War II. Though, like sickle cell, the disease is fatal where one
inherits the gene from both parents, yet the Tay-Sachs gene has been
correlated to an increased resistance to tuberculosis, the scourge of the
ghettoes in those days.
On the other side of the coin, fish, crayfish, and beetles have been found
in caverns that no longer have vision. Indentations still remain where
eyes once scrutinized the world millions of years ago. Through countless
succeeding generations, born in total darkness, eyes were jettisoned by
these creatures as needless encumbrances.
Researchers have begun preliminary investigations in this general area of
inheritance affected by environmental factors. A conference was held in
Pittsburgh in September, 1992, on "male-mediated toxicity."
After 3 days, the consensus was that there is an urgent need
for studies to elucidate mechanisms underlying tantalizing evidence
that many different types of paternal exposure induce changes in
sperm or semen that could affect children's health.
In the not too distant future we may discover how adaptive genetic
mutations may be shaped by environmental forces, something that was
postulated by the earliest pioneer of evolution theory, J. B. Lamarck.
Genetic adaptations made by microscopic organisms, insects, animals, and
humans point in the direction of change through time through genetic
mutations which could be affected by usage or the environment, and are
inherent as part of our immune-response system. These factors may induce
the production of enzymes triggering genes that modify the DNA. The
modified DNA may cause beneficial adaptations for succeeding
generations. And who might have had the foresight to endow His creatures
with such a beneficial characteristic? How about a benevolent Creator-God?
The explanation supported by some of our most eminent biologists today,
however, is that chance mutations occur spontaneously and accidentally in
populations affording enhanced survivability to the lucky descendants that
inherit those beneficial adaptations. But consider: Which answer better
fits the evidence?"
In short, ID recognizes the problem, but offers the wrong solution.
Behe is being accused by Roberts of the following well-known logical fallacy:
Premise: All crows are black
Conclusion: Therefore all not-crows are not-black.
Equivalently:
Premise: All irreducibly complex objects are designed.
Conclusion: All not-irreducibly complex objects are not-designed.
It seems obvious to me that Behe never implied this conclusion & that
therefore Roberts' argument contributes nothing of interest to the debate,
because it attacks a straw man.
Here we part company.
ID only asserts design when the complexity demands it, and leaves
non-complex biological mechanisms to the impersonal acts of
nature. Michael Roberts was pointing this out.
Look at your own premise and conclusion. The subject is simply
"objects." Could you be more specific? Let's at least say "biological
objects." Although it would be arbitrary, in theory at least we could draw
a line and say that a certain level of "complexity" could separate
biological objects between those which are "irreducibly complex" and those
which are not.
So in theory, all biological structures could fit into two groupings,
unlike your "crows" analogy. ID only addresses one group. ID makes no
design argument about toenails. I can see God's provision for us in
everything we have - including toenails. As does Michael Roberts. That I
feel was the point of his article - but he can speak for himself.
Dick Fischer - Genesis Proclaimed Association
Finding Harmony in Bible, Science, and History
www.genesisproclaimed.org
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