What unexpectedly vitriolic replies to the article I wrote.
Apparently, your "open-minded" evolutionist
modus operandi consists of merely ridicule. I'll try not to reply in kind (Luke 6:27-28:
"Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you"), as difficult as that is, but will just give my thoughts on specific arguments.
(1) Irreducibly grotesque systems can't readily evolve for reasons I listed in the body of the article. To wit, they would require the simultaneous development of several individual components all necessary for the same mauling or infestation function, which is thoroughly unlikely. Hypothetically, one
could argue they might evolve through indirect pathways, but this is special pleading unless it can be substantiated with strong independent evidence.
(2) Irreducible grotesqueness is most certainly
not an argument from ignorance. Think about it. How does one conclude
anything in science? When one finds a fossil in the ground, its resemblance to
known fossilized creatures is what gives strength to the conclusion--
not the fact no other known process except fossilization creates them! In a similar fashion, to name but one example, the Bubonic Plague's type III toxin injection system bears an uncanny resemblance to designed things like assassin's darts and such.
That's what drives the conclusion of design, not the fact that evolution is powerless to explain it (although that certainly strenghens the point). As I remark at the end (paraphrasing William Paley), if you found a delicately-crafted torture instrument just lying around, would you conclude it was made by chance or design? I submit that the answer should be painfully obvious for anyone who isn't blinded by ideology.
(3) Nothing is "proven" in science, and I never claimed to offer "proofs," merely very strong evidence for design. That sounds like something you could read on an ill-informed creationist site instead (which, sadly for those of us in the movement who try to be intellectually honest, are all too common). Even the prominent evolutionist H. J. Muller concedes this:
"The honest scientist... will tell you that nothing whatever can be or has been proved with fully 100% certainty... Thus there is no sharp line between speculation, hypothesis, theory, principle, and fact, but only a difference along a sliding scale, in the degree of probability of the idea."
(4) Using microevolutionary changes as an argument against irreducible grotesqueness is naive at best, and dishonest at worst (although I'm not accusing anyone of the later--it's very easy to honestly make this mistake). I noted this in my article for those who would actually read it, as opposed to skimming! Sure, hair can grow longer. Jaw size can increase or decrease. Teeth and claws can become a bit sharper. But this won't spontaneously (and simultaneously!!) give a formerly benign worm the abilities to infest a person, crawl out through their bloodied eyes, transfer embryos to an intermediate flying insect, have those survive inside the gut, and
then, to top it all off, make them able to reinfect a new person from a bite and
evade all the immune responses using a variety of complex stealthing mechanisms as they repeat the cycle! Without
any of these abilities,
Loa loa (the eye worm of Africa) couldn't reproduce! Its staggeringly complex lifecycle is thoroughly irreducible; how would evolution account for it, even in
principle? Design certainly could...
(5) While the issue of common descent is outside the scope of my article, it doesn't bear one way or another on the issue of IG systems' evolveability. Dr. Behe apparently accepts that humans and apes share a common ancestor, but denies that IG systems were produced by evolution, for example. Others deny it wholesale. I won't comment on it here. Keep in mind that both common descent
and almighty God's involvement in life's design are logically possible.
(6) ID has plenty of theories! Where evolutionists only have natural selection, it has amptly-documented psionic mechanisms substantiated by Jesus and other miracle workers throughout history. I *also* noted this in my article. Why did no one read it?
Granted, the
specifics of how these work are not yet totally known--my guess is some kind of esoteric manipulation of quantum mechanics, and I'm sure testable predictions could be derived from this view--but then, there are lingering mysteries in the evolutionary philosophy too, such as just how sexual selection works and such. But give it time. While evolution has had centuries of work, from the Greek philosophers to Darwin and beyond, scientific studies of ID are relatively recent in comparison.
I hope the above points are sufficient to clear up any questions. Ultimately we're all just looking for the truth, both creationist and evolutionist, so there's really no need for personal attacks. May you all be blessed and see the light!
