Discovery Institute's Blog, page 178

Evolutionary Advocacy as a Confidence Game

Darwin advocacy often gives the appearance of a racket, a confidence scam, a game of Three-card Monte. Go read or listen to John Stonestreet's excellent Breakpoint commentary reflecting on the current cover story in National Geographic, "The War on Science." The magazine links and absurdly lampoons a number of skeptical views, as if they were all of a piece. The cover text reads, giving examples "anti-science":

Climate Change Does Not Exist.

Evolution Never Happened.

The Moon Landing Was Fa...

Still No Basis for Stretched-Rubbery Theory of Body-Plan Origins: An Exchange with Vincent Fleury

We've already devoted two past articles to analyzing claims by a French team to have illuminated the origin of animal body plans. See here:

"To Explain the Origin of Animal Body Plans, Here's What May Be the Most Inadequate Proposal Yet" "More on the Stretched-Rubber Theory of Body Plans"

Now one of the researchers, Vincent Fleury of the French National Centre for Scientific Research, has responded to us with a post of his own ("Reply to Evolution News"). Despite some intemperate name-ca...

Answering Objections to the Dissent from Darwinism List

Yesterday, I discussed the contention by advocates of Darwinian evolution claim that there are no legitimate scientific problems with their viewpoint. Supporters of Darwin's theory often seek to portray those who doubt evolution as being moved by strictly religious or political motivations. The Scientific Dissent from Darwinism List shows that many objections to Darwinian evolution are scientifically based. But because numerous pro-Darwin activists cannot admit this, they have developed a va...

Science and Culture, and a Tale of Two Cities

New York Times columnist David Brooks is getting to be more and more interesting. In a column on Tuesday ("The Cost of Relativism") he acknowledged that his writing of late has been increasingly focused on spiritual and moral matters. In the article, he worries about evidence of a pervasive relativism that is wreaking havoc on a segment of the culture identifiable by several key social markers, including their chaotic family and sexual lives.

This segment, he observes, mostly never made it p...

Is Darwinian Evolution "Just a Theory"?

Earlier I wrote here about the Scientific Dissent from Darwinism List, seeking to help students who have been misled into thinking there is no scientific disagreement over Darwinian theory. The list affirms that "Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged." We often hear people who disagree with evolution saying that it's "just a theory." While that's not what the Dissent List signers say, we must ask: Are Darwin-skeptics using the correct terminology when...

If Naturalism Can Explain Religion, Why Does It Get So Many Basic Facts Wrong?

Naturalism, the idea that nature is all there is, has no shortage of theories seeking to explain religion. However, I would like to observe a simple fact: Most of what naturalism tells us about the practical effects of those religions most studied today is wrong, at least with respect to science.

This should come as no great surprise. Incosmology, naturalism ends in a campaign againstfalsifiability.In studies of the origin of life, it ends in"if only"chemistry that ignores the huge informati...

The Right of Medical Conscience Is Fast Coming to an End

Until recently, physicians who did not want to participate in human life-ending practices -- abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide -- were allowed space to practice Hippocratic medicine regardless of the legal status of these procedures.

But that right of medical conscienceis fast coming to an end, with laws starting to be passed that threaten doctors with what I call "medical martyrdom": do the deadly deeds (or be complicit via referral to adoctor who's willing) or don't practice medicine....

The Onion Test Is a Red Herring

Editor's note : With the famous "Onion Test" back in the news (see here and here), readers may find useful the following excerpt from Jonathan Wells's book, The Myth of Junk DNA (2011, Discovery Institute Press). For details of the references cited below, please consult the book.

In 2007, Canadian biologist T. Ryan Gregory wrote: "Some non-coding DNA is proving to be functional, but this is still a minority of the noncoding DNA, and there is always the issue of the onion test when considering...

Stop Me if You've Heard This One Before: Much Ado over "Oldest Human Fossil"

In 2001, the New York Times ran the headline "Fossils May Be Earliest Human Link." In 2009, Discovery Channel announced, "'Ardi,' Oldest Human Ancestor, Unveiled," and Associated Press's story read, "World's oldest humanlinked skeleton found."

Here we go again.

Headlines over the last week have included "'First human' discovered in Ethiopia" (BBC), "Human Origins Just Got a Lot Older" (Slate), and "Jaw Fossil In Ethiopia Likely Oldest Ever Found In Human Line" (NPR), among many others.

As the...

You Shall Be as Gods: The Rise of the Digital Maoists

Bloomberg Markets carries the headline "Google Wants You to Live Forever." From the article:

"If you ask me today, is it possible to live to be 500? The answer is yes," Bill Maris says one January afternoon in Mountain View, California. The president and managing partner of Google Ventures just turned 40, but he looks more like a 19-year-old college kid at midterm. He's wearing sneakers and a gray denim shirt over a T-shirt; it looks like he hasn't shaved in a few days.

Behind him, sun is s...