Comments on: Breaking down irreducible complexity http://www.scienceline.org/2008/01/17/breaking-down-irreducible-complexity/ The Shortest Distance Between You and Science Fri, 20 Nov 2009 14:16:34 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Ted Herrlich http://www.scienceline.org/2008/01/17/breaking-down-irreducible-complexity/comment-page-1/#comment-1314 Ted Herrlich Mon, 21 Jan 2008 20:20:43 +0000 http://scienceline.org/2008/01/17/breaking-down-irreducible-complexity/#comment-1314 There has been more than a little science tearing down Irreducible Complexity. Every example in Michael Behe's book "Darwin's Black Box" has been pretty well settled, although not to his satisfaction. During the Dover Trial he [Behe] faced over 50 scientific publications that dealt with his examples and proved that they are not irreducibly complex. His response was "That's not enough." His biggest mistake is an assumption, he is assuming that the mechanisms have to appear suddenly, completely intact. Behe needs to say something similar to Darwin, "If it could be demonstrated that a complex organ exists which could have been formed by numerous successive slight modifications, my idea of Irreducible Complexity would absolutely not apply." He has yet to find such a mechanism. Interestingly that during the trial he admitted to not looking and that no one is doing any experimentation to look! All he's done is select some mechanisms that hadn't yet been explained in great evolutionary detail. Charles Darwin speculated the Eye might be tough to explain. He was right, it took decades and many advances in science. Behe listed human clotting factor, the immune system, and bacterial flagellum as irreducibly complex mechanisms. It took less than a decade to refute his claim. Now I guess he will select some other examples and keep making his claims while science catches up. The good thing is Science will catch up! tedhohio@gmail.com http://sciencestandards.blogspot.com There has been more than a little science tearing down Irreducible Complexity. Every example in Michael Behe’s book “Darwin’s Black Box” has been pretty well settled, although not to his satisfaction. During the Dover Trial he [Behe] faced over 50 scientific publications that dealt with his examples and proved that they are not irreducibly complex. His response was “That’s not enough.”

His biggest mistake is an assumption, he is assuming that the mechanisms have to appear suddenly, completely intact. Behe needs to say something similar to Darwin, “If it could be demonstrated that a complex organ exists which could have been formed by numerous successive slight modifications, my idea of Irreducible Complexity would absolutely not apply.” He has yet to find such a mechanism.

Interestingly that during the trial he admitted to not looking and that no one is doing any experimentation to look! All he’s done is select some mechanisms that hadn’t yet been explained in great evolutionary detail. Charles Darwin speculated the Eye might be tough to explain. He was right, it took decades and many advances in science. Behe listed human clotting factor, the immune system, and bacterial flagellum as irreducibly complex mechanisms. It took less than a decade to refute his claim. Now I guess he will select some other examples and keep making his claims while science catches up. The good thing is Science will catch up!

tedhohio@gmail.com
http://sciencestandards.blogspot.com

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