Giving Up Darwin – David Gelernter(claremont.org) |
Giving Up Darwin – David Gelernter(claremont.org) |
Consider the thought experiment given: "Starting with 150 links of gibberish, what are the chances that we can mutate our way to a useful new shape of protein? ... Try to mutate your way from 150 links of gibberish to a working, useful protein and you are guaranteed to fail. Try it with ten mutations, a thousand, a million—you fail. The odds bury you. It can’t be done."
That's a variant of the watchmaker analogy. It's an appeal to incredulity.
But we know that genetic programming and genetic algorithms, which are based on exactly the same described mechanisms, are able to work.
Dawkins wrote "The Blind Watchmaker" which addresses the exact point. Quoting Wikipedia:
> Dawkins' first concern is to illustrate the difference between the potential for the development of complexity as a result of pure randomness, as opposed to that of randomness coupled with cumulative selection. He demonstrates this by the example of the weasel program. Dawkins then describes his experiences with a more sophisticated computer model of artificial selection implemented in a program also called The Blind Watchmaker, which was sold separately as a teaching aid.
If this were an honest discussion, Gelernter would need to address this well-known objection.
Nor does Gelernter, who mentions several times 'intelligent design', is little more than a renaming of "creationism". As pointed out during the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial, drafts of the creationist textbook "Of Pandas and People" show that the term "creationism" and "Creation Science" were nearly all replaced with "intelligent design" and, famously, on use of "creationists" was changed to "cdesign proponentsists".
When you see "intelligent designer", remember, that should include "a group of visiting space aliens did it". But usually it's a cover for "God did it."