Hanging out with Phillip Johnson, Godfather of the Intelligent Design Movement

[StopFear]

Phillip Johnson is a very smart man. Very good guy. He taught at my school.

[TheDarwinman]

Phillip Johnson is a lawyer. Perhaps we should ask Werner Arber to blather to us about his opinion regarding Tort Reform in someones living room.

[djs259]

@TheDarwinman The only academic degree that Charles Darwin held was in Theology.

To exclude Johnson's arguments out of hand on the basis of his academic degrees goes against every standard of intellectual integrity. If he had a degree in molecular biology, would you then take his arguments any more seriously? Oh, wait, Michael Behe has already done that, only to be attacked relentlessly the same pointy headed geeks demanding advanced science degrees from those who expose their flawed logic.

[AntonJT81]

Science and religion are two separate studies of human understanding. Science only explains what is natural. Religion explains what is spiritual and nautral. Science can only explain what is natural while religion can explain what is natural, meta-physical, and supernatural, but it falls outside of the methodology of science. There ought to be no conflict between religion and science. The problem with science, from which i disagree, is the belief that we will be able to explain everything

[KeithTaylor1]

Fair enough. But I have a question for you.

By labeling yourself as "theistic," I'd assume you're part of one of the three Abrahamic religions.

So, my question is how do you reconcile your understanding of evolution with the story of creation?

I do hope you respond, because I'm not trying to change your mind I'm just generally curious. I put the same question to a Muslim convert recently during an interview, and I'm curious to see how your response compares.

[KeithTaylor1]

6:00 is when he lost me.

Evolution shows how finches become eagles and bears...what?

I assume that this man is being willfully misleading. His failure to mention divergence makes me think he knows what hes talking about, and that he's choosing to be dishonest about evolution.

[Lookin4TruthDotCom]

Dr. Johnson is summarizing the various examples sighted as evidence for macro-evolution (change from one species to another). His point is that trivial change (pepper moth adaptation, finch beak size, bacteria changes/resistance,) within an fundementally unchanging existing species may illustrate micro-evolution but not macro-evolution.

How do you feel it's misleading Keith?

[KeithTaylor1]

No part of evolutionary theory suggest birds can spontaneously become bears or any other such nonsense. That is the idea he is putting forward and it's perniciously misleading. Also if an existing species is evolving on a micro level, the effect of micro evolution will be macroevolution. No adaptation favored by natural selection is trivial, and enough change at a micro level will result in a fundamentally changed species (i.e. speciation). If micro happens it leads to macro, end of story.

[Lookin4TruthDotCom]

Not so, sorry I just cannot buy it. Small non speciated (what he calls trivial changes ie. bigger nose on a human) change does not neccessarily mean all changes add up to create speciation. Take Darwin's finches, for example, their beaks change generation to geneation, smaller and then back to bigger. Can we then say over millions of years the longer beak will be a trunk???

If most As become Bs can we simply assume (untestable unrepeatable unvarifiable) that eventually all As will be Zs?

[allan3141]

@KeithTaylor1 "No part of evolutionary theory suggest birds can spontaneously become bears or any other such nonsense" He did not say that did not come close to saying and never ever even suggested anything like that. cont....

[allan3141]

cont.. "That is the idea he is putting forward and it's perniciously misleading" No that is not the idea he is putting forward you are being perniciously misleading. "If an existing species is evolving on a micro level the effect of micro evolution will be macroevolution" Perhaps you mean or understand something different by these terms, but it at the very least is not self-evident that it would and the more that is understood the more implausible it becomes.

[allan3141]

@KeithTaylor1 @KeithTaylor1 "No adaptation favored by natural selection is trivial" Sure it is. "If micro happens it leads to macro, end of story" You say end of story but this issue is far more difficult than that.

[allan3141]

Keith you are the one misleading yourself. He did not say what you are suggesting. If you do not seek to even bother to understand the point someone is making why bother to comment? By all means challenge what is being put forward if you have a problem with it. But he did not say it is suggested that finches did become bears gorillas, or eagles for that matter. Do you really not get the point he is making even if you disagree with it?

[grandconjunct]

In the future they will look back at the way Johnson was dismissed by academic partisans and wonder how our age could be so blinded by our prejudices.

[KeithTaylor1]

I'm an undergrad and it only took me a few minutes to dismiss this tosh...

I do hope you don't think this is a valid representation of evolution....

[allan3141]

@grandconjunct I think and hope so too. I am not a Christian but I recognise that he is a great man.

[gCuezy]

Very interesting...

[KeithTaylor1]

I hope your "very interesting" comment is based on how misleading this information is...

[gCuezy]

I like to follow the ID movement(for various reasons)... I happen to be a theistic evolutionist though.