Posted: Jun 24, 2010 12:29 am
Thanks for the full quote, jaredennisclark.
Then irreducible complexity is a completely void concept. IF any two of those three parts together has some function, any function whatsoever, they can be selected for and maintained in the cell, up to some time when the third part (whichever third part) is introduced/co-opted into the new structure. No matter how kludgy, if it provides any selective advantage it has a chance to reproduce and be refined from that point by ordinary evolution.
Later on, after the system has become "well-matched" and vital to the organism in its new role, you truly can't remove one of the parts and have it still function. Trivially true. But the heart of Behe's argument is the untrue assertion that evolution can't account for how it arose to begin with, and since evolution cannot describe a process leading to the current state, ergo it must have been implemented by an outside designer.
That's a stupid argument. It's nothing more than an argument from incredulity "I can't figure out how these pieces got fitted into this complex-looking system. And since I'm a real smart guy, if I can't figure out the answer by looking at them, there must not be an answer - except maybe goddidit, err, designerdidit."
Behe is a pretty smart guy. It's too bad he hitched his intelligence to the incredulity train, and now he'll never be able to figure out how to get off it.
Except, he is saying that it cannot occur step by step in successive slight improvements such as we know are within the power of natural evolution to produce.CharlieM wrote:Behe:
By irreducibly complex I mean a single system composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning...Because the bacterial flagellum is necessarily composed of at least three parts - a paddle, a rotor and a motor - it is irreducibly complex.
CharlieM:
Note that Behe is not saying that it is impossible for an irreducibly complex system to be assembled by known naturalistic means.
And he is not saying that if you take one or more parts away then the remainder will not have some function.
What he does say is that in considering the bacteria's flagellar motility system, if any one of the three parts mentioned above is removed then the system loses its motility function. Nothing that I have read here disproves this.
Then irreducible complexity is a completely void concept. IF any two of those three parts together has some function, any function whatsoever, they can be selected for and maintained in the cell, up to some time when the third part (whichever third part) is introduced/co-opted into the new structure. No matter how kludgy, if it provides any selective advantage it has a chance to reproduce and be refined from that point by ordinary evolution.
Later on, after the system has become "well-matched" and vital to the organism in its new role, you truly can't remove one of the parts and have it still function. Trivially true. But the heart of Behe's argument is the untrue assertion that evolution can't account for how it arose to begin with, and since evolution cannot describe a process leading to the current state, ergo it must have been implemented by an outside designer.
That's a stupid argument. It's nothing more than an argument from incredulity "I can't figure out how these pieces got fitted into this complex-looking system. And since I'm a real smart guy, if I can't figure out the answer by looking at them, there must not be an answer - except maybe goddidit, err, designerdidit."
Behe is a pretty smart guy. It's too bad he hitched his intelligence to the incredulity train, and now he'll never be able to figure out how to get off it.