Intelligent Design Creationists reveal their top story of 2016

Yesterday I posted an article on: Creationists list the top ten stories of 2016 . Some of you may have noticed that there were only nine stories. That's because Evolution News & Views didn't post their top story until today. I was pretty sure what it would be.

Let me remind you of the main point I made yesterday. Intelligent Design Creationists claim to have scientific evidence of intelligent design. They claim their movement is focused on demonstrating intelligent design but not on proving anything about who the designer might be.

But that's not what the movement is all about. Most of their writings and speeches are focused on attacking evolution. They hope that by discrediting evolution and science they will, by default, support the case for gods (false dichotomy). They also hope that by promoting gaps in our knowledge they will lend support to those who want to insert gods into the gaps.

You don't need to take my word for it. Just look at what they think are the top stories of 2016. Most of their top nine stories were critiques of science in one way or another. There wasn't a single top story that advanced the case for intelligent design.

So, what about the #1 story? Is it going to be different?

#1: Happy New Year! Why the Royal Society Meeting Mattered

The top story is a report of the Royal Society meeting last November (see photo above). Intelligent Design Creationists were there in full force. (That's me with Paul Nelson in the photo.) The movement is delighted to report controversy among evolutionary biologists.

As usual, the IDer's failed to understand what was really going on at the meeting. It wasn't about fundamental flaws in evolution or our understanding of the history of life. It was about different ways of looking at the way life evolved. Many of the participants thought this had something to do with fundamental evolutionary theory but that view, although widely promoted, failed to make much of an impression. Furthermore, the target of the attack, the same target as the creationists, is not modern evolutionary theory but the old-fashioned Ernst Mayr view of the Modern Synthesis from the early 1960s.

Here's how Evolution News & Views (sic) sees the meeting,

The opening presentation at the Royal Society conference by one of those world-class biologists, Austrian evolutionary theorist Gerd Müller, underscored exactly Meyer's point. Müller opened the meeting by discussing several of the fundamental "explanatory deficits" of "the modern synthesis," that is, textbook neo-Darwinian theory.

That's exactly right. Müller complained about the Modern Synthesis version of evolutionary theory where mutation plus natural selection equals evolution. He claimed that this was the version presented in all the modern textbooks and it's wrong.

The next talk was by Douglas Futuyma, author of the leading textbook on evolution. He pointed out that even his first edition, in 1986, contained most of what Müller talked about. Futuyma described how his textbook differed from the old-fashioned view of the Modern Synthesis that Müller claims is promoted in every textbook. In other words, the audience was treated to a masterful repudiation of just about everything Müller said about the textbooks and the modern view of evolutionary theory. (I doubt very much that Gerd Müller has even read a modern textbook because he seems to be ignorant of Neutral Theory and random genetic drift, both of which are extensively covered in all textbooks.)

Let's return to the main point. The Intelligent Design movement is bankrupt when it comes to promoting intelligent design. They've been at it for more than twenty years and they've made no headway at all. All they can do in 2016 is attack evolution, attack science, attack "materialism" (whatever that is), attack an outmoded view of evolution theory (neo-Darwinism), attack scientists, and promote books that do all of these things.

Their top story is a report on controversy among evolutionary biologists. That could have been their top story every year since ID was founded because that's what science is all about. It's about challenging existing views and healthy debate.

If the ID movement really wants to be treated seriously then they should emulate scientists and start looking critically at their own views. Is common descent a fact as Michael Behe and Michael Denton claim? Is evolution of an irreducibly complex system really impossible? Is there more to evolutionary theory than just natural selection? Is life on Earth billions of years old? Can Intelligent Design Creationism be falsified if our genome is full of junk? Can life be explained by postulating aliens as the designers? Does the term "specified complexity" really mean anything? Is the Cambrian explosion really a big mystery? Why has the movement failed to convince anyone who isn't already committed to gods? Is the Wedge Strategy a failure after 18 years?

Answering those questions could be the top Intelligent Design Creationist stories of 2017. Very few of the IDiots are willing to question ideas that could divide the movement. Jonathan McLatchie is one of the exceptions but even he will only go so far. (That's him with me at the meeting (top right).)

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