How likely is it that you could swish together amino acids randomly and come up with a sequence that would fold up into a functional protein?
Evolution News reports on research performed by Doug Axe at Cambridge University, and published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Molecular Biology.
Excerpt:
Doug Axe’s research likewise studies genes that it turns out show great evidence of design. Axe studied the sensitivities of protein function to mutations. In these “mutational sensitivity” tests, Dr. Axe mutated certain amino acids in various proteins, or studied the differences between similar proteins, to see how mutations or changes affected their ability to function properly.10 He found that protein function was highly sensitive to mutation, and that proteins are not very tolerant to changes in their amino acid sequences. In other words, when you mutate, tweak, or change these proteins slightly, they stopped working. In one of his papers, he thus concludes that “functional folds require highly extraordinary sequences,” and that functional protein folds “may be as low as 1 in 10^77.”11 The extreme unlikelihood of finding functional proteins has important implications for intelligent design.
Just so you know, those footnotes say this:
[10.] Douglas D. Axe, “Estimating the Prevalence of Protein Sequences Adopting Functional Enzyme Folds,” Journal of Molecular Biology, 1-21 (2004); Douglas D. Axe, “Extreme Functional Sensitivity to Conservative Amino Acid Changes on Enzyme Exteriors,” Journal of Molecular Biology, Vol. 301:585-595 (2000).
[11.] Douglas D. Axe, “Estimating the Prevalence of Protein Sequences Adopting Functional Enzyme Folds,” Journal of Molecular Biology, 1-21 (2004).
And remember, you need a lot more than just 1 protein in order to create even the simplest living system. Can you generate that many proteins in the short time between when the Earth cools and the first living cells appear? Even if we spot the naturalist a prebiotic soup as big as the universe, and try to make sequences as fast as possible, it’s unlikely to generate even one protein in the time before first life appears.
Here’s Doug Axe to explain his research:
If you are building a protein for the FIRST TIME, you have to get it right all at once – not by building up to it gradually using supposed Darwinian mechanisms. That’s because there is no replication before you have the first replicator. The first replicator cannot rely on explanations that require replication to already be in place.
Note: For a Christian response to the complaint that the Bible doesn’t condemn slavery, see this article and this article for slavery in the Old Testament, and this article for slavery in the New Testament. These are all by Christian philosopher Paul Copan. You can watch a lecture with Paul Copan on the slavery challenge here, and buy a book where he answers the challenge in more detail. There is also a good debate on whether the Bible condones slavery here, featuring David Instone-Brewer and Robert Price. My post is not a formal logical essay on this issue, it is more that I am outraged that atheists, who cannot even rationally ground objective morality, insist on criticizing the morality of the Bible. I think that atheists who are serious about finding the truth about these issues should check out those links, if they are interested in getting to the truth of these matters.
In other posts, I’ve argued that without an objective moral standard of what is right and wrong, any judgments about right and wrong are just individual opinions. So, when an atheist says slavery is wrong, what he really means is that he thinks slavery is wrong for him, in the same way that he thinks that,say, that chocolate ice cream is right for him. He isn’t saying what is wrong objectively, because on atheism there are no objective moral rules or duties. He is speaking for himself: “I wouldn’t own a slave, just like I wouldn’t eat broccoli – because it’s yucky!”. But he has no rational argument against other people owning slaves in other times and places, because their justification for owning slaves is the same as his justification for not owning slaves : personal preference.
So do atheists oppose slavery? Do they believe in an objective human right to liberty? Well, there are no objective human rights of any kind on atheism. Human beings are just accidents in an accidental universe, and collections of atoms do not mysteriously accrue “rights”. There is no natural right to liberty on atheism. Now consider abortion, which is arguably very similar to slavery. Most atheists do favor abortion in this time and place. Like slavery, abortion declares an entire class of weaker people as non-persons in order to justify preserving their own happiness and prosperity by means of violence. That’s exactly what slavery does, except abortion is worse than slavery, because you actually kill the person you are declaring as a non-person instead of just imprisoning them.
So how many atheists have this pro-abortion view that it is OK to declare unborn children as non-persons so they can kill them?
Well, according to Gallup, the “non-religious” are the group most likely to support abortion. In fact, 68% favor legalized abortion, compared to only 19% who oppose it.
Most atheists are OK with the strong killing the weak
The Gallup numbers might actually be low, because “No religion” might include people who are spiritual, but not religious. But what about atheists alone?
As a group, atheists tend to be among the most radical supporters of legalized abortion. The Secular Census of 2012 found that 97% of atheists vote for abortion. There are almost no pro-life atheists. Why is it that atheists look at unborn children and think it’s OK to kill them? Well, let’s see what atheists scholars think about morality, and we’ll find out why they think abortion is OK.
Atheist scholars think morality is nonsense
Atheist William Provine says atheists have no free will, no moral accountability and no moral significance:
Let me summarize my views on what modern evolutionary biology tells us loud and clear — and these are basically Darwin’s views. There are no gods, no purposes, and no goal-directed forces of any kind. There is no life after death. When I die, I am absolutely certain that I am going to be dead. That’s the end of me. There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning in life, and no free will for humans, either.
Atheists Michael Ruse says atheists have no objective moral standards:
The position of the modern evolutionist is that humans have an awareness of morality because such an awareness of biological worth. Morality is a biological adaptation no less than are hands and feet and teeth. Considered as a rationally justifiable set of claims about an objective something, ethics is illusory. I appreciate when someone says, ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself,’ they think they are referring above and beyond themselves. Nevertheless, such reference is truly without foundation. Morality is just an aid to survival and reproduction, . . . and any deeper meaning is illusory.(Michael Ruse, “Evolutionary Theory and Christian Ethics,” in The Darwinian Paradigm (London: Routledge, 1989), pp. 262-269).
Atheist Richard Dawkins says atheists have no objective moral standards:
In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, or any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference… DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is. And we dance to its music. (Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life (1995))
Let’s take a closer look at Richard Dawkins.
Richard Dawkins and morality
Here’s how far Dawkins takes his view that there is no evil and no good:
Richard Dawkins explains morality on atheism
But wait! He goes even further than mere abortion:
So, looking at Dawkins, what kind of ethic can you get from Darwinism and atheism? Survival of the fittest. The strong kill the weak.
Now atheists may feign morality in order to get along with other people in a society that is still anchored in Judeo-Christian values, but they tend to vote for liberal social policies, and they oppose political action by those who still hold to objective morality. So what they are working toward, generally, is less and less influence in politics by those who favor objective human rights, objective moral values and objective moral duties.
So do atheists oppose slavery, or don’t they?
I actually don’t think that atheists think slavery is morally wrong, although they might personally not want to own slaves in this time and place because slavery is illegal – thanks to Judeo-Christian values. But in other areas, like abortion, we can see that atheists are willing to use violence against the weak to augment their happiness and prosperity. Unborn babies are weak, like slaves. Atheists are willing to kill the weak unborn babies who stop them from pursuing pleasure and prosperity. I don’t see how they would have any objections to enslaving other people if they had the strength to do so. In fact, unjust imprisonment and forced labor are happening in atheistic North Korea right now.
But do you know who does oppose slavery enough to do something about it?
Slavery was mostly eradicated from Western civilization–then called Christendom–between the fourth and the tenth century. The Greco-Roman institution of slavery gave way to serfdom. Now serfdom has its problems but at least the serf is not a “human tool” and cannot be bought and sold like property. So slavery was ended twice in Western civilization, first in the medieval era and then again in the modern era.
In the American South, Christianity proved to be the solace of the oppressed. As historian Eugene Genovese documents in Roll, Jordan, Roll, when black slaves sought to find dignity during the dark night of slavery, they didn’t turn to Marcus Aurelius or David Hume; they turned to the Bible. When they sought hope and inspiration for liberation, they found it not in Voltaire or D’Holbach but in the Book of Exodus.
The anti-slavery movements led by Wilberforce in England and abolitionists in America were dominated by Christians. These believers reasoned that since we are all created equal in the eyes of God, no one has the right to rule another without consent. This is the moral basis not only of anti-slavery but also of democracy.
And, in fact, you can see Christians pushing the culture hard against abortion today, just as we did with slavery. Defending the weak is what we do. Meanwhile, most atheists think that an unborn child has as much of a right to legal protection as a cockroach.
I found this fun lecture by the grandfather of the big-tent intelligent design movement, Berkeley law professor Philip E. Johnson.
I’ll bet you guys have all heard of him, but you’ve never heard him speak, right? Well, I was a young man, I used to listen to Phil’s lectures and his debates with Eugenie Scott quite a bit. This is one of my favorite lectures. Very easy to understand, and boilerplate for anything else in the origins debate. This is a great lecture – funny, engaging and useful. You will definitely listen to this lecture several times if you listen to it once.
Many people get their understanding of origins by watching movies like “Inherit the Wind” (or reading science fiction)
The actual events of the Scopes trial are nothing like what the movie portrays
The law forbidding the teaching of evolution was symbolic, not meant to be enforced
The actual Scopes trial was a publicity stunt to attract attention to Dayton, TN to bring business to the town
The ACLU advertised for a teacher who would be willing to be sued
They found a substitute physical education teacher who would be willing to “break” the law
The movie is nothing like the actual events the movie is a morality play
The religious people are evil and stupid and ignorant and bigoted
The scientists and lawyers are all intelligent, romantic, and honest seekers of the truth
The religious people think that the Bible trumps science and science is not as reliable as the Bible
The movie argues that the reason why there is ANY dissent to evolution is because of Biblical fundamentalism
The movie presents the idea that there are no scientific problems with evolution
The movie says that ONLY Biblical fundamentalists who believe in 6 day, 24-hour creation doubt evolution
The movie says that Biblical fundamentalism are close-minded, and not open to scientific truth
The movie says that people who read the Bible as making factual claims are misinterpreting the Bible
The movie says that smart people read the Bible for comfort and feelings and arbitrary values, not for truth
Guided evolution and methodological naturalism
What scientists mean by evolution is that fully naturalistic, unguided, materialistic mechanisms caused the diversity of life
Scientists do not allow that God had any real objective effect on how life was created
Scientists think that nature did all the creating, and any mention of God is unnecessary opinion – God didn’t DO ANYTHING
Scientists operate with one overriding rule – you can only explain the physical world with physical and material causes
Scientists DO NOT allow that God could have done anything detectable by the sciences
Scientists WILL NOT consider the idea that natural, material processes might be INSUFFICIENT for explaining everything in nature
You cannot even ask the question about whether natural laws, matter and chance can explain something in nature
Intelligent causes can NEVER be the explanation for anything in nature, and you can’t even test experimentally to check that
Scientists ASSUME that everything can be explained with natural laws, matter and chance – no questioning of natural causes is allowed
Where no natural explanation of a natural phenomenon is available, scientists SPECULATE about undiscovered natural explanations
The assumption of naturalistic sufficiency is called “methodological naturalism”
To question the assumptions that natural is all there is, and that nature has to do its own creating, makes you an “enemy of science”
But Johnson says that naturalists are the enemies of science, because they are like the Biblical fundamentalists
Naturalists have a presumption that prevents them from being willing to follow the evidence where it is leading
Experiments are not even needed, because the presumption of naturalism overrides any experimental finding that falsifies the sufficiency of natural causes to explain some natural phenomenon
What can natural selection and mutation actually do?
what evolution has actually been observed to do is explain changing populations of moths and finches
finches with smaller or larger beaks are observed to have differential survival rates when there are droughts or floods
no new body plan or new organ type has been observed to emerge from these environmental pressures
the only kind of evolution that has been observed is evolution within types – no new genetic instructions are created
in textbooks, only confirming examples are presented – but what is required is a broad pattern of gradual development of species
if you look at the fossil record, what you see in most cases is variation within types based on changing environments
the real question is: can natural law and chance be observed to be doing any creating of body plans and organ types?
What kind of effect requires an intelligent cause?
the thing to be explained in the history of life is the functional information sequences
you need to have a sequence of symbols or characters that is sufficiently long
your long sequence of characters has to be sequenced in the right order to have biological function
the only thing that can create long sequences of functional information is an intelligent cause
intelligent design people accept micro-evolution – changes within types – because that’s been observed
the real thing to be explained is the first living cell’s functional information, and the creation of new functional information
Critical response
The next 15 minutes of the lecture contain a critical response from a philosophy professor who thinks that there have been no developments in design arguments since Aquinas and Paley. He basically confirms the stereotypes that Johnson outlined in the first part of the lecture. I recommend listening to this to see what opposition to intelligent design really looks like. It’s not concerned with answering scientific questions – they want to talk about God, the Bible and Noah’s ark. It’s our job to get people like this critic to focus on the science.
Here’s my snarky rendition of what he said:
1) Don’t take the Bible literally, even if the genre is literal.
all opposition to evolution is based on an ignorant, fundamentalist, literal reading of the Bible
the Bible really doesn’t communicate anything about the way the world really is
the Bible is just meant to suggest certain opinions and experiences which you may find fetching, or not, depending on your feelings and community
if Christians would just interpret the Bible as myths and opinions on par with other personal preferences, then evolution is no threat to religious belief
2) As long as you treat the design argument as divorced from evidence, it’s not very effective
the latest and best version of the design argument is the old Paley argument which involves no experimental data, so I’ll critique that
this 200-year old argument which doesn’t rely on science has serious problems, and unnamed Christians agree with me!
Christians should NOT try to prove God’s existence using evidence from the natural world (as Romans 1 says), and in fact it’s “Pelagianism” to even try
Christians should divorce their faith from logic and evidence even though the Bible presents faith as being rooted in reason and evidence
Christians should not tie their faith to the science of today, because science is always changing and the theism-friendly evidence of today might be overturned tomorrow
It’s a good idea for me to critique the arguments of 1000-year old people who did not know anything about the cosmic fine-tuning argument – that’s fair!
I find it very useful to tell people that the argument from design is false without mentioning any design arguments from DNA or cosmic fine-tuning
We need to assume that the natural world is explainable using only natural causes before we look at any evidence
We should assume that natural causes create all life, and then rule out all experimental evidence for intelligent causes that we have today
As long as you accept that God is a personal opinion that has nothing to do with reality, then you can do science
The non-Christian process theologian Teilhard de Chardin accepts evolution, and therefore so should you
Remember when theists said God caused thunder because he was bowling in the clouds and then we found out he didn’t? Yeah well – maybe tomorrow we’ll find out that functional sequences of amino acids and proteins have natural causes! What would you do then?
3) What the Bible really says is that you should be a political liberal
Q&A time
The lecture concludes with 13 minutes of questions.
WINTERY KNIGHT 