Bees fly, creationists cry

[DJPoopypants]

Hah! How's about some smiting from the science end, eh?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10791395/

Proponents of intelligent design, which holds that a supreme being rather than evolution is responsible for life's complexities, have long criticized science for not being able to explain some natural phenomena, such as how bees fly.

Now scientists have put this perplexing mystery to rest.

Using a combination of high-speed digital photography and a robotic model of a bee wing, the researchers figured out the flight mechanisms of honeybees.

SCOREBOARD!!!

hopefully, this scientific advance may actually save lives...

The scientists said the findings could lead to a model for designing aircraft that could hover in place and carry loads for many purposes such as diaster surveillance after earthquakes and tsunamis.

though of course, if god wanted lives saved, maybe he wouldn't have sent that earthquake or tsunami, eh? (just kidding)

[Yankee_Blue]

God this forum was made just for you and matrim...

[DJPoopypants]

OK, maybe the gloating was inappropriate.

There was good intellectual discussion on the "Does the historical record show a person called Jesus really existed"? Which is important because obviously, proof either way is important (central?) to the validity or invalidity of many religious beliefs.

So here we have disproof of one of the central tenants of ID/Creationism - "If scientists have all the answers, how come they can't figure out how bees can fly?"

That's not news?

[Chicago1871]

OK, maybe the gloating was inappropriate.

There was good intellectual discussion on the "Does the historical record show a person called Jesus really existed"? Which is important because obviously, proof either way is important (central?) to the validity or invalidity of many religious beliefs.

So here we have disproof of one of the central tenants of ID/Creationism - "If scientists have all the answers, how come they can't figure out how bees can fly?"

That's not news?
It was just the gloating he was questioning or should have been questioning.

[Yankee_Blue]

So here we have disproof of one of the central tenants of ID/Creationism - "If scientists have all the answers, how come they can't figure out how bees can fly?"


Central tenet? No way. I've never heard anyone say "You know what? Scientists dont know how bees fly, therefore, evolution is wrong/creation is right..." How bees fly is a curiosity. That they do, is self-evident.

[Chicago1871]

Central tenet? No way. I've never heard anyone say "You know what? Scientists dont know how bees fly, therefore, evolution is wrong/creation is right..."
Actually the fact that it wasn't understood how bees flew--it went against certain principles dear to science (therefor it must have been intelligently designed), and the claim that the eyeball couldn't have developed, are some of the "evidence" creationists cite on regular occasions.

[DJPoopypants]

It strikes me that the rationale in favor of intelligent design is like Jenga. A tower of little wooden blocks, and science keeps pulling them out one by one.

[scarshins]

It's always seemed to me that complexity is the work of nature, why would God get all concerned with little details like that?

People, in general, need to stop putting conservation of nature as their number 173 priority. It should be top 5. Creationists' denigration of the natural world, and the analagous political right's ridiculous "arguments" against global warming and conservation, are a very selfish and dangerous thing.

[Norsk Troll]

I love to watch Beaze fly. Especially up and down the left wing.

[Yankee_Blue]

It strikes me that the rationale in favor of intelligent design is like Jenga. A tower of little wooden blocks, and science keeps pulling them out one by one.

Because scientists figured out how bees fly? I see it all as one harmonious system. It just hasn't been figured out yet. There doesn't have to be a zero-sum-game winner-take-all conclusion here. The mistake is to assume that "science is all wrong therefore religion is right". It's just as big of a mistake to assume the opposite as well...

[royalstilton]

The point isn't about the how of bee's flight. It's about the evolution of flight as a phenomenon. See, it's pretty much an all or nothing thing, or so it would seem. So the mechanism for moving wings in such a way as to keep aloft a bee or a dragonfly aloft is more than a mystery. First of all, the complexity of the system is fairly amazing. So don't think looking at a bee now begins to explain how a bee then got airborne.

[Yankee_Blue]

The point isn't about the how of bee's flight. It's about the evolution of flight as a phenomenon. See, it's pretty much an all or nothing thing, or so it would seem. So the mechanism for moving wings in such a way as to keep aloft a bee or a dragonfly aloft is more than a mystery. First of all, the complexity of the system is fairly amazing. So don't think looking at a bee now begins to explain how a bee then got airborne.


I understand that. My response was to a much more general conclusion drawn by another poster. The mystery, though, all along, WAS the mechanics of the flight of the bee, not the evolution of its flight. So really, the point is "how" the bee flies.

[royalstilton]

I understand that. My response was to a much more general conclusion drawn by another poster. The mystery, though, all along, WAS the mechanics of the flight of the bee, not the evolution of its flight. So really, the point is "how" the bee flies.
---
and my point is simply that science has done nothing by this discovery to dent the idea of intelligent design. And if you note my post, it doesn't quote yours, so I was not responding to you directly.

[royalstilton]

It strikes me that the rationale in favor of intelligent design is like Jenga. A tower of little wooden blocks, and science keeps pulling them out one by one.
---
cite examples...

i'm sure you've read Michael Behe's tome Darwin's Black Box?

[Samarkand]

---
and my point is simply that science has done nothing by this discovery to dent the idea of intelligent design.
And intelligent design has done nothing to prove it's science.......

[DJPoopypants]

---
cite examples...

i'm sure you've read Michael Behe's tome Darwin's Black Box?

I have not read that, tho I stayed at a holiday inn last night and read lots of novels...

Here is my uneducated(?) assessment though.

Evolution is a scientific theory that asserts the idea that evolutionary changes have directed the changes in life. Details and ideas are different, but the key undelying assumptions are the same.

People who love ID reject that. For some reason, they feel threatened by such an idea. Meanwhile, many christians have found a way to co-exist with science (prime mover, deity that set the laws of science, etc)

But ID posits that science (and evolutionary theory) is wrong, and that its all God's direct work. That the literal word of the bible is truth, and not perchance allegory, nor an overly simplistic explanation to an almost prehistoric culture that is not ready to comprehend deeply scientific explanations.

What proof does ID have? Nothing but critiques of science and evolution based on examples where current scientific models cannot explain things we see today. How can a bee fly - in violation of current understanding of flight? The eye is so complex, that evolutionary changes cannot account for its function. Where's the missing link between apes and man?

And that is the logical fallacy. By saying "science cannot explain x", it is like assessing an incomplete jigsaw puzzle. To ID, any open spots are evidence of God's will. Meanwhile, science is targeting these open spots, and trying to fit unused pieces together. And every day, more open spots are being filled. And previously fit peices are also being re-evaluated to see if they truly belong somewhere else.

Eventually, the puzzle will probably be complete. ID then loses its argumentative basis that open spots mean science fails and is false.

What happens to those who bet on ID? As opposed to more rational types who claim that science is OK, and God created the entire puzzle?

I'm not anti-christian. I place my bet on those trying to solve the puzzle scientifically. Who do not claim to categorically say who made the puzzle.

I do not deny the possibility of a creator who set things in motion, and who created certain processes (evolution?) to direct the path forward. Why do you?

[royalstilton]

But ID posits that science (and evolutionary theory) is wrong, and that its all God's direct work. That the literal word of the bible is truth, and not perchance allegory, nor an overly simplistic explanation to an almost prehistoric culture that is not ready to comprehend deeply scientific explanations.

I do not deny the possibility of a creator who set things in motion, and who created certain processes (evolution?) to direct the path forward. Why do you?
---
ID doesn't say science is wrong about everything. Just that science does not adequately explain certain rather complicated phenomena that seem to be more clearly explained by intelligent design. I have no illusions that ID is scientific, but, if you would bother to read Behe's book, he would assert that some of the science ( he's a scientist ) that purportedly explains evolutionary development is not particularly sound.

If you are trying to reconcile scientific evolution and intelligent design by saying that God set a process into motion, I have no problem, so long as the process is limited to what is referred to, commonly, as micro-evolution, the origin of species, as it were. But to make the assertion that man is just a better adapted ape isn't within that construct, is it?

[Yankee_Blue]

People who love ID reject that. For some reason, they feel threatened by such an idea. Meanwhile, many christians have found a way to co-exist with science (prime mover, deity that set the laws of science, etc)


Unfortunately, ID/evolution has "devolved" into a right/left, red/blue, God/No God politicized debate as evidenced by your article that started by this thread. Both sides are getting defensive and protective of their turf. As a result, both sides suffer.


But ID posits that science (and evolutionary theory) is wrong, and that its all God's direct work. That the literal word of the bible is truth, and not perchance allegory, nor an overly simplistic explanation to an almost prehistoric culture that is not ready to comprehend deeply scientific explanations.


Not really and this may be the problem. Adherents to ID consider many extra-biblical sources to point to. Including, but not limited to, the Kalaam argument. If this debate is going to really be a sticking point for you, DJ, you should really make a clear conscience effort to see what the ID people are really saying.

[Mel Brennan]

Central tenet? No way. I've never heard anyone say "You know what? Scientists dont know how bees fly, therefore, evolution is wrong/creation is right..." How bees fly is a curiosity. That they do, is self-evident.


There is no DOUBT in my minds that certain fundamentalists held to the belief that because science had not fully articulated how bees flew, that that FACT was one of a number of PROOFS of evolution; I have two such persons in my extended family, and heard the argument across a wedding rehersal dinner table. So let's not act as if this isn't out there in folks' thinking and in their mores and folkways and personal mythologies, because it is, and now it's been rebuked.

Although for me, it has to be asked: if you can't EXECUTE the science yourself, why are you - why is anyone - so quick to embrace it? Scientific claims can be just as much an illusion, just as much a tool of control, as religious claims have often been, if not moreso.

[Samarkand]

I really wish I could find the page again, but I was surfing some time ago and found a page from the flatearthers. In it amongst the usual claims as to why evolution was bunk was the claim that no one had ever witnessed a horse changing into a rabbit or a cow morph into a weasel (I think). Therefore, evolution was not true.