Airplane magnetos, contingency designs, and reasons ID will prevail
| June 14, 2006 | Posted by scordova under Intelligent Design |
Intelligent design will open doors to scientific exploration which Darwinism is too blind to perceive. The ID perspective allows us to find designed architectures within biology which are almost invisible to natural selection. Thus, the ID perspective is a far better framework for scientific investigation than the Darwinian perspective. What do I mean, and how will I justify my claim?
Let me illustrate my point with some anecdotes. I was piloting a small airplane in the spring of 2002. My airplane suffered a potentially serious systems failure during the flight. In piston powered aircraft, the electrical ignition system (called a magneto system) is life-critical. Aircraft engineers consider the magneto system so crucial that they design each engine with two redundant, independent magnetos. If one magneto fails, the other seamlessly takes over. In fact, these dually redundant systems are so effective that a pilot will not even know if one of the magnetos failed in mid-flight until he’s back on the ground doing a routine inspection of his airplane!
Well that’s what happened to me on my flight in 2002. My left magneto gave out and I continued flying using only the right magneto. There are no instruments on board to indicate if one of the magnetos fail. The failure is usually discovered after landing. The airplane flies just fine on one magneto as long as the other magneto is working. That is by design.
How did I eventually realize I had a left magneto failure? After I landed, I took a break, then prepared to take off again. I went through a routine procedure to check out the airplane’s airworthiness.
I started the engine and followed several procedures on my check list. I then got to the part on the checklist where I separately test the integrity of each magneto. I shut off one magneto and leave the other on.
“Engine 1800 RPM: check!”
“Right magneto: check!”
“Left magneto: Whoa! Holy smokes!”
The engine practically cut off during the left magneto check. There are no instruments to indicate a mid-flight magneto failure. Such system failures are detected after landing. Thus, I had previously been flying through the air blissfully unaware of the left magneto failure. “Ignorance is bliss”. Ha! As I came to the realization that I had been flying on only one magneto, I had visions of what might have happened had the right magneto also failed, visions of me having to fly the airplane with a dead engine, and visions of me gliding the airplane to a safe landing in someone’s backyard…(ah, but I digress)….
What does this have to do with biology and Darwinism? One way Darwinists conclude something is evolutionary junk, a vestigial feature, or an otherwise useless biological artifact is to apply “knock-out” experiments on an organism. If a piece of the organism is knocked out, and the organism still functions well and is otherwise “fit”, then the knocked-out piece is deemed useless, an evolutionary leftover, junk, or even bad design.
What’s wrong with such logic you ask? Well allow me to clarify. Imagine if one applies this line of reasoning to the architecture of a magneto-fired airplane engine:
We knocked out the left magneto system on Airplane X and determined the airplane flies just as well without it. We knocked out the right magneto system on Airplane Y and determined the airplane flies just as well without it. We conclude therefore from these knockout experiments that neither the left magneto nor the right magneto have any functional significance since the airplanes were clearly fit without them. Magnetos are therefore unneeded vestigial artifacts, junk, and evidence poor design, totally useless to the airplane. Furthermore this is further evidence that airplanes are made by blind watchmakers.
Think I’m kidding, and evolutionary biologists don’t make these kinds of obviously bad inferences?
See:
Minimal genome should be twice the size, study shows
“Previous attempts to work out the minimal genome have relied on deleting individual genes in order to infer which genes are essential for maintaining life,” said Professor Laurence Hurst from the Department of Biology and Biochemistry at the University of Bath.
“This knock out approach misses the fact that there are alternative genetic routes, or pathways, to the production of the same cellular product.
When you knock out one gene, the genome can compensate by using an alternative gene.
But when you repeat the knock out experiment by deleting the alternative, the genome can revert to the original gene instead.
Using the knock-out approach you could infer that both genes are expendable from the genome because there appears to be no deleterious effect in both experiments.”
Knockout experiments have also been used to argue “junk DNA” is junk. This is out rightly bad science, but it persists because of Darwinist’s eagerness to close their eyes to design and paint various artifacts in biology as the product of a clumsy blind watchmaker rather than an intelligent designer.
The strategy of using several different means to achieve a particular goal where each of the individual means is sufficient by itself to achieve the goal is used in many engineered systems to ensure that the goal will be achieved, even if one or more of the means fail. For example, the space shuttle’s on-board inertial guidance system, consists of five redundant computers!
How does this relate to biology and intelligent design? Let me quote geneticist Michael Denton in his book Nature’s Destiny:
It now appears that a considerable number of genes, perhaps even the majority in higher organisms, are completely or at least partially redundant. One of the major pieces of evidence that this it the case has come from so-called gene knockout experiments, where a gene is effectively disabled in some way using genetic-engineering techniques so that it cannot play its normal role in the organism’s biology. A classic example of this came when a gene coding for a large complex protein known as Tenascin-C, which occurs in the extra cellular matrix of all vertebrates, was knocked out in mice, without any obvious effect. As the author of a paper commenting on this surprising result cautions: “It would be premature to conclude that [the protein] has no important function …[as] it is conserved in every vertebrate species, which argues strongly for a fundamental role.” The protein product of the Zeste gene in the fruit fly drosophila, which is a component of certain multi-protein complexes involved in transcribing regions of the DNA, can also be knocked out without any obvious effect on the very processes in which it is known to function.
The phenomenon of redundant genes is so widespread that it is already acknowledge to pose something of an evolutionary conundrum. Although in the words of the author of one recent article, “true genetic redundancy ought to be, in an evolutionary sense, impossible or at least unlikely,” partially redundant genes are common. As another authority comments in recent review article: “Arguments over whether there can be true redundancy are moot for the experimentalist. The question is how the functions for partially redundant genes can be discovered given that partial redundancy is the rule.
And it seems increasingly that it is not only individual genes that are redundant, but rather that the phenomenon may be all-pervasive in the development of higher organisms, existing at every level from individual genes to the most complex developmental processes. For example, individual nerve axons, like guided missiles or migrating birds, are guided to their targets by a number of different and individually redundant mechanisms and clues. The development of the female sexual organ, the vulva, in the nematode provides perhaps the most dramatic example to date of redundancy exploited as a fail-safe device at the very highest level. A detailed description of the mechanism of formation of the nematode vulva is beyond the scope of this chapter, suffice it to say that the organ is generated by means of two quite different developmental mechanism, either of which is sufficient by itself to generate a perfect vulva.
It seems increasingly likely that redundancy will prove to be universally exploited in many key aspects of the development of higher organisms, for precisely the same reason it is utilized in many other areas–as a fail safe mechanism to ensure that developmental goals are achieved with what amounts to a virtually zero error rate.
Now, this phenomenon poses an additional challenge to the idea that organisms can be radically transformed as a result of a succession of small independent changes, as Darwinian theory supposes. For it means that if an advantageous change is to occur, in an organ system such as the nematode vulva, which is specified in two completely different ways, then this will of necessity require simultaneous changes in both blueprints. In other words, the greater the degree of redundancy, the greater the need for simultaneous mutation to effect evolutionary change and the more difficult it is to believe that evolutionary change could have been engineered without intelligent direction.
Denton describes what I call contingency designs. It should be hopefully obvious that contingency designs are exactly the kinds of designs that are hard pressed to be created via natural selection. How does one evolve a contingency design when the primary design functions just as well? If a creature mutates a failure into a life-critical primary system, it will more likely be selectively eliminated before it can evolve a fully functioning backup system!
ID’s explanatory filter is therefore a potentially more effective tool at identifying designs which elude Darwinian style tests (such as knockout experiments) for functionality. ID’s explanatory filter looks for possible functionality by identifying specified complexity in biological artifacts which may not evidence any immediate effect on the organism if the biological artifact is knocked out.
I will pursue this more perhaps in another post, but I point out, IBM may have unwittingly detected designs which would otherwise elude the fitness test. See:
Invasion of the IBM engineers
The ability of the Explanatory Filter to identify designs in biology which Darwinists would sooner perceive as an accident and which will elude “fitness tests” is another reason I believe ID will prevail as the proper scientific framework for investigating biology.
The Explanatory Filter may very well succeed in identifying places to look for design which may have otherwise been easily overlooked. I will post on this more, but in the meantime in case you’ve missed it, here is my essay on a related topic: How IDers can win the war
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41 Responses to Airplane magnetos, contingency designs, and reasons ID will prevail
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Chris –
It depends on what you mean by “evolution”. If evolution is merely the change in organisms from generation to generation, then I count myself an evolutionist to the highest degree! There’s nothing more interesting in biology than the way organisms adapt to their environments, and then transmit those adaptations to their offspring.
If on the other hand, you mean by “evolution” any or all of (a) everything descends from a small set of unicellular common ancestors, (b) there are no final causes in biology, (c) happenstance changes are the substrate of beneficial change in a large search space, and possibly other atelic notions that have become dogma in biology which states that these systems can come into existance on their own, then I am anti-evolution.
As I’ve pointed out before, I think that your own positions may be closer to ID than you think, and you have simply been sold on the mantra that “ID isn’t science” and have taken that as a basic fact, rather than investigated what it is that ID says and how closely it matches your own thoughts.
Noone that I have ever met has had any problems with the experimental results of evolutionary biology (and I’m a fairly fundamentalist Creationist who hangs out with some people even more fundamentalist than myself). The issue is this — where is all of this information to guide change coming from? It is evident for many that it must necessarily come from higher-order designs and plans, not self-built from lower-order designs or non-designs that happen on fortuitous variations. Such a thing is the equivalent of a propetual motion machine for information.
Brains.
It’s my understanding that DNA is classified as junk for theoretical reasons, not observational reasons. Can anyone else comment on this?
Does anyone know the source for Mayr’s figures? Who made these estimates, and what were they based upon?
I made a stupid comment. There clearly are many redundant systems, even at the DNA level: e.g. multiple copies of rRNA genes etc. But I am not convinced yet that this redundancy cannot be explained from a functional point of view (i.e. NS). Here’s some anecdotal evidence: an uncle of mine lost one kidney by the horns of a bull. Yet he lived because he had a second one (but sadly he later died from cancer in the remaining kidney). True story.
Quite a bit of junk DNA will of course turn out to be functional too (it’s a one-way street), but roughly 50% of human DNA supposedly consists of the remnants of transposible elements (TEs), “selfish” DNA (see Mung’s comment) that spreads by inserting copies of itself all over the genome. Quite functional (i.e. NS) from the viewpoint of the TE itself, but bad for the organism. That stuff is worse than junk from the individual point of view, but of course not from the TE’s point of view.
“roughly 50% of human DNA supposedly consists of the remnants of transposible elements (TEs), “selfish†DNA (see Mung’s comment) that spreads by inserting copies of itself all over the genome.”
The “selfish” DNA hypothesis is a nice story, but like most such stories, simply isn’t consistent with the facts. Transposable elements are used by the genome for many purposes, including function modulation and whole-genome resstructuring.
A good paper against the “selfish” DNA hypothesis:
On the Roles of Repetitive DNA Elements in the Context of a Unified Genomic–Epigenetic System
A good paper on how transposable elements are used by cells in very beneficial ways:
Transposable elements as the key to a 21st century view of evolution
Basically, transposable elements are tied to the circuitry of the cell’s genetic engineering system, and are used to help in the manufacture of novel genetic variation.
Transposons are often activated in times of stress, and help the genome re-engineer itself to recover from the stress. Transposons contained entire packets of function that can be quickly mobilized and distributed to the locations in the genome where it is needed.
The view of the genome that you are espousing (and what is being taught in schools) is both 15 years out-of-date and was based on arguments from ignorance when they originated. In fact, the modern view of transposons as “controlling elements” was that which was expressed by the scientist who found them, Barbara McClintock. IIRC they wouldn’t even let her publish her findings because they were so at odds with the view of biology at the time. Finally, after her work was finally recognized, they were relabelled “selfish DNA” to avoid the obviously telic implications of a functionally structured genome. And this label unfortunately persists despite mounds of evidence to the contrary.
johhnyb: I don’t think the view that transposons are “selfish” elements is as out of date as you suggest. The Sternberg paper you refer to seems to be mostly ignored by other scientists (5 citations in 4 years). Here’s the abstract from a paper in Trends in Genetics (Vinogradov 2003, #19, p609-614) which cites the Sternberg review:
“Notwithstanding an average evolutionary increase of genome size in the higher plants due to activity of transposable elements, threatened plant species (those that are now on the brink of extinction) are shown here to have on average larger genomes than their more secure relatives, which indicates that redundant DNA in the plant genome might increase the likelihood of extinction. The effect is (at least partially) independent of the duration of the plant’s life cycle. Polyploidy is found not to be associated with the increased risk of extinction. These data agree with the hypothesis of ‘selfish’ DNA and indicate an antagonism between different selection levels, thereby supporting the concept of hierarchical selection.”
“As I’ve pointed out before, I think that your own positions may be closer to ID than you think, and you have simply been sold on the mantra that “ID isn’t science—
Not really I read most of Darwin’s Black Box and a lot of Discovery Institue articles before I’d even heard of the NCSE etc. My problem is similar to David Heddle’s, he says:
“I will accept ID as science when I read something like this:
A scientist at (some respected research university) has been awarded a grant to do experiment X. ID predicts the result of the experiment will be Y. Non-ID predicts the result will be Z.
And don’t tell me this cannot happen because the secular scientific community would never allow it. I was a practicing scientist before I was a believer, and we never had any secret meetings where we discussed our true agenda of destroying Christianity in the guise of science.
Predictions such as We will never discover an evolutionary pathway for (whatever) or We will never detect a parallel universe are interesting and important, but they are not examples of predictability arising from a full-fledged scientific theory.”
“Such a thing is the equivalent of a propetual motion machine for information.”
I’d appriciate any links people can give me where the relationship between evolution, biology and information theory is explianed. Preferably not one where people calculate the probability of entire proteins forming spontaneously out of random combinations of amino acids etc. Im particularly interested in how things like changes in regulation are covered, and how small changes in the genotype that cause large changes in genotype are treated in the context of information. Also something that deals with natural selections branching/pruning would be very interesting.
“The view of the genome that you are espousing (and what is being taught in schools) is both 15 years out-of-date and was based on arguments from ignorance when they originated.”
As I have said before what is taught in school is always out of date and it is certainly a state of affairs that needs remedying. Im not sure what it has to do with ID though, it certainly isn’t a scheme to stop people questioning evolution, as if what scientists know now somehow weakens the theory. Personally I would have loved to have learned about evodevo, plasticity, epigenetics etc, but it will probably be a long time before these things are taught in high school, which is a shame.
Predictions such as We will never discover an evolutionary pathway for (whatever) or We will never detect a parallel universe are interesting and important, but they are not examples of predictability arising from a full-fledged scientific theory.â€Â
Bull! The classic prediction of Darwinian evolution that would falsify it is finding human and dinosaur fossils together in the same strata. In fact it was the basis of a famous hoax where some scientists carefully staged just such a fossil discovery to tease the YECs. -ds
“A scientist at (some respected research university) has been awarded a grant to do experiment X. ID predicts the result of the experiment will be Y. Non-ID predicts the result will be Z.”
Do Centrioles Generate a Polar Ejection Force
N and P elements in V(D)J recombination have the purpose of structurally and functionally stabilizing proteins made from bags of pieces (last abstract in the proceedings, titled Metaprogramming and Genomics).
I don’t know if the former has a grant, and I know personally that the second one does not, ID is making predictions.
Now, out of curiosity, if you apply your same reasoning to evolution, does the same thing happen? Do you have questions which say “the evolutionary prediction is X and the non-evolutionary prediction is Y”? I’m talking about _before_ the experiment is run, not afterwards.
“I’d appriciate any links people can give me where the relationship between evolution, biology and information theory is explianed.”
It’s a large subject, but I would start with the following papers:
Biological Function and the Genetic Code are Interdependent
Chance and Necessity Do Not Explain the Origin of Life
The Origin of Life on Earth and Shannon’s Theory of Communication (I haven’t read it, but I’ve also heard good things about Information Theory, Evolution, and The Origin of Life)
Three subsets of sequence complexity and their relevance to biopolymeric information
Searching Large Spaces
Evolutionary Computation: A Perpetual Motion Machine for Design Information? (lay article)
Darwinism vs. Teleology in Genomic Change (my own lay article — the part you are probably interested in starts with “The Nature of Computational Systems and Programs”)
“Preferably not one where people calculate the probability of entire proteins forming spontaneously out of random combinations of amino acids etc. Im particularly interested in how things like changes in regulation are covered, and how small changes in the genotype that cause large changes in genotype are treated in the context of information. Also something that deals with natural selections branching/pruning would be very interesting.”
While I don’t _remember_ those articles using spontaneous protein generation as the explicit model to refute, I know they all at least have other interesting focuses. The small changes in genotype causing large changes in phenotype are covered in my lay article, which I may try to publish some papers on parts of it. As far as branching/pruning, I would just say that it’s not hugely relevant.
In light of Dembski’s “Searching Large Spaces”, you should read Chance Favors the Prepared Genome, especially this: “A genome’s ability to grow and to explore new organizational structures would be severely constrained, if its options were limited to simple point mutation…most organisms tolerate only relatively low levels of point mutation in a gneeration. Instead they have evolved mechanisms that generate multiple sequence changes in a single step, allowing them to bypass unselected neutral, and negatively selected, sequences that may lie on point mutation pathways between the current sequence and a more optimal sequence. Indeed, where genomic sequences have been available to provide a window into the evolution of a new gene, the series of steps revealed has been complex.”
Also less relevant, but still somewhat on topic, see my own discussion of irreducible complexity.
There are subtlties and corrections that should be considered to my original posting. I thank Dr. Ricardo Acevedo for his constructive criticisms and suggestions:
Pleas visit:
http://newtonsbinomium.blogspo.....urdum.html
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