In such case, I would hope a degree of skepticism would be in order.

Regarding the Original Point by Pav, let me add, I can’t see a single case where the neo-Darwinian view has added to medical knowledge any more than what an ID view would have done. There are examples of it being hurtful.

One has to admit that this is a strange virus. Magic Johnson was diagnosed with HIV back in 1992, cutting short his career. He seems perfectly fine when I see him commenting on NBA games 15 years later. That’s some kind of virus.

Here’s something that was written in in support of an article by Duesberg written in 1990. It’s quite interesting:

“The poor quality of scientific thinking leads to shabby behavior in the conference halls and journals. A theory that is poorly grounded has to defend itself form it critics on the basis of sneer and insult, for it has no honorable weapons of debate.

Now, having failed to rise to the challenge to their theory by scientists such as Duesberg in the scientific papers, defenders of the HIV theory complain that criticisms of it has been made available to the public. This will, we are told, undermine confidence in public health measures designed to protect the general population.”

Judge Jones wouldn’t agree more with the last sentence.

You will see that I specified Darwinism—shall we call it the Modern Synthesis—as RM+NS. While this theory includes things other than SNP’s, such as recombination, and gene duplication, it does not, to my knowledge, include anything at the chromosomal level—and I’m speaking here of theoretical explanations backed up with some kind of mathematical structure. Once we move beyond such structured explanations, it seems, we’re dealing with no more than mere conjecture.

Also, if you read closely, you will see that I, along with Behe, accept a certain measure of Darwinism/Modern Synthesis. My entire point is that dogged attachment to a theory that is correct only to a small degree, resulting in its application to the n-th degree, is counterproductive to true science. Duesberg makes this point when he says that, more or less, Darwinism has led us down the “wrong path” for 35 years.

In other words, the stakes are high; cancer is a serious disease; and religious obsession, or just plain, old reactionism, can prove harmful.

Let me add that a few years ago, in a paper by Prum and Brush, the authors almost sorrowfully reported that after years and years of trying to come up with an explanation for the evolution of feathers via the Modern Synthesis, that it appeared that Darwinian explanations had not only been unable to provide a convincing explanation, but that they had actually gotten in the way of coming up with an explanation. (They, of course, remain Darwinists.)

While Duesberg apparently wants to couch his understanding of aneuploidy in Darwinian language—which is most likely completely wrong—at least he’s recognizing the importance of chromosomal rearrangements: something that Richard Goldschmidt was writing about in 1940. So, maybe Darwinism has been leading down the “wrong path” for 67 years.

Again, I just cannot understand where you’re getting this from. Duesberg is arguing that it is not the case that you need to mess up only a few genes to get cancer. Instead, he argues that you need to mess up a lot of the genome at once, through loss of chromosomal stability. Neither of these hypotheses is incompatible with Darwinism, and fervent belief Darwinism would not really lead you to believe one over the other.

Nullasalus and DaveScot have tried to zoom out and make a point about the bigger picture, and that’s relatively fine, but the claim you are making here is simply a non-starter.

I chimed in with my own view on what links the OP’s content to ID, and I’ve been consistent in those remarks. PaV has just chimed in more or less saying as much, I believe – the case illustrates the value of welcoming a variety of opinions to the table, unpopular or not.

You’ve been telling me that whatever the case, ID’s scientific claims are not vindicated by Duesberg’s case, while Darwinism (whatever that means – the definition always shifts) is not harmed by it. That’s fine – but I’ve not been arguing those points at all. Given PaV’s response, I don’t even think that was the OP’s argument at this point. It’s just one more example of how going against the grain may prove fruitful for science and research, and why tolerance for alternative, even unpopular views is an asset, not a liability.

In 1995, 12 articles were published by dissenters in the journal Genetica (Genetica 1995). Three were written by Duesberg, two by the Perth group of researchers, and two by Root-Bernstein. They formed the basis of the book AIDS: Virus or Drug Induced, published the following year (Duesberg 1996c). In addition to the papers cited above, it included articles and papers by mathematician Mark Craddock, NIDA researcher Harry Haverkos, Lauritsen, Nobel prize winner Kary Mullis (the inventor of PCR), Yale math professor Serge Lang, public health professor Gordon Stewart, and journalist Celia Farber.

Even if the dissent is wrong, it would be hard to argue those involved are crackpots.

Nobel Prize winner Mullis:

We have not been able to discover any good reasons why most of the people on earth believe that AIDS is a disease caused by a virus called HIV. There is simply no scientific evidence demonstrating that this is true… We know that to err is human, but the HIV/AIDS hypothesis is one hell of a mistake. ” —

Kary Mullis, biochemist, 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry (Mullis 1996)

PNAS Editor Forscher:

“The HIV hypothesis ranks with the ‘bad air’ theory for malaria and the ‘bacterial infection’ theory for beriberi and pellagra [caused by nutritional deficiencies]. It is a hoax that became a scam.” —

Bernard Forscher, former editor of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Hodgkinson 1994b)

“The AIDS thing – the hysteria, the stupidity, the institutional craziness – would all disappear if the fear disappeared. The whole thing is kept together by fear, intimidation, terrorism and brutality.” — David Rasnick, biochemist and protease inhibitor designer (Conlan 1998b)

Given how I’ve seen Darwinian evolution promoted and how it has created harmful medical and social practices, it’s hard not to be skeptical of all sorts of accepted scientific “truths”.

The title of the post gives away entirely the point I was making. It wasn’t my aim to make this, let us say, pro-ID. I find myself being more anti-Darwin than anything else.

We often hear Darwinists telling us that without Darwinism anti-bacterial drugs would never have been discovered; hence, “we owe our very lives to Darwinism”. Well, Behe himself concedes that NS actually does work. He gives Darwin credit for discovering that and making a case for it. But, it has its limits.

This is a case where Darwinism, extended beyond its appropriate reach, can be downright harmful. Duesberg explicitly states that it has taken cancer researchers down the “wrong path”. And for 35 years! The question then is: how many more wrong paths is Darwinism leading us? While Duesberg apparently wants to couch his understanding of aneuploidy in Darwinian language—which is most likely completely wrong—at least he’s recognizing the importance of chromosomal rearrangements: something that Richard Goldschmidt was writing about in 1940. So, maybe Darwinism has been leading down the “wrong path” for 67 years. That’s my hunch.

Gasp!
What about Spiderman?!

If researchers have only been following mutations alone in their research then they have not been following the NDE paradigm and can be criticized for not being true Darwinists.

What Dave Scot has said above and Behe discusses in detail in his book, is that these random variations seldom if ever produce anything good. All NDE seems to do is guide the species to extinction. So to be a true Darwinist, a researcher must examine all roads to extinction.

The origin of variety in the alleles of a species is beyond the NDE paradigm to create and one must look elsewhere for the source of the incredible variety in every species. But for the end of a species, NDE is an excellent place to look.

Leaving aside the merits of your case, let me just point out that you are responding to something I never said. I wasn’t talking about an issue of free speech; I was talking about whether the claims of Duesburg supported ID. They don’t.

To SeekandFind,

Yes, PJ’s HIV denialism makes him a crank in that respect (as well).

To DaveScot,

I’m not surprised that you are skeptical of the HIV/AIDS connection, since you seem to be enjoy taking the oddball view for its own sake. To repeat your own (extraordinarily chilling) word to AIDS victims, I’m sure this behavior is thrilling and the thrill is a reward but you don’t have any right to complain if you get hurt doing it.