|
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
a speculation as to how the system could function at all if even one of its molecular cogs were removed. When light first strikes the retina a photon interacts with a molecule called 11- cis -retinal, which rearranges within picoseconds [a picosecond is about the time light takes to cross the width of a human hair] to trans -retinal. The change in the shape of the retinal molecule forces a change in the shape of the protein rhodopsin, to which the retinal is tightly bound. The protein's metamorphosis alters its behavior. Now called metarhodopsin II, the protein sticks to another protein, called transducin. Before bumping into metarhodopsin II, transducin had tightly bound a small molecule called GDP. But when transducin interacts with metarhodopsin II, the GDP falls off, and a molecule called GTP binds to transducin. Concluding, after three long, intervening paragraphs of similar intricacy: Trans -retinal eventually falls off rhodopsin and must be reconverted to 11- cis -retinal and again bound by rhodopsin to get back to the starting point for another visual cycle. To accomplish this, trans -retinal is first chemically modified by an enzyme called trans -retinol a form containing two more hydrogen atoms. A second enzyme then converts the molecule to 11- cis -retinol. Finally, a third enzyme removes the previously added hydrogen atoms to form 11- cis -retinal, a cycle is complete. 36 The retinal site is now ready to receive its next photon. Behe gives similarly comprehensive accounts of such mechanisms as blood clotting and the intracellular transport system, where the functions of all the components and their interaction with the whole are known in detail, and contends that only purposeful ordering can explain them. In comparison, vague, less precisely definable factors such as anatomical similarities, growth of embryos, bird lineages, or the forms of horses become obsolete and irrelevant, more suited to discussion in Victorian drawing rooms. The response from the evolutionists to these kinds of revelations has been almost complete silence. In a survey of thirty textbooks of biochemistry that Behe conducted, out of a total of 145,000 index entries, just 138 referred to evolution. Thirteen of the textbooks made no mention of the subject at all. As Behe notes, "No one at Harvard University, no one at the National Institutes of Health, no member of the National Academy of Sciences, no Nobel Page 29 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html prize winner no one at all can give a detailed account of how the cilium, or vision, or blood clotting, or any other complex biochemical process might have developed in a Darwinian fashion." 37 Behe unhesitatingly sees design as the straightforward conclusion that follows from the evidence itself not from sacred books or sectarian beliefs. He likens those who refuse to see it to detectives crawling around a body lying crushed flat and examining the floor with magnifying glasses for clues, while all the time ignoring the elephant standing next to the body because they have been told to "get their man." In the same way, Behe contends, mainstream science remains doggedly blind to the obvious because it has fixated on finding only naturalistic answers. The simplest and most obvious reason why living systems should show over and over again all the signs of having been designed is that they were. Acknowledging the Alternative: Intelligent Design Others whom we have mentioned, such as Denton, Hoyle, Spetner, express similar sentiments not through any prior convictions but purely from considerations of the scientific evidence. Interest in intelligent design has been spreading in recent years to include not just scientists but also mathematicians, information theoreticians, philosophers, and others dissatisfied with the Darwinian theory or opposed to the materialism that it implies. Not surprisingly, it attracts those with religious interpretations too, including fundamentalists who insist on a literal acceptance of Genesis. But it would be a mistake to characterize the whole movement by one constituent group with extreme views in a direction that isn't really relevant, as many of its opponents try to do in the same way that it would be to belittle the notion of extraterrestrial intelligence because UFO abduction believers happen to subscribe to it. As Phillip Johnson says, "ID is a big tent" that accommodates many diverse acts. All that's asserted is that the evidence indicates a creative intelligence of some kind. In itself, the evidence says nothing about the nature of such an intelligence nor what its purpose, competence, state of mind, or inclination to achieve what we think it should, might be. The argument is sometimes put forward that examples of the apparent lack of perfection in some aspects of biological function and adaptation mean that they couldn't be the work of a supreme, all-wise, all-knowing creator. This has always struck me as curious grounds for scientists to argue on, since notions of all-perfect creators were inventions of opponents more interested in devising means for achieving social control and obedience to ruling authorities than interpreting scientific evidence. Wrathful gods who pass judgments on human actions and mete out rewards or retribution make ideal moral traffic policemen, and it seems to be only a matter of time (I put it at around 200 300 years) before religions founded perhaps on genuine insights for all I know are taken over by opportunists and sell out to, or are coopted by, the political power structure. In short, arguments are made for the reality of some kind of creative intelligence; human social institutions find that fostering belief in a supreme moral judge is to their advantage. Nothing says that the two have to be one and the same. If the former is real, there's no reason why it needs to possess attributes of perfection and infallibility that are claimed for the latter. Computers and jet planes are products of intelligence, but nobody imagines them to be perfect. Those who are persuaded by religious interpretations insist on the need for a perfect God to hand down the absolute moral standards which they see as the purpose in creating the world and then go into all kinds of intellectual convolutions trying to explain why the world clearly isn't perfect. I simply think that if such an intelligence exists it would do things for its reasons Page 30 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html not ours, and I don't pretend to know what they might be although I could offer some possibilities. An analogy that I sometimes use is to imagine the characters in a role-playing game getting complex enough to become aware that they were in an environment they hadn't created, and which they figure couldn't have created itself. Their attempts to explain the reason for it all could only be framed in terms of the world that they know, that involves things like finding treasures and killing monsters. They could have no concept of a software writer creating the game to meet a specification and hold down a [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |
Odnośniki
|