Download Irreducible Complexity and Michael Behe

Irreducible Complexity and Michael Behe
Do Biochemical Machines Show Intelligent Design?
Other Links:
Molecular Machines: Experimental Support for
the Design Inference
Michael Behe presents a briefer version
of the argument from design that
appears in his book.
Behe's Empty Box
This web page contains many links to
web pages supporting or criticizing
Behe's work.
American Scientist Review of
Black Box
In this American Scientist magazine
book review, Yale biologist Robert
Dorit identifies six fallacies that plague
Behe's book.
Darwin v. Intelligent
Design (Again)
Biologist H. Allen Orr scathingly
critiques Behe's book.
Boston Review:
Articles on
Evolution
A number of articles and reviews
written by people with several opinions
of Behe's book appear here.
The
Evolution
of
Vertebrate
Blood
Clotting
Dr. Kenneth Miller lays out a simple
and plausible evolutionary pathway for
the vertebrate blood clotting cascade,
one of Behe's touted examples of an
"irreducibly complex" system.
n 1996, the Free Press published a book by Lehigh University biochemist and
intelligent design advocate Michael Behe called Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical
Challenge to Evolution. The book's central thesis is that many biological systems are
"irreducibly complex" at the molecular level. Behe gives the following definition of
irreducible complexity:
By irreducibly complex I mean a single system composed of several well-matched,
interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the
parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning. An irreducibly complex system
cannot be produced directly (that is, by continuously improving the initial function, which
continues to work by the same mechanism) by slight, successive modifications of a
precursor system, because any precursor to an irreducibly complex system that is missing a
part is by definition nonfunctional. An irreducibly complex biological system, if there is
such a thing, would be a powerful challenge to Darwinian evolution. (p. 39)
Although the argument from irreducible complexity is essentially a rehash of the famously
flawed watchmaker argument advanced by William Paley at the start of the 19th century,
Behe's book has attracted a great deal of attention from creationists and non-creationists
alike. The articles collected here address the claims made by Behe in his book.
The Mullerian Two-Step: Add a part, make it necessary (or, Why Behe's "Irreducible
Complexity" is Silly)
A simple and concise explanation for why the anti-evolutionary argument from
"irreducibly complexity" is flawed — gradual evolution by natural selection readily
evolves "irreducibly complex" structures.
Darwin's Black Box: Irreducible Complexity or Irreproducible Irreducibility?
Keith Robison reviews Michael Behe's book Darwin's Black Box, which claims that
many biological systems are "irreducibly complex" — that in order to evolve,
multiple parts would have to arise simultaneously. But is it true?
Publish or Perish: Some Published Works on Biochemical Evolution
This list of papers has been collected in response to Michael Behe's claim that the
scientific literature is virtually silent on the topic of molecular evolution.
Behe's Criticism of Evolution in Biochemistry Textbooks
In addition to claiming that the scientific literature devotes no time to questions of
molecular evolution, Michael Behe has also said that the same is true of college
biochemistry textbooks. Here, the author of some of the textbooks Behe has
reviewed demonstrates this claim to be false.
Is the Complement System Irreducibly Complex?
One of the molecular assemblages that Michael Behe claims is "irreducibly
complex" is the complement system, an arm of the vertebrate immune system so
named because it "complements" the effect of antibodies. This essay outlines the
functioning of the complement system and undercuts Behe's argument by showing
that simpler yet still functional versions of it exist in nature.
More articles about irreducible complexity and
intelligent design can be found at the sister site of The
Talk.Origins Achive, Talkdesign.org: Critically
Examining the "Intelligent Design" Movement:
Irreducible Complexity Demystified
This FAQ shows that molecular evolution is much too flexible for IC to be an
obstacle, shows that Behe's argument is fallacious, and using Venus' flytrap shows
that the mousetrap analogy is misleading.
Evolving Immunity A Response to
Chapter 6 of Darwin's Black Box
Reviews immune systems of various animals and finds that their complexity is not
the intractable problem that Behe would have us believe.
Evolution in (Brownian) Space:
A Model For the Origin of the
Bacterial Flagellum
Michael Behe, William Dembski, and other intelligent design advocates claim that
the bacterial flagellum is too complex to have evolved. This article proposes a
possible step-by-step model for the evolution of the flagellum. This article is rather
technical and thus has a background file that links to introductory material, articles
by intelligent design advocates on the flagellum, and rebuttals to their arguments.
Two documents in this Archive have a subsection
addressing Behe's claims about irreducibly complex
features:
Applying the Method to Nature: Irreducible
Complexity
Discusses how Behe's fellow intelligent design advocate William Dembski uses
irreducibly complex arguments in his book No Free Lunch. Part of Not a Free
Lunch But a Box of Chocolates.
Suboptimality and Irreducible
Complexity
Discusses the implications of suboptimal biological features on Behe's argument.
Part of 29+ Evidences for Macroevolution.
The Quote Mine Project examines some of the quotes
used by Dr. Behe.
Orr and Coyne unexpectedly find that there is
little evidence for the neo-Darwinian view
John McDonald thinks that research on the
genetic basis of adaptation has led to a great
Darwinian paradox
Behe, Darwin's Black Box, and irreducible complexity
are the subject of two winning posts and one runnerup post of the Post of the Month contest of the
talk.origins newsgroup which are archived in this web
site.
February 1997: Behe and the Blood Clotting
Cascade
December 1999: Behe, the Krebs
Cycle, and Models of Origins of
Complex Biochemical Structures
October 2003 runner-up: Why
Behe's Black Box Is Empty
September 2006:
Irreducible Complexity
as an Evolutionary
Prediction
This Archive also has a copy of Behe's testimony at
the Kansas Evolution Hearings and his trial testimony
at Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District et al.
Short rebuttals to many arguments made by Behe and
other intelligent-design advocates can be found at the
molecular biology and detecting design sections of an
Index to Creationist Claims.