Stephen Meyer reflects further here on critiques of his book Darwin’s Doubt by biologist Nick Matzke. This really is pretty devastating.
Matzke thinks he has found the “missing ancestors” for the Cambrian animals. How? By employing the method of cladistic analysis — which, however, presupposes for the history of life the model of a branching tree terminating at a common ancestor. The presupposition if accepted guarantees that the Cambrian creatures emerged from ancestral forms. But obviously, Meyer points out, you can’t prove a conclusion using an argument that takes the conclusion itself as a given! The point seems to elude even bright guys like Nick Matzke
No doubt Dr. Matzke will have some flip reply, as here:
@d_klinghoffer You guys should really try learning about phylogenetics before talking about it. Try http://t.co/YrlmT9uueb #IDerrors
— Nick Matzke (@NickJMatzke) August 14, 2014
I would be more interested in a substantive response.
Meanwhile this video, before we’ve even announced it, is already piling up the angry, obscene comments from the online Darwin defense force. See the page on YouTube if you’ve got a strong stomach for that kind of thing.
I was about to report them as abusive, but then I thought no, it’s actually instructive on how science and culture are porous to each other. I’ve never seen an angry, obscene defense of intelligent design. From the Darwin faithful, those are a dime a dozen.
Why do you think that is?