A Refutation of God-Directed Evolution, the Bible and the BASF - 4
Not so Intelligent Design – Mistakes in Nature
Given this, how do CVA’s assertions stand up to scrutiny? Their claim that “Consensus evolutionary science will never appeal to intelligence, design or purpose to explain how life developed upon this earth, even though such a hypothesis is entirely rational given the astounding witness of creation” is clearly nonsense. While there is no need as many scientists have done to a priori exclude supernatural claims from scientific investigation, the fact that consistently supernatural claims about natural phenomena have been replaced by natural explanations and creationists are either reluctant to publish in mainstream journals or bypass critical peer review and resort either to the popular press or creationist pseudojournals gives mainstream science little reason to “appeal to intelligence, design or purpose” to explain how the diversity of life on earth has appeared.
CVA’s bold declaration that intelligent design is “entirely rational given the astounding witness of creation” shows again the poverty of their research. While there is no doubt that evolutionary processes have been able to effect elegant solutions, the fact it is a blind process that does not look ahead but selects only for what works at the moment has resulted in considerable instances of poor design that cannot sustain the idea of intelligent design. I referred to this in passing, but specific examples include
* The inverted vertebrate retina which is objectively inferior when compared with the non-inverted cephalopod retina but which predisposes us to considerable morbidity.[1]
* The wasteful path of the recurrent laryngeal nerve which makes a pointless detour past the larynx into the chest before returning to innervate its target.[2]
* The connection of food and air passages in humans that increases the risk of choking.[3]
* The length of the oviduct which increases the risk of ectopic pregnancies which if untreated result in death.[4]
* The formation of the pancreas from two, rather than one structure which can result in the creation of a ring pancreas that can construct the duodenum causing gut obstruction.[5],[6]
* Passage of testes from internal to external position which results in an abdominal wall weak spot[7], and if fails can result in cryptorchidism[8] which increases the risk of infertility and testicular germ cell tumours.[9]
* Presence of the vestigial yolk sac, a remnant from our egg-laying past[10] which while secondarily repurposed as a site of embryonic haemopoiesis can persist as Meckel’s diverticulum, which can result in inflammation, perforation, and bleeding[11].
* The human genome, most of which is useless junk such as dead retrotransposable elements, decayed remnants of ancient viral infection, intronic DNA and pseudogenes[12]. More to the point, the human genome is riddled with multiple design flaws which as evolutionary biologist John Avise states “range from de novo mutational glitches that collectively kill or maim countless individuals (including embryos and fetuses) to pervasive architectural flaws (including pseudogenes, parasitic mobile elements, and needlessly baroque regulatory pathways) that are endogenous in every human genome. Gross imperfection at the molecular level presents a conundrum for the traditional paradigms of natural theology as well as for recent assertions of ID, but it is consistent with the notion of nonsentient contrivance by evolutionary forces.”[13]
This “witness of creation” as Avise points out is a huge problem for the special creationism CVA naively endorses but which is entirely consistent with evolution.
One recurring feature of creationist arguments is a frankly paranoid mindset which imagines the entire scientific world is engaged in a godless conspiracy to suppress special creationism and enforce a naturalistic atheistic agenda in mainstream science. CVA unfortunately engages in this thinking as they continue when they allege
The controversy over creation and evolution stems from the fact that the gatekeepers of most scientific academies and journals today are biased to ensure that their non-theistic version of history – microbes-to-man evolution – is presented as the only show in town. The vast majority of evolutionary scientists are pure Neo-Darwinian evolutionists, and their academic positions and ability to publish papers in the top scientific journals is assured so long as the rationale driving their conclusions remains entirely naturalistic and non-theistic. Even though a number of evolutionary scientists are Christian, for all practical intents and purposes no scientist is allowed to appeal to a creative agent when discussing origins.
One must be honest and call this out for the paranoid conspiratorial thinking that it is. One can readily demonstrate this by substituting believing in a flat earth or vaccine denialism for creationism. One would imagine that even YECs would regard anyone who said scientific journals are controlled by a cabal determined to suppress evidence against the efficacy of vaccines or existence of a flat earth as crazed, yet they allege without providing any credible evidence that the same applies for evolution. As anyone who has been to a journal club or followed the scientific literature realises, scientists are not automatons marching in lock-step mindlessly defending the existing paradigm. Scientific debate is vigorous, often verging on the brutal, and as the acceptance of plate tectonics and the impact theory for the extinction of the dinosaur shows, controversial ideas are eventually accepted if the evidence is there. There is no controversy over evolution in the mainstream scientific community because the evidence for evolution is so compelling that it has not been seriously doubted for over a century, and supernatural explanations for origins have been shown to be not supported by the evidence. CVA also implies that there is a conspiracy to prevent creationists from publishing in the mainstream scientific literature, but as we have seen creationists are able to publish in the mainstream journals, have done so in the past, but much prefer to evade critical scrutiny by publishing in popular books or in their own journals, or legislating to suppress evolution and force creationism into the classrooms.[14]’
“Martyrs for Creationism” – Exposing ‘Expelled – Intelligence Not Allowed”
CVA continues in the same conspiratorial line by alleging that there are many scientists who have been persecuted for doubting evolution, and argues that debate over whether evolution has occurred is suppressed
There are numerous cases of well-reputed scientists being discriminated against and loosing [sic] their academic positions because they publically [sic] doubted the teachings of Neo-Darwanism. [sic] GDE view holders often counter that rigorous debate does take place in the scientific academies, including disputes and discussion over the different possible mechanism of macro-evolution. However, while debate and controversy does occur over the “how” of evolution, no debate is allowed to occur over the “whether” of evolution.
That’s a strong accusation that demands credible evidence. Instead, CVA references a book by Jerry Bergman, a well-known creationist crank. Bergman arguably has a persecution complex, as evidenced by his attempt to sue Bowling Green State University after being denied tenure and dismissed in 1978. Bergman alleged that he was being persecuted for his religious beliefs, but the courts found that the real reason was over ethics and the fact that he claimed to have psychological credentials that he did not have at the time.[15] Appealing to a book by a well-known crank with a vested interest in the subject of “academic persecution” again indicates a strong pattern in CVA’s article of poor research.
The well-work creationist trope of the brave creationist being persecuted for standing up to the Darwinist elite found its full development in the widely-criticised 2008 creationist film Expelled: Intelligence Not Allowed. Christadelphian authors Colin Byrnes and Matthew Jamieson specifically reference this film in their book By One Man as an example of alleged persecution of creationists by mainstream scientists. Typical of the reviews was Roger Ebert’s savaging, where he declared that
This film is cheerfully ignorant, manipulative, slanted, cherry-picks quotations, draws unwarranted conclusions, makes outrageous juxtapositions (Soviet marching troops representing opponents of ID), pussy-foots around religion (not a single identified believer among the ID people), segues between quotes that are not about the same thing, tells bald-faced lies, and makes a completely baseless association between freedom of speech and freedom to teach religion in a university class that is not about religion.[16]
One of the themes of the film was that many creationists have lost careers and been persecuted for rejecting evolution. The reality is however vastly different from what creationists allege. Expelled alleges that Richard Sternberg, Guillermo Gonzalez, Caroline Crocker, Robert Marks, Pamela Winnick, and Michael Egnor were persecuted for their creationist beliefs, but the truth is quite different:
Richard Sternberg: allowed a paper on the Cambrian Explosion by intelligent design proponent Steven Meyer to be inappropriately published in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, a small journal primarily concerned with systematics of which he was the volunteer editor, bypassing peer review in the process. As he was an unpaid Research Associate at the Smithsonian and had already given notice of his intention to retire as editor six months before Meyer’s article was published, it is false to claim that he lost his career because he allowed an article critical of evolution to be published. A lengthy critical review of Meyer’s paper apart from showing how shoddy the paper was pointed out why the journal was the wrong place for Meyer’s article, and showed that Sternberg had a hopeless conflict of interest in vetting the article.
The Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington (PBSW) is a respected, if somewhat obscure, biological journal specializing in papers of a systematic and taxonomic nature, such as the description of new species. A review of issues in evolutionary theory is decidedly not its typical fare, even disregarding the creationist nature of Meyer’s paper. The fact that the paper is both out of the journal’s typical sphere of publication, as well as dismal scientifically, raises the question of how it made it past peer review. The answer probably lies in the editor, Richard von Sternberg. Sternberg happens to be a creationist and ID fellow traveler who is on the editorial board of the Baraminology Study Group at Bryan College in Tennessee. (The BSG is a research group devoted to the determination of the created kinds of Genesis. We are NOT making this up!) Sternberg was also a signatory of the Discovery Institute’s “100 Scientists Who Doubt Darwinism” statement. Given R. v. Sternberg’s creationist leanings, it seems plausible to surmise that the paper received some editorial shepherding through the peer review process. Given the abysmal quality of the science surrounding both information theory and the Cambrian explosion, it seems unlikely that it received review by experts in those fields. One wonders if the paper saw peer review at all.[17]
Expelled Exposed, a website set up to correct the many egregious errors of fact made by Expelled noted in its analysis of the story that
Sternberg did not lose his office or his access to collections, he did not lose his job, he was not “fired” from the (unpaid) editorship of the journal (he had resigned six months before the publication of the Meyer article), and from the e-mails in the appendix to the Souder report, it appears that his colleagues were civil in their communications with him. The Smithsonian renewed his Research Collaborator status for another three years in 2006. It seems, then, that the worst that happened to Sternberg is that people said some unkind things about him in private email to one another. Since the same can be said of almost every person, it’s hard to see how this could be construed as “life ruining”. There is no evidence of any material harm done to Sternberg as a result of the publication of the Meyer article. And any damage done to his reputation would seem to have been self-inflicted.[18]
This is a long way from being persecuted.
Guillermo Gonzalez: the claim that the Iowa State University astronomer was denied tenure because of his belief in intelligent design does not reflect the complex reality of how tenure is granted. In a statement, then-president of Iowa State Gregory Geoffroy said
As part of this decision process, I appointed a member of my staff to conduct a careful and exhaustive review of the appeal request and the full tenure dossier, and that analysis was presented to me. In addition, I conducted my own examination of Dr. Gonzalez's appeal with respect to the evidence of research and scholarship. I independently concluded that he simply did not show the trajectory of excellence that we expect in a candidate seeking tenure in physics and astronomy -- one of our strongest academic programs.
Because the issue of tenure is a personnel matter, I am not able to share the detailed rationale for the decision, although that has been provided to Dr. Gonzalez. But I can outline the areas of focus of my review where I gave special attention to his overall record of scientific accomplishment while an assistant professor at Iowa State, since that gives the best indication of future achievement. I specifically considered refereed publications, his level of success in attracting research funding and grants, the amount of telescope observing time he had been granted, the number of graduate students he had supervised, and most importantly, the overall evidence of future career promise in the field of astronomy.[19]
Being granted tenure depends on a number of factors, some of which Gonzalez did not meet. Writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education Richard Monastersky notes that while Gonzalez’s excellent early career record trailed off after arriving at Iowa State
Under normal circumstances, Mr. Gonzalez’s publication record would be stellar and would warrant his earning tenure at most universities, according to Mr. Hirsch. But Mr. Gonzalez completed the best scholarship, as judged by his peers, while doing postdoctoral work at the University of Texas at Austin and at the University of Washington, where he received his Ph.D. His record has trailed off since then.
“It looks like it slowed down considerably,” said Mr. Hirsch, stressing that he has not studied Mr. Gonzalez’s work in detail and is not an expert on his tenure case. “It’s not clear that he started new things, or anything on his own, in the period he was an assistant professor at Iowa State.”
That pattern may have hurt his case. “Tenure review only deals with his work since he came to Iowa State,” said John McCarroll, a spokesman for the university.
When considering a tenure case, faculty committees try to anticipate what kind of work a professor will accomplish in the future. “The only reason the previous record is relevant is the extent to which it can predict future performance,” said Mr. Hirsch. “Generally, it’s a good indication, but in some cases it’s not.”
David L. Lambert, director of the McDonald Observatory at Texas, supervised Mr. Gonzalez during his postdoctoral fellowship there in the early to mid-1990s. “He was quite productive, one of the better postdocs I’ve had, and I’ve had 20 or 30 over the years,” said Mr. Lambert.
But he is not aware of any important new work by Mr. Gonzalez since he arrived at Iowa State, such as branching off into different directions of research. “I don’t know what else he has done,” Mr. Lambert said, recalling that a few years ago, he reviewed a paper that Mr. Gonzalez had submitted to Reviews of Modern Physics, a leading journal in the field.[20]
Another analysis of his publication history also shows that after early promise, it tailed off
Looking at the graph and the DI’s list of publications, it’s pretty obvious that Gonzalez had a very successful postdoc with a good research group, and that carried over to his first faculty appointment at University of Washington, where he continued to collaborate with his old colleagues from his Ph.D. and postdoc. However, he peaked in 1999, and the decline began even while he was still at the University of Washington. Even more pronounced than the drop in publications is the complete bottom-out in first authorships that is almost sustained throughout his entire probationary period leading up to tenure.
So ISU Physics is stuck with a guy who publishes hardly any papers as primary author, whose publication list contracts once he strikes out on his own, and, perhaps most importantly, who doesn’t publish with new colleagues. New tenure-track investigators are expected to integrate into their departments, and to survive in a funding climate as [poor] as our current one, investigators HAVE to work together. They absolutely MUST take an active role in pursuing one another’s research interests in order to stretch meager funds as far as possible.
Gonzales simply has not done that. And the DI can’t complain that Privileged Planet was responsible for his not being a team player; Gonzalez’s productivity plummet took place before PP was released. He was already treading water at that point. If anything, his output got slightly better after PP, because he at least put out some first author papers. If an investigator can’t collaborate successfully at his or her new institution, he or she needs to network with researchers at other institutions and get papers out, mentor students, and get grants out. Gonzalez already had that network in place, and yet failed to adequately capitalize on it.[21]
Gaining tenure is a difficult process, and while Gonzalez’s public flirtation with the pseudoscience of intelligent design would not help his cause, ultimately his marked drop in publications since arriving at Iowa State University would have been a major factor in not getting tenure. Once again, creationist claims of persecution are hard to credibly sustain.
Caroline Crocker: the allegations that Crocker was immediately dismissed after mentioning intelligent design in her cell biology class at George Mason University and her academic career came to an abrupt end are once again a distortion of what actually happened. The first point to mention was that she had a non-tenure track position which as anyone familiar with hiring practices in universities realises is not a permanent position but offered for a finite period of time. Not being granted a new contract, particularly given the dire state of the academic employment market in the U.S. (and elsewhere) is a simple fact of life for academics.
Crocker was not dismissed immediately after mentioning intelligent design. After the university was made aware of her comments via student complaints, she was allowed to finish her contract and then let go. Given that student ratings are taken into consideration when considering employment, it is hardly surprising that a university would not want to continue employing someone whose endorsement of pseudoscience had resulted in student complaints. Far from having her career ruined, Crocker managed to secure a postdoctoral position at Uniformed Services University in Bethesda, and then after that moved onto promoting intelligent design.
Finally, she did not make a casual remark about intelligent design, but instead repeatedly advanced long-debunked creationist arguments
In the above-mentioned article in the Washington Post, Crocker is described teaching her students a laundry list of discredited Creationist arguments. In a video on the Coral Ridge Ministries site, several of Crocker’s slides are shown. Though it’s not known whether Crocker used the same slides while teaching at George Mason, the Washington Post article provides evidence that they were part of her Northern Virginia Community College lectures. Her use of these slides suggests that Crocker shows either a shocking ignorance of evolutionary science, or a rather shameless willingness to distort the evidence.[22]
Teaching pseudoscience in a science class is bad enough without displaying abysmal knowledge of the subject she was criticising. That alone would be grounds for not renewing the contract. Again, what we have is not a case of persecution, but rather yet another creationist trying to turn the rejection of their attempts to contaminate science teaching into martyrdom.
Robert Marks: the claim that Baylor University Professor of Electrical and Computer engineering had his research website shut down once his belief in intelligent design became known not only neglects to mention a few significant points, hardly counts as persecution since he remains at Baylor University to this day.
The first point is that that his website advancing intelligent design was hosted on a Baylor University server, which not unreasonably meant that the university was concerned that this connection would amount to university endorsement of intelligent design. Secondly, this was not the first time Marks had caused conflict at Baylor on the subject of intelligent design, as with intelligent design advocate William Dembski had set up an intelligent design think tank at the university which triggered considerable unrest at Baylor with many quite rightly being concerned that the university’s excellent reputation would be harmed by this link with intelligent design After this the think tank was significantly reorganised.[23] Expelled Exposed notes
Given this history, it was consistent for Baylor to be sensitive to attempts to portray it as sponsoring intelligent design: the science departments have been reluctant to be associated with a field they consider unscientific, and the issue has been a source of strife at Baylor for several years. In any event, the worst that happened to Professor Marks was that he had to remove his web site from Baylor’s webserver. In no other way was his free speech impinged, nor have his work conditions changed in any way: he remains a Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Baylor, holding a full professorship in the School of Engineering and Computer Science. He continues to teach his courses and conduct research. Where is the harm?[24]
One has to agree that finding any harm in this is difficult; one suspects yet again the usual special creationist tendency to see persecution in quite reasonable pushback
Pamela Winnick: the claim that this journalist was blacklisted for writing articles supportive of intelligent design is yet again another distortion of the truth.
In February 2001, Winnick interviewed intelligent design proponent Michael Behe with a collection of softball questions and presented his answers uncritically. Later that year she wrote a review of PBS’s Evolution series where she criticized it for not covering “the Intelligent Design movement, which began about a decade ago when serious scientists – many with doctorates from prestigious universities – began to tackle evolution on scientific grounds.” This is not “just writing about” intelligent design. This is an endorsement.
So Winnick was advocating intelligent design. Even so, this sounds like a poor basis for being blacklisted as a journalist – but there is no evidence that this ever happened. As a supposedly “blacklisted” reporter, Winnick continued to write for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette until August 2002, almost two years after she began her supposedly career-ending articles on intelligent design; she continues to write occasional guest columns for them (including an anti-evolution opinion piece in December 2005), and has written recent articles for the Weekly Standard and the Wall Street Jorunal.[25]
The blacklisting it seems is yet another creationist misrepresentation of the truth. In passing it should be noted that her book A Jealous God: Science's Crusade Against Religion has been savagely panned,[26] suggesting her competence as a researcher and impartiality as a writer may be in doubt.
Michael Egnor: like the case of Robert Marks, this one is difficult to describe as persecution. In response to an essay contest on the subject “Why I would want my doctor to have studied evolution” Egnor, a respected neurosurgeon countered with an article published on an intelligent design blog arguing that evolution was irrelevant to medicine. Expelled declared that the “Darwinists were quick to try and exterminate this new threat.” Did they move to destroy his medical career and leave him destitute? Hardly. Instead, he received vigorous pushback to his ignorant remarks.[27] Typical of this was the following from surgical oncologist and medical scientist David Gorski who pointed out that
as so many others have pointed out, Dr. Egnor does use evolution, or at least the results of the study of evolution, in his work whether he wants to admit it or not, even if he chooses to label it as “genetics” or “population biology.” He simply doesn’t understand or refuses to remain willfully ignorant that all of these fields are linked. All of them intertwine, and it’s almost impossible to define where one ends and another begins. Besides, if he uses antibiotics according to currently accepted guidelines (in other words, does not use more powerful antibiotics than the infection being treated calls for and does not use them longer than necessary), he is using the fruits of the study of evolution. If his radiation oncologist uses small fractions of radiation therapy to treat brain tumors, he is using differences in mutation rates and DNA repair ability to design a therapy that will maximize damage to tumor, minimize damage to surrounding normal tissue, and minimize the chances of resistance developing. Similarly, the entire study of chemotherapy is based on evolutionary principles applied at the cellular level. Dr. Egnor may dismiss all of this as not being due to evolution as a “distinct field,” but in doing so reveals himself to be that stereotype of surgeons that drives me crazy, that of the pure technician who doesn’t understand the science behind what he is doing. Particularly galling is that Dr. Egnor doesn’t seem to realize that he is not, as he seems to think, being “bold” or” creative” by spouting truly astonishing antievolution nonsense that only reveals the limitations of his own understanding.[28] Emphasis in original
Far from being exterminated, Egnor instead was receiving vigorous criticism for advancing nonsensical ideas.
Creationist Papers are not Being Suppressed – Exposing more Creationist Paranoia
Apart from claims of blacklisting, persecution, and destroying of careers, another creationist claim that CVA implicitly supports is that the papers supporting creationism are actively suppressed. Given that papers by intelligent design advocate Michael Behe have appeared in the mainstream scientific literature, this assertion can be dismissed immediately. Nonetheless, it is worth taking the time to cover a couple of examples creationists advance to support their belief that they are being suppressed.
In 2008, Mohamed Warda and Jin Han published an article in the respected journal Proteomics with the frankly bizarre title “Mitochondria, the missing link between body and soul: Proteomic prospective evidence.”[29] Much of the article was a fairly unremarkable literature review, but included two overtly theological remarks
Alternatively, instead of sinking into a swamp of endless debates about the evolution of mitochondria, it is better to come up with a unified assumption. ... More logically, the points that show proteomics overlapping between different forms of life are more likely to be interpreted as a reflection of a single common fingerprint initiated by a mighty creator than relying on a single cell that is, in a doubtful way, surprisingly originating all other kinds of life.
we still need to know the secret behind this disciplined organized wisdom. We realize so far that mitochondria could be the link between the body and this preserved wisdom of the soul devoted to guaranteeing life.
Steven L Salzberg, writing in the Reports of the National Center for Science Education notes that four bloggers quickly brought this paper to the attention of mainstream scientists, and given the disjointed nature of the writing style, one person raised the question of plagiarism. Shortly after that considerable evidence of plagiarism was unearthed
Within a few days there were dozens of examples, and it appeared that the majority of the text was simply copied wholesale from other sources. John MacDonald, a professor at the University of Delaware, compiled many of these into a document (http://udel.edu/~mcdonald/wardahan.pdf) showing that Warda and Han stole much of their article from six different articles plus a scientific website. The examples fill eight pages. In all cases, Warda and Han copied text word-for-word without attribution.[30]
Once the plagiarism was discovered the journal editor told the authors they needed to retract their paper, so any creationist claim of persecution founders on the fact that the paper committed the academic original sin of plagiarism. In passing, Salzberg’s comment on the first theistic comment in the paper emphasises just why mainstream scientists default to looking for natural explanations for natural causes
Aside from the fact that this sentence is so badly written as to be nearly incomprehensible, the phrase “mighty creator” sticks out like a sore thumb. Boiled down to its essence, Warda and Han are saying “God did it.”[31]
By declaring that “proteomics overlapping between different forms of life are more likely to be interpreted as a reflection of a single common fingerprint initiated by a mighty creator”, the creationist authors have put an end to any further scientific investigation as there is simply no further way one can push scientific investigation past a bald “God did it.”
Another example of a retracted article with overtly theistic claims is “Biomechanical Characteristics of Hand Coordination in Grasping Activities of Daily Living” by Ming-Jin Liu, Cai-Hua Xiong, Le Xiong, and Xiao-Lin Huang.[32] As with the film Expelled, Christadelphian writers Matthew Jamieson and Colin Byrnes reference this paper in their book as part of their claim that evolutionists suppress creationist views. The offending section can be found in the abstract where the authors write
The explicit functional link indicates that the biomechanical characteristic of tendinous connective architecture between muscles and articulations is the proper design by the Creator to perform a multitude of daily tasks in a comfortable way.
This apparent reference to God in a scientific journal provoked considerable online controversy, leading to Ming-Jin Liu to clarify
We are sorry for drawing the debates about creationism. Our study has no relationship with creationism. English is not our native language. Our understanding of the word Creator was not actually as a native English speaker expected. Now we realized that we had misunderstood the word Creator. What we would like to express is that the biomechanical characteristic of tendious [sic] connective architecture between muscles and articulations is a proper design by the NATURE (result of evolution) to perform a multitude of daily grasping tasks. We will change the Creator to nature in the revised manuscript. We apologize for any troubles may have caused by this misunderstanding.
We have spent seven months doing the experiments, analysis, and write up. I hope this paper will not be discriminated only because of this misunderstanding of the word. Please could you read the paper before making a decision.[33]
Eventually, the article was retracted. The authors’ comments that the reference to a creator were a translation error should be taken in good faith, and it is indeed reasonable to ask how the journal failed to pick up on this non-scientific reference to a creator in the review process. However, as noted by Brian Resnick in an article for Vox, the retraction is hardly unreasonable given that mainstream scientists have been battling endless creationist attempts to force their pseudoscience into the education system for decades.
Referencing “the Creator” in a scientific article isn’t just funny to us and humiliating to the journal — it’s also a highly touchy subject for the larger scientific community. In recent years, creationism backers have adopted scientific-like language in their attempts to dispel evolution. (There are whole museums devoted to “creation science” and ironing out discrepancies between the Bible and established fact.) Most scientists — including those who may be religious — try to be exceedingly careful not to mix up their beliefs with verifiable facts.[34]
Science journalist Leonid Schneider contacted the journal for an answer; a summary of the response follows
David Knutson of PLOS informed me in an email about the real reasons, his entire statement is below. In brief, Knutson said:
* The language in the article should have been corrected, but there are issues with the quality of the paper in general, the rationale of the study and its presentation relative to existing literature.
* The decision to retract was taken after a review of the prepublication process, and a reevaluation of the paper by the editorial staff and two expert members of the editorial board.
* There were issues with the rationale and presentation of the findings that were not adequately addressed during peer review.
* The Academic Editor who handled this paper has been asked to step down. The subject of the paper was outside his own direct area of expertise.[35]
Far from censorship, what we have here is a translation error by a scientist whose first language is not English and a regrettable lapse of editorial standards in a science journal.
To be concluded
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[12] Moran, Laurence A.. What's in Your Genome? 90% of Your Genome Is Junk. Canada, University of Toronto Press, 2023.
[13] Avise JC. 2010. Footprints of nonsentient design inside the human genome. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 107:8969–8976.
[14] Forrest, Barbara, and Gross, Paul R.. Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design. United Kingdom, Oxford University Press, 2004.
[15] Gerald R. Bergman v. Bowling Green State University http://jehovah.to/gen/freedom/bergman.htm Accessed 18th December 2023
[16] Roger Ebert “Win Ben Stein’s Mind” RogerEbert.com Dec 3rd 2008 https://www.rogerebert.com/roger-ebert/win-ben-steins-mind Accessed 18th December 2023
[17] Alan Gishlick, Nick Matzke, and Wesley R. Elsberry “Meyer’s Hopeless Monster” Panda’s Thumb Aug 24 2004 https://pandasthumb.org/archives/2004/08/meyers-hopeless-1.html Accessed 19th December 2023
[18] https://web.archive.org/web/20131203223001/http://www.expelledexposed.com/index.php/the-truth/sternberg Accessed 19th December 2023
[19] Statement from Iowa State University President Gregory Geoffroy https://web.archive.org/web/20131215224615/http://www.public.iastate.edu/~nscentral/news/2007/jun/statement.shtml Accessed 19th December 2023
[20] Richard Monastersky “Advocate of Intelligent Design Who Was Denied Tenure Has Strong Publications Record” The Chronicle of Higher Education May 21, 2007 https://www.chronicle.com/article/advocate-of-intelligent-design-who-was-denied-tenure-has-strong-publications-record/ Accessed 19th December 2023
[21] Neurotopia “A Handy Graphic/Timeline of Gonzalez’s Publication Drop” Dec 6 2007 https://web.archive.org/web/20140417101817/http://scienceblogs.com/neurotopia/2007/12/06/a-handy-graphictimeline-of-gon/ Accessed19th Dec 2023
[22] https://web.archive.org/web/20131204004130/http://www.expelledexposed.com/index.php/the-truth/crocker Accessed 19th December 2023
[23] Scott, Eugenie. Baylor’s Polanyi Center in Turmoil. Reports of NCSE 20 (4): 9-1
[24] https://web.archive.org/web/20131204011233/http://www.expelledexposed.com/index.php/the-truth/marks Accessed 19th December 2023
[25] https://web.archive.org/web/20131204005146/http://www.expelledexposed.com/index.php/the-truth/winnick Accessed 19th December 2023
[26] Jeffrey Shallit “Pamela Winnick’s Science Envy” Recursivity July 10 2006 http://recursed.blogspot.com/2006/07/pamela-winnicks-science-envy.html Accessed 19th December 2023
[27] As a doctor, I can attest that while it is possible to function as a “medical technician” while denying evolution, there is an increasing drive to make evolutionary biology a basic clinical science in the medical curriculum, and evolution is increasingly proving to be of use to medicine. Furthermore, there is much in human anatomy, embryology, and genetics which makes no sense except when seen as the result of evolution.
[28] oracknows “Train wreck, thy name is Egnor!” Respectful Insolence 12 March 2007 https://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/03/12/train-wreck-thy-name-is-egnor Accessed 19th December 2023
[29] Warda, Mohamad, and Jin Han. “Retracted: Mitochondria, the missing link between body and soul: Proteomic prospective evidence.” Proteomics 8.3 (2008): I-XXIII.
[30] Salzberg, S. L. "Creationism slips into a peer-reviewed journal." Rep. Natl. Center Sci. Educ 28.1214 (2008): 19. https://ncse.ngo/creationism-slips-peer-reviewed-journal Accessed 19th December 2023
[31] ibid
[32] Liu, Ming-Jin, et al. “Biomechanical characteristics of hand coordination in grasping activities of daily living.” PloS one 11.1 (2016): e0146193.
[33] http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/comment?id=info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fannotation%2F234ef7cc-d89a-4a9e-92d6-9070b175620d Accessed 19th December 2023
[34] Brian Resnick “This scientific paper says our hands were designed by God. How did that happen?” Vox 3rd March 2016 https://www.vox.com/2016/3/3/11154778/plos-hands-the-creator-god Accessed 19th December 2023
[35] Leonid Schneider “Hand of God paper retracted: PLOS ONE “could not stand by the pre-publication assessment”” For Better Science 4th March 2016 https://forbetterscience.com/2016/03/04/hand-of-god-paper-retracted-plos-one-could-not-stand-by-the-pre-publication-assessment/ Accessed 19th December 2023
