Marcos EberlinForesight: How the Chemistry of Life Reveals Planning and Purpose

The quality of Discovery Institute books promoting Intelligent Design Creationism has certainly been on the decline in recent years. After publishing some very cleverly argued books which skillfully took advantage of the intended audience's lack of knowledge of biology – e.g., Darwin's Doubt – they've started having to look farther afield for people who can help fool the rubes. In this case, they've gone to Marcos Eberlin, a Brazilian chemist whose expertise is in Mass Spectrometry. No, that's not a promising start, but it does get worse.Most of this book is taken up with Eberlin's attempt to make something akin to Michael Behe's “irreducible complexity” argument – that living things are too complex to have evolved in any stepwise process. But the argument is looser, and sloppier, than that. Eberlin focuses on things that he calls “causally circular,” by which he seems to mean only that a biological system has multiple interdependent components. This, of course, can be said of essentially all biological systems of any note, and does not in itself pose any particular difficulty for evolution. But where Behe recognized as much, and attempted to find systems for which he thought no plausible evolutionary pathway could exist, Eberlin just notes the interdependent nature of systems and does a victory dance. Victories, by this standard, are very easy to find, so he does quite a lot of that.The basic error here, of course, is that it does no good, when features of an organism have evolved together in the same lineage over a long period of time, to point out that one of them, in its current form, will not function in the event of the destruction of another of them in its current form. But this is how Eberlin frames it, again and again. Some notion of how this goes may be had from his discussion of the importance of the role of the cervix in human reproduction:“One might posit that cervix ripening was a selective advantage acquired over many generations of blind evolution, but notice the problem. If in the first-ever baby delivery, the cervix was not able to hold the baby in place and then open at the right time, this poor pioneer infant would have been expelled too early or been trapped inside the mother's womb, leading to the death of both child and mother. No first baby, no chance for gradual evolution over many generations. Proper dilation at the right time of the cervix is a prerequisite for human reproduction.”This is quite extraordinary. The “first-ever baby delivery”? Does Eberlin understand anything at all about the evolutionary history of reproduction in chordates, in amniotes, in mammals? Does he know that all placental mammals have a cervix? It does not appear that he does. He seems to imagine that there was a “first baby” human; where did that child's parents come from? Were they born, too, or did they just sprout from the ground? The fact is that we have a LONG history of faunal succession that gives us considerable insight into such things, and sexual reproduction has been around for a long, long time, with its features evolving in the context of one another, not in isolation. Even if we were to go back in time, set a bunch of judging criteria, and hand out an award to the first baby we deemed to be a full member of Homo sapiens, the fact is that this child would have parents who looked rather like the child and who were in possession of fully functioning reproductive systems. Having drawn our species boundary with implausible sharpness, we'd now have to declare her parents a different species. But as we followed this line back in time, we'd get to where the ancestors were no longer hominids, then no longer primates, then no longer mammals, then no longer therapsids, then no longer pelycosaurs, then no longer amniotes, then no longer tetrapods, and so on until we had mapped the full range from Homo sapiens to Pikaia. Vertebrate reproductive systems, including the cervix as manifested in a whole range of creatures, have been around for a long time. There never is a point in that sequence where somebody has got to say, “Oops! Baby's on the way, and we still haven't made a cervix that will pass the relevant performance specs.”He does the same with birds, and it's more of the same. He imagines the need for every part of a complex system in a modern species to arise simultaneously by chance; of course, the probability of such a thing is absurdly small, but since this is not what evolutionary biologists propose, it's not really germane to the subject. Birds have ancestors, too. The derived amniotic egg of a modern bird has other amniotic egg predecessors, which have non-amniotic egg predecessors. There's been lots of time, and lots of generations, for features to evolve alongside one another as reproductive systems approached their current states.When he's not posing ridiculous claims about what things have to all happen in the same ten minutes as one another in order for evolution to work, Eberlin expands on this theme that “foresight” in design is evident in living things by expressing overexcitement at just how well some biological systems work. What he does not do, at any point, is express any thoughts as to how one can detect “foresight” in living things as opposed to merely having the subjective impression that it is present. Where Behe at least tries, and fails, to do that, Eberlin doesn't seem even to realize that it's a problem. The whole thesis here is “look at all the great stuff! There's got to be a god behind it!” Of such arguments it is usually said that they only convince those who are already convinced, but this is so weak that it could make a true believer wonder if he's been reading the wrong sources.Now, all of that is pretty bad and would make a lousy book. But it gets worse, and the things that follow make one wonder just how hard the DI is scraping the bottom of that barrel these days.Fraternities used to make the pledges swallow goldfish. At the DI, the hazing ritual for new authors seems to involve forcing them to spectacularly mischaracterize Gould and Eldredge's “punctuated equilibria.” So, in accord with duty and tradition, we have, at p. 139:“Punctuated equilibrium, for example, attempts to explain why we see few transitional fossils in the fossil record from one animal form to a fundamentally different animal form, but it offers no credible mechanism for the geologically rapid evolution of new forms.”First, as Eberlin would know if he'd ever read Gould and Eldredge, the concept of punctuated equilibria explains why we see few species-to-species transitional forms. It has nothing to do with transitional fossils between “fundamentally different” animals. This isn't rocket science – all you've got to do is read Gould: “Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups.”Second, no credible mechanism? The whole foundation of “punk eek” is evolutionary mechanisms. If species transitions in the fossil record were primarily driven by anagenesis over large populations, then we should indeed see gradual species-to-species transition routinely. But population genetics teaches us that this isn't an easy thing to do. Rather, Gould and Eldredge proposed that speciation is a much more significant driver of evolutionary change than anagenesis, and of course allopatric speciation tends to occur in “peripheral isolates” – smaller populations separated by a physical or reproductive barrier from the main population. Lower stability, more rapid fixation of novel genetic features, and voila – speciation. When such a species reconnects with the main group, it can displace it. So if one gets fossils from the range in which the main population, rather than the peripheral isolate, lived, there is no gradual transition to see in them from one species to the next – just an abrupt replacement; and even if one gets lucky, and has the fossils from the place where speciation happened, speciation can happen in a geological (but, importantly, not a BIOLOGICAL) blink of an eye. To resolve such a change over a few thousand years of time is very hard. You've got to have significant quantities of fossils and the ability to date them with more precision than is normally possible.That passage on Gould and Eldredge is pretty embarrassing stuff, to be sure, but it's not the worst. My nomination for that is this red-hot screaming howler:“As Aaron Ellison and Nicholas Gotelli wrote, Charles Darwin pioneered the modern research of carnivorous plants with his 1875 work Insectivorous Plants. There Darwin applied his idea of homology (which modern evolutionary biologists call “homoplasy”)....”It is fair to say that this parenthetical note really leaps out of the text. If you are not familiar with the distinction between homology and homoplasy, the thing you need to understand first is that they are essentially opposites: two wholly different, completely incompatible conclusions about the origin of a feature in a pair (or more) of lineages. If the feature arose from a common ancestor which had the feature, it is homologous. If it arose independently in the two lineages, no matter how similar the feature may be, it is homoplasic. To say that homology is now called homoplasy is like saying that communism is now called capitalism.That's not a mistake a scientist with reasonable familiarity with biological concepts could possibly make. This is the sort of thing one would expect a freshman in a college biology class to be able to easily explain, and explain correctly. Its occurrence in this book is funny, shocking, and telling.It is, indeed, such a ridiculous mistake that I couldn't quite believe it, and I certainly didn't want to cite it against him and then discover that I had somehow misunderstood his meaning. I read and re-read the passage to see if he was trying to say something different from what he appeared to be saying. I looked up the cited paper from Ellison and Gotelli to try to see if they had said anything he might have been repeating out of context, or that he might have misconstrued. I reviewed Darwin's book on insectivorous plants to see whether any of his uses of the term “homology” (which had the same meaning then as now) could possibly be construed as referring to homoplasy. But there is nothing in the paper and nothing in Darwin to account for it. Eberlin really does not know that these common, garden-variety opposite terms, in general use in evolutionary biology, are not synonyms.There is, of course, more. But how much does one need? And, pray tell, what quantity of error and inanity is sufficient to keep a book off of the DI's “must publish” list?When a man proposes to write a critique of evolutionary biology, but is himself so illiterate in the terms of evolutionary biology that he cannot accurately grasp the difference between two very commonly-used terms that are effectively opposites, and even goes so far as to equate them with one another, what does this mean? It means that, not being competent to understand evolutionary theory, he is certainly not competent to critique it. The understanding must precede the critique, if the critique is to have any value at all. This critique is of no value; it does not even meet the DI's usual standards, which are hardly exacting.After all of that, there is an irony of sorts to observe. In the course of trying to make biology seem complicated, Eberlin presents a very child-friendly, simple version of it. The reality is that biology is much, much more complicated than this portrayal; what is now known down to the genetic and biochemical level is absolutely staggering. But rather than the complexity of biology creating unsolvable problems for evolutionary theory, as Eberlin suggests it does, this complexity nourishes the roots of evolutionary theory. Yes, we learn more every year, and yes, this does sometimes mean that old ideas need updating; but Intelligent Design Creationism is neither a source of novel research nor a source of groundbreaking theory. It is, as books like this tend to show, a dead end.POSTSCRIPT: on May 15, 2019, the Discovery Institute published a blog post by Jonathan Wells which is devoted solely to responding to the above review. As the DI does not allow discussion on its blog, it seems that this is the best place to respond, and so I do, as follows:Wells starts out by tone-trolling, and his natural tendency to distort expresses itself here. He says I have called most Americans "rubes." I have not, of course; I have called the DI's target audience, which is a vastly smaller set of people than "most Americans," rubes. After books like Wells' own Zombie Science have won such praise from this group, the expression plainly is apt.Wells continues by trying to rescue Eberlin's notion of "causal circularity." But the problem with causal circularity is just as I have noted, and as I have shown in the example of the human cervix: it is no good to show that the modern condition of a feature depends on the modern condition of other features. We should expect biological systems to contain considerable internal interdependencies because the features of organisms have evolved together. What Eberlin needs is the more difficult standard which Behe strives to establish: that no evolutionary pathway can have led, through more primitive conditions, to the modern condition. Eberlin makes no attempt to do so, whether in the case of DNA/RNA, the cervix, or otherwise.Wells turns, then, to Eberlin's example of the human cervix. He first suggests that the origin of placental mammals is a highly contentious topic -- perhaps, but that's irrelevant -- and then moves along to claiming that I am merely assuming evolution to be true. But anyone familiar with that history of faunal succession will have a hard time finding much in the way of an inexplicable gap in it, and let's remember: it is Eberlin who must assume, for the sake of argument, that evolution is true in order to demonstrate WHERE in the evolutionary reasoning some inconquerable problem arises. Eberlin instead starts with a garden-of-Eden type scenario, where we must account for the "first-ever human baby." But if we assume the garden of Eden, we must also assume supernatural design. That's a big assumption; it is not supported by any line of evidence other than middle-eastern textual sources from the pre-scientific era; and if the object here is to upset the existing scientific paradigm, it's simply not going to work.Then, it's on to punctuated equilibria. The careful reader will note that nothing Wells says actually rescues Eberlin's complete misstatement of what punctuated equilibria asserts -- indeed, in a rare burst of honesty, Wells agrees with my description of it, which is entirely at odds with Eberlin's. He even agrees that it is supported by "direct fossil evidence." He tries to pooh-pooh allopatric speciation, on which punctuated equilibria relies, calling its mechanisms "only hypothetical" (and thus ignoring a very considerable body of evidence on the processes of speciation) but the fact is that allopatric speciation has been accepted by biologists since the 1940s and there is no reason to think that that's about to change -- certainly Wells gives us none. So, by "no credible mechanism" Eberlin means a mechanism which has been universally acknowledged by biologists for most of a century and which remains beyond substantial dispute? That's a curious characterization, is it not? Wells and Eberlin, of course, would have us accept special creation, and if they think there are "credible mechanisms" for that, well...And then we reach homology versus homoplasy. Wells tries heroically to rescue Eberlin from this elementary mistake, but the response is mostly evasion and confusion.Darwin did not, in fact, use the term "homology" to refer to what we now call homoplasy. Taking an example, Darwin did note that the power of movement was gained by various "leaves and their homologues" by independent, convergent evolution -- but he did not refer to these developed powers of movement as homologous. In the same way, bird, bat and pterosaur wings are all, as a whole, homologous (because they are all simply tetrapod forelimbs, owing their basic structure to the original tetrapoda), but in their details they are not homologous (because, for example, the structures which form the leading edge of the wings are derived from different parts of the tetrapod front limb). At no point -- none -- does Darwin ever even once refer to homoplasy as homology.In the paper by Ellison and Gotelli which Eberlin cites, the authors do note that Darwin used the concept of homology to illustrate evolutionary and functional convergence. But this does not mean that he said that convergent (ergo, homoplastic) features were homologous. It means only that Darwin was making inferences about lineage by using the concept of homology, which includes both its presence and its absence. One cannot make inferences about lineage where ALL features are homologous, except to say that there must be some relation or other among species. What one does is compare features in relation to one another in order to determine which are homologous and which are not, and construct a proposed phylogeny accordingly.The fact is that Eberlin simply made an elementary mistake that exposes his ignorance of the most basic concepts of evolutionary biology. If this mistake was in any sense based upon Ellison and Gotelli or upon Darwin, it could only have been based upon a misunderstanding of those sources -- and not a misunderstanding which a person reasonably literate in biology could fall victim to.Wells suggests that I am horrified by ID. This certainly is not so. As I have affirmed many times in the comment sections of these and other reviews, I would be absolutely intrigued and riveted by any credible evidence of design in living things, and I have no a priori objection to offer to it. But when the case is made dishonestly and ignorantly, as it routinely is in the works promoted by the DI, it testifies quite strongly to the lack of such evidence. All the DI can do, seemingly, is appeal to the prejudices of religious cranks.

I found this book eminently readable and informative.I particularly liked and agree with the author's definition of science: “There must be a better, more general definition for science. And indeed there is: Science is a systematic and unbiased search for knowledge about nature. Under this definition, we are free to think, investigate, doubt, and conclude based on whatever evidence we have. The underlying principles of science are freedom of thought and speech, guided by data collected using systematic methods. If science—the search for absolute truths hidden within nature—is to be considered an unflinchingly truth-directed endeavor, reason and evidence must be the only constraints. With this understanding in place, it becomes clear that investigating possible evidence for fine tuning, foresight, and intelligent design are valid scientific projects. Honest debates and dialogue among people involved in a free scientific search for knowledge is the driving force of science. We should follow the evidence no matter who finds it and no matter what the motivation of the person who conducted the search, and regardless of what it may tell us about reality. That’s the only science worth doing.”The author, Marcos Eberlin, points out many examples that demonstrate that amazing foresight was required for even the simplest life to exist. He also gives many examples of the required systems for the higher animals, including humans, to live and thrive. These systems either required foresight or have no plausible explanation from evolutionists.In addition, Eberlin points out examples such as the appendix and the amygdala that materialistic evolutionists had long claimed were unnecessary vestigial organs from earlier species. These organs have recently been found to perform very important functions in humans.As I read his examples of studies of the workings of proteins and enzymes and the mechanisms to ensure against mistakes, I am amazed that the human brain, even the brains of many confirmed materialists, is capable of designing and interpreting the results of such studies. It reminds me of Douglas Axe’s comments on the amazing capabilities of the mind in his book “Undeniable”.Materialistic evolutionists have absolutely no plausible explanation for the existence of the miracle that is the human mind.Many brilliant scientists have devised biological experiments and/or computer simulations to try to prove that evolution works. All they have proven so far is that, even with the best human intelligence involved to coax it along, evolution accomplishes very little. Maybe after a few million years of trying these scientists will have been able to coach evolution to come up with just a few of the marvels that we see in living things today. Then what will they have proven? They will have proven that intelligent design works! Given enough time, even limited human intelligence can accomplish wonders of design and engineering. Still nothing, of course, compared with what God has accomplished through overwhelming intelligence and engineering design.Opponents of intelligent design criticize the “God of the Gaps” that they say ID’s proponents posit. To me, however, it requires many orders of magnitude greater faith to believe in the “Chance of the Gaps” the materialistic evolutionists worship than it does to believe in a God who I cannot see, but whose love and care have been undeniably demonstrated many times in the events of my life.The writings of Eberlin, Behe, Axe, Meyer and many other ID advocates offer very plausible and compelling cases for intelligent design based on the recent results of real scientific studies of living things. Those studies are real science, unlike the unproven and unprovable speculations of materialistic evolutionists, which only masquerade as science, while they insist that everyone should blindly accept their speculations as “real science”.

The author opens one’s eyes to many magnificent designs which can only assume intellectual design with forethought. An observation on my part would suggest that theGod of the Bible has foreseen the events the past and future and has planned for them. This is within His character. Great are you Lord.

Anyone who is interested in the topic of origins and evolution has to read this book to understand the scope of the question, how did life evolve? Here, the author pulls back the curtain to show the myriad system which have dependencies which had to arise at the same time for life to survive - for example, the cell membrane, crucial to protecting the insides of the cell, had to arise at the same time as the various cellular gates to selectively import stuff into the cell. If one were missing, the cell would be DOA.Various other mechanisms of life, exquisitely designed and built of proteins, perform mind-boggling feats that were absolutely necessary for life, such as the nitrogen-fixing bacteria we depend on, performing ballets on the scale of atoms. Water gates twist the H2O molecule at the moment it enters the cell, breaking the ion conducting "wire" formed by the molecule, in order to keep the cell electrically safe. For each of these stupefying features which seem to tell us that intricate planning or foresight was involved in their formation, we have to ask ourselves just how much blind faith we are prepared to keep having in evolution, which is becoming increasingly bankrupt intellectually.

This is a truly fascinating account of the beginnings and essentials of life, seeking to examine "which came first?" when both aspects are required together for their interdependence. Life is truly a miracle of "Foresight", the very apt title of this book.

A compelling read! Can't see how the author's case can be disputed.Would love to see the author debate the likes of Richard Dawkins. When asked how the original complex cell came into being( discussed in great length by the author) Richard Dawkins replied perhaps 'by aliens'

This book is complex enough to satisfy my mind yet it has laymans terms if you prefer which is amazing! Great pace and everything is relevant and well written

This book is a well argued case for a designer. The author knows his subject and presents key facts with clarity andintelligence. It is time for the material naturalist to seriously consider the facts being revealed by microbiology, and the complete implausibility of chance, with or without necessity, producing this universe and the life supported on earth.

An excellent book which yet again outlines the strong evidence we have for the intelligent design of the universe and life. The evidence it gives cannot be dismissed by any purely materialistic alternative. If design is the best answer to the question of 'why we intelligent-life are here to ask the question?' then we need to look no further!